Kwasi Kwarteng says ‘that isn't me’ as news website uses image of another black man

Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng has received an apology from the Mirror newspaper after it used a picture of another black man in a story about him.

Kwarteng tweeted a screenshot of the article, with the caption “that isn't me”, to the news outlet on Saturday morning.

The Mirror then admitted it had made a "terrible error" by mistakenly picturing Bernard Mensah, the president of international for Bank of America, instead of the chancellor.

Mensah had met Kwarteng at the Treasury on Wednesday amid the backlash over his mini-budget.

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The Mirror apologised to the chancellor over the article which was headlined "Kwasi Kwarteng says he had to do 'something different' after causing budget chaos"

It said in a statement: "This morning a picture in a story about Kwasi Kwarteng was wrongly captioned on the Mirror website.

"This was a terrible error and we apologise to Mr Kwarteng and all our readers.

"The Mirror has a long history of working against racism and we will redouble our efforts on this."

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It follows a tumultuous week which saw the pound slump to a record low against the dollar and the Bank of England step in to prevent the collapse of the pensions industry in the wake of Kwarteng’s £45 billion package of unfunded tax cuts.

There are fears of more pain as the Bank is forced to increase interest rates to shore up the currency and keep a lid on rising inflation, while public services are braced for another spending squeeze.

With the Tories tanking in the opinion polls – one poll last week giving Labour a massive 33-point lead – some Conservative MPs have been calling for a change of direction.

There are reports of letters going in to the chairman of the backbench 1922 Committee, Sir Graham Brady, from MPs calling for a vote of no confidence in prime minister Liz Truss.

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The chancellor has defended his mini-budget by saying the government “had no other choice” than to do “something different” to spark the economy.

“The British taxpayer expects their government to work as efficiently and effectively as possible, and we will deliver on that expectation,” he wrote in The Daily Telegraph.

“Not all the measures we announced last week will be universally popular. But we had to do something different. We had no other choice.”

Kwarteng also insisted he would produce a “credible plan” to get the public finances back on track with a “commitment to spending discipline”.

The Tory party conference opens on Sunday with tributes to the late Queen.

Kwarteng will address members on Monday and Truss will deliver the final leader’s speech on Wednesday.