Category Archives: UK news

Theresa May becomes latest Tory MP to step down before election, saying ‘it has been an honour to serve’ – UK politics live

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Former PM says she remains committed to supporting Sunak as she decides to ‘pass the baton on’ after 27 years

Treasury minister Gareth Davies has denied the number of Conservative MPs stepping down signifies a lack of confidence in the party’s electoral prospects.

He told Sky News he was “personally sad” to see Theresa May step down after “a pretty good innings” of “27 years of service not just to her constituents but I think as one of our longest serving home secretaries and then obviously prime minister as well.”

This is what happens when you approach a new election, and completely reasonable for people to decide that it’s time to go, particularly when they’ve been in the House of Commons for a long time.

Each one has made their own decision for personal reasons and I respect every single person’s decision to do so.

Brexit has reignited the UK’s trade standing in global markets ‘worth hundreds of billions of pounds’ says Kemi Badenoch. Britons are better off.

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Theresa May to step down as MP at general election

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Former PM says she wants to focus on causes close to her heart after 27 years in parliament

The former prime minister Theresa May will step down as an MP at the next general election after 27 years in parliament.

In a statement to the Maidenhead Advertiser, the Maidenhead MP said she wanted to focus on causes close to her heart, including her work on the Global Commission on Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking.

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Health gains of low-traffic schemes up to 100 times greater than costs, study finds

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Research looked at three London boroughs to value overall health benefits of active travel over 20 years at up to £4,800 per head

Policies to help people walk and cycle such as low-traffic neighbourhoods can create public health benefits as much as 100 times greater than the cost of the schemes, a long-term study of active travel measures has concluded.

The research, based on six years of surveys among thousands of people living in three outer London boroughs that introduced LTNs or similar schemes, found they tended to prompt people to switch some trips from cars to active travel, although the effects were varied.

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Astronomers detect ‘waterworld with a boiling ocean’ in deep space

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Exclusive: Significant discovery, made by James Webb telescope, provokes disagreement over conditions on planet’s surface

Astronomers have observed a distant planet that could be entirely covered in a deep water ocean, in findings that advance the search for habitable conditions beyond Earth.

The observations, by Nasa’s James Webb space telescope (JWST), revealed water vapour and chemical signatures of methane and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of the exoplanet, which is twice Earth’s radius and about 70 light years away. This chemical mix is consistent with a water world where the ocean would span the entire surface, and a hydrogen-rich atmosphere, according to researchers from the University of Cambridge, although they do not envisage a balmy, inviting seascape.

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UK mothers earned £4.44 less an hour than fathers in 2023, finds analysis

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‘Motherhood penalty’ appears to be worsening, with pay gap for median hourly pay growing by 93p an hour since 2020

The “motherhood penalty” is wreaking havoc on women and the economy, according to campaigners, as fresh analysis reveals that the pay gap between mothers and fathers in the UK has grown by nearly £1 an hour since 2020.

A study of the hourly earnings of mothers and fathers, released on International Women’s Day, found that on average mothers earned 24% less an hour than fathers in 2023 – a “motherhood pay penalty” of £4.44 an hour.

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Former commander-in-chief Zaluzhnyi to become Ukraine’s ambassador to UK

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Popular national figure given new role after being dismissed by Volodymyr Zelenskiy a month ago

Ukraine’s former commander in chief, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, is to become the country’s next ambassador to the UK, a month after he was fired by the president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, from his job leading the military.

The decision makes good on Zelenskiy’s promise to keep the popular former general “as part of the team” but it also removes him from Ukraine, where he is seen as the only realistic challenger to the president if there were to be an election.

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UK science secretary received government advice before Hamas tweet

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No 10 refuses to say how Michelle Donelan was advised over accusation against academic who then sued her for libel

The science secretary, Michelle Donelan, received government advice before she tweeted a letter in which she accused an academic of supporting Hamas, Downing Street has said.

No 10 refused to say what advice officials had given her and whether she actually followed it, but insisted she had “acted in line with established precedent”.

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Sunak warned unfunded axing of national insurance would harm services

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Economists say making the policy an election pledge could cost £40bn, which is badly needed for health, education and elsewhere

Rishi Sunak has been warned against fighting an election on an unfunded plan to abolish employee national insurance amid projections the move could blow a £40bn hole in the public finances.

As the pre-election battle on the economy between the Conservatives and Labour intensified, the prime minister was on Thursday under mounting pressure to explain how the measure could be afforded while public services were crumbling.

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UK Insolvency Service seeks up to 15-year director ban for Lex Greensill

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Government agency issues disqualification proceedings after inquiry into failed finance firm Greensill Capital

The Insolvency Service has begun legal action to have Lex Greensill disqualified from running companies for up to 15 years after the outcome of an investigation into the directors of his failed finance firm.

The government agency said it had issued disqualification proceedings on behalf of the business secretary against the former Australian sugar farmer, who founded the Greensill group of companies.

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UK politics: Sunak refuses to say how abolition of national insurance would be funded – as it happened

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PM says ‘people trust me on these things’ and refuses to be drawn on whether government would forgo entire £46bn raised from measure

Keir Starmer has accused Jeremy Hunt of repeating the budget mistakes made by Liz Truss during her disastrous premiership.

In comments on the budget during a visit to a building site this morning, Starmer focused on Hunt’s proposal to abolish employees’ national insurance over time, saying that this was a bigger unfunded tax promise than those in Truss’s mini-budget. (See 9.28am.)

How humiliating was that for the government yesterday?

We’ve argued for years that they should get rid of the non-dom tax status, they’ve resisted that. And now, completely out of ideas, the only decent policy they’ve got is the one that they’ve lifted from us.

Nothing that Jeremy Hunt did yesterday, nor anything the OBR said, changes anything very significantly. Which is a shame. Because that means we are still:

-heading for a parliament in which people will on average be worse off at the end than at the start,

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I showed my baby nothing but love, Constance Marten tells Old Bailey jury

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Woman on trial with her partner, Mark Gordon, for manslaughter of infant Victoria says she gave her ‘the best any mother would’

Constance Marten, whose daughter Victoria died after she and the baby’s father went off the grid in freezing winter weather to evade authorities, has denied ever harming her child, telling a jury she had shown her nothing but love during her short life.

Marten was giving evidence at the Old Bailey on Thursday, as she and her partner, Mark Gordon, stand trial for the manslaughter of the child in 2023. Gordon declined to give evidence earlier in the week.

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Treasury disbanded non-dom tax policy unit weeks before budget, sources say

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Exclusive: Officials fear government is ill-prepared for lobbying from wealth advisory industry after taxation overhaul

The Treasury disbanded a unit tasked with offshore and non-dom tax policy weeks before announcing significant changes in the budget to the way foreign residents are taxed, sources have said.

The unit, which comprised technical experts on offshore tax issues, included specialists on non-dom policy. These officials would, according. to the sources, have been expected to help manage the implementation of a replacement for non-dom status as outlined by the chancellor this week.

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Jeremy Hunt vows to pay more capital gains tax on his properties

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Chancellor refuses to disclose number of houses owned but says he will pay higher tax rate on proceeds from sales

Jeremy Hunt has promised to voluntarily pay more capital gains tax on his properties so that he does not benefit from a tax cut he introduced.

The chancellor refused to disclose how many houses he owned but said he would pay a higher tax rate on any proceeds from selling his property.

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‘Deniable fiddle’: the MoD, Saudi Arabia and a scandal half a century in the making

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Revelations about payments by Ministry of Defence are culmination of decades of British deal-making with Saudis

The revelation that the Ministry of Defence paid millions of pounds to a firm that would later be accused of being a conduit for secret payments to high-ranking Saudi officials is the culmination of a scandal that has been half a century in the making.

The £8m paid from an MoD bank account between 2014 and 2017 was in connection with a large defence deal, Sangcom, first struck in the 1970s.

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MoD signed £8m deal with firm later alleged to be conduit for secret payments to Saudi prince

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Project Arrow contract signed amid scramble to keep on track £1.6bn defence deal and ran until at least 2017

The UK Ministry of Defence paid millions of pounds to a company later alleged to have been a conduit for secret payments to high-ranking Saudi Arabian officials including a member of the royal family.

The MoD payments, worth £8m, were made under a contract codenamed Project Arrow that ran until at least 2017, according to documents that surfaced in a criminal trial.

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Comedian Hardeep Singh Kohli appears in Glasgow court accused of sex offences

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Kohli, who did not enter a plea during the hearing at the sheriff court, was released on bail

The comedian Hardeep Singh Kohli has appeared in court accused of sex offences.

The 55-year-old, who has appeared on TV shows including Celebrity MasterChef, Loose Ends and Question Time, was released on bail after a private appearance at Glasgow sheriff court.

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Rwanda deportation bill set back again after House of Lords votes

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Rishi Sunak’s bill was opposed in 10 votes by peers, two days after five amendments were forced through

Rishi Sunak has suffered further setbacks in the House of Lords over his controversial Rwandan deportation bill after peers defeated the government on all 10 votes.

Wednesday’s vote comes two days after the prime minister endured his heaviest defeat in the House of Lords when the archbishop of Canterbury and former Conservative ministers joined forces with the opposition to force through five amendments.

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Cameron describes talks with Israeli minister over Gaza as ‘tough but necessary’

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UK foreign secretary repeated request to Benny Gantz for Israel to allow delivery of more aid and refrain from a full-scale assault on Rafah

The UK foreign secretary, David Cameron, has said he had held a “tough but necessary” conversation with Israeli war cabinet minister Benny Gantz, repeating calls for more humanitarian aid for Gaza and warning him against a fully fledged offensive in Rafah.

Cameron said ensuring the availability of aid in Gaza would be a factor when the UK assesses whether Israel is acting in line with international law.

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Budget 2024: UK taxes head for highest level since 1948 despite Hunt’s NI cut

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Borrowing and stealth taxes fund £14bn giveaway, but public spending squeeze looms after election

Britain will go into the next general election with taxes at their highest level since 1948 despite Jeremy Hunt’s 2p budget cut in national insurance contributions – with the threat of a fresh squeeze on public spending to come after polling day.

The chancellor used a combination of higher borrowing and a range of stealth taxes to fund a £14bn giveaway package and said his ambition was to phase out NICs for employees and the self-employed altogether.

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Blur drummer Dave Rowntree selected as Labour candidate for general election

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Labour candidate will stand in Mid Sussex against Conservatives who currently hold seat

Modern Life is Rubbish, Blur once famously pronounced. Well, after the band’s drummer was selected as a Labour candidate at the next general election, they may hope to change the situation.

Dave Rowntree will stand in Mid Sussex, the party announced on Wednesday evening. The constituency includes Burgess Hill, Haywards Heath and the Mid Sussex villages.

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