UK PM Sunak hits out at Boris Johnson on honours list row

London: British Prime Minister Rishi k on Monday slammed former premier Boris Johnson for asking him to overrule a panel vetting his resignation list appointments to the House of Lords, saying it was “something I wasn’t prepared to do”.

The British-Indian leader’s comment at a public function stemmed from a long-running row over Johnson’s honours list, and specifically the list of people he wanted to award peerages to. Johnson’s long-awaited honours list, approved nine months after he resigned as prime minister, included 38 honours and seven peerages. The resignation honours list is a tradition that allows outgoing prime ministers to nominate people for honours.

As a departing prime minister, Johnson has the right to nominate people for seats in the House of Lords, and for other honours such as knighthoods. By convention, current prime ministers pass on the list of nominees to the HOLAC.

The list of new peerages did not include many of the former Conservative party leader’s nominees. Just three hours after its publication, Johnson stepped down as an MP late on Friday and furiously attacked Sunak’s agenda. In his first public response to the row, Sunak on Monday accused Johnson of asking him to overrule the House of Lords Appointment Commission and wave through the rejected nominees.

Sunak said Johnson asked him to override their recommendations, or “make promises to people”.

But Sunak said he refused, adding it was “something I wasn’t prepared to do”. “I wasn’t prepared to do that, I didn’t think that was right. And if people don’t like that, then tough,” he told a tech conference in London.

The intervention marks a new point in an escalating war of words over Johnson’s controversial resignation honours list, the BBC reported.