Carrying on as MP just too taxing... Zahawi becomes 65th Tory to quit
FORMER chancellor and education secretary Nadhim Zahawi has said he will step down at the next general election.
Having represented Stratfordon-Avon since 2010, the 56-yearold said he felt ‘the time is right for a new, energetic Conservative’ in the West Midlands constituency.
Mr Zahawi is the 65th Tory MP – out of 344 in the Commons – to announce they will not stand at the next election. The Liberal Democrats said many were ‘worried’ about being voted out.
Mr Zahawi, a wealthy businessman of Iraqi Kurdish descent, posted: ‘Every morning, I shave my head in the mirror, I have to pinch myself. How is it that a boy from Baghdad who came to these shores, fleeing persecution and unable to speak a word of English, was able to do as much as I have?’
During the Covid pandemic in November 2020, Mr Zahawi was appointed vaccines minister and oversaw the rollout of the vaccination programme.
He was education secretary from September 2021 to July 2022 and had a short stint as chancellor between July and September 2022.
But in January last year, he was sacked as Conservative party chair after an inquiry found he failed to disclose that HMRC was investigating his tax affairs.
Mr Zahawi later agreed to pay a fine, understood to be almost £5million. In 2013, it emerged taxpayers were paying for electricity to his stables after Mr Zahawi put in a £5,822.27 expenses claim.
He added in his post: ‘My mistakes have been mine.’
THE Royal Navy is using virtual reality to allow sailors to practise warfare on the high seas – without having to leave dry land.
Nine VR simulators – which accurately recreate both the bridge of warships and the key waters they sail in – have been installed in England and Scotland, led by the Navy’s warfare school at HMS Collingwood in Fareham, Hampshire.
The £27million investment is aimed at making navigation and running a bridge more realistic, faster and safer than being at sea.
‘Sailors put on headsets on the mock-up bridge wing and suddenly they are immersed in a 3D world,’ the Royal Navy stated. ‘Peer over the “side” and you look down on the waves crashing against the hull, look aft (backwards) and the rest of the ship magically appears.’