The Labour leader has refused to sack Immigration Minister Mike Tapp after Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood requested his dismissal. The disagreement centres on a proposed change to visa rules for migrants already living in the UK, which Tapp expressed opposition to in a newspaper column.
Tapp's comments, published in The Times, argued that foreign care workers who have played by the rules and have genuinely contributed to the UK's care system should not be required to wait longer to apply for settlement. The Home Office had been working on changes to the visa rules, but Tapp's article was seen as a breach of collective responsibility and the Ministerial Code.
Downing Street has stated that Tapp remains in post, and that it is not for any individual Secretary of State to determine whether the Ministerial Code has been followed. Instead, the Prime Minister alone has the authority to make this decision.
The dispute has sparked a row within the Labour party, with some allies of the Home Secretary interpreting Tapp's comments as a threat to leak sensitive documents. Tapp has since denied any wrongdoing, saying that he was simply expressing his views on a policy he had been working on for months.