Grant Shapps makes pen blunder as he arrives at Downing Street to be appointed new defence secretary

Grant Shapps arrived at Downing Street on Thursday morning as he was appointed the new defence secretary by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, following the resignation of Ben Wallace.

Mr Shapps arrived at Number 10 but seemed in such a rush to get inside that he didn’t notice he had dropped his pen on the way in.

This was despite a number of journalists telling him so.

Earlier, Mr Shapps said he was “honoured to be appointed” to his new role.

On X, formerly Twitter, he said he will continue to support the Ukraine in their fight against Putin’s “barbaric invasion”.