Home Secretary announces her resignation

Ms Rudd was appointed Home Secretary in July 2016 and her department oversees the running of the police as well as the fire and rescue service. He decision to resign comes after a week of widespread criticism after she claimed to not be aware of Home Office removal targets for illegal immigrants. But on Sunday The Guardian printed a private memo that Ms Rudd sent to Prime Minister Theresa May in January 2017, which outlined her aims to deport 10% more illegal immigrants than Mrs May had during her last year as Home Secretary. 

The controversy centres around migrants from Commonwealth countries, who were encouraged to settle in the UK from the late 1940s to 1973 and are have been wrongly declared illegal immigrants. These immigrants have been named the Windrush generation and the Home Office has come under heavy criticism for its handling of the situation. 

In her resignation, Rudd wrote: “It is with great regret that I am resigning as home secretary. I feel it is necessary to do so because I inadvertently misled the Home Affairs Select Committee over targets for removal of illegal immigrants during their questions on Windrush.

“Since appearing before the select committee, I have reviewed the advice I was given on this issue and become aware of information provided to my office which makes mention of targets. I should have been aware of this, and I take full responsibility for the fact that I was not.”

Responding to Rudd’s resignation, shadow Home Secretary Diane said: “After this scandal and its botched cover up, Amber Rudd’s resignation was inevitable. It should have come sooner.

“The architect of this crisis, Theresa May, must now step forward to give an immediate, full and honest account of how this inexcusable situation happened on her watch.

“Outstanding questions remain, and a change of Home Secretary must mean a change in the ‘hostile environment’ policies begun by her predecessor, or it will be meaningless.

“The Prime Minister must come before the House of Commons to explain whether she knew that Amber Rudd was misleading Parliament and the public last week about deportation targets.”