Rishi Sunak has resisted calls during PMQs to hand back £10m donated to the Conservative Party by businessman Frank Hester
Speaking in the Commons, the PM condemned the reported remarks by Hester about MP Diane Abbott as "racist" and "wrong" but insisted he had shown "remorse"
Labour has called on the Conservatives to give the money back, and Sir Keir Starmer pressed the PM on the issue at PMQs
"Is the prime minister proud to be bankrolled by someone using racist and misogynist language?" Starmer asked
Sunak said Hester had apologised "genuinely" and accused Starmer of "double standards"
Earlier Andy Street, the Conservatives' West Midlands mayor, said he would have given the money back it if were his decision
Hester allegedly said Abbott made him want to "hate all black women"
Starmer says the Labour party will not be sticking to the Conservatives' unfunded promise.
He says 80% of the National Insurance is spent on social security and pensions, and 20% on the NHS, so Sunak is either cutting pensions or cutting the NHS, or raising other taxes or borrowing money.
"Which is it, prime minister?" he asks.
Image source, UK ParliamentSunak says he is glad to talk about the Budget because Labour has now admitted it will not be sticking to Conservative spending plans .
The PM adds that Labour's "litany of unfunded promises" mean "higher taxes for working people".
Starmer says Sunak is describing a Labour party that "no longer exists", while he is describing a man who is bankrolling the Tories for a general election - to loud shouts in the chamber.
Starmer lists several examples of Rishi Sunak's alleged missteps, asking what is the point of a "prime minister who can't lead, and a party that can't govern".
He points out that National Insurance contributions fund state pensions and the NHS, and asks whether the PM's latest "unfunded £46bn promise [is] going to be paid for by cuts to state pensions, or cuts to the NHS".
Chris Mason
Political editor
As we've been reporting, Diane Abbott is in the Commons and it seems is trying to get called for a question.
Sunak hits back, accusing Starmer of hypocrisy.
Starmer continues, saying the difference is that Sunak is scared of his party. "I've changed my party," he says.
He connects this to Sunak's address on a Friday evening two weeks ago, in which he spoke of taking a strong stance on prejudice.
"But when the man bankrolling the election says the member for Hackney should be shot, he suddenly finds himself tongue tied," he says.
Image source, UK ParliamentSunak says Hester has apologised "genuinely" and his remorse should be accepted.
He accuses Starmer of "double standards", saying his deputy leader Angela Rayner called Conservative opponents "scum".
Henry Zeffman
Chief political correspondent
Labour leader Keir Starmer presses the prime minister on Frank Hester's alleged comments, saying the Tory donor had said MP Diane Abbot "should be shot".
"What racist, woman-hating threat of violence" would he have to make before the Prime Minister agreed to hand back the £10m donation?" Starmer asks.
Rishi Sunak replies by saying the alleged comments made by Frank Hester "were wrong, they were racist".
He adds that Hester has rightly apologised.
Image source, UK ParliamentSir Keir Starmer kicks off his questioning of the prime minister in the expected way, calling out the newly surfaced comments allegedly made by Tory donor Frank Hester towards former Labour MP Diane Abbott in 2019.
"Is the prime minister proud to be bankrolled by someone using racist and misogynist language?" he asks.
Tony Bonsignore
BBC Westminster
The Commons is starting to fill up for PMQs.
Diane Abbott is in her usual spot in the back row, and was just seen a moment ago chatting to Mother of the House Harriet Harman. New Rochdale MP George Galloway is there too.
Rishi Sunak stands up and takes his place the despatch box, meaning PMQs is getting underway.
Labour MP Afzal Khan kicks things off by asking the prime minister to focus on "stamping out" extremism and racism in the Conservative Party and to "finally take Islamophobia seriously".
Sunak replies saying that discrimination "has no place in our society" and that it is important to distinguish between strongly felt political debate and unacceptable acts of intimidation.
He says it is a sensitive subject to address because there has been a rise in extremists who try “to hijack our society”.
We'll bring you all the latest from the Commons right here and you can watch the session live by pressing the Play button at the top of this page.
Diane Abbott is the Independent MP for Hackney and Stoke Newington in north London, and previously served as shadow home secretary in Jeremy Corbyn's cabinet.
She had served as a Labour MP since 1987, but was suspended from sitting in the parliamentary party in 2023 after she said Irish, Jewish and Traveller people were not subject to racism "all their lives". She withdrew her remarks and apologised "for any anguish caused".
Abbott is both the first black woman elected to parliament and the longest-serving black MP.
She described Frank Hester’s alleged comments about her as “frightening” and "worrying".
She also reported the Tory donor to the Parliamentary Liaison and Investigations Team, a Met Police unit set up following the murder of MP Jo Cox in 2016.
Image source, PA Media
Iain Watson
Political correspondent
It’s not too difficult to predict the main clash at PMQs this afternoon.
Rishi Sunak’s spokesman has now said the alleged comments by Conservative donor Frank Hester are "racist and wrong".
So it’s highly likely that Sir Keir Starmer will call for the Conservatives to hand back the £10m Hester donated.
He’ll know some Conservatives also think this should happen so will be looking to maximise Sunak’s discomfort.
He is also almost certainly going to accuse the PM of weak leadership. I have no inside track on how Sunak will respond.
But it’s a fair bet he’ll point out the Conservatives, not Labour, have produced the first PM from an ethnic minority background.
And three female occupants of No 10.
Diane Abbott – the target of Hester’s alleged diatribe – is still suspended from the Labour parliamentary party.
In a letter to the Observer last year, she said Jewish, Irish, and Traveller people were not subject to racism “all their lives".
She has apologised for this but hasn’t had the Labour whip restored.
Sunak knows that there are divisions in Labour over how she should be treated, but he may feel that any attempt to highlight this could rebound, especially given Hester’s alleged comments.
Image source, PA MediaRishi Sunak has now left Downing Street and is making the short journey to the House of Commons for Prime Minister's Questions.
You'll be able to watch PMQs live by clicking Play at the top of the page, or follow our text updates here.
Image source, PA MediaLabour has been calling for the Conservatives to return the money donated by Frank Hester.
This morning, shadow paymaster general Jonathan Ashworth said it was “absolutely astonishing” they had failed to do so.
Ashworth also told Sky News it was “staggering” that it took the prime minister 24 hours to condemn Hester's alleged remarks against black MP Diane Abbott.
He added that Post Office Minister Kevin Hollinrake’s suggestion that the Tories would continue taking donations from Hester showed “how weak and how desperate the Tory Party have become”.
"If Rishi Sunak had anything about him, if he had any backbone, he would pay that money back today,” Ashworth said.
Henry Zeffman
Chief political correspondent
One of the most eye-popping lines from Kevin Hollinrake, the government minister who was giving interviews this morning, was his statement that the Conservative Party should accept more donations from Frank Hester if they are offered.
Hollinrake’s departmental boss is Kemi Badenoch, the business secretary, who was first to break ranks yesterday and say Hester’s alleged comments were racist.
I asked Badenoch’s spokesman if she agreed with Hollinrake about future donations. The spokesman said this:
Quote Message“Kemi is looking forward to signing a trade pact with Texas later, our 8th with a US state; she is looking forward to her department introducing a bill to sweep away false convictions for postmasters later in the Commons, and she thinks the BBC should probably focus on those rather than hypotheticals."
Image source, PA MediaIn our last post, we noted how former Tory chief of staff Lord Gavin Barwell drew parallels between Rishi Sunak's handling of Frank Hester's alleged comments and a previous row over remarks made by Lee Anderson.
As a reminder, Anderson was suspended as a Conservative MP last month after he refused to apologise for claiming Islamists had "control" of London Mayor Sadiq Khan.
Having at first declined to comment on the remarks directly, Sunak came under growing pressure to take action against Anderson. An hour after Khan criticised the PM's "deafening silence" on the matter, Anderson was suspended from the party.
This week Anderson, who was a Labour councillor before joining the Tories, defected to Reform UK.
Shortly after Anderson made his announcement on Monday, MPs from the New Conservatives group, made up mostly of 2019 Tory Red Wall MPs, said "the responsibility for Lee's defection sits with the Conservative Party".
The group added that the Tory party's failure to stick to the promises of the 2019 general election had led to a split in the party.
Image source, ReutersLast night, a spokesperson for Rishi Sunak called Frank Hester's reported comments "racist and wrong", having initially labelled them "unacceptable".
It follows Downing Street's response to Lee Anderson's remarks that Islamists had "control" of London Mayor Sadiq Khan. After initially declining to address the comments directly, Sunak went on to describe them as "wrong" and Anderson was suspended from the Conservative Party.
Now, Lord Gavin Barwell, a former Downing Street chief of staff under Theresa May, says No 10's "patterned behaviour" of taking too long to come to what is "the obvious decision" in calling out these kind of remarks was very damaging to the Conservatives.
Barwell told BBC Radio 4's Today programme earlier that the prime minister needed to "lead on calling this language out", and that it was "bad politics" to make ministers go out "with an indefensible position" just to change it hours later.
Referring to Hester's comment that Diane Abbott "should be shot", Barwell added: "It is inexplicable to me why you wouldn't clearly call out this kind of language."
Image source, YouTube/PAFrank Hester pictured speaking at a Commonwealth Business Forum event in 2022
The man at the centre of the questions for the Conservatives today is donor Frank Hester.
Hester is the founder and chief executive of TPP, a Leeds-based company that specialises in providing healthcare technology.
One of the Conservative Party's biggest donors, he donated £5m to the party last year, with a further £5m donated through his company.
In November, he gifted Prime Minister Rishi Sunak the use of a helicopter for a political visit, valued at £15,900, according to parliamentary records.
The Guardian reported that he had made remarks about MP Diane Abbott while criticising a female executive at another organisation during a meeting at TPP's headquarters in 2019.
The newspaper reported that he went on to say: "It's like trying not to be racist but you see Diane Abbott on the TV, and you're just like I hate, you just want to hate all black women because she's there, and I don't hate all black women at all, but I think she should be shot."
Hester has since apologised. Abbott, who is currently suspended from sitting as a Labour MP, said the comments were "frightening".