Category Archives: UK news

Rishi Sunak’s ‘show, don’t tell’ approach brings hope back to Tories

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Some of party’s MPs even believe they could narrowly win next election – but the odds remain stacked against them

When Rishi Sunak took over, most Conservative MPs were in despair. Some even suggested the party did not deserve to be in power. “We need a reset,” one said at the time. “A period out of office to get our act together.”

But almost five months on, Sunak has given them hope that they can avoid a total wipeout at the next election. Despite 13 years in office and all the problems the UK is facing, they now believe they could hang on, albeit with a significantly smaller majority.

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BBC has undermined its credibility over Gary Lineker, says Greg Dyke

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Ex-director general says decision to suspend presenter for criticising government’s asylum policies is mistaken

The BBC has undermined its own credibility with its decision to stand Gary Lineker down from hosting Match of the Day because it will be viewed as having bowed to government pressure, its former director general Greg Dyke has said.

Dyke’s comments come after the corporation suspended Lineker on Friday for breaching impartiality guidelines by criticising the government’s asylum policies.

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UK rail strikes: what would a deal mean for passengers, unions and operators?

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We look at who might be the winners in the industry’s biggest industrial dispute in decades

After 23 days of national strikes, two years of talking and hundreds of thousands of cancelled trains, rail workers are contemplating a pay rise that barely catches the coat tails of inflation. The rail industry’s biggest industrial dispute in decades may be approaching its final chapter – but with little chance of a happy ending for anyone involved.

The pain for passengers is not yet over – four more 24-hour strikes across 14 operators by train and station staff in the biggest rail union, the RMT, start next Thursday, 16 March.

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Labour pledges to overhaul England’s school ratings with ‘report card’

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Shadow education secretary to announce policy aimed at giving parents more information than Ofsted’s current system

School ratings such as outstanding and inadequate would be scrapped in England under a Labour government and replaced with a “report card” aimed at helping parents, the shadow education secretary is to announce.

Bridget Phillipson will tell a headteachers’ conference in Birmingham on Saturday that Ofsted’s current system of ratings “is high stakes for staff but low information for parents” because it fails to convey important details about a school’s strengths and weaknesses.

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Matt Hancock’s leaked messages being ‘used to rewrite history’, say civil servants

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Some advisers and civil servants speaking to the Guardian say an ‘anti-lockdown filter’ has been placed on events

The mass leaking of thousands of Matt Hancock’s WhatsApp messages have laid bare in the starkest terms the extent of the divisions inside the cabinet and among advisers and civil servants handling the deadliest pandemic in modern times.

But some who worked in Number 10 and across Whitehall, as well as bereaved families, have been angered by what they see as a rewriting of history by some cabinet ministers and by the framing of some of Hancock’s texts.

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Rishi Sunak offers soft rebuke to claims Boris Johnson abused honours list

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PM said Father’s Day card would be his ‘limit’ in response to Johnson nominating his father for knighthood

Rishi Sunak has said his father would be lucky to get a card on Father’s Day, let alone a knighthood, after accusations that Boris Johnson’s honours list had discredited the system.

Sunak has come under pressure to reject Johnson’s list, in which he nominated his father, Stanley Johnson, for a knighthood, given previous allegations about his behaviour.

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BBC to air Match of the Day without presenters after Gary Lineker’s suspension

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Decision taken after corporation takes its highest-paid presenter off air and his fellow broadcasters refuse to appear in solidarity

Match of the Day will be broadcast without any presenters or pundits this weekend, after the main host, Gary Lineker, was suspended from the BBC for breaching impartiality guidelines over his criticism of the government’s asylum policies.

In a dramatic and unexpected escalation of a crisis that has been brewing all week, the corporation took the decision to take its highest-paid presenter off its flagship football show after he was criticised by Tory MPs and the rightwing media.

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BBC apologises for failure to scrutinise Nadine Dorries’ claims about Sue Gray

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Former culture secretary called into question neutrality of civil servant after her appointment as Keir Starmer’s chief of staff

The BBC has apologised for the failure to properly scrutinise claims made by Nadine Dorries on a radio show, capping a day of controversies for the corporation.

The broadcaster said in a statement on Friday that “there should have been more challenge” when the former culture secretary and Boris Johnson loyalist made allegations about Sue Gray on Radio 4’s World at One.

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BBC will not broadcast Attenborough episode over fear of ‘rightwing backlash’

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Exclusive: Decision to make episode about natural destruction available only on iPlayer angers programme-makers

The BBC has decided not to broadcast an episode of Sir David Attenborough’s flagship new series on British wildlife because of fears its themes of the destruction of nature would risk a backlash from Tory politicians and the rightwing press, the Guardian has been told.

The decision has angered the programme-makers and some insiders at the BBC, who fear the corporation has bowed to pressure from lobbying groups with “dinosaurian ways”.

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Teachers’ strikes in Wales called off after revised pay offer

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NEU members had been due to strike for two days next week but will now consider Welsh government’s proposal

Two days of strike action by teachers in Wales next week have been called off after the Welsh government proposed a revised pay offer.

Members of the National Education Union (NEU) were due to stop work on 15-16 March in a dispute over pay.

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Gary Lineker faces a dilemma: toe the BBC line or be a social media influencer

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Corporation is risking its reputation by making an example of its highest-paid star over his tweets on asylum policy

The BBC’s decision to take Gary Lineker off air leaves its most outspoken personality with a potentially career-defining decision, as the corporation looks to risk its reputation to make a public example of one of its biggest stars.

Lineker’s politically loaded tweets about the government’s new asylum policy – followed by a pledge to stand by his comments – had left the BBC in an almost impossible position, balancing impartiality with freedom of expression by its staff.

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Silicon Valley Bank fails in largest bank collapse since 2008 crisis

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US regulators seize SVB’s assets after a run on the bank, as global institutions monitor situation closely

US regulators rushed to seize the assets of top tech lender Silicon Valley Bank on Friday after a run on the bank, marking the largest failure of such an institution since the height of the financial crisis more than a decade ago.

Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), the nation’s 16th largest bank, failed after depositors – mostly technology workers and venture capital-backed companies – hurried to withdraw their money this week as anxiety over the bank’s situation spread.

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UK to help fund immigration detention centre in France, says Rishi Sunak

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PM announces £500m package to stop people trying to cross Channel, after meeting Emmanuel Macron in Paris

Britain will help fund a detention centre in northern France as part of a £500m package to stop refugees trying to cross the Channel, Rishi Sunak has said, amid continuing criticism of his plans to lock up and deport those arriving in small boats.

After a meeting in Paris, Sunak and Emmanuel Macron, the French president, said they had agreed joint funding for more French border patrols, including 500 additional officers and new drones.

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Gary Lineker stands by his immigration policy remarks

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Match of the Day host says he does not fear BBC suspension for comparing government language to that of 1930s Germany

Gary Lineker has said he will stand his ground after a day of attacks from ministers over tweets he posted earlier this week criticising the government’s asylum policy, and dismissed suggestions he could face suspension from his £1.35m-a-year job at the BBC.

Pressure continues to mount on Lineker, with the culture secretary, the home secretary and two former BBC directors adding to the criticism of the Match of the Day presenter’s comments on social media, in which he likened the language used to set out the government’s immigration plans to “that used by Germany in the 30s”.

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Europe’s far right praise UK’s illegal migration bill

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Alternative für Deutschland leaders were among those lauding Sunak’s bill, while other EU figures raised doubts about its legality

European far-right leaders have praised Rishi Sunak’s illegal immigration bill, after a senior EU official repeated her doubts about the legality of the plans.

“Bravo,” wrote the Alternative für Deutschland party on social media. “Way to go! The current [British] government plans now to deny asylum to illegal immigrants and fly them out to Rwanda,” the party wrote on Facebook, saying Germany should follow this approach. “When will we finally have it?”

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Tories ‘rooting for you to win’, Humza Yousaf tells Kate Forbes in SNP debate

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Health secretary said Forbes had ‘given our opponents so much ammunition’ after she criticised his track record in government

Humza Yousaf has told Kate Forbes that the Scottish Tories are “rooting for you to win so that your words are on every single leaflet”, as the first UK-wide televised debate between SNP leadership contenders saw further clashes between the frontrunners, while polling for the Channel 4 hosts suggested the contest remains too close to call.

Referring to heated exchanges at first minister’s questions earlier on Thursday, when Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross jeered that finance secretary Forbes had “torched” the Scottish government’s record, Yousaf said: “What unfortunately happened in the last TV debate, Kate, was that you essentially gave our opponents so much ammunition to attack us with.”

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UK ministers head to Paris to discuss Channel migrant crossings

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Paris gathering is first such UK-France summit in five years

Rishi Sunak and a series of his ministers are heading to Paris for a summit at which he will push Emmanuel Macron to assist him over Channel migrant crossings – but with little apparent chance of securing an immediate deal on returning people.

The gathering in Paris, the first such UK-France summit in five years, is also based around wider bilateral issues such as defence and Ukraine. However, for Sunak’s domestic focus, it seems set to be dominated by the issue of small boats.

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Boris Johnson nominates Daily Mail chief Paul Dacre for peerage for second time

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Placing of media boss on resignation honours list despite previous rejection puts Rishi Sunak in difficult position

Boris Johnson has once again nominated Paul Dacre for a peerage as part of a pared-back resignation honours list despite the Daily Mail chief having previously been rejected by the appointments watchdog, the Guardian has learned.

Sources with knowledge of the list have said that Johnson has put forward Dacre’s name for a second time. He had been knocked back last autumn after reported doubts raised by the House of Lords appointments commission.

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Killer exposed himself to Libby Squire weeks before murder, mother believes

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Mother of murdered Hull student says incidents should be treated as red flags for more serious sex offences

Just weeks before Libby Squire was raped, murdered and dumped in a river, a stranger exposed himself to her on her way home.

Her mother, Lisa Squire, said the assault left the 21-year-old University of Hull student feeling “absolutely furious”. “But I never thought to say to her, you need to report that, you need to ring the police, and she didn’t report it either,” said Squire. “We’re almost conditioned to ignore indecent exposure. I didn’t know better then, but I know better now.”

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Deloitte CEO in thinly veiled criticism of EY after rival’s split plans thrown into chaos

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Joe Ucuzoglu posts 20-minute video to Deloitte’s public website

Deloitte’s chief executive has launched a thinly veiled criticism of rival EY after its controversial plans to split the business into two were thrown into turmoil.

EY initially announced plans for a radical breakup of its global operations last year, that would separate its audit and advisory businesses.

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