Gillian Keegan: Education secretary apologises for swearing on camera in rant on school concrete crisis
Education Secretary Gillian Keegan has apologised for her “choice language” after she was caught complaining about not being thanked for doing a “f***ing good job” over the unsafe concrete crisis.
After an interview with ITV News in Westminster, the cabinet minister criticised others for being “sat on their arses” and claimed the government had gone “over and above” in addressing concerns relating to reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC).
While her mic was still on she said: “Does anyone ever say ‘You know you’ve done a f***ing good job because everyone else has sat on their arses and done nothing.
“No signs of that, no?”
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A Number 10 source said her comments were “wrong” but the prime minister “has full confidence in his education secretary”.
Ms Keegan later apologised and admitted she was “frustrated with the interviewer” who was “making out it was all my fault”.
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Gillian Keegan: ‘I’d like to apologise for my choice language’
More than a hundred schools in England were told they could not fully open just days before the start of the autumn term because of safety fears over the use of RAAC.
Pupils face being taught in temporary classrooms, on different sites or even forced into pandemic-style remote lessons.
Critics have accused the Tories of a “shambolic” handling of the situation, saying issues with the collapse-risk material have been known about for years.
Asked repeatedly who she meant had been “sat on their arses”, Ms Keegan insisted it was “nobody in particular”.
She said: “It was an off-the-cuff remark, after the news interview had finished. I’d like to apologise for my choice language, that was unnecessary.”
Pressed on who she was frustrated with, Ms Keegan said: “Actually, it was the interviewer, because the interviewer was making out it was all my fault and that’s what I was saying, do you ever go into these interviews where anyone ever says anything but you’ve just done a terrible job?”
She said it is “frustrating” because she and her team have been working hard to deal with the issue of unsafe concrete, and she hasn’t slept due to “worrying about this”.
‘Staggering arrogance’
But Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said it was a “farce” to see a Tory minister “blame anyone but themselves”.
Asked if she should remain in her post, he said that was a decision for the prime minister to make.
He added: “Rishi Sunak needs to act, but will he have the strength to act? I doubt it.”
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Starmer: Keegan comments a ‘farce’
Meanwhile Stephen Morgan MP, Labour’s shadow schools minister, said Ms Keegan’s comments were a “staggering admission that Rishi Sunak and the Conservatives have done nothing to address a problem that they have known about for years”.
“The education secretary has displayed staggering arrogance for saying she deserves a pat on the back for the chaos that is gripping our schools on their watch,” he said.
Ms Keegan is due to be interviewed on the Politics Hub with Sophy Ridge on Sky News tonight at 7:30pm.
Questions remain over the extent of the RAAC crisis, the timing of the government’s announcement and how the repairs will be funded.
Earlier, Mr Sunak acknowledged hundreds more schools in England could be impacted as he faced accusations he failed to fund a programme to replace ageing classrooms while chancellor.
The prime minister said that 95% of England’s schools were unaffected, leaving open the possibility that more than a thousand could be.
RAAC is essentially a lighter-weight form of concrete, used to build roofs, schools, colleges and other buildings from the 1950s until the mid-1990s.
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RAAC: The once wonder material causing a chaotic start to the academic year
Experts have long-warned the material has now reached the end of its shelf life and is liable to collapse.
Earlier Jonathan Slater, who was secretary at the Department for Education (DfE) from May 2016 to August 2020, claimed the Treasury had failed to fully fund school rebuilding schemes – including during Mr Sunak’s time at the helm.
He said up to 400 schools a year need to be replaced, but the DfE only got funding for 100, despite the government knowing there was a “critical risk to life”.
Mr Sunak dismissed that criticism as “completely and utterly wrong”.
But Labour insisted he “bears huge culpability for his role in this debacle” – saying funding for rebuilding schools has been slashed over the years.
Analysis published by the party found that spending on school rebuilding between 2019 and 2020 was at £765m, but this fell to £560m the following year.
Tulip Siddiq has told Sky News her “lawyers are ready” to handle any formal questions about allegations she is involved in corruption in Bangladesh.
Asked whether she regrets apparent links with the Bangladeshi Awami League political party, Ms Siddiq said “why don’t you look at my legal letter and see if I have any questions to answer… [the Bangladeshi authorities] have not once contacted me and I’m waiting to hear from them”.
The London MP resigned as a Treasury minister in January after being named in several corruption inquiries in Bangladesh.
In her first public comments since leaving government, Ms Siddiq said “there’s been allegations for months on end and no one has contacted me”.
Last month, the interim leader of Bangladesh told Sky News the MP had “wealth left behind” in the country “and should be made responsible”.
Lawyers acting for Ms Siddiq wrote to the Bangladeshi Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) several weeks ago saying the allegations were “false and vexatious”.
The letter said the ACC must put questions to Ms Siddiq “by no later than 25 March 2025” or “we shall presume that there are no legitimate questions to answer”.
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Staff from the NCA visited Bangladesh as part of initial work to support the interim government in the country.
In a post online today, the former minister said the deadline had expired and the authorities had not replied.
Sky News has approached the Bangladeshi government for comment.
The allegations against Ms Siddiq are focused on links to her aunt Sheikh Hasina – who served as the prime minister of Bangladesh for 20 years.
Ms Hasina was forced to flee the country in August following weeks of deadly protests.
She is accused of becoming an autocrat, with politically-motivated arrests, extra-judicial killings and other abuses allegedly happening on her watch. Hasina claims it’s all a political witch hunt.
Electrocuted on their genitals and mouths sewn up: Inside Bangladesh’s ‘death squad’ jails
Ms Siddiq was found to have lived in several London properties that had links back to the Awami League political party that her aunt still leads.
She referred herself to the prime minister’s standards adviser Sir Laurie Magnus who said he had “not identified evidence of improprieties” but added it was “regrettable” Ms Siddiq had not been more alert to the “potential reputational risks” of the ties to her aunt.
Ms Siddiq said continuing in her role would be “a distraction” for the government but insisted she had done nothing wrong.
Cryptocurrency exchange OKX reportedly hired former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo to advise it over the federal probe that resulted in the firm pleading guilty to several violations and agreeing to pay $505 million in fines and penalties.
Cuomo, a New York-registered attorney, advised OKX on legal issues stemming from the probe sometime after August 2021 when he resigned as New York overnor, Bloomberg reported on April 2, citing people familiar with the matter.
“He spoke with company executives regularly and counseled them on how to respond to the criminal investigation,” Bloomberg said.
The Seychelles-based firm pled guilty to operating an unlicensed money-transmitting business in violation of US Anti-Money Laundering laws on Feb. 24 and agreed to pay $84 million worth of penalties while forfeiting $421 million worth of fees earned from mostly institutional clients.
The breaches occurred from 2018 to 2024 despite OKX having an official policy preventing US persons from transacting on its crypto exchange since 2017, the Department of Justice noted at the time.
A spokesperson for Cuomo, Rich Azzopardi, told Bloomberg that Cuomo has been providing private legal services representing individuals and corporations on a variety of matters since resigning as New York governor.
“He has not represented clients before a New York city or state agency and routinely recommends former colleagues for positions,” Azzopardi added.
OKX reportedly wasn’t willing to comment on its relationships with outside firms.
Cuomo also influenced OKX to make executive appointments: Bloomberg
Cuomo, who is now running for mayor of New York City, also advised OKX to appoint his friend US Attorney Linda Lacewell to OKX’s board of directors, Bloomberg said.
Lacewell, a former superintendent of the New York Department of Financial Services, was added to the board in 2024 and was named OKX’s new chief legal officer on April 1, according to a recent company statement.
Source: Linda Lacewell
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After the investigation concluded, OKX said it would seek out a compliance consultant to remedy the issues stemming from the federal probe and bolster its regulatory compliance program.
“Our vision is to make OKX the gold standard of global compliance at scale across different markets and their respective regulatory bodies,” OKX CEO Star Xu said in a Feb. 24 X post.
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United States President Donald Trump signed an executive order establishing reciprocal tariffs on trading partners and a 10% baseline tariff on all imports from all countries.
The reciprocal levies on will be approximately half of what trading partners charge for US imports, Trump said. For example, China currently has a tariff of 67% on US imports, so US reciprocal tariffs on Chinese goods will be 34%. Trump also announced a standard 25% tariff on all automobile imports.
Trump told the media that tariffs would return the country to economic prosperity seen in previous centuries:
“From 1789 to 1913, we were a tariff-backed nation. The United States was proportionately the wealthiest it has ever been. So wealthy, in fact, that in the 1880s, they established a commission to decide what they were going to do with the vast sums of money they were collecting.”
“Then, in 1913, for reasons unknown to mankind, they established the income tax so that citizens, rather than foreign countries, would start paying,” Trump said.
Full breakdown of reciprocal tariffs by country. Source: Cointelegraph
Trump presented the tariffs through the lens of economic protectionism and hinted at returning to the economic policies of the 19th century by using them to replace the income tax.
Related: Bitcoin rally to $88.5K obliterates bears as spot volumes soar — Will a tariff war stop the party?
Trump proposes eliminating federal income tax and replacing it with tariff revenue
Trump proposed the idea of abolishing the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and funding the federal government exclusively through trade tariffs while still on the campaign trail in October 2024.
According to accounting automation company Dancing Numbers, Trump’s plan could save each American taxpayer $134,809-$325,561 in taxes throughout their lives.
US President Donald Trump addresses the media about reciprocal trade tariffs at the April 2 press event. Source: Fox 4 Dallas
The higher range of the tax savings estimate will only occur if other wage-based taxes are eliminated at the state and municipal levels.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, who assumed office in February, also voiced support for replacing the IRS with the “External Revenue Service.”
Lutnick said that the US government cannot balance a budget yet consistently demands more from its citizens every year. Tariffs will also protect American workers and strengthen the US economy, he said.
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