James Heale

The remarkable thing about today’s Liaison Committee is how unremarkable it was. During the ninety-minute session with the chairmen of the House of Commons' select committees, the contrast with Boris Johnson’s box office battles could not have been clearer. Sunak sought to conciliate, downplay and comfort at every turn, seeking to offer warm words and switching his focus between the macro and the micro: matching MPs on specifics to assure them he was across the detail while taking difficult questions back to his first principles. Child refugees? We have to stop the boats. If Northern Ireland is in the single market, why not Scotland? The 2014 vote remains in force. NHS pay? There will be funds – but we must halve inflation.

Boris Johnson has just finished a mammoth three hour evidence session in front of the Privileges Committee inquiry into whether he misled the House about Covid guidance being broken in No. 10. It was a combative affair at times with Johnson displaying flashes of anger and irritation – understandable given it was twice as long as the Liaison Committee grillings he was used to as PM. If this were a boxing match, it would appear to be decided on a points decision, with neither side being able to land a killer blow: Johnson looked on the ropes at times but the committee were unable to conclusively prove that the ex-premier had knowingly misled the House. Still despite all the heat, there was some light in the proceedings, ahead of the committee's forthcoming report.

Boris Johnson has today published his long-awaited ‘partygate’ defence, ahead of his appearance before the Privileges Committee tomorrow afternoon. In the 52-page submission, Johnson accepts that he did mislead the House of Commons when he said that ‘the rules and guidance had been followed at all times’ during Covid. But he insists he made his statements ‘in good faith’ and that he ‘would never have dreamed’ of doing so intentionally. The committee claims that his submission ‘contains no new documentary evidence'; sources close to Johnson dispute this. Johnson’s defence broadly relies on three familiar arguments. The first is the absence of any smoking gun which proves that he definitely knew that the rules had been broken.

It’s the day after Jeremy Hunt's first Budget and so far the Chancellor has managed to avoid disaster. Reaction has been muted, with the Daily Mail asking the question on the mind of many Tories: 'Is it enough to turn the tide?' The Guardian and Mirror have, predictably, focused on criticism of Hunt's proposal to abolish the Lifetime Allowance but thus far the Chancellor is yet to see his Budget 'unravel' in the manner of George Osborne's 2012 statement or Kwasi Kwarteng's 'fiscal event.' However, this morning's Budget briefing from the Institute of Fiscal Studies offered some grim analysis. Paul Johnson and his number-crunching team ran through the figures in the Spring Budget in detail.

In the Budget we heard plenty about welfare reform and how Conservatives believe in hard work. But in the small print, the OBR reveals it expects just 10,000 to go back to employment because of tighter conditionality on benefits: a tiny sliver of the 5.2 million on out-of-work benefits. A greater number – 75,000 – are expected back to part-time work due to greater childcare support. But the biggest number – 160,000 – are expected from something Jeremy Hunt did not mention at all: migration. This is perhaps the biggest unspoken feature of today’s Budget. Overall, the OBR says it now assumes net migration to settle at 245,000 a year – up from 205,000 it expected only last November and 129,000 in March last year.

Rishi Sunak has announced in California the details of the UK-US pact to supply Australia with nuclear-powered submarines. Aukus was first-unveiled in September 2021: in the 18 months since, the three nations have agreed that the new fleet will be built in Britain and Australia to British designs. It's only the second time ever that the United States have shared nuclear submarine technology with its allies, following a similar UK/US deal in 1958. The first of these submarines are expected to be ready in the UK in the late 2030s and will mainly be built by BAE Systems at Barrow-in-Furness, and Rolls-Royce.