Lost your £180 smart mug, Rishi? Sunak is spotted with ‘throwaway’ coffee cup

He was famously photographed with a £180 smart mug as he drew up a mini-Budget during the height of Covid chaos.

But Rishi Sunak has been inadvertently caught with what appears to be a throwaway coffee cup in footage from his ‘broadcast to the nation’.

A teaser for tonight’s party political broadcast shows the PM seated at a desk with the cup visible next to him.

It will bring back memories of a 2019 episode when an aide snatched a coffee cup out of Boris Johnson‘s hands on camera at Tory conference – telling him he could not have ‘disposables’. 

The government has long pushed for a reduction in the use of disposable coffee cups – although many are now made from recyclable material.

Rishi Sunak has been inadvertently caught with what appears to be a throwaway coffee cup in footage from his ‘broadcast to the nation’

Mr Sunak was famously photographed with a £180 smart mug as he drew up a mini-Budget during the height of Covid chaos 

In July 2020 Mr Sunak – known as one of the richest MPs – was pictured looking over his mini-Budget plans with a Ember Travel Mug displayed prominently on his desk. 

The mug, worth around £180, is said to keep drinks warm for three hours.

A smart phone app also allows the user to set the exact temperature they want their beverage to be kept at, while the cup is powered by an electronic ‘charging coaster’.

It was reportedly a Christmas gift from Mr Sunak’s wife. 

A Lib Dem source told MailOnline: ‘Rishi Sunak is treating the public like mugs. Hiding away his £180 coffee cup doesn’t change the fact that he’s totally out of touch with people struggling to get a GP appointment or pay their bills.

‘At the next election, we hope Conservative MPs will turn out to be just as disposable as Sunak’s new coffee cup.’

Mr Johnson’s entertaining episode happened as he was walking through the Tory conference venue in 2019, and was given a hot drink by his press secretary Rob Oxley. 

The Prime Minister could be heard thanking Mr Oxley for the beverage as they walked through the centre in Manchester.

But the cup was barely in Mr Johnson’s hands before Shelley Williams-Walker, Number 10’s operations chief, snatched it away from the PM.  

The trio continued to walk as a seemingly frustrated Mr Johnson raised his hands in the air. 

Ms Williams-Walker reportedly said ‘no disposable cups’ after she took the drink away from the premier and tried to get it out of shot of the TV cameras. 

It will bring back memories of a 2019 episode when an aide snatched a coffee cup out of Boris Johnson’s hands on camera at Tory conference – telling him he could not have ‘disposables’