Prime minister Boris Johnson has appointed Jacob Rees-Mogg as minister for Brexit opportunities and government efficiency, while Chris Heaton-Harris has been named the new Conservative chief whip.
The mini reshuffle comes as Johnson looks to overhaul the running of government following widespread outrage over the Downing Street ‘partygate’ scandal.
In the aftermath of senior civil servant Sue Gray’s damning report into the affair, the prime minister promised to change the culture at the heart of government and consult with his fellow Conservative MPs more closely on policy matters.
Many of Johnson’s advisers and members of the Downing Street staff workforce have already been switched as part of the shake-up.
Rees-Mogg, who prior to the change held the role of Commons leader, now formally joins the cabinet. Mark Spencer will step into his former position in Parliament.
While Chris Heaton-Harris moves into the chief whip role, the deputy chief whip Stuart Andrew has been moved into a housing minister position and will work alongside the department’s secretary of state, Michael Gove.
With Cabinet Office minister Steve Barclay having stepped into the role of Downing Street’s chief of staff last week, Michael Ellis has been chosen to succeed him in his former role.
As well as his new Cabinet Office role, Ellis will continue to tend to his current duties as paymaster general.
Other moves have seen Heather Wheeler take on an additional role as parliamentary secretary in the Cabinet Office on top of her responsibilities as assistant government whip, while Wendy Morton has moved up in the Department for Transport. Chris Pincher has been moved from his housing minister position to deputy chief whip, and James Cleverly has been switched to the role of minister for Europe within the Foreign Office, having previously been minister for the Middle East and Africa.
Labour deputy leader, Angela Rayner, said that the change came as little more than “reshuffling the deckchairs” when the government has “already hit an iceberg”
The Ashton-Under-Lyne MP also said that the PM should be focused on resolving “an inflation crisis created in Downing Street and supporting the mental health of our children and young people” over trying to salvage his reputation.
She said: “Labour is committed to security, prosperity and respect for everyone. Boris Johnson is desperately trying to save his own skin.”
Elsewhere, health secretary Sajid Javid has been outlining government plans to tackle the NHS England backlog in the House of Commons.
The plans were due to be announced on Monday but were delayed following an intervention from Whitehall, according to reports.
Javid told MPs that the plans include an expansion of surgical hubs but warned that waiting lists for elective procedures would only likely start to subside by March 2024.
Despite the scale of the waiting list, with six million patients currently awaiting non-urgent operations and procedures, Javid called on members of the public to come forward for treatment where required after as many as 10 million individuals put off approaching the health service during the pandemic.
Javid’s counterpart, Labour shadow health secretary Wes Streeting, criticised the plans as coming up “seriously short of the scale of the challenge” ahead.
Photo taken from Wikimedia Commons
