Grant Shapps is the new defence secretary, after Ben Wallace officially resigned this morning. The experienced cabinet minister moves from energy secretary to the coveted role. As I reported in this week’s politics column for the magazine, the criteria desired at No 10 for the candidate included “efficient, unshowy, loyal, decent”. Does Shapps tick all four? Well, he’s certainly loyal, having backed Rishi Sunak not once but twice for leader. He’s also seen as a capable minister both in terms of running a department and performing before the media. Shapps, who famously led the media rounds on Barnard Castle when Boris Johnson was prime minister, is seen as one of the safest pairs of hands.
As for Shapps’ defence credentials, he visited kyiv last week. He also served for a brief period as chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Ukraine, moving to the Home Office under Liz Truss before her tenure fell apart (he is the shortest-serving Home Secretary in history). He has been a member of the National Security Council in previous roles.
Number 10 wanted Wallace’s successor to be someone they could trust.
In his energy report, Shapps has worked to help Ukraine strengthen its fuel security for the winter months and beyond, which he says would help isolate Putin. Shapps still has a big challenge to meet. Wallace used to top the Conservative Home cabinet ranking and was respected by many opposition MPs. His extensive military knowledge was credited with making the UK well placed to help Ukraine in the first place. When it comes to voter issues, a recent Ipsos political study found that the response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine was the only policy area where voters thought Labour would do worse than the Conservatives.
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Ultimately, the reason Shapps has the mandate is that No 10 wanted Wallace’s successor to be someone they could trust when it came to difficult spending decisions, both in terms of the current situation and the message at the next election.
During the Conservative leadership race, Sunak refused to commit as much as Truss on defence, with the former prime minister promising to spend 3% of GDP on defence by 2030. When Sunak succeeded Truss, he watered down that pledge but promised to increase funding to 2.5% of GDP over the long term. The concern among Sunak’s allies was that the wrong candidate might start pushing for spending commitments that the Treasury would struggle to match. Shapps is likely to fall into the same boat. In the immediate term, Shapps will have to deal with the UK’s depleted military supplies, much of which has been sent to Ukraine.
Shapps’s promotion leaves a vacancy in the energy department, so there will still be some more changes today. However, the wider reshuffle will take place after the party conference in October. To find out why, see this week’s Spectator politics column.
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