Boris Johnson faces MPs after controversially missing Heathrow expansion vote - as it happened
Today's coverage from Westminster - as it happened
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Your support makes all the difference.Boris Johnson was ridiculed in the Commons after missing a key vote on Heathrow expansion by arranging a whistle-stop trip to Afghanistan.
Answering questions from MPs, the foreign secretary was mocked for his flying visit to Kabul and forced to defend the government's decision to invite Donald Trump to the UK.
Mr Johnson, whose Uxbridge constituency is under the Heathrow flight path, had previously vowed to "lie down in front of the bulldozers" to prevent expansion at the airport. He was widely criticised, including by a number of Tory MPs, for skipping the vote rather than resigning in order to vote against a third runway.
Elsewhere, Sadiq Khan gave evidence to a Commons committee about the need for more devolution London, while Theresa May delivered a speech on the UK economy after Brexit.
As it happened...
Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, is currently giving evidence to the Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee.
He's making the case for London to be given more powers, saying the Mayor and local councils are more in touch with the needs of Londoners than civil servants in Whitehall are.
Sadiq Khan is asked if he feels he has the powers to represent Londoners in the same way as the Scottish and Welsh assemblies represent their regions.
He says no, because Scotland and Wales have "proper devolution - the ability to raise taxation, decide what the rate should be and how it's spent".
He says other regions have additional powers on issues such as infrastructure and health, which he believes should also be devolved to London.
The Mayor says he was told he was constitutionally not allowed to take part in meetings of the Joint Ministerial Council, at which leaders of the devolved assemblies discuss Brexit with government ministers, but praises David Davis for agreeing to meet with him regularly. The pair meet every couple of months, he says.
Whoops...An article about the Irish government declining to engage with David Davis during Brexit talks has been retweeted by a government minister in, er, David Davis' department.
Lord Callanan, a Brexit minister, has since deleted the retweet. A source close to the peer told the Guido Fawkes website: “This was an honest mistake from a committed reader, which was corrected as soon as it was spotted.”
A former head of the armed forces has accused the government of having "deluded the public" over military spending. General Lord Nick Houghton said the government's current defence plan was "unaffordable" and accused ministers of "living a lie. Full story:
Commons Speaker John Bercow has just confirmed that the Queen has given her assent to the government's flagship EU Withdrawal Act, meaning the process of enacting Brexit is now formally in UK law.
Boris Johnson is on his feet in the Commons to answer MPs questions. Expect a lot of jibes about his decision to skip a key vote on Heathrow so he wasn't forced to resign from the Cabinet...
Boris Johnson is asked whether Donald Trump's policy of detaining the children of illegal immigrants is good enough reason to withdraw the invitation for the US President to visit the UK next month.
The foreign secretary says there is "common ground across this House that it is important to welcome the head of state and government of our most important ally".
He says Theresa May has already criticised the child detention policy, adding:
"No sooner had she spoken than the President of the United States repealed the policy, thus demonstrating, I venture to suggest, the considerable and growing influence of the United Kingdom."
Boris Johnson is asked what he meant when he said he was "increasingly admiring" of Donald Trump.
He says it was a reference to the US President's "willingness, in defiance of the experts, to reach out to the leadership of North Korea and attempt to do a deal".
He said South Korea is "very impressed with the way he has changed the atmospherics" on North Korea.
Labour's Emily Thornberry mocks Boris Johnson by offering her sympathies for the fact that "due to his emergency duties abroad, he was unable to join last night's fight against Heathrow expansion".
She says Johnson, when asked four years ago what he had learned from his political hero, Winston Churchill, replied: "Never give in, never give in, never give in".
Thornberry quips: "For some reason Churchill didn't add: unless you can catch a plane to Kabul."
She suggests Johnson's "new hero" is Donald Trump, and asks for three things the foreign secretary "increasingly admires" about the US President.
He says he has prepared an answer for this:
1. Trump's response to the use of chemical weapons by the Syrian government
2. The US president's attempts to "solve the problem of a nuclear-armed North Korea"
3. Trump encouraging European countries to spend more on their own defence
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