The Tory whips have decided it’s time up for Reform defector Lee Anderson on the Home Affairs Select Committee. Anderson is now getting kicked off by motion, as is the government’s prerogative, to be imminently replaced. Lee’s direct questioning has become a staple of otherwise dull Home Affairs committee meetings. No doubt problematic now he’s not batting for their side…

Anderson says:

“I would’ve liked to have stayed on the committee, but with the Home Office once again due to be scrutinised before it I’m probably the last person they want asking questions in the run up to an election.”

Other committee members acknowledge that Lee is a top performer and say “it’s sad to see him go“. End of an era…

Just Stop Oil loons have just infiltrated the Home Affairs Select Committee, briefly halting the session as they were escorted out. Ironically, the Committee are discussing the Met’s handling of protesters at the coronation… 

An explosive bust-up in the Home Affairs Committee this morning, as Red Wall Rottweiler Lee Anderson clashed with Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley over the Met’s handling of eco-protesters. Somebody ring 999…

A furious Rowley accused Anderson of “making selective comments” over the Met’s failure to do anything about protesters repeatedly blocking the roads:

“You’re making selective comments based on a partial understanding of the law. I do not want Londoners disrupted any more than anybody else does. But the law is very clear that protest is disruptive, and to a certain extent, that is allowed… you may not like that, but I have to work to the law rather than win.”

“To a certain extent” is doing some heavy lifting in that comment…

Lee immediately bit back by telling Rowley he hadn’t done his job properly and was wasting his time:

“I think you might want to believe that you’re doing your job correctly, Commissioner, but I don’t think you are… I feel like I’m wasting my time with you to be honest. You say you took five years out of the force. There’s probably people listening to this today who wish it was a lot longer, and I’m one of them. Do you think you’ve got the confidence of the public?”

Rowley claimed he wouldn’t comment on that last “personally offensive” question. He does have the right to remain silent, after all…

SW1 will be crestfallen to hear Claudia Webbe is being kicked off the Foreign Affairs select committee, before she’d even had one chance to ask Liz Truss any questions about ‘Be’rus’. The news, confirmed in today’s Order Paper, is hardly surprising; even ignoring her recent harassment conviction, figures out last month showed her to have the worst attendance of any FCO committee member, turning up to just 18 out of 39 meetings. Is there no legal action Tom Tugendhat can take for her shirking of duties?

Meanwhile Diane Abbott is set to join the Justice Committee after Tory MPs’ plan to install her as chair of the Home Affairs Committee failed. Thankfully she’ll be able to draw on her familial experience of the justice system…

UPDATE: Skwawkbox points out that Webbe joined the Foreign Affairs Committee in May 2020, several months after other members. Figures for the 2021-2022 session reveal that “much-disliked Labour right-winger Neil Coyle“, who joined the Committee at the same time as Webbe, is in fact its most truant member. Coyle has attended just 7 of the 18 meetings, while Webbe has put in the legwork and showed up to 12. This is despite Coyle not having to take time off to appear in Court as a defendant. Guido is more than happy to correct the record, and thanks Skwawkbox for their help.

While the Blairites may have finally taken back control of the Labour Party front bench, could the race to replace Yvette Cooper as Chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee prove an opportunity for Corbynites to get their own back? Guido hears one fan-favourite, Diane Abbott, may be mulling a comeback. Given she’s already a member of the committee, and served as Corbyn’s shadow Home Secretary for almost five years, she would actually be a serious contender. While centrist Diana Johnson is the only person to have announced their candidacy, Guido reckons Diane would put up a good fight. The chair of the Committee must be drawn from Labour MPs however all MPs are entitled to a vote. Tory MPs voting for Diane would be worth it for the banter alone…

Priti Patel had a rough ride during this morning’s Home Affairs Committee appearance. Facing off against Labour’s Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary was repeatedly challenged over her potential involvement in the use of dormitories for asylum seekers throughout the migrant crisis – despite Public Health England (PHE) advising back in September 2020 that such dormitories weren’t Covid compliant, and “[not] good from a COVID or any type of infection prevention and control perspective.” Patel insisted to Cooper she didn’t see that email…

In the fiery altercation above, the pair repeatedly traded blows over Patel’s handling of the crisis, with Cooper saying:

“The answers that you have given to Diana Johnson implied that you did not know what the PHE advice was… You had an outbreak of 200 cases in dormitory accommodation and anybody across the country could tell you that putting people into dormitories in the middle of a pandemic was going to be a risk.”

Patel responded with:

“Obviously I did not see emails that went to officials, and I can only make decisions based on the advice that comes to me…and the advice that came to me was based on the guidelines or the approach that we should be taking in terms of stepping up our facilities…”

The Tories clearly aren’t happy. One source crunched the numbers and found out of 104 minutes of questioning, Labour and the SNP were given 65% of them. Guido’s Tory source accuses Cooper “and her merry band of left wing click bait merchants” of spending “an hour trying to get clips for social media.”