Labour leader, Sir Keir Starmer, has said that housing secretary Robert Jenrick still has questions to answer over his involvement in a planning case with a Tory donor.
Starmer told the BBC that the matter was "far from closed", however, he did not call for Jenrick’s resignation. The housing minister has faced criticism after he granted permission for party donor, Richard Desmond, to build a luxury housing development in the former Westferry printing works.
Jenrick alleges that he was motivated by a desire to see more homes built. He overruled government inspectors and gave Desmond’s plan for a 1,500-home development in London’s Isle of Dogs the green light in 2019.
Just under a fortnight later, Desmond, who is the fomer owner of the Daily Express, gave £12,000 to the Conservative Party. Jenrick said he was unaware of the donation and acted upon the “merits” of the case throughout.
Boris Johnson said that he considered the matter to be “closed” following Jenrick’s decision to publish all details of his contact with Desmond.
However, in an interview with the BBC’s political editor, Laura Kuenssberg, Starmer said that: "We want straight answers on this, and I think the public do, they can tell that something's wrong here."
He continued that the discussion of Jenrick’s actions were now at a stage that “the prime minister's judgement is an issue".
Starmer continued, asking Sir Mark Sedwill, the UK’s top civil servant, to investigate whether or not Jenrick broke the guidelines for ministerial conduct.
No. 10 have said that the prime minister has full confidence in Jenrick.
