MICHAEL GOVE is “entirely unfit” to carry out his new brief as Environment Secretary, Caroline Lucas has said.

The leader of the Green Party and Brighton Pavilion MP said the Prime Minister’s welcoming of Mr Gove back into the Cabinet less than a year after his sacking was “further evidence of both Theresa May’s complete disregard for the environment and her desperation to hold together a Government in chaos”.

Mrs May offered him the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) position as part of a limited Cabinet reshuffle over the weekend following the snap General Election.

The Green Party co-leader said: “It is hard to think of many politicians as ill-equipped for the role of Environment Secretary as Mr Gove. His record of voting against measures to halt climate change and his attempt to wipe the subject from our children’s curriculum show him entirely unfit to lead our country in tackling one of the greatest threats we face.

“And as we enter Brexit negotiations, Gove’s past suggestion we scrap vital EU environmental protections becomes ever more concerning.”