Rishi Sunak's resignation honours list branded 'ID parade of political flunkies' as anger builds

Michael Gove was among in Rishi Sunak's "rewards for failure" resignation honours list.

The divisive former Cabinet minister was given a peerage by the defeated ex-PM while , James Cleverly, , and Mel Stride were all awarded knighthoods. The list - branded an "ID parade of political flunkies" - comes less than a year after voters turfed the Conservatives out of office after 14 years of chaos.

A source told The : "Rewarding failure is in the Tories' DNA. Surely it's only a matter of time before they reward for crashing the economy and sending mortgages spiralling given they still refuse to apologise for it."

Mr Gove, who was once spotted busting moves on the dancefloor of an Aberdeen nightclub in a suit, was a key member of the Tory psychodrama. He infamously ran in the 2016 Conservative leadership battle forcing his then-friend to pull the plug on his first attempt to become Prime Minister.

He held a string of Cabinet posts under four Tory PMs, including a controversial four-year stint as Education Secretary where he mocked the education leaders as the "Blob". On Friday the leader of the National Education Union (NEU) branded Mr Gove's elevation to the House of Lords a "slap in the face".

General Secretary Daniel Kebede said: "It is typical of Conservative prime ministers to reward failure when they leave office. inflicted deep harm to our education system, and we are living with his legacy to this day. Student mental health has deteriorated since 2010. The wellbeing of teachers has too.

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"He created a toxic culture of exam factories, excessive accountability and out of control workload. That is not something to honour. His peerage is a slap in the face to those left picking up the pieces."

Others said Mr Gove, who quit as MP last year and now edits the Spectator magazine, had done huge damage to the country as one of the architects of the EU Leave campaign. Health Minister Stephen Kinnock told LBC: "Michael Gove has done huge damage to our country.

"He was one of the architects of having a with no plan whatsoever on how to actually deliver it. He's been at the heart of some pretty damaging policies. He was a Cabinet minister pretty much throughout that period of time [14 years] and look at the mess we ended up in."

Mr Sunak, who led the Tories to their worst-ever election defeat, also dished out peerages to other key allies during his 20 months in Downing Street. They included former Transport Secretary Mark Harper, former chief whip Sir Alister Jack, ex-attorney general Victoria Prentis, and the former chief executive of the Conservatives, Stephen Massey.

In total 36 names were on Mr Sunak's list, including a raft of CBEs and OBEs for close advisers working behind-the-scenes in his Downing Street operation.

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Mr Hunt, who was awarded a knighthood, was brought in as Chancellor by disaster PM Liz Truss during her final days in No10. He was forced to rip up her reckless economic plans and was kept on at No11 by Mr Sunak until the Tories were ousted from power in July 2024.

Former Home Secretary Mr Cleverly was also given a knighthood despite once being branded “Colonel Calamity” after jumping from crisis to crisis. In 2023, he faced calls to resign as a minister after The Mirror revealed he made a joke about giving his wife a date-rape drug. Elsewhere Mr Cleverly came under fire after being accused of calling a Labour MP's constituency a "s**thole" after he spoke about the issue of poverty in his area.

Lib Dem deputy leader Daisy Cooper said: “These political nominations look like an ID parade of political flunkies whose fingerprint of failure are still felt on family finances." She added: "They are rewards for the failure of a dreadful Conservative Government that was rightly kicked out of office. The fact that has dished out honours to his mates after all the damage they did is yet more proof of how out of touch the Conservatives still are."

Darren Hughes, Chief Executive of the Electoral Reform Society, added: “Trust in our politics has slumped to record lows in recent years. Yet today the public is again witnessing the spectacle of a former Prime Minister stuffing even more friends and allies into the already ludicrously bloated House of Lords – handing each one a job for life in Parliament.

“This business-as-usual ‘jobs for mates’ approach at Westminster will do nothing to arrest that alarming collapse in public trust."

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