A Tory minister has dismissed calls for Liz Truss to lose the Tory whip over her behaviour at a right-wing gathering in America.
The former prime minister has come in for severe criticism over her appearance at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington last week.
During an interview with controversial former Donald Trump adviser Steve Bannon, Truss claimed that the Financial Times was “friends of the deep state”, which she blames for her downfall as PM.
She also failed to challenge Bannon when he described far-right agitator Tommy Robinson as a “hero”.
That led to Labour demanding that Rishi Sunak suspend her from the Tory Party.
On Sky News this morning, policing minister Chris Philp was quizzed by Kay Burley on Truss’s performance.
After he praised the PM for withdrawing the Conservative whip from Lee Anderson “almost immediately”, Burley said: “He’s not withdrawn the whip from Liz Truss. Should he?”
The minister replied: “No.”
Asked why not, he said: “Because I don’t think she’s done anything wrong.”
Burley then told him: “She didn’t step in when the person on the stage with her said that Tommy Robinson was a hero.”
Philp said: “Well he’s clearly not, but I don’t think you can attack someone for a sin of omission and we don’t know what the circumstances of that were.”
Burley said Truss had also criticised the Conservatives and supported other parties, but Philp said: “She’s a Conservative and I’m sure she’ll be campaigning as hard as the rest of us for a Conservative government to stop the Labour Party from winning the next election.”
The exchange came after Truss ignored nine questions from a BBC reporter about the controversy.