Amber Rudd returns to Cabinet after quitting over Windrush row

Amber Rudd, pictured tonight, has made a dramatic return to Theresa May’s Cabinet calling on Tory rebels to ‘think again’

Amber Rudd made a dramatic return to Theresa May’s Cabinet tonight calling on Tory rebels to ‘think again’ as she took the job of Work and Pensions Secretary. 

Ms Rudd, who quit as Home Secretary over the Windrush immigration scandal, has returned to the PM’s side just 201 days later with Mrs May in a fragile position over Brexit.  

The 55-year-old was a prominent Remain campaigner during the referendum and was seen as a ‘human shield’ for Mrs May after she took office.

She replaces Brexiteer Esther McVey who resigned on Thursday over the PM’s divisive Brexit agreement. 

The rehabilitation of Ms Rudd, who quit in a row over immigration targets, comes after a report concluded she had been let down by her officials. 

Addressing Tory rebels on Sky News tonight she said: ‘I would ask them to think again. 

‘This is not a time for changing our leader, this is a time for pulling together, for making sure that we remember who we are here to serve, who we are here to help, that’s the whole of the country.

‘I worry sometimes that my colleagues are too concerned about the Westminster bubble rather than keeping their eye on what our job is, to serve people.

‘I am confident the Prime Minister can survive. 

‘I think she’s demonstrated this week her complete commitment to making sure that she serves the people she was elected to do so, and she’s come forward with a really practical response to leaving the European Union. I think it’s the right combination.’ 

Ms Rudd stood in for the PM during a 2017 general election debate and during the Windrush scandal Labour said she was being used as a ‘human shield’ to protect Mrs May. 

Asked about the term tonight, Ms Rudd said: ‘I never saw it like that’.  

As Work and Pensions Secretary she will also have to take on the challenge of the divisive Universal Credit policy.

Asked whether the job was a ‘poisoned chalice’, Ms Rudd said tonight she would seek to ‘iron out’ difficulties with the scheme.  

She said: ‘I’m delighted to have been given the honour and responsibility of becoming Secretary of State at the DWP, A huge office, a really important job, helping 20m people across the country.

‘As a one nation Tory I want to make sure that we really do help everyone across the country.

‘I’ve seen Universal Credit do some fantastic things. In my constituency in Hastings & Ryre it really has transformed lives. 

But I also recognise that there have been some issues with it, some problems with it, and I see it very much as my job, my role to make sure that I try to iron out those difficulties so it becomes a force wholly for good.’ 

Labour MPs Diane Abbott and David Lammy, who helped to expose the Windrush scandal, slammed Ms Rudd’s appointment tonight. 

Mr Lammy said: ‘Rudd made inexcusable errors over Windrush. It is wrong that she has been given a new job before any victims have had compensation. 

‘She will be the sixth DWP secretary since March 2016. This is a poisoned chalice in a government that is unlikely to survive until Christmas.’

Ms Abbott said: Amber Rudd resigned because of her mismanagement of Windrush scandal. Now Theresa May puts her in the DWP. 

Ms Rudd (pictured), who quit as Home Secretary over the Windrush immigration scandal, has returned to the PM's side just 201 days later with Mrs May in a fragile position over Brexit

Ms Rudd (pictured), who quit as Home Secretary over the Windrush immigration scandal, has returned to the PM’s side just 201 days later with Mrs May in a fragile position over Brexit

‘Let’s hope she shows more concern for the victims of this department’s unfairness and cruelty than she did at the Home Office.’ 

Asked what Mrs May would say to victims of the Windrush scandal who might feel the Hastings & Rye MP’s rehabilitation had come too soon, the PM’s official spokesman said: ‘Amber Rudd took responsibility for what happened but you saw in the Alex Allan report that she was not supported as she should have been in her role.

‘The Government has apologised, the Prime Minster and Home Secretary apologised for the Windrush scandal. Mistakes were made which shouldn’t have taken place and work is ongoing to make sure those people are properly compensated.’ 

The spokesman said the PM viewed Ms Rudd as ‘a very experienced Secretary of State who has worked across a number of departments’ and was ‘confident she will do an excellent job’. 

Ms Rudd resigned after ‘inadvertently misleading’ the Home Affairs Committee in April at the height of the scandal over the treatment of the Windrush generation.

But a report into the row found officials repeatedly gave her wrong information and then failed to clear up the problem in time to allow her to correct the record. 

The report, written by Sir Alex Allan, the Prime Minister’s independent adviser on ministerial standards, says ‘crossed wires’ contributed to Ms Rudd’s downfall.  

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