Alex Cunningham, MP for Stockton North, claims James Cleverly made comment during Wednesday’s PMQs
A Labour MP has claimed that his constituency was described as a “shithole” by the home secretary, James Cleverly, during prime minister’s questions.
Alex Cunningham said Cleverly had uttered the phrase when the Labour MP for Stockton North asked: “Why are 34% of children in my constituency living in poverty?”
Continue reading...Despite £27bn windfall for the autumn statement, government forecaster warns of generally more difficult outlook until 2028
The government’s official forecaster has slashed its predictions for economic growth over the next two years, and warned that inflation could take until 2025 to come back to the official 2% target.
In an updated financial health check to accompany the autumn statement, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) said a more resilient economy this year had handed the chancellor a £27bn budget windfall, but it warned of a more difficult outlook up to 2028 than previously forecast at the time of the budget in March.
Continue reading...Amid less gloomy OBR forecasts the chancellor is expected to take first steps towards cutting personal taxes
Jeremy Hunt will announce 110 measures to boost Britain’s stagnant economy and bow to demands from anxious Tory MPs for tax cuts when he delivers his second autumn statement on Wednesday.
In one of the last set-piece economic events before the general election, the chancellor will pledge to “turbo charge” growth while taking the first steps to cut personal taxes after recent sharp increases.
Continue reading...Discontent among people housed at Essex site is growing, with residents complaining about conditions
James Cleverly has said he hopes to close down the controversial mass accommodation centre in Wethersfield “as soon as practicable”, in a departure from government policy to move asylum seekers out of hotels and on to sites like the Essex military base.
Wethersfield, most recently used by Ministry of Defence police, is the Home Office’s largest mass accommodation site in the UK for people seeking asylum, with several hundred people accommodated there.
Continue reading...Chief medical officer for England and chief UK medical adviser says civil servants did good job but PM took ‘unique’ decisions
Q: Was there no aspect on the pandemic on which you did not advise?
Whitty says he would not put it like that. He says he felt it important to advise on issues where advice from a scientist or doctor would be useful.
Continue reading...Chancellor says bringing down inflation remains one of his main aims as he prepares autumn statement
The UK government borrowed less than expected in the first seven months of the financial year as Jeremy Hunt puts the last-minute touches to a series of pre-election giveaways in his autumn statement on Wednesday.
Public sector borrowing between April and October was just above £98bn, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), and while this was £22bn higher than in the same period last year, it was almost £17bn less than the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) forecast in March.
Continue reading...Government paper says Britain must act robustly if interests challenged by the Chinese development model
China’s growing role in international development marks a systemic global shift that will require robust challenge by Britain if its interests are threatened, a UK government white paper on aid has warned.
With David Cameron starting as foreign secretary and under scrutiny for his previous business links with China, the document does not hold back in challenging the Chinese development model or its growing influence.
Continue reading...Former chief scientific adviser Patrick Vallance revealed there was ‘complete lack of leadership’ at times in crisis
Vallance says that some of what he was doing during Covid would have been done by anyone else in the post of government chief scientific adviser (GCSA).
But he says because of his medical training, and his knowledge of vaccines (he had worked for GlaxoSmithKline before taking the GCSA job), he was probably more involved than another GCSA might have been.
Continue reading...Chief scientific adviser in pandemic says lockdown should have come sooner and that Johnson is not great at science
Sir Patrick Vallance, the UK government’s chief scientific adviser throughout Covid, has been giving evidence to the inquiry into the pandemic on Monday. Here is what we have learned so far.
Continue reading...PM would almost certainly have known concerns over ‘eat out to help out’ scheme, says former chief scientific adviser
Rishi Sunak would almost certainly have known scientists were worried about his “eat out to help out” scheme during the pandemic, Sir Patrick Vallance has said, directly contradicting the prime minister’s evidence to the Covid inquiry.
In potentially damaging testimony, Vallance, the UK government’s chief scientific adviser during the pandemic, said he would be “very surprised” if Sunak had not learned about objections to his plan to help the hospitality industry.
Continue reading...PM signals that business tax cuts more likely than personal ones as he sets out ‘next phase’ of government’s economic plan
Rishi Sunak has hinted at business tax cuts to boost economic growth as he promised to reduce the tax burden “carefully and sustainably” and “over time”.
In a speech on Monday the prime minister declined to give any specifics before the autumn statement, but stressed the focus was “very much the supply side” of the economy in a signal that business tax cuts are more likely than personal ones.
Continue reading...Chancellor seeks to promote growth ahead of autumn statement that could spark a rebellion among Tory backbenchers defending marginal seats
Jeremy Hunt has played down the prospect of immediate income tax cuts, pledging not to do anything in this week’s autumn statement that will fuel inflation.
Although some Conservative backbenchers are eager for measures that would be quickly felt by households, the chancellor on Sunday sought to emphasise the need to promote growth and indicated that tax cuts were “not going to happen overnight”.
Continue reading...Hundreds march through Keir Starmer’s constituency to protest against failure to back ceasefire
Some protests targeting MPs over their stance on the war in Gaza have “crossed the line from protest to intimidation”, the shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves, has said.
Other MPs already voiced concern about their safety and that of staff ahead of a weekend on which more than 100 pro-Palestine events were planned across the UK as campaigners sought to put pressure on parliamentarians who failed to vote for a Scottish National party motion last week calling for a ceasefire.
Continue reading...Stewart, a Tory MP at the time, told activist Sayed Ahmed Alwadaei to ‘go back to Bahrain’ during row last year
A former Tory MP has said he will step down at the next general election after being found guilty of racially abusing an activist.
Bob Stewart, who surrendered the Tory whip and now sits as an independent in Beckenham, south London, was found guilty of telling Sayed Ahmed Alwadaei to “go back to Bahrain” during a confrontation in central London in December last year.
Continue reading...PM’s speech at food summit comes as humanitarian crisis caused by Israel-Hamas war reaches crisis point
Leaders of some of Britain’s biggest aid charities are urging Rishi Sunak to use his opening speech at a global food summit in London on Monday to condemn Israel’s siege in Gaza, which they say is causing 2 million people to go hungry and taking 1 million children to the brink of starvation.
The charities, including Oxfam, Christian Aid, Medical Aid for Palestinians and Islamic Relief, say the UK has an obligation to speak out at the summit since private diplomacy is not working and Britain is the guardian of the key UN resolution that forbids starvation as a “weapon of war”.
Continue reading...New UK foreign secretary’s promotion of China-backed development in Sri Lanka has increased concern he could be a pawn for Xi Jinping
When Chinese president Xi Jinping cut the ribbon on Sri Lanka’s Port City Colombo construction site in September 2014, it was promoted as a future major hub in China’s global infrastructure project, the belt and road initiative.
With a financial centre, beach-front villas and an international yacht marina, the city is aiming to be a rival to Dubai and Singapore. China has already invested $1.4bn in the development, which is due to be completed by 2041.
Continue reading...The chancellor’s potential inheritance tax cut in Wednesday’s budget would aid millionaires amid a cost of living crisis
Jeremy Hunt faces a backlash from “red wall” Tory MPs if he uses a fiscal windfall of up to £20bn to deliver tax cuts for the rich rather than to help ordinary families with the cost of living, the Observer has been told.
The chancellor and Rishi Sunak are this weekend finalising an autumn statement on Wednesday that could include a major reduction in inheritance tax – four-fifths of which would benefit those with more than £1m at their death, according to a new report from the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS). Each person with more than £1m would receive an average tax cut of £180,000, the IFS states.
Continue reading...Former Labour leader argues Hamas and Israel both guilty of targeting civilians, after he avoided term in TV interview
Jeremy Corbyn has described Hamas as a “terrorist group” in a magazine article after repeatedly refusing to use the term in a television interview earlier this week.
The former Labour leader has written an article accusing the Israeli army of being guilty of “acts of terror too”, arguing that the comparison was necessary because Israel had killed thousands of children in strikes on Gaza in retaliation for Hamas’s attacks.
Continue reading...Protesters march through Camden and gather outside Labour leader’s office amid anger over failure to call for ceasefire
Hundreds of people marched through Keir Starmer’s constituency and protested outside his Camden office on Saturday over the Labour leader’s failure to call for a ceasefire.
The action was organised by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, which planned more than 100 local demonstrations across the country on Saturday rather than holding a national march in the capital.
Continue reading...Dossiers were compiled by 15 departments after scouring social media activity to vet people invited to speak at official events
Fifteen government departments have been monitoring the social media activity of potential critics and compiling “secret files” in order to block them from speaking at public events, the Observer can reveal.
Under the guidelines issued in each department, including the departments of health, culture, media and sport, and environment, food and rural affairs, officials are advised to check experts’ Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn accounts. They are also told to conduct Google searches on those individuals, using specific terms such as “criticism of government or prime minister”.
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