Strikes UK today: Rishi Sunak faces PMQs as half a million workers walk out

Sir Keir Starmer compared Rishi Sunak to Boris Johnson, saying he treats questions about conduct as “something to brush off”.

“The Tory party’s addiction to sleaze and scandal has done huge damage to this country.

“Surely even this PM can put his foot down and stand up to his old boss, and say, ‘He made the mess he can pick up the bill’.”

Responding to Sir Keir Starmer’s accusation that he did nothing about bullying claims against Dominic Raab, Rishi Sunak said:

“When I was made aware of formal complaints I appointed a leading KC to undertake an investigation because I take action when these things happen.”

Sir Keir Starmer has moved onto Dominic Raab, the justice secretary who faces several bullying claims.

The Labour leader said Rishi Sunak was “too weak to do anything about it”.

MPs heard how The Independent broke news of Nadhim Zahawi’s tax affairs, starting a chain of events that would lead to his sacking as Tory chair last week.

At PMQs Sir Keir Starmer asked Rishi Sunak about his knowledge of the former minister’s trouble with HMRC.

“Mr Speaker, in The Independent sixth of July: ‘New Chancellor’s finances secretly investigated by the National Crime Agency’,” he said in reference to this paper’s first report on what would become a huge scandal.

Sir Keir Starmer has asked if Nadhim Zahawi told officials he was being investigated by HMRC before or afer Rishi appointed him.

Independent TV is hosting PMQs live on YouTube.

Rishi Sunak is at the despatch box now.

Independent TV is following a workers’ march through the streets of London.

Keep up with the long walk to Downing Street here:

Rishi Sunak will face Prime Minister’s Question at midday as around half a million workers walk out on Britain’s biggest day of strike action in more than a decade.

Teachers, train drivers, civil servants, university lecturers, bus drivers and security guards are among the professions walking out today.

Union bosses on the picket lines have accused the government of forcing the action. Mick Whelan, general secretary of the Aslef union, told The Independent: “The reality that this is a political strike driven by the government.”

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer will use this afternoon’s session to grill the prime minister over his government’s record over months of widespread industrial action, which have seen ministers table new laws to limit the rights of striking workers.

Howard Stevenson, a professor in education at the University of Nottingham and a UCU Officer, said at a picket line that staff were “really, really dissatisfied” with a number of issues but said employers had only engaged on “the most minor details”.

He said: “Alongside the pension issue, we also have concerns about pay because pay has been eroded very substantially, over the last 10 years in particular.

“Workloads are very high, pay gaps are a concern, across the sector they are very high and at the University of Nottingham and we have something like a 20 per cent gender pay gap.

“This campaign is about tackling those issues, and in the higher education sector generally there is systemic misuse of precarious contracts, so many of our colleagues are on hourly paid contracts or fixed term contracts, so there are very high levels of job insecurity.