Rishi Sunak to come under fresh pressure over Nadhim Zahawi at PMQs
A senior Tory is among those who have called for the resignation of the Tory party chairman over his tax affairs.
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Your support makes all the difference.Rishi Sunak will come under fresh pressure over Nadhim Zahawi as he resists firing the Tory party chairman despite him being under investigation over his tax affairs.
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer is likely to seize on the fallout from Mr Zahawiās multi-million pound settlement at Prime Ministerās Questions on Wednesday.
The Prime Minister ordered his ethics adviser to investigate whether Mr Zahawi broke ministerial rules over the estimated Ā£4.8 million bill he settled with HMRC while chancellor.
Mr Sunak admitted there are āquestions that need answeringā as the inquiry was launched but it was unclear what he knew when appointing Mr Zahawi to the Cabinet-attending role.
Chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life Lord Evans criticised the legal threats Mr Zahawi made as he tried to prevent stories about his tax affairs emerging.
As they worked to uncover the situation, The Independent website said he personally threatened ālegal actionā and tax lawyer Dan Neidle was contacted by āexpensiveā libel lawyers.
Lord Evans suggested ātrying to close down a legitimate public debateā would not live up to the Nolan principles on public life that must be upheld under the ministerial code.
āAccountability, openness are things which the Government says that it wants to be characterising its own behaviour, so that I think speaks for itself,ā he told BBC Radio 4ās PM programme.
āThe sort of attempts, apparent legal attempts to suppress this story, I donāt think that does live up to the sort of standards that the public would rightly expect.ā
Senior Conservative MP Caroline Nokes has called on him to āstand aside until this matter is all cleared upā but Mr Sunak has so far stood by Mr Zahawi.
The Prime Minister argued it is ālongstanding practiceā for ministers to remain in their roles while under investigation.
Just last Wednesday, Mr Sunak told PMQs that Mr Zahawi had āalready addressed this matter in fullā.
The Prime Ministerās press secretary said Mr Sunak ātakes Nadhim Zahawi at his wordā.
But Mr Sunak bowed to pressure to order the investigation by ministerial interests adviser Sir Laurie Magnus after the Guardian revealed Mr Zahawi paid a penalty as part of the dispute.
Downing Street subsequently suggested Mr Sunak did not know last week that Mr Zahawi had paid the reportedly 30% penalty to HMRC.
And the Prime Minister said that the advice he received ahead of appointing Mr Zahawi party chair in October was that there was āno reasonā not to.
Mr Zahawi, the MP for Stratford-upon-Avon, has insisted his āerrorā over shares in the YouGov polling company he co-founded was ācareless and not deliberateā.
He has insisted he is āconfidentā he has āacted properly throughoutā.
Labour has argued Mr Sunak should sack the chairman before the investigationās conclusion, describing it as a āpathetic attempt to pass the buckā.
Mr Zahawi was appointed chancellor by Boris Johnson, whose time in No 10 was continuing to create challenges for Mr Sunak.
Fresh allegations of cronyism in the Tory party have been levelled after it emerged BBC chairman Richard Sharp helped secure Mr Johnson a loan of up to Ā£800,000 before the then-PM backed his appointment to the broadcaster.
Since the last PMQs, Mr Sunak has also received a second police fine, this time for failing to wear a seatbelt after he broke coronavirus rules during the partygate scandal.