PM tells warring Ministers to bury the hatchet
THERESA MAY has hosted a Downing Street ‘peace summit’ to try to bring together two warring Cabinet Ministers.
Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson and Chancellor Philip Hammond were told by the Prime Minister to bury the hatchet at a special meeting held in the wake of their extraordinary stand-up Commons row earlier this month.
Mrs May, who had been forced to intervene to stop their public feud over defence cuts, told the two Ministers to settle their differences in private.
The tensions first arose after the MoD complained that it had been left with a £2 billion hole in its budget, which backbench Tory MPs warned could lead to a cut in the number of frontline troops.
Allies of Mr Hammond – suspecting that the rebellion was being whipped up by Mr Williamson to appease the Armed Forces and boost his political ambitions – mockingly dubbed the Defence Secretary ‘Private Pike’, after the naive Dad’s Army character.
Mr Williamson retaliated by banning the Chancellor from taking the RAF aircraft reserved for official Government and Royal business, claiming the Treasury had failed to pay the MoD a six-figure bill. Mr Hammond struck back by saying that the Defence Secretary had yet to ‘get his head around’ his own budget – triggering the bitter confrontation later that evening.
A senior source said: ‘There is a defence review under way and budgetary issues to be ironed out. Everyone in No 10 was a bit shaken by how badly the row spiralled out of control. My understanding is that it was Gavin who was told to get back in his box, and not be so transparently ambitious.’