Rishi Sunak urged to overhaul the cabinet as he begins his first day as PM

Published

3 years ago

October 25, 2022

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Rishi Sunak is being urged to overhaul the cabinet on his first day as prime minister.

Foreign Secretary James Cleverly told Sky News that the new PM’s government should feature the best ministers available – rather than focusing on those who are loyal.

“We have got to have the first 15 on the pitch. I know that Rishi understands that,” Mr Cleverly said.

Reshuffle rumours as some Tory members said to be ‘fuming’ – new PM latest

Mr Sunak’s team are keeping tight-lipped about any potential reshuffle moves – but Sky News understands that recently appointed Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is likely to keep his job.

The new prime minister will be officially appointed by King Charles this morning, and is set to make a public address in front of Number 10 before lunchtime.

Sky News will have full coverage of Mr Sunak’s first day in the job – and you can find out more details of today’s key timings here.

Reports suggest he is planning to build a cabinet of “all the talents” that will see the political return of the “adults”.

Long-time backers of Mr Sunak – including ex-justice secretary Dominic Raab, Commons treasury committee chair Mel Stride and ex-chief whip Mark Harper – are tipped to be in the cabinet, as well as former party chairman Oliver Dowden.

Many of the most senior posts are expected to go to those who have consistently supported him – including when he lost to Ms Truss in the last Conservative leadership race that began just three months ago.

Newly appointed Home Secretary Grant Shapps will be hoping to keep his job after backing Mr Sunak both in July and in recent days.

Mr Hunt is widely expected to remain in Number 11 as he works towards a highly anticipated fiscal statement on Halloween, as part of attempts to stabilise jittery markets.

But another source in the new PM’s camp told Sky News that discussions are still ongoing – and cautioned that no decisions have been made.

And Penny Mordaunt – who bowed out of the race after failing to get the required 100 nominations from Tory MPs – could also receive some kind of promotion.

There is speculation that she could replace Mr Cleverly in the Foreign Office, and a source close to Ms Mordaunt has told Sky News that she would like to be offered the role.

Suella Braverman and Kemi Badenoch – favourites of Conservative members to the right of the party – will also be hoping to serve in Mr Sunak’s top team after endorsing his latest campaign.

Veteran cabinet minister Michael Gove – who was sacked as levelling up secretary in the dying days of the Johnson government – and former defence secretary Gavin Williamson are other high-profile backers of the Sunak campaign who could be rewarded.

‘Unite or die’

Mr Sunak will become the country’s first Hindu leader and the UK’s youngest prime minister in modern political history – beating all his predecessors except William Pitt the Younger, who was just 24 when he took office in 1783.

The 42-year-old only became an MP in 2015 and has had a swift rise to the top job.

Speaking to Tory politicians yesterday, he acknowledged the “profound economic challenge” that the nation now faces – and reportedly warned that the party must “unite or die” as they focus on delivering the public’s priorities.

He now has the difficult task of steering the nation through a crisis that was exacerbated by Ms Truss’s government’s disastrous mini-budget, which caused the pound to fall to a record low.

Last week, she resigned after just 44 days in office.

In an 86-second address to the nation yesterday afternoon, Mr Sunak promised to serve with “integrity and humility” and praised Ms Truss for having served during “exceptionally difficult circumstances”.

Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster Nadhim Zahawi said Mr Sunak becoming prime minister proves “the United Kingdom is a place where you can achieve amazing things”.

But opposition parties have reiterated their calls for an immediate general election – stressing that Mr Sunak has “no mandate” to govern.

Shadow health secretary Wes Streeting has said “the public are clamouring for a say”, adding: “The Conservative Party is a sclerotic mess.

“They are chaotic and who’s to say Rishi Sunak isn’t going to be out in six months’ time because you can hear the knives sharpening in Westminster of the disgruntled Borisites … who still think Rishi knifed Boris Johnson in the back.”

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Hamas ‘ready’ to deliver aid to hostages after outcry over footage of Israeli captive

Published

36 mins ago

August 4, 2025

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Hamas 'ready' to deliver aid to hostages after outcry over footage of Israeli captive

Hamas has said it is ready to cooperate with a request to deliver food to Israeli hostages in Gaza, if Israel agrees to permanently open a humanitarian corridor into the enclave.

The militant group’s statement comes amid international outcry over two videos it released of Israeli hostage Evyatar David, who it has held captive since 7 October 2023.

The now 24-year-old looks skeletal, with his shoulder blades protruding from his back.

The footage sparked huge criticism, with EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas labelling the videos “appalling” and saying they “expose the barbarity of Hamas”.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday he had asked the Red Cross to give humanitarian assistance to the hostages.

Hamas’s military spokesperson Abu Obeidah said it is “ready to engage positively and respond to any request from the Red Cross to bring food and medicine to enemy captives” if certain conditions are met.

These are that Israel must permanently open a humanitarian corridor and halt airstrikes during the distribution of aid, he said.

Gaza’s health ministry said on Sunday that six more people had died of starvation or malnutrition in the enclave in the past 24 hours.

This raises the number of those who have died from what multiple international agencies warn may be an unfolding famine to 175 since the war began, the ministry said. This includes 93 children, it added.

No aid entered Gaza between 2 March and 19 May due an Israeli blockade and deliveries of supplies including food, medicine and fuel have been limited since then.

Israeli authorities have previously said there is “no famine caused by Israel” – and that its military is “working to facilitate and ease the distribution of humanitarian aid in the Gaza Strip”.

Meanwhile, Palestinian health authorities also said at least 80 people in Gaza were killed by Israeli gunfire and airstrikes on Sunday.

These included people trying to reach aid distribution, Palestinian medics said.

The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) has repeatedly said it “categorically rejects the claims of intentional harm to civilians” and has previously blamed Hamas militants for fomenting chaos and endangering civilians.

Hamas killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in its attack on 7 October 2023 and abducted 251 others. Of those, they still hold around 50, with 20 believed to be alive, after most of the others were released in ceasefires or other deals.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed more than 60,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry, which does not differentiate between militants and civilians in its count.

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New US plan for Gaza starting to emerge despite sanitised tour for Trump peace envoy

Published

10 hours ago

August 3, 2025

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New US plan for Gaza starting to emerge despite sanitised tour for Trump peace envoy

We’ve seen this many times before.

Highly anticipated talks and meetings with America, Israel’s closest ally and the one country with the power to pressure Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to change course, then nothing changes.

We need to give Steve Witkoff time to report his assessments back to the White House before we can give a complete verdict on this visit but what we’ve seen and heard so far has offered little hope.

The pressure on Donald Trump to stop the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza is mounting after a small but vocal contingent of his base expressed outrage.

Even one of his biggest supporters in Congress, Marjorie Taylor Green, has referred to it as a genocide.

It was little coincidence Mr Witkoff was dispatched to the region for the first time in three months to speak to people on both sides and “learn the truth” to quote US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, who accompanied him to an aid site in Gaza.

The pair spent five hours in Gaza speaking to people at a Gaza Humanitarian Foundation centre and it’s understood saw nothing of the large crowd of Palestinians gathering a mile away waiting for food.

Their sanitised tour of Gaza did not include a visit to a hospital where medics are receiving casualties by the dozen from deadly incidents at aid sites, and where they’re treating children for malnutrition and hunger.

A critical trauma nurse at Nasser hospital told us a 13-year-old boy was among the people shot while Mr Witkoff was in the enclave.

An American paediatrician at the same hospital who had publicly extended an invitation to meet with Mr Witkoff heard nothing from the US delegation.

Dr Tom Adamkiewicz described people “being shot like rabbits” and “a new level of barbarity that I don’t think the world has seen”.

The US delegation was defensive of the controversial GHF aid distribution that was launched by America and Israel in May, hailing its delivery of a million meals a day.

But if their new system of feeding Gaza is truly working, why are we seeing images of starved children and hearing deaths every day of people in search of food?

The backdrop of this trip is very different to the last time Mr Witkoff was here.

In May, life was a struggle for Palestinians in Gaza, people were dying in Israeli bombings but, for the most part, people weren’t dying due to a lack of food or getting killed trying to reach aid.

Mr Netanyahu’s easing of humanitarian conditions a week ago, allowing foreign aid to drop from the sky, was an indirect admission of failure by the GHF.

Yet, for now, the US is standing by this highly criticised way of delivering aid.

A UN source tells me more aid is getting through than it was a week ago – around 30 lorries are due to enter today compared to around five that were getting in each day before.

Still nowhere near enough and it’s a complex process of clearances and coordination with the IDF through areas of conflict.

Lorries are regularly refused entry without explanation.

Then there was Mr Witkoff’s meeting with hostage families a day later where we began to get a sense of America’s new plan for Gaza.

The US issued no public statement but family members shared conversations they’d had with Mr Trump’s envoy: bring all the hostages home in one deal, disarm Hamas and end the war. Easier to propose than to put into practice.

Within hours of those comments being reported in the Israeli media, Hamas released a video of hostage Evyatar David looking emaciated in an underground tunnel in Gaza.

Now 24 years old, he was kidnapped from the Nova festival on 7 October and is one of 20 hostages understood to be still alive. The release of the video was timed for maximum impact.

Hamas also poured water on any hopes of a deal in a statement, refusing to disarm unless an independent Palestinian state is established.

Hamas has perhaps become more emboldened in this demand after key Israeli allies, including the UK, announced plans for formal recognition in the last week.

It’s hard to see a way forward. The current Israeli government has, in effect, abandoned the idea of a two-state solution.

The Trump administration’s recent boycott of international conferences on the matter suggests America is taking a similar line, breaking with its long-standing position.

Arab nations could now be key in what happens next.

In an unprecedented move, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Egypt joined a resolution calling for Hamas to disarm and surrender control of Gaza following a UN conference earlier this week.

This is hugely significant – highly influential powers in its own backyard have not applied this sort of pressure before.

For all the US delegation’s good intentions, it’s still political deadlock. Israeli hostages and Palestinians in Gaza left to starve and suffer the consequences.

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Sydney Harbour Bridge pro-Palestine protest so busy it was ‘perilous’, police chief says

Published

13 hours ago

August 3, 2025

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Sydney Harbour Bridge pro-Palestine protest so busy it was 'perilous', police chief says

Tens of thousands of Sydney residents marched across the city’s iconic Harbour Bridge to support Palestinians in Gaza and call for an end to the war.

The decision to centre the protest on such an iconic landmark was controversial. The bridge is considered a symbol of unity in the city.

However, the Israel-Hamas war has been deeply divisive in Australia and increased tension between the country’s Jewish and Muslim communities.

On Sunday there were pro-Palestinian demonstrations in Melbourne, Adelaide and Sydney.

In Sydney organisers hoped 50,000 people would attend, despite heavy rain.

In the end, the bridge and the central business district were so packed – and the weather so bad – that police and organisers called the march off mid-way, fearing there would be a crush in the crowd.

Police said the crowd numbers in the Sydney Harbour Bridge march were “far greater” than expected, creating the risk of a crowd crush.

“It was perilous,” said senior officer Peter McKenna, adding his force was “very lucky the crowd was well-behaved”.

The final figures for the number of people who attended haven’t been released. But it was an impressive turnout in the tens of thousands.

Some of those attending the march, called by its organisers the March for Humanity, carried pots and pans as symbols of the hunger in the besieged enclave of Gaza.

There was also a surprise guest, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange.

He has largely kept a low profile since his release from a British prison last year. He didn’t speak to the crowd, but he was among those leading the march.

However, the demonstration almost didn’t happen after New South Wales police tried to stop it from taking place on the Harbour Bridge.

On Saturday, the country’s Supreme Court ruled it could go ahead.

Despite the rain, there were families with children and seniors as well. It was a true cross-section of Australian society.

One of the protesters, Sarah, drove up from the Blue Mountains outside Sydney to attend.

She said, “enough is enough” and the Australian government should take “stronger action”.

Sarah also said Australians want people to know they care about what’s happening in the world.

Australia has not joined France, the UK and Canada is announcing plans to recognise a Palestinian state in September.

The government here says recognition is a matter of “when not if”. But it has not committed to any timeline.

Public pressure is growing on Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to take a stronger stand against the war. So far, he has largely resisted that pressure.

But the government’s language towards Israel is becoming more critical.