Early evening summary
- Sir Philip Barton, the head of the Foreign Office, has been accused at a select committee hearing of covering up the PM’s involvement in the decision to evacuate dogs from Kabul. The Labour MP Chris Bryant made the accusation after he read out a leaked letter from Boris Johnson’s PPS which he said implied Johnson’s “fingers” were “all over” the controversial decision. (See 6.16pm.) Barton did not accept the charge, and earlier Johnson dismissed the accusation that he was involved as “complete nonsense”. (See 1.26pm.) At the foreign affairs committee hearing Barton also admitted that he was wrong not to return from holiday earlier in August as the Afghanistan crisis was unfolding. (See 3.38pm.) After the hearing Tom Tugendhat, the committee chair, said the hearing exposed a “lack of leadership” at the Foreign Office. He said:
Today’s session left the committee concerned about the Foreign Office’s role in the evacuation effort.
We have seen the disintegration of a nation British troops laid down their lives to protect. In leaving, many Afghan friends and partners were abandoned. This crisis demanded, and deserved, the full attention of the Foreign Office. It seems that junior staff members and soldiers bore most of the burden, having been placed under huge pressure to make life-or-death decisions with insufficient guidance, support or oversight.
The evidence we’ve heard today points to a lack of leadership, urgency and adequate resourcing.
Updated
Leaked letter suggests FCDO covering up PM's involvement in dog airlift from Kabul, MP claims
In the foreign affairs committee, as the session was drawing to an end, Chris Bryant (Lab) said that he had just been sent a copy of a letter that Trudy Harrison MP, the parliamentary private secretary to Boris Johnson, sent to Paul “Pen” Farthing about the evactuation of his animals from Kabul. It was sent on 25 August, Bryant said. He said Harrison was writing as PPS to the PM, and she said:
Dear Paul,
I’m writing to inform you that I have received confirmation from the FCDO, the Home Office and the Ministry of Defence that you, your staff and their dependents are permitted to travel to Hamad Karzai international airport.
Bryant said: “Feels very much like a direction from the prime minister to me, I have to say.”
He went on to read more from Harrison’s letter.
The secretary of state has made it clear that all 68 persons will be provided a flight by the Royal Air Force as part of the evacuation programme. The secretary of state has also confirmed that animals under the care of Nowzad can be evacuated on a separate chartered flight. The Minister of Defence will ensure that a flight is available.
Bryant said this did not equate with what the officials said earlier in the hearing, when they denied any knowledge of No 10 being involved in allowing the animals to be evacuated.
Sir Philip Barton, head of the Foreign Office, told Bryant he was not aware of this. He said they had not set out to mislead the MPs.
Bryant said the letter implied that “the prime minister’s fingers are all over this”. He went on: “And you are just - I’m hesitant to use the words cover up, but that what it feels like.”
There was silence for a short moment, before Barton said again: “I wasn’t aware of the letter.”
Bryant replied:
Again, it feels like nobody’s ever aware of anything, anything could happen at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and the senior management, really, are a bit absent.
Barton did not reply.
At the foreign affairs committee hearing on the Afghan crisis an excruciating exchange has taken place between Chris Bryant, Philip Barton & Lawrie Bristow on how involved the PM was in the decision to facilitate the evacuation of Pen Farthing and his pets pic.twitter.com/6h6Q4KcZfM
— Noa Hoffman (@hoffman_noa) December 7, 2021
Updated
Bryant says Foreign Office 'cruelly' misled Afghans about their prospects of being evacuated to UK
Back at the foreign affairs committee, Chris Bryant (Lab), a former Foreign Office minister, says he thinks the Foreign Office falsely held out hope that it would be able to evacuate many more Afghans than it could because ministers were “desperate to please”. He says:
What I think really happened is that ministers were desperate to please. They weren’t courageous enough to say: ‘I’m sorry, there’s a limit to what we can do.’ There wasn’t enough preparation done from last year - let alone from April this year - to be able to do a proper evacuation of the numbers that we really knew we were likely to have to evacuate.
We offered the prospect, the hope - the expectation, indeed, for lots and lots of people - that they might be able to come to the United Kingdom, cruelly, in all honesty.
Bryant says ministers then got hundreds and hundreds of emails about Afghans needing help, and he says the Foreign Office pretended these were being properly considered, when they weren’t.
Barton says he does not think this is “an accurate characterisation” of what happened.
Updated
The animal rights campaigner Dominic Dyer says Zac Goldsmith, the environment minister, was one of the people he contacted when he wanted the government to allow the evacuation of animals from Kabul. Dyer claims pressure from himself and others persuaded Boris Johnson to intervene. (See 4.36pm.)
In the Lords Goldsmith was asked by Lord Foulkes, a Labour peer, why Johnson prioritised animals over people. Goldsmith said claims about the PM getting involved were wrong. He told Foulkes:
Number 10, indeed the prime minister, have very clearly and emphatically pushed back against any such suggestion. He [Foulkes] shakes his head, but I can tell him from my own experience that his rebuttal is entirely accurate.
Updated
No 10 confirms it is not following Scotland and encouraging working from home
Downing Street has said the UK government will not be following the Scottish government, and urging people to work from home. Asked about Nicola Sturgeon’s statement to MSPs about working from home (see 2.48pm), No 10 said “that’s not our position”.
In her statement Sturgeon stressed that the Scottish government is already encouraging people to work from home. But she said she was now asking employers to ensure that this was possible for workers if they allowed it during lockdown last year. She told MSPs:
We already advise people to work from home wherever practical.
Today, I am asking employers to ensure this is happening.
To be blunt, if you had staff working from home at this start of the pandemic, please now enable them to do so again.
We are asking you to do this from now until the middle of January when we will review this advice again.
I know how difficult this is, but I cannot stress enough how much difference we think this could make in helping stem transmission and avoid the need for even more onerous measures.
The foreign affairs committee hearing was suspended to allow its members to vote in a division, but it has just resumed.
Chris Bryant (Lab) says he has spoken to ministers who think it was a mistake for the UK to open its evacuation scheme potentially to so many Afghans.
He says it seems “terribly cruel” to imply to people that they might be eligible for rescue. For example, journalists could have been eligible, he says.
Nigel Casey, the PM’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, says ministers were responding to pressure, including from MPs. That is why they created a new system for people not eligible for help under Arap (the Afghan relocations and assistance policy). He says media organisations were among those saying the government should help certain people not covered by Arap.
Updated
Matt Hancock calls for bill to screen children for dyslexia
Undiagnosed dyslexia is a “quiet scandal”, the former health secretary Matt Hancock has told MPs as he called for all children to be screened for the condition before they leave primary school. PA Media reports:
Hancock also told MPs that teachers need special training to prevent dyslexic children slipping through the cracks into a life of crime, as he proposed a dyslexia screening bill under the 10-minute rule procedure in the Commons.
The now-backbench Conservative MP said he was “proud to be dyslexic”, but his difficulty with reading and writing was not spotted at school.
He was only diagnosed with dyslexia when he went to university in Oxford, which he described as a “lightbulb moment” after “years of frustration at school”.
Hancock told the Commons: “I was one of the lucky ones who was caught. There are too many children who are not caught early enough. It is a quiet scandal that an estimated four-in-five dyslexic children leave school with their dyslexia unidentified.”
He also said that dyslexic people’s ability to “think differently”, with a higher likelihood of having skills like visualisation and lateral thinking, was becoming more highly prized by employers. He cited the example of GCHQ apprentices who are “four times more likely to be dyslexic”.
Hancock said: “These are the skills that dyslexics tend to have in abundance and they are also the skills that the future of work values more and more.”
But the West Suffolk MP warned: “We see all to commonly what happens to many undiagnosed dyslexics who then struggle to read and write. Because the flipside is that while 40% of successful entrepreneurs are dyslexics so too are over half of the prison population.”
So-called 10-minute rule bills almost never become laws, but they allow MPs to publicise proposals for legislation which sometimes subsequently get adopted by government.
Updated
Keir Starmer told the BBC that Dominic Raab should have resigned as foreign secretary in the summer over the failings of his department in Afghanistan. He said:
It is shocking that we are all now learning that emails and letters that we sent in to the Foreign Office - including from my office - were opened but haven’t been actioned.
It’s a total failure of political leadership with an ex-foreign secretary who was busy on the beach instead of doing his job.
Asked whether Raab should be in office, Starmer said:
I think Dominic Raab should have resigned at the time, that would have been the decent, honourable thing to do.
That is a slight difference from the line adopted this morning by Emily Thornberry, who said Raab should resign now. (See 10.53am.)
Prisons in England and Wales to be set targets for cutting drug use
Prisons in England and Wales will be set targets for the first time to root out drugs and rehabilitate inmates under government plans, PA Media reports. PA says:
National league tables are to be introduced as part of efforts to hold prison governors to account on how well they can keep illegal substances out of their jails and get offenders “clean”.
The proposals have been put forward in a white paper, with the prisons minister, Victoria Atkins, setting out more detail in the Commons.
Atkins tolds MPs: “We secured almost £4bn in the spending review to carry out the largest prison-building programme this country has seen in more than a century, creating 20,000 additional prison places by the mid-2020s.
“To protect the public we also need to strengthen the prison regime, to reform and rehabilitate offenders throughout their sentence, that is the most effective way to reduce reoffending and cut crime overall.
“This government puts public protection at the heart of everything we do. We’re recruiting more police officers, we’re putting serious offenders behind bars for longer and now we’re building the state-of-the-art prisons, bolstered with a regime that will drive down reoffending by making sure that every day an offender spends behind bars, involves purposeful reform and rehabilitation to help them go straight, turn their life around and make a positive contribution to society.”
Updated
Tugendhat tells head of Foreign Office he's being 'platitudinous' about his holiday error
Back at the foreign affairs committee Chris Bryant (Lab) is asking Sir Philip Barton, head of the Foreign Office, about his holiday again.
Barton says he left for holiday on 9 August. He repeats the point about how he has reflected on this. Tom Tugendhat, the chair of the committee, tells him this “sounds less credible every time your repeat it”. He adds: “It sounds platitudinous.”
Bryant says this line “just feels a bit scripted now”.
Bryant also tells Barton that, on 9 August, it should have been obvious there was going to be a crisis.
Barton says it was not clear at that point.
Updated
Dominic Dyer, an animal rights campaigner, has repeated a claim he made in the summer about how the government only agreed to facilitate the evacuation of animals from Kabul following an intervention from Boris Johnson and his wife, Carrie.
Dyer said he “reached out” to Carrie when the government was refusing to help. “I went publicly on social media and said to the prime minister ... and I did reach out to Carrie Symonds that evening, and some ministers I was in contact with, including Zac Goldsmith to say ‘look, who’s in charge here?’,” he said.
Dyer claimed that the government changed its policy as a result of his intervention.
I forced the prime minister’s arm, I think all of us behind this campaign did. The next day, the senior commander in the Ministry of Defence, in the air force department, contacted me and said you can have your flight authorisation and we could get that plane down on the ground into Afghanistan.
That’s my proof because without the intervention from the prime minister, [Ben Wallace, the defence secretary] would have continued to block the operation.
Downing Street (see 12.25pm), and Johnson personally (see 1.26pm), have both insisted that the PM was not involved.
Updated
Bristow says the way papers were left in the British embassy in Kabul after it was abandoned giving details of some Afghans who had worked for the British was “a mistake”. The families were quickly evacuated after the Times alerted the Foreign Office to what happened, he says.
Former ambassador insists animal airlift did not stop people being evacuated from Kabul
Royston Smith (Con) asks how many emails sent to the Foreign Office about people needing help in Afghanistan went unread.
Barton says they received an uprecedented volume of correspondence. They had to prioritise, he says. He says they ensured every MP got a reply.
Q: Who authorised the prioritisation of animals over people?
That did not happen, says Barton.
Q: So how did animals get evacuated before people?
Barton disputes that that happened. He says there was a charter flight.
Casey says the charter flight was only allowed out after the evacuation of people had finished.
Q: How much staff time did allowing the charter flight out take?
Casey says this did not distract from the evacuation effort.
Tom Tugendhat, the committee chairs, says if the gates to the airport were open to allow the people and animals boarding the charter flight on to the flight, they could have been open for other people – such as the five-year-old son of an interpreter who used to work for him, who wanted to leave.
Casey says the Taliban had not approved a further evacuation.
Bristow says the Taliban were becoming increasingly uncooperative.
He says he has checked with the commander on the ground if the operation with the animals displaced people. He says no plane failed to land or take off because of this, and no one else would have made it through if the animals had not gone through.
Alicia Kearns (Con), a former civil servant, says if soldiers had not been escorting animals, they could have been escorting another planeload of people.
Bristow says the trade-off is not that simple.
Q: Why not?
Bristow says the people who were in the system for evacuation had been processed.
He says he cannot say with certainty soldiers were moving animals through the gate. He says his understanding is that no one else would have been able to get out.
Updated
This is what Raphael Marshall says in his memo (pdf) about how staff were discouraged from working for longer than eight hours, the subject of the exchanges a few minutes ago. (See 3.55pm.)
Despite the urgency of the situation, the default expectation remained that FCDO staff would only work eight hours a day, five days a week. FCDO employees were only asked to work shifts for which they volunteered. This likely resulted in a lack of night shifts and limited cover over the weekend because these shifts were less popular. It also resulted in frequent changes of personnel due to days off. FCDO employees were not asked to work over periods for which they had indicated they were unavailable, even if this led to serious shortages of capacity.
I believe this reflects a deliberate drive by the FCDO to prioritise ‘work-life balance’. FCDO employees, including senior leaders, are often told that working more than eight hours a day suggests that they are inefficient. Working more than eight hours a day has also sometimes been portrayed as selfish, as it potentially pressures other employees to do so as well. Senior leaders are sometimes encouraged to set a good example by not sending emails outside working hours. Whilst a healthy ‘work-life balance’ is important in moderation, in my opinion the FCDO’s approach has undermined organisational effectiveness.
Bob Seely (Con) goes next.
Q: What do you make of the criticisms published by Raphael Marshall?
Barton says the points in the Marshall memo are ones that the Foreign Office will look at in its lessons learned exercise. He suggests some of the criticisms are fair, but not others.
Q: It feels as if we were getting false assurances that this was being dealt with, but you were being overwhelmed.
Barton says it was “incredibly difficult” to deal with such a large number of people seeking help.
He says, as part of their lessons learned exercise, they will want to look at how they have the capacity to deal with so many emails in an emergency like this.
It was not “lack of urgency” that was the problem, he says. He says the problem was to do with the complexity of the problem.
Q: Marshall writes about people only working eight-hour days. That is not what should be happening, he says.
Barton says there is not a clocking-off culture in the Foreign Office.
But, as for working eight hours, there was a three-shift system to cover 24 hours. So that is why people had to clock off.
Q: Marshall says you did not have the people.
Barton says this was not about work-life balance. This was about ensuring people did not burn out.
Updated
Stuart Malcolm McDonald (SNP) is asking the questions now. He says when Dominic Raab was giving evidence to the committee, he refused to say when he want on holiday. The consensus is that it was around 4 August, he says.
He asks Barton to tell him the date. Barton says he does not want to answer for the former foreign secretary. But he appears to confirm that the Foreign Office will have a record of this. McDonald asks him to tell the committee. Barton says he will take away the request, but does not confirm that he will supply the date.
Here is some comment from journalists on Sir Philip Barton’s reluctance to give up his summer holiday. (See 3.38pm.)
From the Times’ Henry Zeffman
NEW Sir Philip Barton tells MPs: "I have reflected a lot since August on my leave and if I had my time again I would have come back from my leave earlier than I did." He says he came back on August 26, a week after we revealed he was away https://t.co/3vp938BUnm
— Henry Zeffman (@hzeffman) December 7, 2021
From the Independent’s Rob Merrick
Wow!! Foreign office top civil servant Philip Barton reveals he stayed on holiday until Aug 26th….11 days after the fall of Kabul
— Rob Merrick (@Rob_Merrick) December 7, 2021
Even Dominic "where’s my paddle board" Raab returned on the 16th
From the Times’ Tom Newton Dunn
This is the first time Barton has revealed the date he returned to the Foreign Office. The last US military flight left Kabul on August 30, meaning Sir Philip stayed on holiday through almost the whole of the desperate three week airlift. This is simply staggering.
— Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) December 7, 2021
Head of Foreign Office admits it was mistake to remain on holiday during Kabul crisis
Back in the foreign affairs committee, Sir Philip Barton, head of the Foreign Office, says he has reflected on his decision to go on holiday in August and “if I had my time again, I would have come back from my leave earlier”.
I’m happy to get into dates in a minute but let me just say before I do that, I have reflected a lot in August on my leave, and if I had my time again I would have come back from my leave earlier than I did.
He says he returned from holiday on 26 August.
As my colleague Patrick Wintour reports, that was almost a fortnight after Kabul fell.
Sir Philip Barton permanent under secretary at the foreign office admits he did not return from a holiday abroad until August 28. Kabul fell on August 15. He says "I have reflected on this and if I had my time again I would have come back earlier".
— Patrick Wintour (@patrickwintour) December 7, 2021
Q: Where were you?
Barton says he does not want to say. He was partly in the UK, he says.
Q: Have you changed holiday plans before?
Yes, says Barton.
He repeats the point about having reflected on this.
Updated
The government has apologised for failures in the lead up to the Grenfell Tower fire, admitting to “errors and missed opportunities” that helped create “an environment in which such a tragedy was possible”. As my colleague Robert Booth reports, it told the public inquiry into the disaster it was “deeply sorry” and conceded it did not know how building regulations were being applied on the ground. It said the “system failed”.
Q: Did you or anyone from government have contact with the Taliban before they took over?
Sir Laurie Bristow,the former British ambassador to Afghanistan, says he didn’t. He was accredited to the non-Taliban government.
But Nigel Casey, the PM’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, says he did have contact with them. Those contactss were kept secret. He says there had been contacts for some years.
Survation has released a poll giving Labour a three-point lead over the Conservatives. It says this is Labour’s biggest lead in polls it has carried out since Boris Johnson became PM.
NEW – Largest Labour lead in a Survation poll since Boris Johnson became PM:
— Survation. (@Survation) December 7, 2021
Westminster Voting Intention:
LAB 39% (+2)
CON 36% (-1)
LD 9% (-1)
SNP 5% (-)
GRN 3% (-1)
RFM UK 3% (-1)
OTH 8% (+1)
1060, online, UK adults aged 18+, 30 Nov-1 Dec 21. Changes vs w/ 15 Nov 21 pic.twitter.com/xaM31qE0vX
Also Labour's first actual polling lead with us since the General Election: pic.twitter.com/faXmRrXC3g
— Survation. (@Survation) December 7, 2021
Full data tables and details here: https://t.co/Oq5FnUTBkD
— Survation. (@Survation) December 7, 2021
Bristow says, ahead of the evacuation, the number of people in the embassy in Kabul had been reduced from 150 to 75.
He says the demand for evacuation was a “known unknown”. They did not know how many people would want to be evactuated. They did not know how many British passport holders were in the country on any given day.
We did not know how many people would come forward on the day for evacuation, if that’s what it came to, because we did not know how many British passport holders were in Afghanistan on any one day, we had no way of knowing.
Q: Wasn’t it likely that there would be a surge?
Bristow says that was “top of everybody’s mind”. But this was just one of several scenarios.
Updated
Q: So in April there was no plan to help people like judges who had sat in on narcotics cases?
Barton says people might have been assessed under the scheme. He does not answer directly.
Casey says category 4 of ARAP said that some people who did not work directly for the British in Afghanistan (the main beneficiaries of ARAP) would be included.
Q: So did you not think that more than 4,000 people might apply?
Casey says, as the situation worsened during the summer, the number of people wanting to leave went up.
Updated
Q: How many people did you expect to have to evacuate?
Barton talks about anticipating the evacuation, but does not put a number on it.
Casey says they expected to evacuate 3,000 Britons, and 4,000 others eligible under the Afghan relocations and assistance policy (ARAP).
Updated
Barton says no one expected the Taliban to take over Afghanistan as quickly as they did.
He says it was a particularly challenging period for the Foreign Office.
More than 15,000 people were evacuated, he says.
But he says they would like to have evacuated more.
He says there are lessons to be learnt, as with any big event.
MPs question head of Foreign Office about Afghanistan
The foreign affairs committee is about to take evidence from Sir Philip Barton, head of the Foreign Office, about the withdrawal from Afghanistan. He will be appearing with Nigel Casey, the PM’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan and a senior FCDO official, and Sir Laurie Bristow, former British ambassador to Afghanistan.
Updated
Sturgeon urges Scottish firms to let staff work from home if possible until mid-January
There will be no changes this week to current Covid restrictions in Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon has said, while telling the Scottish public “it is time for all of us to go back to basics”
She urged employers to ensure that all staff who can are working from home until the middle of January, telling people to do a lateral flow test “on every occasion” they intend to mix with others over the festive season, whether at work, socialising or going shopping.
At her regular Covid briefing to MSPs, Sturgeon confirmed 99 cases of the Omicron variant in Scotland, an increase of 28 since yesterday.
To give a sense of the speed of increase - albeit at this stage from a low level - the figure I reported this time last week was nine.
She said health officials estimate the R number associated with the new variant may be well over 2, and that there are now confirmed cases in nine of Scotland’s 14 health board areas, “suggesting that community transmission is becoming more widespread, and possibly more sustained, across the country”.
Underlining the significance of this speed of increase, Sturgeon warned:
The sheer weight of numbers of people who could be infected as a result of increased transmissibility and some immune evasion will create this pressure even if the disease the new variant causes in individuals is no more severe than Delta.
Confirmed Omicron cases in UK up by 101 since yesterday to 437, says UKHSA
The UK Health Security Agency has announced that the number of confirmed Omicron cases in the UK has gone up by 101 since yesterday and is now 437.
That is a 30% increase.
#OmicronVariant latest information
— UK Health Security Agency (@UKHSA) December 7, 2021
101 additional confirmed cases of the #Omicron variant of COVID-19 have been reported across the UK.
The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the UK is 437. pic.twitter.com/5PAnH1RkvT
72 additional cases of the #Omicron variant of COVID-19 have been reported across England.
— UK Health Security Agency (@UKHSA) December 7, 2021
The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in England is 333.
28 additional cases of the #Omicron variant of COVID-19 have been reported across Scotland.
— UK Health Security Agency (@UKHSA) December 7, 2021
The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Scotland is 99.
1 additional case of the #Omicron variant of COVID-19 has been reported across Wales.
— UK Health Security Agency (@UKHSA) December 7, 2021
The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Wales is 5.
There have been no confirmed cases of the #Omicron variant of COVID-19 reported in Northern Ireland.
— UK Health Security Agency (@UKHSA) December 7, 2021
Omicron wave likely to peak in Wales at end of January, health minister says
The spread of Omicron is expected to reach its peak by the end of next month, the Welsh health minister Eluned Morgan has said.
She told a press briefing in Cardiff:
We are expecting a significant wave of Omicron to hit Wales. The modelling suggests it will reach its peak by around the end of January, which is why there is an urgency in terms of getting people vaccinated and boosters done as soon as possible.
Morgan said health boards are again setting up more vaccination centres, including walk-in and drive-through clinics with longer opening hours. Local government officials, firefighters and students are to provide support to the clinics and Morgan called for volunteers to come forward.
No new restrictions have been introduced in Wales in response to the new variant, but the first minister, Mark Drakeford, is due to announce the Labour-controlled government’s latest coronavirus review on Friday.
The Welsh Conservatives are worried that the government could extend its vaccine passport scheme (which currently affects settings such as nighclubs) to other hospitality businesses.
Shadow health minister Russell George said:
The possibility of extending vaccine passports to hospitality business is a slap in the face for one of the worst-affected sectors of the pandemic. They are coercive, ineffective, anti-business, and have no evidence base whatsoever.
Starmer criticises Johnson for not being honest about No 10 party
Keir Starmer has said that people are “very, very upset” by reports that No 10 staff broke lockdown rules last Christmas and that the Downing Street claims to the contrary are meaningless.
He told the BBC that there should be “no more of these games about ‘we were following the rules’, all these words that don’t mean anything”. He went on:
Be honest, own up. Very many people are very, very upset by this because while all the rest of the country was in lockdown, not seeing loved ones, the people who lost people in that period now know that there was a knees-up and a booze-up in Downing Street, and even now the prime minister can’t just be honest.
So I say to him: Be honest, own up. We don’t need a criminal investigation, we need a prime minister who is honest about it.
Updated
Johnson says new prisons strategy intended to cut re-offending
And here are the other lines from Boris Johnson’s pooled TV interview.
- Johnson said the prisons strategy announced today was intended to reduce reoffending. He said:
When young people, and it’s almost invariably young men, end up in in prison, that cannot be a dead end for them.
And we want to stop the drugs coming in. So we’re putting in a lot of money for scanners, but we also want them to come out with more qualifications and more self-esteem about their chances in the future. So basic English and maths and opportunities to learn things ... like painting and decorating and other skills that they can use so that they have a passport for their skills when they get out of prison.
Now, at the moment, recidivism is running at 70%. But for the protection of the public, to make our streets safer, we’ve got to get those numbers down, make sure that people get out of prison and get into jobs.
There is a summary of the strategy here, and here is the prisons stragegy white paper (pdf) published today.
- He dismissed claims that booster vaccines were not being rolled out fast enough. The Telegraph today splashed on a story saying that “the booster rollout vaccinated fewer people over the weekend than it did before ministers promised to put it ‘on steroids’”. But Johnson claimed the government was ahead of its own timetable. He claimed that the UK’s booster programme was “the fastest in Europe” and that it has delivered more booster jabs than in any comparable country. But it could go faster, he said.
TELEGRAPH: Booster rollout at a standstill #TomorrowsPapersToday pic.twitter.com/5bav8p36Ua
— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) December 6, 2021
- He said he did not think it was acceptable that some people were still waiting for power to be restored after Storm Arwen. “Too many people have spent too long without power,” he said. He said he had been told by those involved in restoring electricity that they had faced “massive technical difficulties”, partly because equipment froze. But that was no consolation to those affected, he said.
We need to learn the lessons for the future and make sure that we have better resilience against storms of this kind.
We haven’t seen a storm as violent as Storm Arwen for a long time. It’s likely to happen again, we have got to make sure that we protect people against it.
Updated
Johnson says it is 'complete nonsense' to claim he ordered evacuation of dogs from Kabul
Although Boris Johnson would not deny that a party took place at No 10 last Christmas, he was willing in his TV interview to give a robust denial to the claim that he personally intervened to order the rescue of dogs from Kabul in August. (See 11.15am.) That was “complete nonsense”, he said.
Johnson went on to praise the evacuation effort generally. It was “one of the outstanding military achievements of the last 50 years or more”, he claimed.
Updated
Johnson declines to adopt his spokesman's claim there was no No 10 party last Christmas
Boris Johnson has given a TV interview on a visit to a prison this morning, and for what may be the seventh day in a row (the story broke last Wednesday) he faced questions about the Downing Street party last Christmas.
Yesterday the PM’s spokesman claimed the event did not constitute a party. But asked today if he was personally saying that what happened was not a party, particularly in the light of the new reports saying people were asked to bring “secret Santa” presents (see 12.07pm), Johnson did not repeat that claim.
Instead, in line with what he said at PMQs last week, when he first refused to deny a party took place, he replied:
What I can tell you is that all the guidelines were observed, continue to be observed. And what I can also tell you is that we’re getting on with the job as we have been throughout of dealing with the priorities of the people, particularly fighting crime.
Asked again if this was or was not a party, Johnson repeated the point about the guidelines being followed at all times.
Asked if he had investigated that point personally, Johnson replied:
I have satisfied myself that the guidelines were followed at all times.
Updated
No 10 won't rule out diplomatic boycott of Winter Olympics in China
Here are the main points from the Downing Street lobby briefing.
- The PM’s spokesman strongly denied a claim from a Foreign Office official that Boris Johnson ordered the rescue of dogs from Kabul. (See 12.25pm.)
- The spokesman said the decision to allow a chartered flight to evacuate animals from a charity run by a Briton in the city did not distract from the effort to evacuate people. He said:
We are confident that at all times we prioritised people over animals. We continued to evacuate people right up until the last possible moment ... The approach we took [in] regards to that charter flight in no way distracted from that commitment.
In his evidence (pdf) to the foreign affairs committee, the Foreign Office whistleblower Raphael Marshall claims the government “transported animals which were not at risk of harm at the direct expense of evacuating British nationals and people at risk of imminent murder”. (See 10.38am.)
- Johnson told cabinet that the Omicron variant is more transmissible than Delta, the spokesman said. (See 12.40pm.)
- The spokesman stood by his claim from yesterday that there was no Christmas party in Downing Street last December. Asked if he wanted to revise his position in the light of the latest report saying staff were invited to the party at least a week in advance (see 12.07pm), the spokesman said he did not have anything more to add.
- The spokesman did not rule out the UK ordering a diplomatic boycott of the Winter Olympics in China. Asked if the UK would be following the US, which has announced such a boycott, the spokesman said that a decision had not yet been made on government attendance at the Olympics and that a decision would be announced “in due course”. This is from the Telegraph’s Lucy Fisher.
NEW: Downing Street is still playing for time to decide who, if anyone, from UK Govt will attend Chinese Olympics.
— Lucy Fisher (@LOS_Fisher) December 7, 2021
PM’s Official Spox says British attendance decisions will be set out “in due course”.
⏰ Clock ticking, as the Games begin in less than two months on Feb 4… https://t.co/DqIrrAsqMC
- The spokesman said that 539 homes were still waiting for power to be restored following Storm Arwen 11 days ago. Asked what the PM felt about such a long wait, the spokesman said:
It’s obviously unacceptable that these homes, these families are without power, we’ve seen the situation improve but that will not be of help to those who are still facing this challenge.
Omicron variant 'more transmissible than Delta', Johnson tells cabinet
At cabinet this morning Boris Johnson told his ministers that the Omicron variant is more transmissible than Delta, which is currently the dominant variant in the UK. The No 10 cabinet readout says:
The prime minister said it was too early to draw conclusions on the characteristics of Omicron but that early indications were that it was more transmissible than Delta. Further measures were introduced this week to help slow transmission and further seeding of the variant, and the prime minister reiterated that booster vaccines remain our best defence against new and existing variants, with the NHS on course to meet the target of offering a booster to all adults by the end of January.
Johnson’s comment will not have surprised ministers who have been reading the papers, because over the past week the evidence to back this up has been getting stronger and stronger.
No 10 says Foreign Office official's claim PM ordered rescue of dogs from Kabul 'entirely untrue'
The Downing Street lobby briefing has just finished, and the prime minister’s spokesman has strongly denied the claim from the Foreign Office whistleblower that Boris Johnson intervened to ensure that dogs from a rescue home run by a Briton in Kabul were rescued. (See 11.15am.)
Asked about the claim from Raphael Marshall , the spokesman said:
It’s entirely untrue. At no point did the prime minister intervene. We have always prioritised people over animals, as we said both during [the airlift] and subsequently.
Asked if the PM intervened to help Paul “Pen” Farthing and staff at his Nowzad animal charity to get out, the spokesman replied:
No, he didn’t instruct officials to take any particular course of action on that issue. As you know, this was agreed by the defence secretary. Clearance for Pen Farthing’s flight was sponsored by the UK.
Asked if the PM instructed ministers, the spokesman denied that too, and he said the PM’s focus was on saving and evacuating people.
The spokesman also insisted that the PM’s wife, Carrie, who is an animal rights campaigner, was not involved. Asked if she shared her views with officials in any way, the spokesman said she did not.
I will post more from the briefing soon.
Police watchdog asked to investigate claim that officers guarding No 10 did not stop illegal party
In the Times (paywall) today Oliver Wright says the Downing Street Christmas party last year (the one that No 10 claims wasn’t a party, and did not breach lockdown rules) was organised at least a week in advance, via WhatsApp. Wright says:
The party last year is understood to have been organised via a WhatsApp group with staff asked to bring “Secret Santa” presents. Some of those present also wore Christmas jumpers.
About 30 people are understood to have attended the event. Some staff working in other parts of the building are said to have joined in the festivities later in an “impromptu” way ...
Two sources have confirmed that the December 18 event did take place, with one saying it that it had been organised in advance. “Of course it was premeditated because everyone came with Secret Santa presents. It was arranged at least a week in advance via WhatsApp with a follow-up email.”
They added that there was a “proper spread” of food that people had brought along with alcohol. “The majority of people there were civil servants with a few special advisers and others there,” the source added. “But it was mostly officials.”
Jenny Jones, the Green party peer, has written to the Independent Office for Police Conduct asking for an investigation on the grounds that, if there was a party, the police on duty at Downing Street must have known about it, and therefore played a role in facilitating an illegal gathering.
My complaint to the police complaints body IOPC about why #metpolice refuse to report, or subsequently investigate, a christmas party at Downing Street when they had officers guarding the place inside and out. pic.twitter.com/yXA0ZtYSqH
— GreenJJNews (@GreenJJNews) December 6, 2021
Raab denies government planning annual 'interpretation bill' to allow it to overrule judicial review decisions
In his Today programme interview this morning Dominic Raab, the justice secretary, strongly played down a report in the Times yesterday claiming the government wants to make it easier for ministers to overrule judicial review decisions that go against them. Asked if it was true he was planning to limit the power of judges to order the government to obey the law, Raab replied: “No.” Asked about claims the government wanted to have an annual “interpretation bill” to allow judicial review decisions to be overruled, he replied: “I don’t even recognise that title.”
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Photograph: Victoria Jones/PA
Here are a few of the (very many) Twitter tributes to Harriet Harman, following her announcement that she is standing down as an MP at the next election. (See 9.36am.)
From Keir Starmer, the Labour leader
Harriet, your commitment to Labour and Camberwell and Peckham for almost 40 years is phenomenal.
— Keir Starmer (@Keir_Starmer) December 7, 2021
A champion for women and social justice - you've paved the way for future generations.
It’s been a privilege to work with you, I look forward to continuing to do so for a while yet. https://t.co/u53OXjrOsd
From Ed Miliband, the former leader
Feminist, fighter, conviction politician. Harriet taught me so much as my first political boss and was a brilliant deputy. She has achieved so much and will be sorely missed from the House of Commons. https://t.co/iogmvNBjXL
— Ed Miliband (@Ed_Miliband) December 7, 2021
From Tom Watson, the former deputy leader
One of the most talented parliamentarians of her generation. She’s made a huge difference to society but rarely given the credit she deserves. When I joined Labour in 1982, we still had women’s sections that made the tea at Party events! Hard to imagine now. Thank you Harriet. 🙏🏻 https://t.co/OanvgCWMyC
— Tom Watson (@tom_watson) December 7, 2021
From Labour MP Jess Phillips
All my life Harriet has been in Parliament and as a woman that life would have been very different if she hadn't. Harriet Harman is my hero. I owe her a debt so big it cannot be repaid. https://t.co/eCKJJBgdVo
— Jess Phillips MP (@jessphillips) December 7, 2021
From the Labour MP Sarah Champion
Wow, this is hugely significant. Harriet has literally changed the face of Parliament, we largely owe the fact there are so many women MPs to her. Plus, she was the inspiration & driving force behind the equality act. Thank you ❤️ https://t.co/BnMhEng3fP
— Sarah Champion (@SarahChampionMP) December 7, 2021
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Amanda Spielman, head of the Ofsted schools inspectorate, has said England risks a repeat of cases such as Arthur Labinjo-Hughes, the six-year-old abused and murdered in his own home last year, if schools and social services are disrupted by future lockdowns, my colleague Richard Adams reports.
PM told officials to help ensure evacuation of dogs from Kabul, FCDO whistleblower claims
In his memo (pdf) for the foreign affairs committee, Raphael Marshall, the Foreign Office whistleblower, says Boris Johnson ordered officials to help ensure that Paul “Pen” Farthing, a former Royal Marine who ran a dog charity in Kabul called Nowzad, was able to evacuate his animals. Marshall says:
We received an instruction from the prime minister to use considerable capacity to transport Nowzad’s animals.
But Marshall does not elaborate on the PM’s involvement in his memo. Elsewhere he says that Wendy Morton, a Foreign Office minister, intervened and asked for help with the Nowzad evacuation.
Over the summer there were suspicions that Johnson was involved in the decision to help Nowzad (a decision that angered Ben Wallace, the defence secretary) because his wife, Carrie, is a passionate animal lover. But No 10 said at the time that neither Johnson nor his wife were involved.
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Emily Thornberry, the shadow atttorney general and a former shadow foreign secretary, has said Dominic Raab should resign because of the failings at the Foreign Office documented by the whistleblower Raphael Marshall. She told Times Radio:
It sounds complete chaos. But responsibility goes to the top and what we have at the moment is we had the former foreign secretary training around the television and the radio studios, not being prepared to take any responsibility for this at all. That I’m afraid is yet another example of the poor character of Dominic Raab. I really think that he should consider his position.
“Consider his position” is Westminster terminology for resign. Thornberry does not mean Raab should have a good think about whether he is in the right job, and then decide he is. But given that Raab has already left the Foreign Office (in what was seen as a demotion), calling for him to quit now is unusual.
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What FCDO whistleblower said about Raab in detail, and how Raab responded
And here is what Dominic Raab said this morning when asked about some of the specific criticisms in the lengthy memo (pdf) from the Foreign Office whistleblower, Raphael Marshall.
Number of Afghans who failed to receive help
What Marshall says:
I estimate between 75,000 and 150,000 people (including dependents) applied for evacuation under the LOTR scheme [leave outside the rules scheme - a scheme for Afghans whose lives were at risk and who did not qualify for the Afghan relocations and assistance policy (ARAP), which helped Afghans who had worked for the British]. The vast majority of these applicants feared their lives were at risk as a result of their connection to the UK and the West and were therefore eligible for evacuation.
I estimate fewer than 5% of these people have received any assistance. It is clear that some of those left behind have since been murdered by the Taliban.
What Raab says:
Asked if he recognised the 5% figure, Raab said:
I don’t. But what is certainly true is that we had a lot of people rushing to get out of Afghanistan for all sorts of reasons.
And I think it’s right that we had a process in place to check two things: one, that we were helping those at genuine risk of persecution, or British nationals or people who had worked for the British government.
And secondly, making sure that we didn’t allow anyone to come into the UK who might present a threat to the UK.
And it was important to have a process to make those decisions swiftly but also accurately.
Prioritising animals over humans
What Marshall says:
I believe that British soldiers were put at risk in order to bring [the dog charity] Nowzad’s animals into the airport. It has been reported that British soldiers ventured into the crowd around Kabul airport to clear the way for Nowzad’s vehicles. At this point, the crowd was estimated to exceed 25,000 people, with many Taliban fighters present. There were many reports of people being crushed to death. On 26 August, 13 US Marines and around 170 civilians were murdered by an Isis-K suicide bomber in the same area of the airport. In these circumstances, any task which involved British soldiers venturing into the crowd presented a meaningful risk to the soldiers.
I understand that an American animal charity is still operating in Kabul managed by an American. I understand the animals and staff of this charity have not been subject to any mistreatment by the Taliban. I understand that far from being harassed by the Taliban, this charity has been able to hire members of the Taliban. This vindicates the MoD and FCDO’s belief that neither Nowzad’s animals nor its staff were at risk from the Taliban.
HMG therefore transported animals which were not at risk of harm at the direct expense of evacuating British nationals and people at risk of imminent murder, including interpreters who had served with the British Army.
What Raab says:
That’s just not accurate. We did not put the welfare of animals above individuals.
Asked if Marshall was lying about this, Raab said:
I am not accusing anyone of lying. I am just correcting the facts.
Desk officers taking key decisions
What Marshall says:
Marshall said at certain points desk officers [relatively junior officials] took key decisions relating to who would get help. He says:
At this point two colleagues (I believe a D6/G7/Team Leader and a C4/HEO/Desk Officer respectively) further narrowed down the list in line with a senior civil servant’s instructions. These were committed people and I am sure they carried out this task with integrity. However it is unclear on what basis they made these decisions.
What Raab says:
The suggestion that junior desk officers were making decisions is just not correct. There’s a difference between processing and deciding, so I’m afraid I don’t accept that characterisation.
Time taken to take decisions
What Marshall says:
To address some of the numerous requests for the reconsideration of particular cases we received, the Crisis Centre adopted a system of submitting exceptional cases to the foreign secretary for approval. We therefore wrote notes or submissions on a series of individual cases which arose for the foreign secretary’s approval.
It took several hours for the foreign secretary to engage on any of these notes.
What Raab says:
On the charge it took several hours to make decisions, we’re not talking about days, it’s not been suggested weeks, but several hours to make sure we had the facts, and that, as between myself, the home secretary and the defence secretary, decisions were made and actually I would suggest that’s a reasonably swift turnaround.
Staffing shortages
What Marshall says:
Marshall has a whole section in his paper with the heading “inadequate staffing”. At one point he said:
On the afternoon of Saturday 21 August, I was the only person monitoring and processing emails in the Afghan special cases inbox. No emails from after early Friday afternoon had been read at that point. The number of unread emails was already in the high thousands, I believe above 5,000, and increasing constantly.
What Raab says:
I think the inherent challenge of getting factual questions in relation to undocumented people applying for the three different schemes that were available - that is inherent. I don’t think having extra staff in London would have particularly made that easier.
The challenge was deciphering the facts on the ground, as well as the second operational challenge, which was making sure we could get to the airport in Kabul, safe passage, given the very difficult conditions there.
Asked about Marshall working on his own, Raab said:
It certainly wouldn’t be correct to say that he was the only person working on it. We had a thousand people working. Of course, they would do it on a rota shift, but the Foreign Office were working night and day, but of course this was a joint operation because the claims were coming through in relation to three separate schemes and the Home Office, the MoD was working with the Foreign Office. I think the cross-Whitehall effort was extensive.
And at another point Raab said:
Well over 1,000 Foreign Office staff were working often night and day on rota system … as well as the troops on the ground in Afghanistan under incredible operational pressures. I would point to the fact that in just two weeks, 15,000 people were evacuated.
I don’t think in living memory we’ve seen an operation on that scale and certainly in relation to this one, no other country bar the United States evacuated more.
How Raab wanted information presented
What Marshall says:
It took several hours for the foreign secretary to engage on any of these notes. In the circumstances, I am not sure why. The foreign secretary then replied through his private office to say that he could not decide on individual cases and he would need all the cases set out in a well-presented table to make decisions. I understand that he or his private office had commented that as a lawyer he could not take information without the full facts in a table. We therefore reformatted the table and sent it back to the foreign secretary.
What Raab says:
In terms of presentation, of course with the volume of claims coming in I make no apology for saying I needed the clear facts that each case presented precisely so we can make swift decisions.
Updated
Raab claims criticism of Kabul evacuation from Foreign Office whistleblower ignores 'facts on the ground'
The memo from Raphael Marshall, a former official at the Foreign Office about how the FCDO (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, as it is now) handled the withdrawal from Afghanistan is particularly powerful because it is long, detailed, and calmly and rationally argued. You can read it in full here (pdf).
Although Dominic Raab, who was foreign secretary at the time, is disputing many of the claims in the document, he is not dismissing the whole thing out of hand.
Speaking on the Today programme, he accepted that there were lessons to be learned from the operation.
But he also argued that, in general, Marshall was not taking enough account of the “facts on the ground”. He said:
Do I also want to say that some of the criticism seems rather dislocated from the facts on the ground - the operational pressures that with the takeover of the Taliban, unexpected around the world, both our teams in Afghanistan, military, Home Office, Foreign Office, all doing a great job, working very closely together, coupled with the crisis centre in London? Yeah, I do think that not enough recognition has been given to quite how difficult it was.
Updated
Harriet Harman says she is standing down as MP at next election
Harriet Harman, who was Labour’s deputy leader from 2007 and 2015 and who served as interim party leader after Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband both resigned, has announced that she is standing down from parliament.
After nearly 40 years in Parliament I won't be standing again at the next election. It's been a great honour to be an MP and to represent Camberwell & Peckham since 1982. I will do that with complete commitment and enthusiasm up until the last day! My email to C & P Lab members👇 pic.twitter.com/CFv1pZcX9a
— Harriet Harman (@HarrietHarman) December 7, 2021
She has also posted a nice Twitter thread on what has changed during her time in parliament here.
It's been a long time... pic.twitter.com/BQJiGa2vj4
— Harriet Harman (@HarrietHarman) December 7, 2021
Although Harman never held particularly high office in government, her record as a campaigner is remarkable and it is hard to think of any MP in parliament now who has been linked with pushing through so much transformative, progressive change.
I’ll post more on her departure later.
‘Inaccurate in certain respects’: Raab defends record after damning account of handling of fall of Kabul
Good morning. It is a difficult day for Dominic Raab, the deputy prime minister and justice secretary, because a former official has given the Commons foreign affairs committee a shocking account of how the Foreign Office handled the evacuation of Afghanistan when Raab was foreign secretary. My colleague Patrick Wintour has the story here.
And my colleague Aubrey Allegretti has summarises the whistleblower’s main accusations here.
Commenting on the evidence, set out in this 40-page memo (pdf), Tom Tugendhat, the Conservative chair of the foreign affairs committee, said:
These allegations are serious and go to the heart of the failures of leadership around the Afghan disaster, which we have seen throughout this inquiry. These failures betrayed our friends and allies and squandered decades of British and Nato effort. The evidence we’ve heard alleges dysfunction within the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and substantial failings throughout the Afghanistan evacuation effort.
Raab has been giving interviews this morning, and he has rejected some – but by no means all – of the claims made in the memo. Asked on the Today programme if the description of the Foreign Office as dysfunctional and chaotic under his leadership was unfair and untrue, Raab replied: “What I would say is it’s inaccurate in certain respects.”
He also told Sky News that he did not think the problems with the handling of the evacuation from Afghanistan led to his being demoted in the subsequent reshuffle.
Kay B: You lost your job because of this...@DominicRaab: I don't think that's true
— Kay Burley (@KayBurley) December 7, 2021
Kay B: Why did you lose your job then? 🤔#KayBurley #Afghanistan UF pic.twitter.com/1axDrC5nw8
I will post more from his interviews shortly.
Here is the agenda for the day
9.30am: Boris Johnson chairs cabinet.
10am: Tracey Crouch, the former sports minister, gives evidence to the Commons culture committee about her fan-led review of football governance.
11.30am: Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, takes questions in the Commons.
11.30am: Downing Street holds its lobby briefing.
After 12.45pm: MPs resume their debate on the nationality and borders bill.
2.20pm: Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s first minister, gives a statement to MSPs about Covid.
3pm: Sir Philip Barton, head of the Foreign Office, and other senior diplomats give evidence to the Commons foreign affairs committee about Afghanistan.
3.30pm: Alok Sharma, president of Cop26, gives evidence to the environmental audit committee.
I try to monitor the comments below the line (BTL) but it is impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer questions, and if they are of general interest, I will post the question and reply above the line (ATL), although I can’t promise to do this for everyone.
If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter. I’m on @AndrewSparrow.
Alternatively, you can email me at andrew.sparrow@theguardian.com
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