Akinwande Soji-Ojo
British Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, is being investigated by the parliamentary watchdog over a possible failure to declare shares his wife holds in an agency benefiting from a recent budgetary allocation.
Parliamentary Standards Commissioner, Daniel Greenberg, had last Thursday launched a probe into shares Akshata Murty holds in childcare agency, ‘Koru Kids,’ his office announced on Monday.
Sunak did not mention Murty’s shares in the firm at a recent committee hearing.
Finance Minister, Jeremy Hunt, had in March announced a pilot of incentive payments for childminders joining the profession, which doubles if workers sign up through one of six agencies, including Koru Kids.
Sunak had promised “integrity, professionalism and accountability at every level” when he assumed power in October after the short reign of Liz Truss and the scandal-tainted tenure of Boris Johnson.
The Prime Minister has since received a police fine for not wearing a seatbelt, aside the one he received for breaching lockdown rules when he was finance minister under Johnson.
Murty is the daughter of co-founder of Indian IT giant, Infosys,and her wealth is estimated to be around $700 million.
Sunak has previously been criticised when it emerged that Murty had so-called “non-domiciled” status and did not declare earnings from her dividends in Infosys for UK tax purposes.
Murty later said she would include them after a furore.
Critics, including the main opposition Labour Party, have said the “privately wealthy” Sunak, who worked in finance before entering politics, is out of touch with ordinary voters struggling with rising costs.
