Rishi Sunak complained the D-Day commemorations ‘ran over’ when he turned up late to the TV interview he skipped them for.
The prime minister was condemned for failing to attend some of the events to mark the 80th anniversary of the Allied landings in Normandy last week, so he could return home for a sitdown with ITV that is finally due to be aired on Wednesday evening.
But despite leaving for that interview, Mr Sunak was still late for the pre-recorded chat – and apologised to the presenter before the conversation began.
Meeting ITV’s Paul Brand, the PM said: “Very nice to see you, sorry to have kept you… it all just ran over, it was incredible, but it just ran over, so apologies for keeping you.”
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Mr Brand asked if it was a powerful trip and whether it was particularly pertinent against the backdrop of Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Mr Sunak added: “I have not seen President Biden’s remarks but that is the echo of what he said.”
And the prime minister said he met “lots” of veterans, speaking to “almost everyone who was there”.
The prime minister skipped out on the international ceremony attended by other world leaders, including US president Joe Biden and French president Emmanuel Macron, to mark the 80th anniversary of the Allied landings.
He instead returned to the UK to take part in the ITV interview in which he sought to defend his claims about Labour’s tax plans after criticism from the head of the Treasury and the UK’s statistics watchdog.
He left foreign secretary and ex-PM David Cameron in his place, leading to a group picture of world leaders without the PM present.
Amid the fallout of the blunder, Mr Sunak was forced to insist he was not planning to quit before the 4 July general election. And he was condemned by members of his own top team, with policing minister Chris Philp saying he was “surprised and disappointed” by the PM’s decision to leave early.
Asked whether the latest revelation about the D-Day blunder showed Mr Sunak was “tone deaf”, defence secretary Grant Shapps said no. “He has rightly apologised for it and we can carry on going round in circles but I think the more interesting thing is what he really thinks about our veterans,” he told Sky News.
But the Liberal Democrats said Mr Sunak had treated D-Day commemorations as an inconvenience and “simply didn’t care enough to stay in Normandy”.
Treasury spokesman Sarah Olney said: “How he brushes this off is frankly insulting… Rishi Sunak does not deserve to be Prime Minister.
“Honouring the sacrifice of our veterans should be a privilege, instead Sunak treated it as an inconvenience.”
Mr Shapps insisted the bits Mr Sunak skipped “had no British veterans at all”, with presenter Kay Burley pointing out that Sir Keir Starmer stayed at the international event regardless.
D-Day veteran Ken Hay, who was captured as a prisoner of war, said Mr Sunak had let the country down. The 98-year-old said: “It’s not the representation of how we’re trying to weld things together to keep the peace.”
The PM’s D-Day snub was the low point of what has so far been a gaffe-riddled election campaign, and opened him up to attacks from Nigel Farage.
The Reform UK leader said the blunder shows Mr Sunak is “not fit to lead the country”. “He has made the biggest mistake of his political career. If it wasn’t an election campaign, there’d be a leadership challenge against him this week,” he told the BBC.
Reform is just a point behind the Conservatives in the latest poll, with Mr Farage’s party on 17 per cent compared to the Tories on 18.
