Defence Secretary Ben Wallace says he has 'withdrawn' the offer for a disused North Yorkshire RAF base at Linton-on-Ouse to be used to house asylum seekers.

He told reporters he had 'obligations to do something else' with the site.

Mr Wallace was asked about Rishi Sunak’s reported comments that the former chancellor would ask the Home Office to find an alternative solution to using the site in Linton-on-Ouse.

He said: “I have withdrawn the offer to the Home Office for that site.

“It’s been with them for a number of months. I have obligations to do something else with that site, and you know there are other sites we made available to the Home Office if they wish to take it up.”

He added: “I have withdrawn the offer of that site to the Home Office. It was one of, I think, five sites we offered at the time, when Rishi Sunak was in Government, and he was certainly supportive of it at the time. He isn’t now, interestingly enough.”

Mr Sunak's rival for the Conservative Party leadership and to be next PM, Liz Truss, has also said she understands the proposed centre for asylum seekers in Linton-on-Ouse is “not going ahead”.

When it was put to her that Mr Sunak wanted to scrap the plans for the site, she said it was a 'moot point' because 'it won’t be going forward'.

She told reporters in Huddersfield: “Well, my understanding from the Defence Secretary is that site is not going ahead.”