The parliamentary question asked by Angela Rayner, the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, in the House of Commons on 16 November 2022.
Angela Rayner
After days of dodging and denial, this morning, the Deputy Prime Minister finally acknowledged formal complaints about his misconduct, but his letter contains no hint of admission or apology. This is Anti-Bullying Week. Will he apologise?
The Deputy Prime Minister
On the economic challenges, which are global and caused by covid and the war in Ukraine, we have got a plan to grip inflation, balance the books and drive economic growth. If we listened to the right hon. Lady, debt would go up, unemployment would go up and working Britons would pay the price.
The right hon. Lady asked about the complaints. I received notification this morning and I immediately asked the Prime Minister to set up an independent inquiry into them. I am confident that I behaved professionally throughout, but of course I will engage thoroughly, and I look forward, may I say, to transparently addressing any claims that have been made.
Angela Rayner
Let me get this straight: the Deputy Prime Minister has had to demand an investigation into himself because the Prime Minister is too weak to get a grip. We have a Prime Minister, who has been in office less than a month, with a disgraced Cabinet Minister who resigned with his good wishes; the Home Secretary, who breached the ministerial code and risked national security, still clings on; and now the Prime Minister defends his deputy, whose behaviour has been described as “abrasive”, “controlling” and “demeaning”, with junior staff too scared to even enter his office. And that is without mentioning the flying tomatoes. The Deputy Prime Minister knows that his behaviour was unacceptable, so what is he still doing here?
The Deputy Prime Minister
I am here, and happy to address any specific points the right hon. Lady wishes to make. [Hon. Members: “Flying tomatoes?”] That never happened. I will thoroughly rebut and refute any of the claims that have been made. She has not, in fact, put a specific point to me. If she wishes to do so—and this is her opportunity—I would be very glad to address it. [Interruption.]
Angela Rayner
Maybe the Deputy Prime Minister just does not think there is a problem, or maybe he is suggesting that civil servants are liars. Now he is reportedly banned from meeting junior staff without supervision, while we await an inquiry that the Prime Minister has not even instigated from a watchdog that he has not even appointed. In the Prime Minister’s letter, he did not say how and when this will be investigated, or by who—no ethics, no integrity and no mandate. And still no ethics adviser. When will the Government appoint an independent ethics adviser and drain the swamp?
The Deputy Prime Minister
The recruitment of the new ethics adviser is already under way and taking place at pace.
There is a reason that the right hon. Lady has come to the Dispatch Box with her usual mix of bluster and mud-slinging: it is because Labour does not have a plan. We are helping people into work; she is in hock to the unions. We are protecting our borders; she voted against every single measure to control illegal immigration to this country. We are delivering cleaner growth and energy security; she wants to send billions in reparation payments abroad. The British people want a Government who can deal with the real challenges, and Labour Members are not up to it.
