Tory MP John Stevenson submits letter of no confidence in Boris Johnson – UK politics live | Politics

Our correspondent Jessica Elgot makes it 46 Tory MPs who have either written a letter of no confidence or suggested the prime minister should stand down. And she notes those are only the ones who have so far gone public.

The threshold number of letters required to trigger a vote of no confidence is 54.

Urging caution among Tory MPs considering submitting letters of no confidence in the prime minister, the science minister, George Freeman, has told the BBC’s World At One that Boris Johnson “didn’t stand as the patron saint of virtue” and that “people knew who they were electing”.

“He got a massive majority,” said Freeman. “Got us out of the Brexit deadlock, delivered the pandemic vaccine programme success, Ukraine, cost of living – £37bn [the projected size of the support package announced this week].

“Before we change prime ministers we need to make sure we’re doing the day job first. We mustn’t be driven by short-term speculation.”

Boris Johnson has written to civil servants explaining that the government needs “fewer” of them and apologising for the “concern and uncertainty” caused by his plan to reduce staff numbers.

In a message sent to civil servants and seen by the PA news agency, the prime minister outlined how the civil service has grown by 20% since 2016 during “exceptional circumstances”, but that it needs to spend taxpayers’ money “judiciously” and will look to reduce costs in the face of high inflation.

Johnson said:

We no longer require the state to have the same colossal presence in people’s lives. And rolling back the state in turn means we will also need fewer civil servants.

The general secretary of the Public and Commercial Services Union, Mark Serwotka, said:

The prime minister thanks civil servants in one sentence, tells them their jobs are at risk in the next. He is a disgrace and we call on him to stand down immediately for the good of the country.

Earlier this month, Johnson tasked ministers with cutting about 90,000 civil service jobs – about a fifth of its workforce – to get numbers down to 2016 levels.

Part of his message sent on Tuesday reads:

I profoundly believe that the public service you provide is a great and noble calling, but we must also remember that every penny of it is paid for by the taxpayer. That money is not the government’s money, it’s the people’s money – hard-earned pounds that we share a moral duty to spend judiciously.

So we must ensure the cost of government is no greater than absolutely necessary to deliver for the people we serve. And as many families and businesses now look at how to reduce their costs in a period of higher global inflation, it is right that we do the same.

That is why I have asked my ministerial team and permanent secretaries to develop proposals to return the civil service to the size it was in 2016.

I know that this will cause concern and uncertainty and I am sorry for that. It is why I want us to complete this work swiftly and to provide every possible support to anyone affected by the changes that follow.

Even with these changes, we are retaining a very substantial civil service – as we had in 2016 – and we are taking forward an exciting programme of modernisation that will create better jobs.

The general secretary of the Prospect union, Mike Clancy, said there would be “deep anger” among members “that the prime minister seems to be giving them a slap on the back while saying one in five of their jobs will go”.

He continued:

And, beyond worrying about their jobs, staff also face a cost of living crisis which this prime minister has done nothing but deepen.

These massive cuts to public services will do immeasurable damage to the public services we all rely on. It is time for the government to step back and drop these reckless plans.

Andrea Thorpe, the chairman of Maidstone and the Weald Conservative Association, said: “I do think we need firm leadership, a firmer leadership now.”

She told BBC Radio 4’s World at One programme:

My position is very changeable. Last week I thought he [Boris Johnson] has got to stay. This week, having spoken to many constituents here, a lot of people are just waiting for the letters to pile into Sir Graham Brady’s inbox and I think the damage has been done.

She added:

But there’s more to it than Partygate now. It’s the cost of living; it’s the fact that we’ve still got the national insurance rise; we’ve still got VAT on fuel. All of these, these aren’t Conservative values and we’re not getting lower taxes; we’re just in this state of, the whole country seems to, the police aren’t working, the NHS isn’t working and I think that’s the general feeling I’m getting.

John Stevenson says he has submitted a letter of no confidence in the prime minister, and that he is “deeply disappointed” in revelations about the parties and events during lockdown.

A statement by the Tory MP has been shared on Twitter by ITV’s Tom Sheldrick.

In the statement, Stevenson says he called for Boris Johnson to put himself forward for a vote of confidence as a way to “draw the line under all the recent issues”.

He said:

The continuing criticism, revelations and questionsare debilitating for the government at a time when there are so many other important and critical issues to be addressed.

The MP for Carlisle concluded:

Sadly, the prime minister appears unwilling to bring matters to a head and submit himself to such a vote. Therefore, the only option is for the Conservative MPs to facilitate a vote of confidence. I have already taken the appropriate action.

Tobi Thomas

The UK civil service has paused its flagship graduate scheme for at least a year in order to reduce its number of staff.

The scheme, known as the civil service fast stream, will not run in 2023 as it has in previous years. The decision was made at a Cabinet Office board meeting on 19 May, chaired by Stephen Barclay, the prime minister’s chief of staff.

The move comes after the government said it wanted to cut 91,000 civil service roles to save money.

The civil service fast stream is made up of 15 individual schemes, and graduates with a minimum degree result of 2:2 are able to apply.

Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, sent a letter to civil servants in which he acknowledged that although the job cuts would be “challenging”, civil service staffing levels had risen significantly since 2016, partly due to the coronavirus pandemic.

In 2016 the state employed the fewest civil servants since the second world war, 384,000, but due to Brexit that number rose to 475,000 at the end of 2021.

The government also said it had not completely ruled out a recruitment freeze or compulsory redundancies to reduce staffing levels. However, the decision to pause the civil service fast stream has faced criticism.

Alex Thomas, a programme director at the Institute for Government thinktank, said:

Pausing the fast stream as a way for the civil service to bring in new talent from different backgrounds risks cutting off the supply of people who have the digital and project management skills to improve public services.

Focusing on headcount reductions rather than budget savings can create perverse incentives, skewing towards losing the cheaper and younger talent rather than making bigger efficiencies elsewhere.

Read more here:

My colleague Jessica Elgot has been sent another example of a Tory MP being openly critical of Boris Johnson but falling short of calling for his resignation.

In a letter to a constituent West Cornwall’s MP Derek Thomas says he doubts the prime minister can restore trust and suggests he misled MPs but then doesn’t say he should go.

George Grylls of the Times has put together a thread of Tory MPs who have been critical of Boris Johnson but who have “gone under the radar – showing [the] breadth of dissent”.

In a letter to a constituent, Andrew Selous said:

I have no power over whether anyone else chooses to resign. I do advocate strongly for high standards in public life, standards which I try to adhere to myself.

John Lamont, meanwhile, has described reading about the parties in Downing Street during lockdown as “sickening” and says he awaiting the findings of the House of Commons investigation into potential breaches of the ministerial code.

Kate Griffiths said she “remains angry about the actions of the prime minister and his senior staff” and says there are still “unanswered questions”.

In his column for his local paper The Kidderminster Shuttle, Mark Garnier said of reading the Sue Grey report and seeing the leaked photographs of the event:

I can’t pretend to say that this looks anything other than awful. The stories become more lurid by the day, and some question the probity of the Met and how their view on what happened seems to differ from what appears in released photographs.

Finally, Andrew Murrison said he was still considering whether or not to put a letter in.

Tobi Thomas

The former children’s commissioner for England has called for free school meals to be extended to all families on universal credit, while acknowledging that poverty has not been tackled in this country “well enough”.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme, Anne Longfield, who is chairing a year-long commission on young lives, said she had supported the extension of free school meals to all families receiving the benefit for “some time”, adding that this was something Marcus Rashford and Henry Dimbleby had also called for.

It came as teaching unions have written to the chancellor and education secretary asking for free school meals to be provided for all children from families receiving universal credit in England.

In a letter seen by the BBC, unions and organisations claiming to represent 1 million school staff asked for an urgent expansion of the scheme amid the cost of living crisis. It said vulnerable children not receiving the meals were facing a “real barrier to learning”.

The letter said:

We see the devastating reality of children coming to school unable to afford to buy lunch, because their family circumstances mean they fall outside the restrictive free school meal eligibility criteria.

Longfield said:

[Free school meals for families on universal credit] is something that makes sense in any day. But at the moment we’re in a huge financial turmoil, families are struggling with the huge cost of living increase, so [free school meals] adds certainty.

It means that all children get a nutritious meal, they learn and concentrate better, and it makes a positive difference to their physical health and their time in school.

Longfield said she supported making schools meals free for all primary-age children, as it “takes away the stigma from the young children which would take free school meals”.

She added: “But ultimately this is about tacking poverty, which is something we haven’t done in this country well enough.”

Read the full story here:

It is “pointless speculating about something unless or until it happens”, the arts minister, Stephen Parkinson, said when asked about the prospect of a confidence vote in the prime minister.

Asked about his experience as Theresa May’s adviser, Lord Parkinson told Sky News:

Well there’s an awful lot of speculation about the numbers of letters that go in and past experience shows, not just then but before, the only person that knows how many letters that have been sent in is the chairman of the 1922 Committee [Sir Graham Brady].

It’s pretty pointless to speculate about the numbers before then, it’s a distraction from the work of government and in government we’re getting on with making sure that we grow the economy to help with the cost of living.

He added: “It’s pointless speculating about something unless or until it happens.”

Asked if the rebellion against Johnson was growing, Parkinson said: “We’ll cross those bridges if and when we come to them.”

He said:

Only Sir Graham Brady knows how many letters are sent and it’s just important that across government we’re focusing on the things that matter, at DCMS that’s the happy news of announcing the new city of culture winner which we’ll be doing this evening.

He added:

Well, the prime minister’s taken responsibility, he’s apologised for what went on in No 10, he’s made some changes to the operation there, so that people can see that a difference is being made and he is redoubling his efforts to focus on the things that matter to people. The cost of living, the war in Ukraine.

It’s for colleagues in the House of Commons to decide what they want to do, in the House of Lords that doesn’t affect us, we don’t write letters to the chairman of the ‘22, but across government everybody is focusing on the things that matter to people, making sure they can get away on their holidays, making sure that there’s help with the rising cost of living, making sure that the economy is growing, that we’re getting people into good jobs, clearing the backlogs in the NHS because of the Coronavirus pandemic and that’s the sort of thing that people want us to be focusing on.