Rachel Reeves defended NatWest boss as victim of ‘bullying’ day before Starmer said she was right to quit – as it happened

• Dame Alison Rose, the chief executive of NatWest Group, has stood down after a row over the closure of Nigel Farage’s bank accounts with the private bank Coutts, which NatWest owns. She quit after No 10 and the Treasury let it known they had concerns about her staying. Keir Starmer said this morning she was right to quit, but in an interview recorded yesterday but broadcast this evening Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, defended Rose and said she was a victim of bullying. (See 3.35pm.)

• Factor 8, a group campaigning for victims of the infected blood scandal, has criticised Rishi Sunak for refusing to commit to bringing forward plans to unveil a compensation scheme in his evidence to the inquiry this afternoon. Sunak stuck to the government’s position, which is that it will announce a decision about compensation after the inquiry produces its final report. In a statement Factor 8 said:

It is with profound disappointment, dismay, and a sense of deepening sorrow that we, the Factor 8 campaign group, respond to prime minister Rishi Sunak’s appearance at the infected blood inquiry.

Regrettably, the prime minister offered neither new information nor commitments to the victims and bereaved families of the infected blood scandal.

Despite our impassioned plea in the letter delivered to him on Monday, urging swift action in line with the inquiry’s recommendations, he did not take this golden opportunity to advance the cause of justice for victims and their families. Our hearts are heavy.

• Keir Starmer has backed Sadiq Khan’s call for the government to put money behind a more generous scrappage scheme to help Londoners upgrade older vehicles to comply with the expansion of London’s ultra-low emission zone as the party seeks to limit the electoral fallout of the policy.

• Michael Gove is a “monster” if he continues to rubbish green policies while fully understanding the urgency of the climate crisis, and Grant Shapps, the energy and net zero secretary, is taking “backward steps”, Zac Goldsmith has said in his first major interview since leaving the government.

• Ministers are under fresh pressure to resolve the NHS pay row after junior doctors announced they would stage a four-day strike next month that is likely to lead to thousands more cancelled operations.

Back at the infected blood inquiry, Rishi Sunak has finished giving evidence.

Sir Brian Langstaff, the chair, ends with his own address to Sunak.

He urges Sunak to reassure the victims, by actions or words – “actions preferably” – that compensation will be paid.

If it troubles his conscience, it should trouble the conscience of a caring government, “and that has what you said you want to be”.

People at the hearing (many of whom are victims, or their relatives), applaud.

Rachel Reeves’ office has been in touch to point out that the interview with Channel 4 News in which Reeves defended Alison Rose (see 3.35pm) was recorded before Rose admitted yesterday that she was the source for the BBC’s story about Nigel Farage’s bank account and apologised for a “serious error of judgment”.

(There had been suspicions that Rose was the source for days, ever since it was reported last week that she sat next to Simon Jack, the BBC’s business editor, at a dinner the night before he broke the story.)

26 Jul 202311.37 EDT

Farage mocks Reeves' claim that Alison Rose did good job as NatWest chief executive

Ben Quinn

Nigel Farage hit back at Reeves’ criticism (see 3.35pm), which he contrasted with Keir Starmer’s more supportive comments earlier in the day and said that it would backfire on Labour. He said:

I don’t know whether Rachel Reeves has ever heard of something called the stock market. Maybe not. But have a look at the share price and ask yourself how good a job Alison has done.

Of Reeves’ claims that the the Tories were picking fights on his behalf, he added: “Typical of some people to politicise a non-partisan issue. What a disappointment.”

“I think Starmer’s position was more intelligent,” he said, after the Labour leader told BBC Radio 5 Live that NatWest had “got this one wrong” and Rose had to go. Starmer said Farage should not have had his personal banking details revealed. (See 10.05am.)

Turning back to the Labour policy document criticising first past the post for a moment (see 12.12pm). One person who might welcome that is Ian Dunt. Earlier this year he published How Westminster Works … and Why It Doesn’t and if you are still looking for a summer political read, I’d recommend it highly. There is a mountain of books out there about the failings of Westminster politics, but very few of them are as good as this.

It is not a book about the electoral system, but first past the post does feature very high on Dunt’s list of reasons for the UK’s political dysfunctionality. Here are two extracts.

Hardly any other advanced democracy uses [first past the post] except for the US and Canada. Over the course of the 20th century, most gave up on it, from Australia in 1913 to New Zealand in 1993. No major democracy has ever adopted it after using a different system. Since 1945, only three newly democratic independent countries have made the conscious decision to adopt the system – Albania, Macedonia and Ukraine – and every single one of them has subsequently dropped it …

[FPTP] is at the heart of many of our problems. It is the origin of the machofication of our political culture and all the inadequacies that flow from that. It fails in two distinct ways. First, it fails on the most basic possible level imaginable by ignoring the majority of voters. Second, it fails by creating a form of government with no need to compromise.

One of the other good politics books out this summer, Why Politics Fails by Ben Ansell, also addresses this issue. It is more theoretical and more international than Dunt’s book, and Ansell is marginally less evangelical about PR, but he does suggest it might be a distinct improvement on FPTP. He says:

Consider proportional representation (PR). As an electoral system it may help us escape the democracy trap both because it better represents the diversity of differences among us but also because it encourages cooperation among parties. But PR doesn’t only have electoral effects. Countries with PR, such as Sweden and Norway, also seem better able to escape the other traps.

Compare, for example, inequality levels in countries with PR, such as those in Scandinavia or the Netherlands, to those in countries with majoritarian electoral systems, such as Australia, the UK and the USA. Not only is earnings inequality somewhat lower in the PR countries – likely a legacy of high levels of unionisation – but inequality in disposable incomes is often dramatically lower because countries with PR have much higher levels of redistribution – in part because they have more leftwing parties in government. Higher taxation and powerful trade unions may not be a price all of us are willing to pay to escape the equality trap, but PR certainly seems to promote them.

Jenni Richards KC, counsel for the inquiry, has finished her questions to Rishi Sunak now. But he is not finished yet. The hearing has been adjourned again, and it will resume at 4.35pm for Sunak to take questions from counsel for core participants.

Q: Do you agree that, if accepting the moral case for compensation is not followed by paying compensation, you are not putting things right?

Sunak says of course action will be taken.

Q: Can you say you are committed to paying compensation?

Of course, says Sunak.

Richards asks Sunak if he can give any reassurance about timescales.

Q: We have had assurances about “working at pace”. But that does not say what the pace is. And we have heard about the government responding “as soon as possible”. But those words don’t have much content. Can you say what they mean?

Sunak says he agreed with Sir Brian Langstaff, the committee chair, who said he would move “as quickly as thoroughness allowed”.

Langstaff intervenes to say that what he said was that he would proceed as quickly as “reasonable thoroughness” allowed. It is possible to be too thorough, he says.

Here is my colleague John Crace’s take on the takeaway from Rishi Sunak’s evidence to the infected blood inquiry.

Back at the infected blood inquiry, Jenni Richards KC, counsel for the inquiry is asking Rishi Sunak about a Telegraph report saying payments in relation to the scandal could reach £20bn.

She says this information had not been discussed in parliament. It could be a leak without government approval, a leak with government approval, or the journalist “making it up”.

Q: Has there been a leak inquiry?

Sunak says he is not aware of one. He says he cannot control leaks from government. Sometimes they hold leak inquiries, but it is hard to find who is responsible for leaks.

Q: Should there be a leak inquiry? Because, if this is deliberately being leaked, this could be part of a strategy to win over the public, and pre-empt the inquiry findings.

Sunak says he would not speculate on a leak inquiry. The last thing you would do is tell people an inquiry will take place.

(In fact, No 10 does sometimes announce leak inquiries.)

Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, has come to the defence of Dame Alison Rose. In an interview with Channel 4 News Reeves said that Rose, who was forced to resign as NatWest chief executive after admitting that she had discussed Nigel Farage’s bank account with a BBC journalist, had been a victim of “bullying”, and she implied that Tory Treasury ministers were partly responsible.

She also said that, instead of attacking the banks on behalf of Nigel Farage, the chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, and his colleagues should be tackling the cost of living crisis.

Reeves said:

I don’t like, some of the frankly, what I see as bullying attitudes towards her. She’s the first female chief executive of NatWest. She took over at a time when that bank had real big problems. It seems to me that Alison Rose, has done a good job turning that bank around.

Let me say this. If I was in the Treasury at the moment, rather than Jeremy Hunt and his Conservative ministers, I’d be spending my time this summer trying to ensure that families in Scarborough, like the ones I’ve spoken to today, are properly protected during this cost of living crisis rather than picking a fight with banks on behalf of Nigel Farage.

Channel 4 News says this interview was recorded yesterday, before Rose resigned. And Reeves’s office has said that the interview was recorded before Rose admitted late yesterday afternoon that she was the source for the BBC’s story about Farage’s bank account and apologised for her “serious error of judgment”.

This morning, after Rose resigned in the early hours of this morning, Keir Starmer said she was right to go. (See 10.05am.)

Sir Brian Langstaff calls a 15-minute break.

He reminds Sunak that, while they are having their break, he should not discuss his evidence with anyone.

Q: Will you consider again whether it is right to delay arranging the compensation scheme until the report is out?

Sunak says it is right for the government to go through this properly. He says the inquiry itself has taken several years, “rightly and necessarily”. The government needs to consider its response thoroughly too.

Q: Is the answer no? Or is the answer that you won’t say?

Sunak says it would not be right to change government policy now.

But he wants the government to move “with urgency”.

Q: I was not asking you to change the government’s position. I was asking if you would look at this again.

Sunak says it would not be right speculate on changing the government’s consideration.

Sir Brian Langstaff asks what would happen if the inquiry report were delayed. Suppose he had an accident that meant he could not finish the report for another three months. Would victims have to wait another three months? He says that is something for Sunak to think about.

Sunak says it is for the inquiry to decide when it reports to government. He cannot control that.

But he can ensure that work to address points raised in the interim reports is going on. That is happening, he says.

Q: Do you accept that, when the report comes out, the election, and election purdah, could delay a response?

Sunak says the chair of the inquiry said he would proceed “as quickly as thoroughness allows”. That should be the government’s approach too, he says.

And he says it is the approach he has followed as PM.

Q: Some people think the government is delaying setting up a compensation scheme now, either because it only started work on this later, or because it does not want to respond until the inquiry is over, and no longer has legal powers.

Sunak says it is normal for a government to wait until an inquiry is over before responding.

There are lots of means by which the government can be held to account. There are “very strong scrutiny mechanisms” in place, he says.

Sunak says rational decision-making requires the government to wait for the final report before deciding what to do. That is what legal precedent says.

Q: What are you waiting to find out?

Sunak says he cannot comment on policy options that are actively being considered.

He says he does not want to contribute to the “litany of broken promises” that have been made in the past to victims.