Transport Secretary Louise Haigh resigns over work phone ‘mistake’

Louise Haigh has resigned as Transport Secretary after pleading guilty to a criminal offence after she incorrectly told police that a work mobile phone was stolen in 2013.

Her resignation is the first from the Prime Minister’s Cabinet and comes a day after Haigh admitted that she told police she had lost her phone in a mugging but later found it had not been taken.

In a letter to Sir Keir Starmer, she said she is “totally committed to our political project” but believes “it will be best served by my supporting you from outside Government”.

“I am sorry to leave under these circumstances, but I take pride in what we have done. I will continue to fight every day for the people of Sheffield Heeley who I was first and foremost elected to represent and to ensure that the rest of our programme is delivered in full,” she wrote.

She added: “My appointment to your Cabinet as the youngest ever woman remains one of the proudest achievements of my life, but not as proud as the steps we took to improve the lives of the British people.”

Starmer thanked Haigh for her work to deliver the Government’s transport agenda. The BBC reports that Haigh disclosed the conviction to Starmer when she was first appointed to his shadow cabinet.

On Thursday Sky News and the Times reported on Thursday that Haigh admitted the offence in 2014.

She had reported to police a list of items that she had believed stolen, including a work phone, after she was mugged on a night out in 2013.

Haigh said she discovered “some time later” that the phone had not been taken.

She said the matter was a “genuine mistake” from which she “did not make any gain”, and that magistrates gave her the “lowest possible outcome”.

As the conviction has now been spent it is no longer on her record.

Haigh has been MP for Sheffield Heeley since 2015 and held several shadow ministerial and shadow cabinet roles before becoming Transport Secretary when Labour won the election in July.

She was working for insurance giant Aviva at the time of the incident, according to reports.

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In her letter to the Prime Minister, she wrote: “I appreciate that whatever the facts of the matter, this issue will inevitably be a distraction from delivering on the work of this government and the policies to which we are both committed.”

Sir Keir said Ms Haigh had made “huge strides” as Transport Secretary to take the rail system back into public ownership through the creation of Great British Railways and investing £1 billion into vital bus services.

A Conservative Party spokesman said: “Louise Haigh has done the right thing in resigning. It is clear she has failed to behave to the standards expected of an MP.

“In her resignation letter, she states that Keir Starmer was already aware of the fraud conviction, which raises questions as to why the Prime Minister appointed Ms Haigh to Cabinet with responsibility for a £30bn budget?

“The onus is now on Keir Starmer to explain this obvious failure of judgement to the British public.”

This is a breaking news story and will be updated.