Business secretary Kemi Badenoch has received a furious dressing down from the Commons Speaker over her attitude towards parliament and her U-turn on EU laws.
Speaker Lindsay Hoyle demanded to know “who do you think you are speaking to?” after Ms Badenoch gave what appeared to be a flippant response to concerns about the government’s approach.
The clash came during an urgent parliamentary question about the minister’s U-turn on the government’s “bonfire” of Brexit laws.
Ms Badenoch had on Wednesday quietly announced through a written statement that she would be gutting a flagship plan to wipe EU laws from UK statue books by the end of the year.
But she was dragged to the Commons in person on Thursday morning by the Speaker who granted an urgent question on the matter.
“It is highly regrettable that the government decided not to offer an oral statement on this matter yesterday given the importance of this announcement,” he said.
“On such matters full engagement with parliament and its committees is essential.
“I would remind the government that we are elected to hear it first: not to read it in the Telegraph, and certainly not a WMS is satisfactory on such an important matter.”
In her opening statement Ms Badenoch said: “I am very sorry that the sequencing that we chose was not to your satisfaction.”
The comment enraged the Speaker, who gave the minister a dressing down.
“Order, order, order, order. That is totally not acceptable. Who do you think you’re speaking to Secretary of State?” he said.
“I think we need to understand each other. I am the defender of this House and these benches on both sides. I am not going to be spoken to by a Secretary of State who is absolutely not accepting my ruling.
“Take it with good grace and accept it that members should hear it first. Not a Written Ministerial Statement or what you decide.
“These members have been elected by their constituents and they have the right to hear it first. It’s time this government recognised we’re all elected, we’re all MPs, and use the correct manners.”
Ms Badenoch swiftly apologised to the irate Speaker, adding: “What I was trying to say was that I am very sorry that I did not meet the standards which you expect of secretaries of state. Forgive my language.”
The government’s EU retained law bill previously included a sunset clause that would have automatically deleted all European law from British statute books at the end of 2023.
But Ms Badenoch on Wednesday quietly confirmed that they were gutting the bill’s “sunset clause” and that the mass deletion would not go ahead as planned.
Now, only EU laws specifically chosen to be repealed will be scrapped – with the rest automatically becoming UK law at the end of the year.
The change turns the logic of the bill on its head and has enraged some hardcore Brexiteers, who were keen to expunge the influence of Brussels from the British constitution.
Tory eurosceptic Jacob Rees-Mogg accused Rishi Sunak of “behaving like a Borgia” over the about-face.
Mr Ress-Mogg, who introduced the plans when he was in Liz Truss’s cabinet, accused the prime minister of having missed “a great opportunity”
“Politicians need to stick to what they said they will do,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
Asked on Thursday morning whether Rishi Sunak was a “man of his word,” the prime minister’s official spokesperson said: “Yes.”
