Susanna Reid and Ed Balls have been praised for their persistent grilling of security minister Tom Tugendhat, interrogating him over an apparent deleted tweet that he wasn’t aware had disappeared from his profile.
On Tuesday’s Good Morning Britain, the presenters welcomed the MP onto the programme to talk about the government’s defence spending, following the nuclear submarine deal made by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.
Balls called out comments that Tugendhat had previously made, when the politician apparently claimed in an article that the government promising to increase defence spending to 2.5% of GDP (gross domestic product) wasn’t enough.
Tugendhat insisted that he was talking about both defence and intelligence in the article, while Balls continued to question if he still stands by saying that 3% of GDP ‘is the minimum we need’, calling out their guest for ‘resiling’ from his previous statements.
Balls then read out a tweet that the MP reportedly posted on July 13 last year, which read: ‘The truth is we don’t spend enough on the defence of our country. As PM, I would commit 3% of GDP to defence spending.’
‘Is that tweet still on your Twitter account?’ Balls asked, to which Tugendhat responded: ‘God knows.’
‘You don’t know. Well I can tell you it’s not there, but that’s what you said,’ the GMB presenter stated.
Reid then chimed in, as she remarked: ‘With respect, I’m just listening to the tweet, and the tweet is very clear, but I’m also very interested to know whether you have deleted that tweet? Ed says you have – did you delete that tweet?’
The security minister replied: ‘I’m afraid I have no idea how the Twitter system works. I don’t know whether it’s there or not. You’ll have to look.’
Tugendhat explained that while he publishes his own tweets, he has ‘no idea what happens to them once they go out’, adding that he doesn’t personally delete his own tweets unless they contain typos.
‘So why would that have been deleted? Was it because it was wrong? Or for some other reason?’ Reid asked.
‘I’m afraid I have absolutely no idea, I don’t delete those tweets,’ he maintained.
The presenter then said: ‘That’s really interesting because you’re security minister at the Home Office, I’m just interested to know… social media is a risky place as we know. Someone’s deleted that tweet for a reason.’
Tugendhat said he felt ‘very lucky’ to have a team of people who work in his office, before speculating whether a programme may have been used which deleted the tweet in question.
Several GMB viewers applauded the presenting duo for their tenacious line of questioning, as one said: ‘Brilliant from @edballs & on @GMB. Tearing @TomTugendhat apart regarding his lies about defence spending.’
‘Skewered! @TomTugendhat well done @edballs @susannareid100,’ another wrote.
Someone else said that Balls ‘tied him up in knots about his stance on his defence spending’, before adding that the ‘takedown on his deleted tweet was hilarious’.
Good Morning Britain airs weekdays from 6am on ITV.
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