Ex-Post Office chair gives details of ‘stitch up’ which he says led to Badenoch making false claims about his sacking – as it happened | Politics

• Henry Staunton, the former Post Office chair, has given details of what he calls the “stitch up” that he says led to Kemi Badenoch, the business secretary, making false claims about his dismissal in a statement to MPs. (See 3.51pm.)

• Martin Lewis, the consumer champion, has told MPs that introducing financial education into the national curriculum in England may have been “counterproductive”. Lewis campaigned for this move, which was introduced in 2014. But, in evidence to the Commons education committee this morning, he said schools did not have the resources to deliver it properly. He said:

I still think there is a real poverty of financial education in the UK … I think in many ways, getting it on the curriculum was a pyrrhic victory. In some ways, it was counterproductive.

The Green party has criticised Labour for not being willing to block the Rwanda bill. This is from the Green peer Jenny Jones ahead of the debate tomorrow, when peers will vote on further amendements to the bill.

This is a mess of a bill. It is illegal and nonsensical. We are being asked to indulge in another day of pointless chatter, with great legal minds drawing up detailed amendments that the government will ignore. And this is partly fuelled by the Labour party refusing to vote this bill down.

The Labour party are trying to rewrite the Salisbury Convention that says that the Lords should not stop anything in the government’s manifesto. Labour wants that to apply to all legislation passed by MPs, as the Commons is elected and the second chamber is not. Then what is the point of the Lords? Why don’t they join the Green party in calling for the Lords to be abolished and replaced by an elected second chamber?”

Labour seem to hope that when they are in government, then the Conservatives will reciprocate, but that clearly isn’t going to happen.

Labour has said that it is not constitutionally appropriate for the Lords to vote down a bill passed by the elected chamber.

In a thread on X last night Sunder Katwala, who runs the British Future thinktank, says there has been relatively little discussion of Labour’s decision not to hold up the bill. He does not go as far as Jones, in saying Labour should vote down the bill, but he suggests Labour might have been better advised to deploy aggressive delaying tactics in the Lords.

Here are some of his posts.

It is widely understood/assumed across Lords groups- but almost entirely undebated in media & politics – that Labour Party has made a tactical decision to let the government push the bill through. Rather than to use a delay threat to insist on one of these amendments (or others)

Labour’s calculation: the risks of a “get Rwanda done” message about delaying the scheme (nb/scars of 2019) mean they need to give the government the bill *including* reviving govt chance of sending some planes to Rwanda (including removals that UK courts/ECHR would find unsafe)

A much more *consequential* ethical decision (for MPs/peers) than votes on Gaza, which are emotionally, symbolically & politically significant. But whose real world impacts are minor. Here, the real life impact is much more significant (if planes go that might not, esp unsafely)

Ethics aside, the (unexplored & undebated) politics look questionable. Are the scars of 2019 seeing Labour generals fight last electoral war & give Sunak an unexpected gift? Is giving Sunak proof of concept on Rwanda really smart to stop him blaming Labour for failing to deliver?

Suella Braverman, the former home secretary, has told GB News that Rishi Sunak did not go far enough in his speech on extremism on Friday. She claimed that parts of London were becoming “no-go areas for Jewish people” as a result of the pro-Palestinian marches and she said Sunak should have announced emergency legislation to restrict them. She explained:

We need to be holding the police to account in a better way and I would have liked to have seen an emergency law introduced to actually empower ministers and empower all of those policymakers who are responsible for this issue to actually take steps to restrict some of these marches.

This has been going on now for four months. It’s become a weekly fixture. Parts of London have become a no-go areas for Jewish people. That is totally unacceptable. We’ve seen antisemitism skyrocket.

In its recent report on the protests, the Commons home affairs committee quotes evidence from the Metropolitan police saying that, although people have been committing hate crimes in “very small numbers” during the protests, the “overwhelming majority” of people attending have behaved lawfully and peacefully.

The former Post Office chair Henry Staunton has revived his claim that Kemi Badenoch, the business secretary, and others have spread false claims about him to justify her decision to sack him in January.

In a letter to the Commons business committee, he gave his fullest account yet of the misconduct allegation about him that was used by Badenoch to part-justify her decision to dismiss him.

In a statement to MPs last month explaining why she got rid of Staunton, Badenoch said that when Staunton was chair “a formal investigation was launched into allegations made regarding his conduct, including serious matters such as bullying” and that “concerns were brought to my Department’s attention about Mr Staunton’s willingness to co-operate with that investigation”.

Last week Staunton told the committee that it was actually Nick Read, the chief executive, who was being investigated over a misconduct allegation. He said the Post Office’s HR director had submitted an 80-page “Speak Up” whistleblowing complaint about Read, and that just one paragraph referred to him. It wrongly said he had made a politically incorrect comment, he claimed.

In his follow-up letter, now published, Staunton explained what had actually been said. He recalled:

The context of my conversation (with the HR director) was that whilst reviewing a list of shortlisted candidates for a NED (non executive director) position, I recounted, by way of example of the obstacles that I had encountered previously in my attempts to promote board diversity, a conversation I had had when I was chair of another organisation in which, a woman in a senior management role had said to me that she did not like appointing “girls” because they were, in her experience, “pains in the arses”. It was clear to the HR director at the time that I was not personally using offensive terms, if anything the opposite, and she confirmed that to me subsequently. Indeed, given the context it could not have been understood in any other way.

Staunton said the HR director used some of this language in her whistleblowing complaint, to explain how she felt she was being treated at the Post Office. She was not complaining about Staunton, he said.

He said that in a subsequent interview with Post Office investigators the HR director said the “girls” and “pains in the arses” remarks came from Staunton. He said they then used this to discredit him.

(The investigators) were clearly not interested in understanding the context of the remarks, which were quoting critically what was said by a third party on another occasion at another organisation. All they were interested in was the fact that they had stumbled on a pretext for widening the investigation to include me, which is why I can only consider this sham investigation as a stitch up …

Despite the unbelievably weak grounds for launching an investigation into me personally which was prompted by a primary complaint by the HR director against the chief executive, and the chief executive alone, I have fully cooperated with the investigation, have answered all their questions to the best of my ability, and indeed have recently attended an interview with the barrister leading the investigation. I take assertions to the contrary by both the Post Office and the Business Department very seriously indeed. To me they are further evidence of the way closing ranks and covering people’s backs have, through this entire sorry episode, been given priority over getting at the truth. I do not recognise the false equivalence between the allegations against Nick Read, some of which are serious, and the allegations against me which are flimsy in the extreme.

In a separate letter to the committee, the Post Office said that the HR director’s “Speak Up” note runs to 12 pages, not 80 pages. It is being disclosed to the committee on the assumption that confidential material will not be published. The Post Office said Staunton may have been thinking of a separate, 80-page report into someone else.

Rishi Sunak has discussed his irritation at an unmade bed as well as his bedtime habit of watching Friends reruns, in an interview with Grazia, PA Media reports. PA says:

Joined by his wife, businesswoman Akshata Murty, the prime minister answered a number of questions about household jobs ahead of International Women’s Day (March 8), including who cooks more and who is more likely to make the bed.

“We found out how the country’s most high-profile couple share domestic duties,” Grazia UK’s Instagram caption read.

Sunak cut a quieter figure than his wife, who took the lead on answering questions, with the Conservative party leader jumping in to criticise Murty’s dishwasher stacking and his children’s lack of dog-walking.

On unmade beds, Sunak said: “It bugs me, so I actually sometimes come up back into the flat from the office after we’ve all left and make the bed, because I’ll be irritated if it’s not made.”

Asked about his favourite job around the house, he replied: “Hard choice … dishwasher stacking, making (the) bed? Both have a nice, satisfying ending. Probably the bed.”

Sunak labelled his wife’s penchant for having plates in her bed when she was younger as “disgusting” and said “That’s me” when asked who is better at loading the dishwasher.

“It requires redoing after you’ve been very enthusiastic,” he told his wife.

“It creates more work. And then more goes in as a result!”

He also said he wishes his children were better at walking their dog, but admitted his wife reads more than he does.

“I’m too exhausted when I get home at the end of every day, so I watch an episode of Friends and then go to bed. It never gets old,” he said.

“We have watched the same episodes of Friends I don’t know how many times,” said Murty.

Murty also conceded that her husband is “the better cook”, although Sunak added: “It’s mainly just breakfast on a Saturday morning – Gordon Ramsay scrambled eggs.”

UPDATE: You can watch the clip here.

The Commons business committee has published a series of letters from Post Office figures relating to its marathon hearing last week where Henry Staunton, the former chair, said he was the victim of a smear campaign led by Kemi Badenoch, the business secretary.

At the weekend the Sunday Times reported that Nick Read, the Post Office chief executive, repeatedly threatened to resign unless he got a pay rise. There were suggestions that this implied he was not telling the truth when, in his evidence to the committee, he dismissed talk of his resigning.

In a letter now published, Read told the committee he wanted to “clarify” when he meant when he answered no in response to a question about whether he had ever tried to resign as chief executive. He said:

To reiterate the response I gave on the 27th, I have never tried to resign. Nor have I ever issued a resignation letter or resigned verbally. Like many people in highly complex roles like this one, I have suffered frustrations – many CEOs have conversations privately with appropriate people in their organisation and I am no different. However, I remain here completely committed to doing the vitally important work to support Postmasters and transform the Post Office.

Labour will end exemptions for bee-killing pesticides that have already been outlawed in the EU but which the UK government has approved for four years in a row, Daniel Zeichner, the shadow farming minister has said. Helena Horton has the story.

Downing Street has confirmed that Rishi Sunak does not favour the payment of reparations for the UK’s historic involvement in the slave trade and that he believes it is better to “look to the future”.

The PM’s spokesperson made the comment at the No 10 lobby briefing in response to a question about whether Suank thought the Church of England was right to propose creating a £1bn fund to address the legacy of slavery and in response to the fact that the wealth owned by the church today can in part be traced back to the slave trade. The spokesperson implied that Sunak was not a warm supporter of this initiative.

Asked if the church was right to propose a £1bn fund of this kind, the spokesperson replied:

It’s obviously a matter for the Church of England. For the government’s part, there is clearly no plan to pay reparations. It’s widely recognised the UK led the international efforts and was one of the first countries in the world to abolish slavery and we believe the most effective way for UK to respond to our history is to look to the future …

The UK is making a real difference in the lives of people today through things like our overseas aid programmes, including in the Caribbean and Africa where we are investing in infrastructure, security and prosperity.

The spokesperson also pointed out that, in his speech on extremism on Friday, Sunak talked about his pride in Britain’s history. The spokesperson quoted the passage from the speech where Sunak said:

No country is perfect, but I am enormously proud of the good that our country has done.

Our place in history is defined by the sacrifices our people have made in the service of our own freedom and that of others.

And when these groups tell children that they cannot – and will not – succeed because of who they are, when they tell children that the system is rigged against them or that Britain is a racist country, this is not only a lie, but a cynical attempt to crush young dreams, and turn impressionistic minds against their own society.

More than 400 people arrived in the UK in small boats yesterday – the highest number crossing the Channel in a day so far this year, PA Media reports. The figures came out as the Home Office announced that the UK and France will lead a “customs partnership” involving other European countries intended to disrupt the supply of materials used to assemble small boats.

PA says:

Home Office figures show 401 people made the journey in seven boats. This suggests an average of around 41 people per boat.

It comes after 327 migrants crossed the Channel on Sunday in eight boats, meaning 728 people were recorded arriving within 48 hours.

The latest crossings take the provisional total number of UK arrivals so far this year to 2,983.

The second highest daily total recorded to date in 2024 was 358 migrants arriving on January 17 in eight boats.

The figures suggest more than 40,000 migrants have arrived in the UK since Rishi Sunak became prime minister in October 2022, with over 72,000 arrivals recorded since the Rwanda deal was signed six months earlier.

At the Downing Street lobby briefing, asked about the lastest figures, the PM’s spokesperson nsisted the UK’s joint work with France was “already delivering”, with more than 26,000 crossing attempts prevented in 2023 at an interception rate of 47%.

Asked about the government defeats in the House of Lords last night on the safety of Rwanda (asylum and immigration) bill, the spokesperson said:

There is still an option for the Lords to work for the House of Commons, protect innocent lives from perilous journeys across the Channel, and we hope that they will take that opportunity in future votes.

The spokesperson also refused to say whether or not the government has found an airline willing to fly migrants to Rwanda if the government orders flights to leave once the bill becomes law.

Commenting on the latest arrival figures, Yvette Cooper, the shadow home secretary, said:

This is the prime minister who promised the British people he would stop the boats, but has now seen more than 40,000 arrivals on his watch. This is the prime minister who said his strategy was working, yet is presiding over the busiest start to a year on record in terms of Channel crossings.

Under Rishi Sunak, independent reports show our border security has become a farce, billions are being spent on asylum hotels, and the Home Office has just lost thousands of asylum-seekers. Everything this prime minister touches fails, and our country deserves better than his weak, incompetent leadership.