Tulip Siddiq and the Labour government would like to think that her resignation as a minister earlier this week will end the controversy surrounding her and will result in a quick return to the front bench. ‘The door remains open you for going forward,’ Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, said of Siddiq in response to her resignation letter.
It is unlikely to be as straightforward as that. First, there is the letter written to the Prime Minister by Sir Laurie Magnus, the independent advisor on ministerial standards. In it, he sets out the findings of his ‘exercise to establish the facts’ – note, not an investigation – connected to ‘recent media allegations about Ms Siddiq’.
The Magnus letter will not bring an end to controversy around Siddiq’s properties
The letter is so vague as to be nearly useless. In relation to Siddiq’s decision in 2022 to move into a £2 million property, located around the corner from a well-regarded primary school, that had months earlier been purchased by an Awami League leader who subsequently received significant benefits from the Awami League government in Bangladesh, the letter provides no details at all.
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