Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to the Electoral Commission investigation report of 9 December 2021, if he will place in the Library of the House a copy of the WhatsApp messages between the Prime Minister and Lord Brownlow.

I refer the Rt Hon. Member to the published correspondence between the Independent Adviser on Ministers' Interests and the Prime Minister.

The previous Freedom of Information request was processed in line with the provisions in the Act. For the reasons set out in that correspondence, no official information was held under the Act in scope of that request at the time.

After the Electoral Commission’s investigation concluded, the messages referred to in the Electoral Commission report were subsequently provided to the Independent Adviser.

That exchange is set out in an annex to that published correspondence; the letters are already in the Library of the House, further to the answer to the Rt Hon Member of PQ 98322.