Dowden on his feetpublished at 12:01 British Summer Time 17 May 2023Breaking
The deputy prime minister is up at the dispatch box, which means this week’s Prime Minister’s Questions has begun.
Stay with us for the latest lines and analysis.
Summary
Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden and Labour's deputy leader Angela Rayner clash over NHS waiting lists and child poverty at Prime Minister's Questions
Rayner says waiting lists are longer than when the prime minister made his pledge to reduce them
She also claims the Conservatives have taken a "wrecking ball" to measures aimed at eradicating child poverty
But Dowden insists the government is making "good progress" on reducing the lists and that he is proud of his party's record on tackling poverty
Dowden was making his first appearance at PMQs, standing in for Rishi Sunak, who is travelling to Hiroshima in Japan for his first G7 summit as PM
Meanwhile, the government says it will ban landlords from evicting tenants without justification - but Labour says the measures don't go far enough
Dowden on his feetpublished at 12:01 British Summer Time 17 May 2023
How will Dowden fare in his first PMQs?published at 11:53 British Summer Time 17 May 2023
Helen Catt
Political correspondentWe're not quite sure what we're going to see at this session of PMQs.
When Angela Rayner went up against the former Deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab, it was always a pretty fiery watch.
Oliver Dowden is quite a different character though. As a former chair of the Conservative Party, there's a fair chance he'll face at least some questions on the Tories' local elections performance.
There have also been two conferences over the past few days at which some of his Conservative colleagues have questioned the party’s direction, so it’s also likely he’ll be called up on to put up a defence on the prime minister’s behalf.
How will he respond? Will he try to avoid making news or come out fighting?
Who is Oliver Dowden?published at 11:46 British Summer Time 17 May 2023
Image source, GettyOliver Dowden was appointed deputy prime minister after Dominic Raab resigned in April.
Dowden, as Cabinet Office secretary, already played a key role at the heart of the prime minister's administration.
He was first elected to Parliament in 2015 and has long been close with Rishi Sunak - though, unlike the PM, he voted to remain in the EU in the Brexit referendum.
Dowden, 44, ran Sunak's leadership campaign last summer.
He had served as a junior minister under Theresa May, and at the cabinet office and as culture secretary under Boris Johnson, before he became Conservative Party Co-Chairman in September 2021.
But he resigned from Mr Johnson's cabinet on the morning after the party suffered by-election defeats in Wakefield, and Tiverton and Honiton, in June 2022, saying: "We cannot carry on with business as usual."
Within two weeks, Mr Johnson had quit as Tory leader.
In a tweet, Mr Dowden, MP for Hertsmere in Hertfordshire, said he was "deeply honoured" , externalby his latest appointment.
Dowden's first PMQs since becoming deputy PMpublished at 11:46 British Summer Time 17 May 2023
Today marks Oliver Dowden's first PMQs since taking over as deputy prime minister last month.
It's standard practice that if a prime minister is unable to make the weekly Commons session, their deputy will fill in.
The same goes for the leader of the opposition and their second in command.
Dowden and deputy Labour leader Angela Rayner will go head to head, as their bosses normally would, on any number of issues.
Vocal Tory right give Rishi Sunak a headachepublished at 11:42 British Summer Time 17 May 2023
Chris Mason
Political editorConservative right wingers are growing increasingly anxious about the direction of Rishi Sunak's government - and what might come after it.
"The party has wasted its period in power,” a long-standing Conservative tells me on the phone.
What I am hearing is a post-mortem, postponed.
We would have heard much more of it a week ago, immediately after the Tories' huge losses in the English local elections.
And while the Coronation delayed the autopsy, there is nothing delaying it now.
But much of the discussion privately within the Conservative Party, and in particular on its right wing, is much more than a reflection on a grim set of council results.
It is, instead, a much wider look back, and look forward.
Read more here.
Coming up today...published at 11:39 British Summer Time 17 May 2023
Our weekly coverage of Prime Minister's Questions - or PMQs - usually sees PM Rishi Sunak grilled by Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer and a number of backbench MPs.
Today, though, there's a slightly different line up. Instead of Sunak and Starmer, it'll be their deputies, Oliver Dowden and Angela Rayner, facing each other at the despatch box.
Dowden, who became deputy PM in April after Dominic Raab resigned, is standing in because Sunak is attending the G7 summit in Hiroshima.
As is convention when the PM is absent from PMQs, Rayner is standing in for Starmer.
Rayner is a veteran of PMQs, having last appeared in March, but it’s Dowden’s first appearance.
The action starts at 12:00 BST, stay with us for the latest political developments and analysis.