News Desk :
Jacob Rees Mogg has been sacked as Commons leader and demoted to Brexit minister as Boris Johnson launches a mini-reshuffle to distract from weeks of Tory chaos and scandal.
The Prime Minister is reshaping his top team after being deserted by a series of No10 aides and the Met Police launching an investigation into 12 rule-busting parties in Downing Street during lockdown.
Arch-Eurosceptic Mr Rees-Mogg’s full title will be Minister for Brexit Opportunities and Government Efficiencies. He will still attend Cabinet and gets a £35,000 pay rise, too, reports The Mirror.
Meanwhile, Chief Whip Mark Spencer replaces Mr Rees Mogg as Commons leader and Tory MP Chris Heaton Harris will head the whips office.
Mr Spencer has kept his seat at the Cabinet table, however, despite weeks of criticism over the top Tory’s handling of the Owen Paterson lobbying row.
Stuart Andrew was promoted from Deputy Chief Whip to Housing Minister, serving in Michael Gove’s Levelling Up Department. He will be the Tories’ 11 Housing Minister in 12 years.
He was one of 72 MPs who voted down legislation in 2016 which would have forced landlord to make rented homes “fit for human habitation”.
James Cleverly stays in the Foreign Office but becomes Minister for Europe instead of Minister for Middle East, North Africa and North America. And Paymaster General, one of the PM’s staunchest defenders in the Commons in recent
weeks, was awarded a promotion to Cabinet Office minister.
Angela Rayner, Labour’s Deputy Leader, accused the Government of ignoring a debate in the Commons on the cost of living crisis to conduct the reshuffle.
