Recess may have arrived for MPs and Peers, but it wouldn’t be a political family Christmas affair without a dose of drama! Read on for the happenings and not-so-happenings of Parliament in the last few days. Read 2023's final Who's Top Who's Not below
'Twas the week before Christmas, and all through the house...
With recess having fallen, MPs and Peers – along with the rest of the country – will be hunkering down at home for the festive period, to return on the 8th January.
But it wouldn’t be a political family Christmas affair without a dose of drama! Read on for the happenings and not-so-happenings of Parliament in the last few days.
With that, the Whitehouse team bids you a very happy Christmas and New Year. We’ll be back bright-eyed and bushy-tailed with your next dose of Who’s Top, Who’s Not in 2024.
Flying High: Julia Lopez
No doubt bleary eyed and sleep deprived, WTWN gives a warm welcome back to Julia Lopez after her maternity leave!
Lopez will re-assume her position as Minister for Media, Tourism and Creative Industries jointly within the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and Department for Science, Innovation and Technology.
She’ll have a lot to catch up on. The legislative beast that was the Online Safety Bill has since passed into law, while the nascent Media Bill has now had its early stages in the House of Commons – which sits squarely within Lopez’s remit.
Together with upcoming reviews on Internet-TV channels, Local TV, VisitEngland and VisitBritain, and on online advertising, Lopez won’t have long after Christmas to get her feet back under the desk.
Middle Ranking: Rishi Sunak
We’re used to the Prime Minister being the one in charge – our most senior political leader, and the one who gives orders to those in offices beneath him.
We’re less used to our Prime Minister being told off. Yet, Sunak has been sent to the naughty corner by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) for making misleading claims that “debt is falling”.
Chair of the ONS, Sir Robert Chote, reprimanded him for undermining “trust in the government’s use of statistics”, clarifying that debt is not already falling.
The claim by Sunak has been interpreted as him intending to suggest that he is meeting one of his five tests in government for 2023 – notably, his pledge to “make sure our national debt is falling”. If so, it’s a clear sign that those in Westminster are already well in the mindset of an upcoming election – even if the next general election date is yet to be formally confirmed.
The ONS’s reprimanding may not in itself evolve into much more than a mishap. But Sunak’s real problem is that voters don’t like being lied to. With a general election somewhere on the near horizon, playing footsies with the truth is a dangerous game for the party-in-power to play.
Sinking Quickly: Peter Bone
Is there a greater disgrace for a Member of Parliament than to be expelled outside of an election by your own constituents?
In a reminder of the power relationship between constituents and their MP, Peter Bone has lost his seat in Wellingborough after a successful recall petition by his local constituents.
Prompted after Bone was suspended from the House of Commons for breaching the MP code of conduct for bullying and sexual misconduct claims, the petition now triggers a by-election to be held in the new year.
Labour will be licking its lips at the prospect of re-claiming a seat that was last red in 2001. Bone, meanwhile, joins this year’s long Naughty List of disorderly MPs – along with the likes of Margaret Ferrier and Paul Bristow. At a time when the Conservative Party might have been hoping for some light festive relief and a fresh start in 2024, they are instead staring down the barrel of yet another daunting by-election.