May picks pro-Brexit MP after Patel resignation
Penny Mordaunt is UK’s new int’l development minister
London, Nov. 9: British Prime Minster Theresa May on Thursday replaced Priti Patel with Penny Mordaunt as the UK’s new international development minister, a day after the Indian-origin MP resigned over her unauthorised secret meetings with Israeli politicians while on a holiday in the Jewish country.
Ms May was under pressure from Eurosceptic MPs to ensure that Ms Patel is replaced by a proBrexit MP like her predecessor to maintain a balance within the UK Cabinet.
Mordaunt, 44, is a proBrexit Conservative party MP for Portsmouth North who has held a number of junior ministerial posts, including the post of disability minister in the department for work and pensions from where she has now been promoted.
Ms Mordaunt lists India among her countries of interest, having worked with the charity ‘Diabetes UK’ in India.
The quick Cabinet reshuffle had become necessary after 45-year-old Patel was forced to resign from her Cabinet post in charge of the Department for International Development (DfID) on Wednesday after days of controversy surrounding a series of unauthorised meetings she had held with Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“While my actions were meant with the best of intentions, my actions also fell below the standards of transparency and openness that I have promoted and advocated. I offer a fulsome apology to you and to the Government for what has happened and offer my resignation,” Ms Patel had said in her resignation letter addressed to May.