Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has barred Immigration Minister Mike Tapp from accessing government documents or attending meetings without her specific approval, escalating a row that began when Tapp wrote an unauthorised newspaper column calling for overseas care workers to be exempt from visa rule changes.
Mahmood had demanded that Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer sack Tapp, a loyal ally, for writing the article in The Times. A Home Office source said the piece amounted to “freelancing on policy” and was a breach of collective responsibility and the Ministerial Code. But Downing Street has not yet acted; a spokesman said the prime minister was “taking advice” and had confidence in both Mahmood and Tapp.
“Shabana Mahmood bars Mike Tapp from Home Office documents after he wrote unauthorised article on migration.”
Tapp, the MP for Dover, used the article to argue that care workers who “have played by the rules and have genuinely contributed to our care system should not be required to wait longer to apply for settlement”. After the column was published on Thursday evening, a Home Office source told the BBC: “Mike Tapp is expected to be sacked… He has taken possible ideas that the home secretary and her team were working on, and briefed them as his own to try to win a job in the new administration.”
In a defiant response on X, Tapp wrote: “It’s gone from ‘he broke the ministerial code’ to ‘he stole my idea’. I have put my views across on a policy I’ve been working on for months (I have the receipts) in an op ed in The Times. Give it a read, and let’s continue to discuss. I won’t be intimidated to drop my views. Stay classy!” Allies of the home secretary interpreted the reference to “receipts” as a threat to leak sensitive documents. In a separate since-deleted tweet, Tapp told a supporter: “The attempted intimidation is quite a sight. I’ve seen off the Taliban and taken out terrorists. Country First, always.”
The extraordinary public rupture, in the last days of Starmer’s premiership, has left the government’s migration plans in disarray. Tapp, who is attending a wedding in San Francisco, now requires Mahmood’s approval to participate in any Home Office business.