Labour leader says UK is ‘crying out for clear leadership’ and his party ‘must provide it’
Keir Starmer has criticised the “grotesque chaos” of recent weeks and said the government “no longer has a mandate from the British people”.
The Labour leader said there were no historical precedents for the ongoing economic turmoil and that the prime minister, Liz Truss, would not be able to “fix the mess she has created”.
Continue reading...Chair of Commons defence committee had whip withdrawn for failing to turn up for a confidence vote
A senior Conservative MP has had the whip restored after being suspended from the party for missing a confidence vote in the summer.
Tobias Ellwood, chair of the Commons defence select committee, had the whip withdrawn after failing to vote for Boris Johnson’s government in a confidence vote in July.
Continue reading...Project hit by fall in labour supply and rise in costs, and investigation launched over low visitor numbers
For some, the whole project was supposed to be a celebration of Britain’s departure from the EU. Which means there is more than a little irony in the fact a main concern of the “festival of Brexit” organisers was the impact of leaving itself.
Disruption to the supply of workers and materials, as well as increased costs, emerged as one of the risks overshadowing the project, according to records.
Continue reading...BT customers face £113 rise as providers such as EE and TalkTalk prepare controversial ‘inflation-plus’ mechanism
Broadband bills could surge by as much as £113 next year if a number of the UK’s biggest telecoms firms push ahead with inflation-busting price increases next spring, says consumer watchdog Which?
Many of the country’s main internet providers – including the largest player BT, along with TalkTalk, EE, Plusnet and Vodafone – use a mechanism to increase the cost of bills annually by the rate of inflation as measured by the consumer prices index (CPI) in January, plus 3.9%.
Continue reading...Increase adds up to a £26bn rise for homeowners, says Resolution Foundation thinktank
More than five million families could see their annual mortgage payments rise by an average of £5,100 between now and the end of 2024, heaping fresh pain on households already struggling with higher food and energy bills.
The increase adds up to a £26bn mortgage rise for homeowners, according to the analysis by the Resolution Foundation thinktank which said nearly a fifth of British households would have to spend more on their housing costs by the end of 2024.
Continue reading...PM’s move to replace chancellor and commit to raising corporation tax fails to placate markets or Tory MPs
Liz Truss is desperately clinging to her premiership after she sacked her chancellor and ripped up the mini-budget but failed to calm the financial markets or furious Conservative MPs.
In a humiliating reversal, the prime minister backed down on plans to scrap an £18bn rise in corporation tax and replaced Kwasi Kwarteng as chancellor with Jeremy Hunt.
Continue reading...Government withdraws letter to woman, who is 37 weeks pregnant, saying that it was sent by mistake
The Home Office has apologised to a pregnant rape survivor from Eritrea who was sent a letter threatening her with forced removal to Rwanda, saying it was sent by mistake.
Guardian and ITV News revealed on Thursday that the woman was distraught after receiving the Home Office letter, which has now been withdrawn.
Continue reading...Adeshina Adio, 20, from south-east London, was arrested after jumping into Thames to evade police
A 20-year-old man has admitted sexually assaulting a young woman by exposing himself and pushing into her from behind as she waited in the queue to attend the Queen’s lying in state.
Adeshina Adio, from south-east London, jumped into the River Thames to escape arrest after assaulting the woman at Victoria Tower Gardens as she waited in the queue to pay her respects to the late monarch. He was detained by officers when he came out of the water.
Continue reading...Alok Sharma’s intervention puts pressure on Trump-appointed Bank chief who faces calls to resign
The UK has joined calls for sweeping reforms to the World Bank, to focus much-needed funding on the climate crisis, saying that its current structures are not working.
The intervention from Alok Sharma, the current president of the UN climate talks, heaps further pressure on beleaguered World Bank chief, David Malpass. He has faced calls to resign over an apparently climate-dismissing stance, and the Bank’s perceived failures to deliver climate finance.
Continue reading...Source close to sacked chancellor briefs Times that ‘wagons are still going to circle’ around embattled prime minsiter
The Conservative peer, Ed Vaizey, said he disagreed with the international trade secretary, Greg Hands, who earlier said Kwasi Kwarteng’s early return is not unusual. “It is quite unusual for this to happen,” he said.
Speaking to Sky News, Vaizey said the chancellor cutting his trip to the US short is “not a good sign”. He said:
I’m afraid the chancellor coming back a day early doesn’t fill one with confidence.
The fact that people were speculating about the prime minister’s leadership this early in her premiership is not ideal, but I think he’s just got to bite the bullet. He’s got to try to give the markets confidence in the British economy.
If he can do that then perhaps he can say: ‘Well, I had to do some difficult choices, slightly humiliating choices, but the result is stabilisation and I can move forward.’
Continue reading...In England about one in 35 people had Covid in week ending 3 October, according to ONS data
Covid infection levels are rising across much of the UK, with more than 1.7 million people thought to have had the virus in the most recent week, data has revealed.
About one in 35 people in England – 2.8% of the population – had Covid in the week ending 3 October based on swabs from randomly selected households, according to the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics. It is an increase from one in 50 the week before.
Continue reading...Truss ally has experienced a dramatic reversal of fortune after five weeks and three days in the job
When Kwasi Kwarteng became chancellor on 6 September it seemed a logical career progression. Deemed a politician imbued with economic doctrine, even his critics conceded he was determined and intellectually imposing. Five weeks and three days later, he is gone.
The newly restored backbench MP for Spelthorne in Surrey is not the shortest-serving chancellor of modern times, but only because the holder of that unwelcome title, Iain Macleod, died from a heart attack a month into his tenure in 1970.
Continue reading...Former foreign secretary and leadership contender is back in cabinet, in stunning reversal of fortune
Jeremy Hunt has been appointed as Liz Truss’s new chancellor, in a stunning reversal of political fortune and a sign that the beleaguered prime minister wants to reach out to other sections of the Conservative party.
Hunt, the former foreign secretary and health secretary, has twice tried unsuccessfully to become Conservative leader.
Continue reading...Strong demand for beauty products such as eyeliners and mascaras, as chocolate and coffee also sell well
The shadow cast by the cost of living crisis has spurred a retreat into small luxuries with Britons cheering themselves up with mood boosters such as luxury lip balms and false nails as well as chocolate and coffee.
The lipstick index, coined by Estée Lauder’s Leonard Lauder, is the idea that sales of affordable luxuries rise in economic downturns. This spending behaviour has been true during previous downturns and the same picture is emerging again as consumers battle severe financial headwinds.
Continue reading...Rainfall levels have not been sufficient to dampen soil and refill reservoirs after scorching summer
England could be in drought beyond spring 2023, ministers have said, after record low rainfall has left the country short on water.
The news will be particularly problematic for farmers, who were hoping for a damp autumn and winter to refill reservoirs so they could plant and harvest crops into next year.
Continue reading...Chancellor does not rule out increasing corporation tax when asked about whether government will perform U-turn
The Home Office has taken the modern slavery brief away from the minister responsible for safeguarding and classed it as an “illegal immigration and asylum” issue, updated online ministerial profiles show.
The move is seen as a clear sign that the department is doubling down on Suella Braverman’s suggestion that people are “gaming” the modern slavery system and that victims of the crime are no longer being prioritised.
The largest single group of modern slavery victims under the referral system last year were British children – including those who were exploited through county lines. The evidence shows the majority of exploitation takes place in the UK rather than across borders.
The government should be treating this as an enforcement and safeguarding issue and taking stronger action against the crime of modern slavery wherever it takes place.
Continue reading...Ed Miliband criticises Liz Truss’s ‘anti-green-energy dogma’ after plans to ban solar projects revealed
Labour has criticised prime minister Liz Truss’s plan to ban solar power from most of England’s farmland and vowed to treble the renewable energy source in its first term.
Ed Miliband, the shadow climate secretary, will visit a solar farm on Friday. He is to lay out his opposition to plans by Truss and her environment secretary, Ranil Jayawardena, who the Guardian revealed earlier this week are hoping to ban solar from about 41% of the land area of England, or about 58% of agricultural land.
Continue reading...With people aged 65 and over controlling 51% of Britain’s wealth, the logic for investors is simple
• Canadian owners of care homes avoided UK taxes, researchers claim
With a spa, cinema and wood-panelled hall, Reigate Grange in Surrey, where Ann King was abused, is part of a growing trend for luxury care homes. Fuelled by global investors’ desire to capitalise on older people’s property wealth, luxury care applies a cruise-ship sheen to the grittier reality of dementia and the end of life.
The logic for investors is simple. People aged 65 and over in the UK now control 51% of Britain’s wealth, up from 42% in 2008, the year of the financial crash, according to the Resolution Foundation. A large minority of older people can afford £100,000-a-year care home fees because they have houses worth far more that they no longer need. A person in a £1m home who survives for the typical two years of a care home resident would still leave £800,000 in their will.
Continue reading...Speculation that reversal on leadership campaign pledge risks split with her chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng
Liz Truss has bowed to intense pressure from Conservative MPs and the markets by agreeing to redraw her mini-budget, paving the way for a major U-turn on her signature corporation tax cut.
In another serious blow to her authority as prime minister, government sources told the Guardian that a climbdown on the plan to scrap the rise in corporation tax was now “on the table”.
Continue reading...Eritrean woman, 28, in acute distress having spent most of her life in search of safety
A heavily pregnant rape survivor from Eritrea has been threatened with forced removal to Rwanda by the Home Office.
Human rights campaigners say it is the “most egregious” case they have come across so far in the government’s scheme to outsource the processing of UK asylum claims to the east African country.
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