Another week brings another litany of Tory nonsense.
This week, Boris Johnson made history – though not in a way he might have liked – an MP was found to be a sex offender, and the government gave us all a bank holiday treat by letting us know they want to shove asylum seekers to Rwanda, for some reason.
With a grimace, we look back at the week that was.
And you can too:
1. Rishi Sunak’s financial affairs row continues
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It has been a particularly bad week for Sunak for two reasons. Firstly, his and his wife’s financial affairs continue to face scrutiny.
Sunak has asked for an investigation into his own financial affairs after his wife was criticised for having “non dom” status, meaning she has legally avoided about £20m in tax, and he himself was criticised for having a US green card – suggesting permanent residency abroad.
He has also been slammed because his list of ministers’ interests contains no mention of his wife’s £690m stake in Indian company Infosys – which has UK government contracts.
We will get to the second reason later…
2. Tory MP found guilty of sexually assaulting a child
This week, Imran Ahmad Khan was found guilty of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old boy in 2008.
A jury heard he forced the youngster to drink gin, dragged him upstairs and asked him to watch pornography before assaulting him.
Later in the week, he announced he is resigning from the Commons and said he is appealing against his conviction.
Khan is set to be sentenced at a later date.
3. Another Tory MP defends sex offender MP
If that wasn’t bad enough, Crispin Blunt sparked huge backlash after he defended Khan.
“I am utterly appalled and distraught at the dreadful miscarriage of justice that has befallen my friend and colleague Imran Ahmad Khan, MP for Wakefield since December 2019,” he wrote in a statement.
“I sat through some of the trial. The conduct of this case relied on lazy tropes about LGBT+ people that we might have thought we had put behind us decades ago.
“As a former justice minister, I was prepared to testify about the truly extraordinary sequence of events that has resulted in Imran being put through this nightmare start to his parliamentary career.”
After being slammed by other MPs, he issued a retraction:
Blunt wrote: “On reflection I have decided to retract my statement defending Imran Ahmad Khan. I am sorry that my defence of him has been a cause of significant upset and concern not least to victims of sexual offences.”
4. PM and chancellor fined over Partygate
Remember when we said Johnson made history this week? Here’s why…
Johnson has become the first sitting prime minister to be sanctioned by the police for breaking the law in office!
Have you sent him a congratulations card?
He and Sunak ( we told you we’d get to the second reason why it has been such a bad week for him) were both slapped with a £50 fine by the police for breaking lockdown rules by gathering in Downing Street in June 2020 briefly to celebrate Johnson’s birthday. The one where he was “ambushed with a cake”…
Despite criticism, he said he would not resign and although he apologised he said: “In all frankness at that time it did not occur to me that this might have been a breach of the rules”.
Meanwhile, the police continue investigating 12 events alleged to have taken place in Downing Street while the country endured Covid restrictions and it has handed out 50 fines in total so far.
Makes you proud to be British.
5. Tory MPs flock to defend their lawbreaking colleagues
Then we were serenaded with sycophancy from ministers and MPs dragged out to defend their lawbreaking colleagues.
We had Nadine Dorries, of course, telling everyone to move on. We had Edwina Currie seeming bored by the whole affair. We had Jacob Rees-Mogg once again saying people should focus on the war in Ukraine instead. We had Grant Shapps telling us to judge Johnson “in the round”.
And then…
6. One MP does so by making cack-handed comment about teachers and nurses
Kudos to the loyalty Michael Fabricant has for his leader. So keen is he to stand firm with his party against the pesky police’s findings that he will say just about anything to get Johnson off the hook.
Or at least that’s how it seemed when he told BBC News that Johnson probably didn’t think he was breaking the law and teachers and nurses probably did the same sort of thing. teachers and nurses probably did the same sort of thing.
“I think at the time just like many teachers and nurses who after a very, very long shift would tend to go back to the staff room and have a quiet drink which is more or less what he has done…. I don’t think he thought he was breaking the law, but of course that doesn’t make any sort of excuse…,” he said.
His comments sparked controversy and nursing and teaching bodies called him out.
7. Government launches controversial Rwanda plan for asylum seekers
With all that chatter about fines and taxes ringing in the nation’s ears, the government decided to make some policy.
Did they announce measures to deal with the cost of living crisis? No. Make any progress on climate change? Don’t be silly. What then?
Well, they decided that migrants arriving in the UK will be “offshored” to Rwanda while they wait for an asylum decision from the Home Office.
It is understood that the Rwandan government will be paid an initial cost of £120m under the deal, which will be funded by the taxpayer.
The government say it will stop people smugglers but the plan has been criticised with Priti Patel’s counterpart in the Labour Party Yvette Cooper calling it “unworkable, unethical and extortionate” and even Tory former cabinet minister Andrew Mitchell dubbed it a “British Guantanamo Bay”.
8. Local politician resigns after Nazi uniform photo row
That’s national politics but surely things are a bit more encouraging at a local level? Nope!
A London Conservative Association chair has resigned after he said he “could not rule out” that he was once pictured in Nazi military uniform.
Colin Davis, formerly of the Enfield Southgate Conservative Association told Jewish News he had “no recollection” of the occasion “at all” after an image said to be of him a number of decades ago was sent to the paper this week.
He said he could not recall dressing up as a Nazi, but added that “there were various wild parties, very perverse themes expressed… I can’t absolutely rule it out”.
Just another week in Tory Britain…
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