Just months after she made fun of Rishi Sunak on Twitter for his “bizarre” staircase photocall as chancellor, Amber de Botton, head of UK news for ITV, has been hired as his director of communications.
After ITV’s political editor Robert Peston made the announcement on Twitter, Downing Street confirmed the new hire.
A “big vacuum at ITV News” will be left by the mother of two, according to him, who is a “great news editor and journalist.”
Beth Rigby, the political editor of Sky News, where Ms. De Botton formerly served as deputy head of politics, also had high regard for the Durham University alum.
She is a political operator and news editor with considerable aptitude, and she is moving to No. 10 to oversee the PM’s communications plan, according to Ms. Rigby. They are serious.
As a special adviser, Ms. De Botton will have the authority to advise ministers on political matters, defend the Government’s policies, and criticise the opposition parties, in contrast to an unbiased civil servant.
When Mr. Sunak served as chancellor in 2020, Allegra Stratton was hired as his head of strategic communications. However, a few months later, she was plucked by Boris Johnson to serve as his spokeswoman for televised briefings.
Days after an allegedly rule-breaking Christmas party at No. 10, Ms. Stratton was caught on camera at a pretend news conference making jokes about a “fictional party.” She left a day later.
Ms. De Botton made fun of a now-famous press image taken in March 2021 of Mr. Sunak, the chancellor at the time, standing atop No. 11 Downing Street carrying his red “budget box.”
His Treasury team was oddly grouped together, going down the stairway one after the other.
