Farmers should not expect help with rising food prices, says Thérèse Coffey

The environment secretary tells MPs it is ‘not the role of government to provide free food’ or to intervene in markets

The government has ruled out making any intervention in the market to help farmers or consumers with high food prices, the environment secretary, Thérèse Coffey, has said.

Food prices have soared in the past year, in part owing to higher input prices such as energy, fertiliser and animal feed. Last month, food price inflation hit a fresh high of 12.4%, with poorer households hit hardest.

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Matt Lucas to leave The Great British Bake Off

Comedian who has co-hosted Channel 4 show for three series to focus on other projects including Fantasy Football League

Matt Lucas has announced he is stepping down from his presenting role on The Great British Bake Off.

The 48-year-old comedian, who has hosted the popular Channel 4 show alongside Noel Fielding for three series, explained he was leaving as he could no longer commit to the programme’s schedule alongside his other projects, including his new hosting role on the revived comedy show Fantasy Football League.

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Aberdeenshire MP elected new SNP leader at Westminster

Stephen Flynn, 34, who won seat in 2019, expected to seek more independence from party’s Edinburgh leadership

An Aberdeenshire MP little known outside Scotland’s political bubble has been elected the Scottish National party’s new leader at Westminster, as the party tries to keep its independence dreams alive after a fresh vote was blocked by the supreme court.

Stephen Flynn, 34, a former city councillor who only won his seat in 2019, will face Rishi Sunak at prime minister’s questions on Wednesday after beating Glasgow Central MP Alison Thewliss, a surprise late entry into the race, to lead the UK parliament’s third biggest bloc.

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Early medieval female burial site is ‘most significant ever discovered’ in UK

Find dating from about 650AD in Northamptonshire includes jewelled necklace and changed archaeologists’ view of the period

Archaeologists don’t often bounce with excitement, but the Museum of London archeology team could hardly contain themselves on Tuesday as they unveiled an “exhilarating” discovery made on the last day of an otherwise barren dig in the spring.

“This is the most significant early medieval female burial ever discovered in Britain,” said the leader of the dig, Levente Bence Balázs, almost skipping with elation. “It is an archaeologist’s dream to find something like this.”

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Former development secretaries urge Sunak to increase east Africa aid amid drought

‘Famine in all but name’ ravaging Somalia, Ethiopia and Kenya, yet British aid is one-fifth of 2017 amount

The UK urgently needs to do more to help more than 28 million people in drought-stricken Somalia, Ethiopia and Kenya, two former secretaries of state for international development and the heads of 14 of the UK’s leading aid agencies have warned in a joint letter to the prime minister, Rishi Sunak.

They say one person is dying every 36 seconds, yet British aid to the region is only one-fifth of what Britain provided when the region was struck by famine in 2017. More than 7 million children are acutely malnourished across the three countries.

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Farmers urge UK government to fund hedge creation to bolster biodiversity

Lack of funding identified as biggest obstacle to planting and maintaining hedgerows

Farmers are urging the government to include hedge creation in its nature-friendly farming subsidy scheme in an attempt to increase biodiversity.

Details about the post-Brexit replacement for the EU’s common agricultural policy have been scarce, with land managers simply told they would get payments for providing “public goods” such as protecting nature.

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UK retailers boosted by November sales of winter coats and hot water bottles

Total sales rose by 4% but figures were helped by inflation masking lower volumes, says BRC

Britain’s retailers benefited from a November sales boost fuelled by Black Friday discounts and colder weather as consumers bought winter coats, hot water bottles and hooded blankets, according to industry data.

In its latest snapshot of high street and online spending, the British Retail Consortium (BRC) said sales growth picked up last month compared with October, despite mounting concern over the cost of living crisis.

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Free preschool childcare for all would boost UK growth, report finds

Labour-endorsed study finds initiative would save families thousands of pounds, cut benefits spending and raise tax revenues

Free universal preschool childcare and more funding for after-school clubs could increase government revenues and save a family with young children between £620 and £6,175 a year, a joint report endorsed by the Labour party has revealed.

The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) and the charity Save the Children have called for a universal childcare guarantee for all families until the end of primary school to allow more women to get back into work and reduce the attainment gap between rich and poor children in their early years.

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Martin Lewis charity highlights mental toll of cost of living crisis

Survey finds nearly a fifth of respondents have had suicidal ideation about financial problems

The shocking impact that soaring bills are having on mental health has been laid bare by a report that highlights how money worries are driving many people to thoughts of suicide.

The Money and Mental Health policy institute, a charity founded and chaired by the consumer champion Martin Lewis, reported that 17% of respondents to a survey said they had experienced suicidal ideation over the past nine months owing to the rising cost of living.

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Delays in seeing a GP mean millions will get diagnosis too late, says Labour

Serious illnesses among estimated 5m people in England who could not get an appointment in October may have been missed

Millions of people in England are struggling to get GP appointments and as a result some will not have serious medical conditions diagnosed until it is “too late”, Labour has warned.

The party has made new estimates based on the latest GP appointment figures for England with GP patient survey data.

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Strep A: No 10 tells parents to look for signs of infection with reports of eighth death

Warning comes as health official says earlier start to cases in UK could be knock-on effect of pandemic

Downing Street has told parents to be on the lookout for signs of strep A infection after reports a primary-school pupil has become the eighth child to die in a matter of weeks.

On Monday, Alison Syred-Paul, headteacher at Morelands primary in Waterlooville, Hampshire, said: “Very tragically, we have learned of the death in recent days of a child who attended our school, who was also diagnosed with an invasive Group A streptococcal (iGAS) infection.”

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No 10 rules out law change for return of Parthenon marbles

No plans to amend legislation that could stop removal back to Greece, after secret talks held over their future

Rishi Sunak has ruled out changing a law that could prevent the British Museum from handing the Parthenon marbles back to Greece, after it emerged that trustees have held secret talks with the Greek prime minister about the future of the artefacts.

The prime minister’s official spokesperson said there were no plans to amend legislation under which a museum can dispose of objects within its collection only in very limited circumstances. However, it could decide to lend part of the collection to Greece.

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Keir Starmer says Labour’s decentralisation plans will address concerns that led to people backing Brexit – UK politics live

Labour leader says, though he argued for remain, he could not argue against leave voters calling for more control over their lives

Starmer is now taking questions.

Q: [Beth Rigby from Sky] When people are struggling with the cost of living, you are talking about constitutional issues. This might look to people as if you are out of touch. Are you talking to Westminster about stuff that won’t happen. What in this will improve people’s lives from day one of a Labour government?

When you come to the next election, it may be that the Scottish National party will have a one-line manifesto and want a one-issue general election.

But we have done a huge amount of research on Scottish public opinion and people want a better health service immediately, people want living standards improved immediately, people want jobs for young people immediately, people want better housing immediately and people of course want change in the way that we are suggesting immediately.

People up and down this country are crying out for a new approach. During the Brexit referendum I argued for remain. But I couldn’t disagree with the basic case that many leave voters made to me.

They wanted democratic control over their lives so they could provide opportunities for the next generation, build communities they felt proud of, and public services they could rely on.

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Prince Harry speaks of ‘suffering’ of women marrying into royal family

‘We know the full truth,’ Harry’s voiceover says in trailer for his and Meghan’s Netflix docuseries

Prince Harry has highlighted the “pain and suffering” of women marrying into the British royal family, in a new trailer for the Sussexes’ highly anticipated behind-the-scenes docuseries.

Netflix has promised an “unprecedented and in-depth documentary series” over six episodes where the couple “share the other side of their high-profile love story”.

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Mone’s Covid lobbying ‘extraordinarily aggressive’, claims Hancock

Ex-minister claims Tory peer intimated unnamed firm she was helping was being treated unfairly

The Conservative peer Michelle Mone made “extraordinarily aggressive” lobbying efforts on behalf of a company bidding to supply Covid tests during the pandemic, Matt Hancock has claimed in a serialisation of his diaries.

The former health secretary claimed that Lady Mone made “wild accusations” about the procurement process, intimating that the company she was helping, which is not named, was suffering unfairly.

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UK new car sales rise as industry leaders say recovery ‘within grasp’

Increase for fourth consecutive month, with almost 143,000 new vehicles registered in November

Sales of new cars in the UK have risen for the fourth month running, with purely electric vehicles accounting for a fifth of the total.

In the best November for the industry since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, almost 143,000 new vehicles were registered.

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Police investigate burglary at Raheem Sterling’s Surrey home

Officers say no one was at England footballer’s Leatherhead home when jewellery and watches stolen

Jewellery and watches were among items stolen at the Surrey home of the England footballer Raheem Sterling in a burglary that forced the winger to return to the UK from the World Cup in Qatar.

Surrey police confirmed they were investigating a burglary at a property in Oxshott, Leatherhead, after Sterling missed England’s win against Senegal in the knockout stages of the tournament on Sunday due to a “family matter”.

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UN refugee body criticises ‘errors’ in asylum report backed by Braverman

Organisation questions use of ‘illegal’ to describe asylum seekers in report calling for radical crackdown

A report partially endorsed by the UK home secretary, Suella Braverman, calling for a radical crackdown on those seeking asylum has been criticised by a UN body for “factual and legal errors”.

Braverman wrote the foreword to the report by the right-leaning Centre for Policy Studies that says “if necessary” Britain should change human rights laws and withdraw from the European convention on human rights in order to tackle Channel crossings by small boat.

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Weather tracker: high pressure drags cold Arctic air towards UK

Wintry conditions will arrive this week, with temperatures plummeting and possibility of snow showers

This week winter will arrive in earnest in the UK, driven by a large area of high pressure over Iceland that will drag Arctic air southwards.

As this cold air descends over the UK on Tuesday, northern Scotland will experience the first signs of this wintry weather, with daytime temperatures forecast to be barely above freezing, alongside some possible sleet and snow showers throughout the day. The cold front will make its way further south over the course of Wednesday, pulling temperatures to well below the seasonal norm.

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New HMRC data raises UK hopes of end to Northern Ireland Brexit trade checks

Analysis of database tailored to EU needs shows 85% of GB exports stay in the region’s factories and shops

UK hopes that controversial Brexit checks on goods crossing the Irish sea can be eliminated have risen after early analysis of government data showed that at least 85% of goods arriving in Northern Ireland from Great Britain stay in factories or shops in the region.

The research comes from a new HM Revenue and Customs database, the EU Access system, that tracked the movement of 1m goods crossing the Irish Sea in 2021.

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