“Failures and the disgraced”: Ashworth lays into new Cabinet ahead of first meeting

The new Cabinet has been described as a collection of “right wingers, failures and disgraced returnees” ahead of its first meeting under Prime Minister Theresa May this morning.

Shadow minister Jonathan Ashworth has hit out at the Government’s top team today, saying that the reshuffle will “do nothing for working people”.

May appeared to appeal to the left in her first statement as PM, pledging worker representation on company boards – but then was accused of a lurch to the right when she promoted prominent Brexiters such as Liam Fox, David Davis and Boris Johnson.

“Theresa May entered Downing Street on the back of warm words about reaching out and putting working people first,” Ashworth said today. “But after six years at the heart of a Tory Government which has failed to do this the test now is not speeches, photo opportunities or press releases but action.

“The early signs for Theresa May’s administration are not universally good. Her first acts were to abolish the department tasked with tackling climate change; to put someone who wanted to scrap the Department for International Development in charge of it; and to fill the rest of her Cabinet with a variety of right-wingers, failures and disgraced returnees from the backbenches.

“Changing the faces at the top of the Tory Party will do nothing for working people let down by this Government. We need a change of direction to put ordinary people first.”