Conservatives accused of ‘levelling up’ stunt to
save Boris Johnson’s job
Lisa Nandy slams claim of boost for 20 towns, saying
‘new’ fund for poorer areas is recycled pledge
Toby Helm
and Mark Townsend
Sat 29 Jan
2022 22.00 GMT
The
government has been accused of trying to manipulate announcements on extra
funding for poorer parts of the UK in a desperate attempt to save Boris
Johnson’s premiership.
An
extraordinary row blew up after Michael Gove’s Department for Levelling Up,
Housing and Communities released a press statement – before publication of a
levelling up white paper this week – saying 20 towns and cities would benefit
from a “new £1.5bn brownfield fund”. The release, which named only Sheffield
and Wolverhampton as recipients, said the 20 areas “will benefit from
developments combining housing, leisure and business in sustainable, walkable
beautiful new neighbourhoods”.
Gove added
that the “radical new regeneration programme” would prove transformational and
deliver on the government’s flagship policy to create a more equal country.
“This huge investment in infrastructure and regeneration will spread
opportunity more evenly and help to reverse the geographical inequalities which
still exist in the UK.”
But after
the Observer contacted senior sources at the Treasury to ask if its ministers
had signed off on the promised £1.5bn, Gove’s department backtracked and
confessed that the “new” fund was not new money at all but would be made up of
levelling-up funds that had been announced by the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, in
his spending review last autumn.
The
confusion was seized upon by Labour and other opposition parties as evidence of
the lengths Johnson and his ministers are prepared to go in order to persuade
Conservative MPs in so-called “red wall” seats to stick by the prime minister
before the imminent publication of a report into the “partygate” scandal this
week by the senior civil servant Sue Gray. If at least 54 Tory MPs write to Sir
Graham Brady saying they want Johnson to go, it would trigger a vote of
confidence in the prime minister. If he were to lose the vote of Conservative
MPs it would mark the end of his premiership.
Shadow
levelling-up secretary Lisa Nandy said the Tories had been caught out trying to
spin that extra money had been found for poorer areas when the white paper
actually contained nothing they did not already know about.
“I don’t
think Tory MPs are going to find it very reassuring when the supposed new pot
of gold contains not a penny of new money,” Nandy said.
The SNP
leader in Westminster, Ian Blackford, added: “Not only is the government trying
to take the public for fools, they are also trying to take their own MPs for
fools. It shows the lengths they are prepared to go to keep Boris Johnson in
power. It is beyond contempt.”
The Liberal
Democrat deputy leader Daisy Cooper said the episode showed the government was
not “remotely serious about levelling up this country.”
Johnson has
spent much of the past fortnight calling and meeting his MPs to persuade them
to stick with him as the row about lockdown-busting parties has grown. One
former minister told the Observer last week he had been reassured by the PM
personally that his area would receive help for local industries – which had
persuaded him to stay loyal.
In spite of
the government’s troubles, the latest Opinium poll for the Observer shows
Labour’s lead over the Tories has shrunk to 5pts, with Keir Starmer’s party on
39% (down 2pts compared with a fortnight ago) while the Tories are up 2pts on
34%.
But while
the Labour bounce over partygate appears to have peaked, and gone into reverse,
the party is now favoured by more voters to do a better job than the Tories on
10 out of 14 policy issues, including tackling crime and handling immigration.
Both are subjects on which the Tories have traditionally been strong. On crime,
Labour is now 3pts ahead of the Conservatives and on immigration it is 4pts
ahead.
On Saturday
night, Gray – who on Friday was asked by the Metropolitan police to make
“minimal” references in her report to serious matters to do with the gatherings
that the Met is investigating – was understood to have still not yet submitted
her report to No 10.
Sources
indicated she would only do so on a day when parliament is sitting, so Johnson
would be obliged to go straight to parliament to make a statement, rather than
giving him a weekend to spin its conclusions to the media. One Whitehall source
said he expected the report to make “uncomfortable reading for all concerned”.
Another said: “Sue Gray is very clear how she wants this handled. She will hand
it over on a day parliament is sitting because she believes strongly in the
propriety of the process.”
Meanwhile
there were calls on Saturday night for the Met to be discharged from its
investigation because of a “conflict of interest”. The demands came from
officials tasked with monitoring the force who claim it cannot be trusted to
deliver on such a politically sensitive case.
Unmesh
Desai, whose questioning at the London Assembly last Tuesday led to the Met
commissioner Cressida Dick announcing the investigation, said an outside police
force needed to take over the inquiry.
Desai,
Labour’s London Assembly policing and crime spokesperson, said he was writing
to the commissioner this week raising his concerns that Dick’s boss is, in
effect, the home secretary, Priti Patel, who in turn owes her position to
Johnson.
“It’s a
clear conflict of interest. Wouldn’t it be better for an outside force to
investigate?” said Desai, a member of the police and crime committee which
scrutinises policing in London. Speaking on behalf of a number of committee
members, Desai added: “You could even call in a retired chief constable to
oversee it, the evidence is all there.”
Johnson
controversially backed Patel after she was found to have bullied staff in an
internal inquiry in 2020. The home secretary has recently thrown her full
support behind the prime minister over the lockdown parties. Patel had prompted
further controversy last year after handing Dick a two-year extension as Met
commissioner despite a series of scandals that have embroiled the country’s
most senior police officer.
Desai will
also urge the commissioner to make sure Met officers are investigated for
potential breaches of Covid regulations while deployed at Downing Street.
He will ask
the commissioner to “review” the Met’s diplomatic protection group, which is
tasked with monitoring premises such as 10 Downing Street, amid concern they
may have colluded by allowing the parties to take place.
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