PMQs: Sunak looks weak as Williamson leaves him in an awkward position

Gavin Williamson put Rishi Sunak in an awkward position ahead of PMQs. The minister resigned last night, but only after allowing several allegations of bullying to rock Sunak’s fledgling premiership this week. The Prime Minister entered Downing Street promising “integrity, professionalism and accountability at every level”. Accepting the resignation of a cabinet member for allegedly telling someone to “slit your throat” and having to deny that you knew anything about the many other complaints made against him, just two weeks later, is not a good look.

There were some choice descriptions of Williamson today; Keir Starmer spoke of a “sad middle manager getting off on intimidating those beneath him” and a “cartoon bully with a pet spider”. But his focus was not on Williamson. The Labour leader wanted to talk about the “the boss who is so weak, so worried the bullies will turn on him that he hides behind them”. Starmer extended the analogy to accuse Sunak of being unable to stand up to “vested interests”, offering Shell as an example. As the Labour leader pointed out, the energy giant has made £26bn in profits this year but paid nothing under the windfall tax due to a tax exemption for investing in fossil fuels – something Starmer described as the “absurd oil and gas giveaway”.

Labour has been focusing on the ‘grubby deals’, which saw Conservative MPs fall in behind Sunak after Liz Truss resigned, since the Prime Minister got the top job – characterising him as too weak to govern, bending to the whims of the factions in his party and unable to act in the national interest. Williamson’s resignation is a vindication of this argument; not only has he left government with serious questions outstanding around what Sunak knew before appointing the minister, he was also the one to decide that it was time to go. Sunak looks weak – worse, comical – as he frantically insists that he now thinks the behaviour was “unequivocally” unacceptable after a week of saying he has confidence in Williamson.

The Prime Minister is writing Starmer’s contributions for him. In just his third PMQs session, Sunak again promised that his government would be one of “integrity” – and then promptly sat down next to scandal-ridden Suella Braverman. The more he tells everyone that his government is one that can be trusted, the easier it is for the opposition to highlight the many – and indeed often handily nearby – contradictions.