It’s not a laughing matter... Foreign aid minister Priti Patel forced to resign
FOREIGN aid secretary Priti Patel was last night forced to resign over revelations about a string of secret meetings with Israeli politicians.
As Theresa May sought to reassert her authority, a dramatic day saw the International Development Secretary ordered back to London from Africa where she had only just arrived for an official visit.
The last straw came when it emerged that Ms Patel had withheld crucial information about her Israeli contacts even when she met Mrs May on Monday to apologise and clear the air.
Thousands of people used internet sites to track the progress of the Kenya Airways flight Ms Patel was on.
Later she arrived through the back door at Number 10.
Ms Patel, who became the first British Indian to hold a Cabinet post, was allowed the face-saving compromise of resigning but in Whitehall there was no doubt that otherwise she would have been sacked.
After the short meeting in Downing street Ms Patel left via the back door and was driven away.
It was the Cabinet’s second loss in less than a week, after Defence Secretary Michael Fallon was forced out last Thursday over allegations he harassed women.
In her resignation letter Ms Patel said: “In recent days there have been a number of reports about my actions and I am sorry that these have served as a distraction from the work of the Department for International Development and of the Government as a whole.
“As you know from our discussions I accept that in meeting with organisations and politicians during a private holiday in Israel my actions fell below the high standards that are expected of a secretary of state.
“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.”
Underlining her personal commitment to Brexit, she vowed to continue supporting Mrs May but added: “I will also speak up for our country, our national interests and a great future that Britain has as a free, independent and sovereign nation.”
Spectacular
In her reply Mrs May said: “As you know the UK and Israel are close allies, and it is right that we should work closely together.
“But that must be done formally and through official channels. That is why when we met on Monday I was glad to accept your apology and welcomed your clarification about your trip to Israel over the summer.
“Now that further details have come to light it is right that you have decided to resign and adhere to the high standards of transparency and openness that you have advocated.”
Ms Patel’s spectacular fall from grace began on Friday when it was revealed that she held two meetings, with an Israeli politician and a disability charity, during a family holiday in Israel in August. A string of subsequent
revelations were about many more undisclosed meetings, including seeing Israel’s Premier Benjamin Netanyahu.
Reports Ms Patel had suggested breaking UK policy by sending aid to the Israeli army finally sealed her fate.
Mrs May – who may feel particularly humiliated by having played host to Mr Netanyahu last week without knowing he had met Ms Patel – will hope to have steadied her ship.
However her de facto deputy, First Secretary of State Damian Green, is among senior Tories under investigation over claims about behaviour towards women.
Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson is facing calls to resign over remarks he made about British mother Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe that are blamed for Iran’s threat to double her five-year jail sentence on charges of acting against the state.
The row surrounding Ms Patel deepened on Monday when she admitted she had held 12 meetings during her holiday in Israel, including seeing Mr Netanyahu.
She admitted she breached usual procedure in organising and reporting the meetings and that her original statement on Friday lacked “precision” when she appeared to suggested Mr Johnson and the Foreign Office knew about them in advance.
Hopes
The Foreign Office only became aware of her visit the day before it ended and Downing Street said the Prime Minister did not know until inquiries were launched on Friday.
On Monday Mrs May’s spokesman revealed that Ms Patel had been hauled into Number 10 for a dressing-down by Mrs May.
Hopes that a line could be drawn under the affair were dashed on Tuesday by reports that Ms Patel had suggested giving aid to “humanitarian work” by the Israeli army in the disputed Golan Heights, neighbouring Syria.
Potential replacements for Ms Patel are thought to include Work and Pensions Minister Penny Mordaunt, who like Ms Patel is a pro-Brexit campaigner.
Many MPs had voiced dismay that Mrs May had passed up a chance to make her Britain’s first female Defence Secretary when Mr Fallon quit.
Education and Women’s Minister Anne Milton is another woman contender, while some consider the vacancy could mean a Cabinet comeback for Brexit-backing former Northern Ireland Secretary Theresa Villiers.
Conservative men thought to be in the frame include Foreign Office number two Sir Alan Duncan – a keen supporter of Mrs May. Former soldier and diplomat Rory Stewart, currently a joint DfID and Foreign Office minister, could also be a popular choice.
HAS a Government in modern times ever looked so browbeaten as Theresa May’s has over the past week? One thinks back to John Major’s calamities over Maastrict and Black Wednesday but at least the Tories then had a majority and the government remained intact.
No sooner had Mrs May ordered Priti Patel on to a flight home yesterday than she found herself dragged into the scandal, with the Jewish Chronicle alleging that she did after all know about her International Development Secretary’s unofficial meetings with the Israeli government.
Last night Ms Patel quit her job and that would be enough on its own without the resignation of Sir Michael Fallon after Andrea Leadsom complained of crude remarks he had made to her. May’s Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson is under the cosh for giving inaccurate information to a Commons committee that could result in a British woman imprisoned in Iran having her sentence increased.
Her effective deputy Damian Green has been forced to deny acting improperly with a female political contact.
ABACKBENCH MP has been suspended by the Tories over allegations that have been referred to the police, while a list of 30 others alleged to have embarrassments has been doing the rounds. Brexit negotiations seem to be stalled while the Government has suffered a defeat that will force the release of documents on the impact of leaving the EU.
All this has occurred against the backdrop of a minority Government, in the knowledge that it will only take a handful of votes to swing a noconfidence motion that would send voters back to the polls for the third time in as many years.
Theresa May must at times have felt like throwing in the towel. Even before the past week the pressure on her was intense. Many Tories have not forgiven her for squandering her majority in June’s election.
To survive as a PM requires a rhinoceros skin yet therein lies the problem: Mrs May’s seeming imperviousness to emotion has caused her difficulties, such as over her reaction to the Grenfell disaster. It would be good if those of us on the outside would just stop for a moment to consider that, for all her faults, Theresa May must have some extraordinary qualities to have withstood what she has over the past few months and retain her physical and mental health.
They are qualities which could yet save her and her Government but it will take a monumental fight. To survive she will also have to show ruthlessness and astute judgment.
Assuming the Government can last the week all eyes will turn quickly to the Budget. The Government can survive the odd Commons defeat but not over its Finance Bill. Lose that and the Government will fall.
The omens are not good. May has a Chancellor with a tin ear for the interests of ordinary people. After his spring Budget, Philip Hammond was forced into an embarrassing retreat over proposals to hike rates of national insurance for the selfemployed – a clear breach of a manifesto commitment that Hammond failed to notice.
There is little to suggest that he has learned a lot since then. There are reports that he may be about to lower the threshold for VAT so as to bring thousands of small businesses into the VAT system. Hammond’s friends in big business will love it because it will drive some of their smaller competitors out of business.
But it would cause outrage among many Conservative supporters who would feel small businesses are being thrown to the wall while wealthy corporations continue to get away with aggressive tax avoidance.
Theresa May needs to make it clear to Hammond what she needs from this Budget: not ingenious ways of extracting more revenue from small-time entrepreneurs but ways of making housing more affordable, both to buy and rent.
That is an issue which above all others drove millions of young voters towards Jeremy Corbyn and which must be put right. On Brexit, May needs to go back to saying that no deal with the EU is better than a bad deal. She needs to make it clear that if the EU continues to block a trade deal Britain will go away and turn itself into what the EU most fears: a low tax, open economy a few miles off Calais which will shamelessly draw trade and investment away from EU countries.
And she also needs to act on the Daily Express’s Stop The Foreign Aid Madness crusade, which is receiving tremendous support.
MAY needs to take the fight much more to Labour too. We don’t hear enough about what would happen if Jeremy Corbyn were given the chance to enact his policies. His extravagant spending plans, predicated on the assumption that corporation tax receipts would rise in line with rates, would be thrown into turmoil as firms shifted their operations abroad.
After her general election debacle May pulled back from sacking ministers whom she saw as underperforming. That looks a mistake. While her parliamentary numbers are delicate, keeping the wrong minister in the wrong job is going to cause more problems.
The odds are stacked up hugely against Theresa May surviving to complete her parliamentary term. But if she is to survive it will be thanks to her showing a degree of decisiveness which has so far eluded her.
‘She needs to take the fight to Labour’