Cabinet minister refuses to back Suella Braverman’s claim homelessness is ‘lifestyle choice’ – UK politics live – The Guardian

During her morning interview round, Claire Coutinho, the energy security and net zero secretary, seemed to spend quite a lot of time not agreeing with Suella Braverman’s choice of words. As well as refusing to say the home secretary was right to call homelessness a lifestyle choice (see 9.25am), Coutinho indicated that she did not agree with her cabinet colleague about the pro-Palestinian marches in London and elsewhere being “hate marches”. Asked about that term, Coutinho told ITV’s Good Morning Britain:

I wouldn’t necessarily use that language, but let me say this – what we’ve seen on those marches, in instances, is incredibly hateful behaviour.

Good morning. Legislating is at the heart of what government is all about, and tomorrow, in the king’s speech, Rishi Sunak and his team will set out their programme for what is almost certainly the final full session of parliament before the general election. But already there are signs that some of what’s in it is motivated not so much by governing priorities, but party politics. Sunak is looking for “wedge issues” where he can force Keir Starmer to oppose measures that might be popular with potential Labour voters. All governments do this a bit, although getting the monarch to participate might be considered bad form.

The best example is the announcement overnight that the king’s speech will require the North Sea Transition Authority to issue licences for oil and gas exploration every year. The NSTA can and does already hold regular licensing rounds anyway, but Sunak wants to set a trap for Labour, which says it will not issue new licences if it wins the election. Pippa Crerar has the story here. And these are from Ed Miliband, the shadow secretary for climate change and net zero.

This proposed Bill does nothing to lower energy bills, does nothing to deliver energy security and is a sign of a government that is bankrupt of any ideas.

We already have regular North Sea oil and gas licensing in Britain and it is precisely our dependence on fossil fuels that has led to the worst cost of living crisis in generations.

All this embarrassing stunt tells you is that Rishi Sunak is continuing with his retreat from net zero.

No wonder we see consternation from so many leading businesses, and even figures in his own party, who know he is undermining our energy security and damaging our economy.

At the weekend the Financial Times reported on another king’s speech proposal that would be overtly partisan when it said that Suella Braverman, the home secretary, wanted to include a proposal to stop charities distributing tents to homeless people in cities. Braverman then confirmed the story on X, and added to the provocation by describing homelessness as a “lifestyle choice”.

This time she may taken “wedge politics” a bit too far. Wedge issues work by opening up a split (‘driving a wedge’) between your opponents’ leadership and their supporter base. But Braverman may have put the wedge in the wrong place, because she has horrified some Tories.

At the weekend Bob Blackman, the Conservative MP who heads the all-party parliamentary group for ending homelessness, said Braverman should use “wiser words”. Last night Steve Brine, the Conservative MP who chairs the Commons health committee, went further, telling Radio 4’s Westminster Hour:

I utterly resist the line that sleeping rough is a lifestyle choice. I just think it was clumsy and it was crass.

And this morning Claire Coutinho, the energy security and net zero secretary, who was doing a media round to talk about oil and gas licensing, refused to back Braverman’s language. Asked if she agreed homelessness was a lifestyle choice, Coutinho replied:

I wouldn’t have used necessarily those words, but in my experience what you have is people often with very complex needs and sometimes they might refuse accommodation, and that’s often because they’ve got complicated problems in their lives – like I said, it might be addiction, it might be mental health issues.

Here is the agenda for the day.

10.30am: Clare Lombardelli, the former chief economic adviser to the Treasury, gives evidence to the Covid inquiry. Later in the morning Stuart Glassborow, deputy principal private secretary to Boris Johnson when he was PM, gives evidence.

Morning: Rishi Sunak is on a visit in Norfolk. He is due to record a clip for the media.

11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.

2pm: Ben Warner, a data specialist who worked closely with Dominic Cummings and who worked as a No 10 adviser during the pandemic, gives evidence to the Covid inquiry.

If you want to contact me, do try the “send us a message” feature. You’ll see it just below the byline – on the left of the screen, if you are reading on a laptop or a desktop. This is for people who want to message me directly. I find it very useful when people message to point out errors (even typos – no mistake is too small to correct). Often I find your questions very interesting, too. I can’t promise to reply to them all, but I will try to reply to as many as I can, either in the comments below the line; privately (if you leave an email address and that seems more appropriate); or in the main blog, if I think it is a topic of wide interest.