- Thursday, April 18, 2024
By: Shubham Ghosh
More questions await prime minister Rishi Sunak over his family’s financial interests following a standards investigation that was launched into a potential violation of transparency rules in connection to his links to a childcare agency in which his wife Akshata Murty is an investor, The Guardian reported.
The opposition has said that the probe by the parliament’s commissioner for standards, Daniel Greenberg, was an indication that corruption was back to No.10 and it will be third propriety investigation into the prime minister, who has already been fined for breaching Covid-19 rules and for not wearing a seatbelt, the report added.
It was learnt that while Downing Street has assured cooperation with the probe, Sunak, who became the prime minister last October, has plans to defend himself by saying that he acted openly over his Indian-born wife’s stake in Koru Kids by announcing it to a register of ministers’ interests that has not been updated for almost a year.
Sunak’s spokesman said that the commissioner was probing whether the premier was not clear that he had dual responsibilities to declare the connection as a ministerial interest and to declare it when speaking to parliamentarians about the issue, the BBC reported.
“The prime minister has set out in his response to the Liaison Committee that he is confident the appropriate process has been followed to avoid or mitigate any potential conflict of interest, and that the interest of ministers’ spouses or partners is not something that would influence their actions either as ministers or as members of parliament,” the official was quoted as saying by the news outlet.
Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner said the failure to update the rules or publish the register of ministers’ interests had “left a transparency black hole which is enabling the prime minister and those he has appointed to dodge proper scrutiny of their affairs”, the BBC added.
“If Rishi Sunak has got nothing to hide, he should commit to publishing the register before May’s elections so the public can see for themselves,” she was quoted as saying by the BBC.
If Sunak is found to have breached parliamentarians’ rules over the declaration, it could be a big political setback for him as he promised to put “integrity and accountability” in his administration.
