Sunak Puts Ally Shapps in Defense Post as He Shapes Top Team
- Shapps promoted from energy security and net zero secretary
- Wallace urges Sunak to continue investing in defense
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Rishi Sunak appointed long-time ally Grant Shapps to be the UK’s defense secretary, as the prime minister begins to shape his team ahead of a general election that’s widely expected next year.
Shapps’s promotion on Thursday came after Ben Wallace quit the defense post after four years, a resignation he’d signaled back in June that he was planning. Shapps was replaced as Energy Security and Net Zero secretary by Claire Coutinho, who had been a junior education minister and becomes the first member of the 2019 intake of lawmakers to enter cabinet.