Rishi Sunak refuses to repeat Suella Braverman’s claim ‘hurricane’ of migrants coming

Transport Secretary Mark Harper said the decision to cut HS2 north of Birmingham “is in the interest of the country” as he shrugged off criticism from Tory former premiers David Cameron and Boris Johnson.

He told Sky News: “They’re absolutely entitled to their opinion. I worked closely with both of them in government and was very proud to serve with them. But that was a number of years ago.

“The facts have changed, the costs of the project have escalated, the patterns of travel have changed post-pandemic.

“So this Government’s taken a different decision. The Prime Minister’s taken a different decision that he thinks and I think is in the interest of the country.”

Rishi Sunak declined to repeat Suella Braverman’s claim that a “hurricane” of mass migration is coming and dodged questions on whether she was right to vilify people seeking to migrate to the UK as part of an “invasion”.

The Home Secretary’s comments in her Tory conference speech caused unease among some senior Conservatives.

Asked whether he agreed with her words, the Prime Minister told the BBC’s Today programme on Thursday: “Illegal migration is putting unsustainable pressure on our country and, for me, it is non-negotiable that it should be the British people who decide who comes to our country and not criminal gangs.

“I made a speech myself eight months ago about illegal migration. I pointed out the number of people who potentially could come to the UK, figures that have been mentioned by international organisations. That’s clearly unsustainable, which is why we’re taking action to stop the boats.”

He said it is “right when people come here that they integrate”.

When it was put to him that he was happy with the Home Secretary’s remarks, Mr Sunak said: “Your words, not mine.”

A tetchy Rishi Sunak defended his decision to ban smoking but not impose restrictions on junk food, saying cigarettes are “different to a pack of crisps or a piece of cake”.

The prime minister said smoking, which he banned for future generations as a flagship policy in his first Tory conference party speech as leader on Wednesday, was “unequivocally the single biggest preventable cause of death, disability and illness in our society”.

And he said it was “chemically addictive”, praising his own plan to ban it as “the single biggest intervention in public health in a generation”.

Rishi Sunak came under fire within hours of delivering his first Conservative Party conference speech as two former Tory prime ministers took aim at his flagship plans.

In a wide-ranging address, the PM finally announced he was scrapping the northern leg of HS2 – as first revealed by The Independent – and unveiled a ban on cigarettes for the next generation.

But in an extraordinary attack, David Cameron denounced the decision to axe the high-speed line beyond Birmingham as the “wrong one”, saying that a “once-in-a-generation opportunity” had been lost.

Kate Devlin, Adam Forrest and Jon Stone report:

The Home Secretary is being taken to court over new anti-protest legislation.

Liberty has told Suella Braverman, “See you in court,” after it was granted permission by the High Court on Wednesday to take legal action against her.

The human rights organisation said the Government has “unlawfully introduced new anti-protest legislation, which had been democratically rejected by Parliament just a few months earlier”.

Rishi Sunak declined to apologise to people in the North of England for cutting HS2 north of Birmingham.

In a pre-recorded interview broadcast on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Thursday, the Prime Minister was asked whether he would apologise for the Tory Party’s “false promises” made over many years.

He replied: “No. What I want to say to everybody is that what we’re doing is going to be better. It’s going to be better for our country.

“You keep using the word scrap but what we’re doing is replacing HS2 with something that’s going to benefit far more people in far more places and far quicker.

“Every penny that would have been spent on this project, £36 billion, is going to be reinvested in every form of transportation, not just heavy rail and in every part of our country.”

He repeated his claim that “the facts have changed” with a pandemic that has “totally changed business travel”.

“The right thing to do is to have the courage to change direction and do something different and that’s what I’ve done.”

Rishi Sunak has been reported to police in Scotland over comments made about former first minister Nicola Sturgeon in his Tory conference speech.

Mr Sunak sought to make fun of the former SNP leader after she was arrested and questioned as part of Police Scotland’s investigation into her party’s finances – dubbed Operation Branchform.

Ms Sturgeon was released without charge following her arrest back in June.

Now Chris McEleny, the general secretary of the rival pro-independence Alba Party, has reported Mr Sunak to the force for contempt of court allegations, as the prime minister’s comments come amid a live police investigation.

Former UKIP and Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage has said the things he fought for have become “quite mainstream within the Conservative Party”.

He told ITV’s Good Morning Britain that his views had previously been characterised by senior Conservatives as “extreme”, “bad” and “wrong”.

He added: “Those things we have fought for have become quite mainstream within the Conservative Party. I was welcomed with open arms (at the party’s conference).”

He also said it was “very nice” of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to say he could return to the Conservatives but he would not be doing so.

West Yorkshire mayor Tracy Brabin said Rishi Sunak had not consulted northern leaders on his plans to rip up the northern leg of HS2.

She told BBC Breakfast: “It also feels quite frustrating that when the Prime Minister was on the platform, he was saying ‘I know what the North needs’.

“He hasn’t spoken to any northern leaders and we could have been helpful in trying to work out what was actually a priority for us and it is that capacity that HS2 was there to solve.”

She also complained about a lack of detail on the transport schemes announced by Mr Sunak.

“We’ve had a decade of underfunding on transport in the North. Now we’ve been given the things that we’ve been campaigning on, pots of money – we don’t know what they are, we don’t know where they’re coming from, we don’t know the timeframe.”