Back when it was Suella Braverman’s turn as the Lobby’s weekly plaything, virtually every Labour MP joined in the fun of calling for her sacking. Among the chorus of voices was Taiwo Owatemi, who had this to say when Braverman admitted sending six work emails to a personal phone last month:

“How can Suella Braverman be trusted with our national security when she leaks confidential documents & doesn’t take most basic security measures.

She is unfit to be Home Secretary. It’s time for the Prime Minister to put national security ahead of Conservative party politics.”

All well and good… except Owatemi herself left a parliamentary laptop – with sensitive information and data on it – with an ex-staffer for nearly a year in 2021. When the staffer left her team early in the spring, no one bothered to collect the computer until December. What was that about “basic security measures”?

When asked about this obvious security oversight, Owatemi’s office blamed the pandemic, claiming:

“… with staff working remotely during the pandemic and a churn of staff in the office it took a while to get staff to return laptops via a courier; and they were not particularly quick in returning them to us once having left the office.” 

Guido’s sure her constituents will be happy with that answer…