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This is a global player original podcast. This payment, this settlement that was paid to an

academic after the science secretary Michelle Donnellan had falsely accused them of supporting Hamas.

A settlement of £15,000 has been paid by the taxpayer.

Did you approve that?

I don't think I did because the Chancellor only approves much larger sums of money.

But it is normal practice that government lawyers support government

ministers in legal cases that bought against government ministers in the course of their duties.

And it was paid, I think, to reduce the cost that would be incurred to the taxpayer if there

was a protracted legal case. That was the Chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, doing his morning after the budget before broadcast around on Thursday.

He was trying to sell a story that we've turned the corner, that he has a plan, that he's cutting your taxes.

But it didn't take him long for him to be dragged onto tougher turf, a story which broke earlier in the week,

but which was rather lost in the budget noise. It concerns

Michelle Donnellan, the science secretary, close ally of Rishi Sunak. It's been revealed that some of

your taxes have been used to pay her legal bills after she libelled an academic, falsely accusing

them back in October of being a Hamas sympathiser and of publishing extremist content.

This week, Donaldon's department published a letter withdrawing the claim, deleting her original post and fully accepting that Professor Sang was not an extremist, a supporter of Hamas or other prescribed organisation.

That is all pretty extraordinary in itself. A secretary of

state libeling someone. But as I say, guess who is on the hook for the out-of-court settlement

believed to be £15,000. That's right. You, me, the taxpayer. It's Lewis here. Welcome to the

newsagents. The's Lewis here. Welcome to the newsagents.

The newsagents.

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