Category Archives: Politics

Morad Tahbaz has been freed from jail in Iran on electronic tag, UK says

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Foreign Office confirms British-Iranian man is at home in Tehran and officials are working to free him permanently

Morad Tahbaz, the British-Iranian man held in a Tehran prison, has been released on an electronic tag, the UK Foreign Office has confirmed.

He had been due to be released on a tag at the same time as Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Anoosheh Ashoori were allowed to return to the UK in March, but he was only allowed to return to his mother’s home in Tehran for a few days before he was sent back to Evin prison.

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Train strikes: millions across Britain face rail disruption as union action begins – live

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Some 40,000 workers from 14 train companies and Network Rail are striking in an ongoing dispute over pay, jobs and conditions

Here’s the latest TfL update:

Bakerloo — Part suspended. There is no service between Queen’s Park and Harrow & Wealdstone.

I’m looking at banning strikes by different unions in the same workplace within a set period. We should also place an absolute limit of six pickets at points of Critical National Infrastructure, irrespective of the number of unions involved, and outlaw intimidatory language.

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Grant Shapps rules out meeting with rail unions as strikes halt most trains

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Shadow minister defying Labour leadership to stand on picket line says lives are at stake

Grant Shapps has escalated the government’s confrontation with the rail unions by ruling out meeting with them, as a shadow minister said “lives could be lost” if wages did not improve.

Labour’s Sam Tarry defied his party leadership to stand on the picket line at Euston on Wednesday morning while rail strikes disrupted travel for millions.

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Train strikes: UK railways disrupted again as workers take action over pay and conditions

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More than 40,000 staff involved in widespread action after union leaders rejected ‘paltry’ 4% pay rise

The railways will again grind to a halt on Wednesday as workers strike over pay, job security and working conditions.

The latest talks to avert the action failed last week, a month since three days of industrial action in June. The strikes involve more than 40,000 workers at Network Rail, 14 train companies, and members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT).

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Labour would fix ‘broken’ water and energy markets through regulation not nationalisation, says Starmer – UK politics live

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Labour would, however, stick to plans to nationalise the railways if it won the next election, Starmer says

Polling from YouGov suggests that Liz Truss was perceived by Tory members to have outperformed Sunak on every issue covered in last night’s debate.

In particular, she led on Ukraine, cost of living and levelling up, although her lead was weaker on Brexit, the environment and taxation.

There are some lines on PA from Robert Buckland, the Wales secretary who is supporting Rishi Sunak for the Tory leadership, defending last night’s fierce TV showdown as “robust debate”.

There’s this balance to be struck between having a vigorous debate and being sort of almost too polite to each other.

I think it’s inevitable that you’re going to have candidates disagreeing, and frankly, we need to hear what the arguments are.

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Labour pledges to fast-track rape and domestic violence cases through courts

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Boris Johnson’s ‘appalling’ attitude to women to blame for lack of progress on gender-based violence, suggests Keir Starmer

Rape and domestic violence cases will be fast-tracked through the courts under a Labour government so that no victim has to wait more than a year for justice, Keir Starmer has pledged.

In an interview with the Guardian, the Labour leader said Boris Johnson had made no progress tackling gender-based violence during his premiership because of his “appalling” attitude towards women.

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Boris Johnson says 2018 Lebedev visit was in line with security protocols

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PM says no government business was discussed ‘as far as I am aware’ and officials knew of his trip in advance

Boris Johnson has told MPs that no government business was discussed “as far as I am aware” when he met the former KGB agent Alexander Lebedev at an Italian palazzo without officials present when he was foreign secretary.

The prime minister admitted this month that he met the businessman in April 2018 after making a trip to a restored castle in Perugia owned by Evgeny Lebedev, Alexander’s son, for a weekend-long party after attending a Nato foreign ministers’ meeting in Brussels that discussed the security situation with Russia.

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Why Sunak may have to change his brand to Rishi the risk taker

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Analysis: Poor strategy in Tory leadership race has allowed former chancellor to be painted as timid, fear supporters

Monday’s debate was supposed to be a turning point for Rishi Sunak, a moment billed as his chance to change his fortunes after polling suggested he was trailing Liz Truss in the Tory leadership contest.

Her awkwardness, her less fluent grasp of detail could be shown up in the head-to-head – similarly to how poorly she performed in the last two debates. “The more they see of her, the more they like him,” was the refrain from Sunak supporters.

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‘His legacy will endure’: tributes paid to David Trimble

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Death of Northern Ireland’s inaugural first minister inspires rare solidarity as role in ending the Troubles is hailed

David Trimble has accomplished in death a feat that eluded him in life: he has united Northern Ireland unionists, with one leader after another lining up to laud him.

The region’s inaugural first minister inspired a rare solidarity across the fractured ranks of unionism on Tuesday when even his bitterest foes paid tribute to his role in ending the Troubles.

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Truss and Sunak trade blows in acrimonious first TV debate

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Leadership candidates ignored calls from fellow Conservatives not to ‘tarnish the brand’ as they wrangled over tax cuts, inflation and relations with China

The battle to become the UK’s next prime minister descended into fierce clashes on Monday night as Rishi Sunak launched repeated attacks on the economic policies of the favourite Liz Truss in their first head-to-head TV debate.

The two Conservative leadership hopefuls traded blows over tax cuts, China and inflation, with the former chancellor Sunak accusing the foreign secretary of seeking “a short-term sugar rush” by cutting national insurance.

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Liz Truss pledges crackdown on unions but is accused of ‘Tory fantasy’

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Labour dismisses Conservative leadership hopeful’s plan for minimum service levels as unworkable

Liz Truss has promised a further crackdown on trade unions, widening restrictions to a significant new number of industries, but her proposals were immediately criticised as the “biggest attack on civil rights” since the 19th century.

Truss said she would legislate for minimum service levels on critical national infrastructure in the first 30 days of government under her leadership. The pledge would go further than the Tories’ 2019 policy, which promised a minimum service should operate during transport strikes.

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Sunak ruse aims to outmanoeuvre Truss over China

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Analysis: claims by ex-chancellor about Foreign Office weakness towards Beijing look like an attempt to head off a similar attack on him

Rishi Sunak’s pre-emptive strike attacking Liz Truss over alleged Foreign Office pusillanimity towards China looks to have been a daring attempt to fend off an imminent assault from his Tory leadership rival.

But it locks the contestants into a potentially uncontrollable dogfight as they seek to prove their credentials as the truer enemy of authoritarianism.

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Tory leadership: Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak clash in heated BBC debate – as it happened

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Latest updates: final two candidates exchange blows over plans for cost of living, levelling up and China

Starmer says Labour’s approach to levelling up will be based on a practical plan, unlike the government’s.

And he says he was impressed by the approach of Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, whom he met in Berlin recently. Starmer suggests Britain could learn from the way new battery factories are located in poor regions in Germany.

There will be no magic money tree economics with us.

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Beijing urges British politicians not to ‘hype the China threat’

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Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson asks for restraint after Rishi Sunak labels country UK’s ‘biggest long-term threat’

Beijing has urged British politicians to exercise restraint in their comments on China, saying “hyping the China threat” would not help solve the UK’s own problems.

Asked about Rishi Sunak’s comments, where he labelled China as Britain’s biggest long-term threat and pledged to close all UK-based Confucius Institutes, Zhao Lijian, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson, declined to offer specific comments, saying the election of the next Tory leader is the UK’s internal affair.

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Sunak to promise curbs on China as UK’s ‘biggest long-term threat’

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Leadership contender says he will close 30 Mandarin teaching programmes to restrain Beijing’s soft power

China is the biggest long-term threat to Britain, Rishi Sunak will say on Monday as he unveils plans to curb the country’s soft power by closing all of its 30 Confucius Institutes, which promote the teaching of Chinese language and culture, in the UK.

He will take on Liz Truss, his rival in the Conservative leadership race, by effectively accusing the foreign secretary and western leaders of having “turned a blind eye to China’s nefarious activity and ambitions” and call for a new Nato-alliance to be set up to counter it.

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Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss accused of cruelty over Rwanda-style deal promises

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Amnesty International leads criticism of immigration plans announced by Tory leadership candidates

Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss have been accused of “cruelty and immorality” for promising more Rwanda-style deals to remove asylum seekers from the UK, as charities claimed the pair were pandering to party members’ hardline views.

Amnesty International led criticism of immigration plans announced over the weekend by the Tory leadership candidates, saying the “dreadful” pledges would come at “great human and financial cost”.

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Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss serve up ‘red meat’ policies to tempt Tory members

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Analysis: Leadership contenders compete on hardline approach to Rwanda immigration policy in appeal to the right of the party

It’s not just barbecues that red meat is being tossed on to in the sweltering summer temperatures.

As the Tory leadership contest hots up, a platter of hardline policies is being offered to party members by Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak, in a bid to whet appetites and boost support in the race to become Britain’s prime minister.

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Just one in 100 Tory MPs came from a working-class job, new study shows

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Institute for Public Policy Research study also shows proportion of working-class Labour MPs has halved since 1980s

Only about 1% of the current crop of Tory MPs entered parliament from a working-class job, according to new research that suggests a growing “representation gap” in parliament.

Just 7% of all MPs can be considered “working class”, compared with 34% of all UK working-age adults. While 13% of Labour MPs joined parliament from a working-class occupation, the proportion has halved since the 1980s.

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Boris Johnson’s plan to create large number of new peers comes under fire

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Lord Speaker raises concerns about public loss of confidence in parliament due to huge quantity of new and planned peers

Boris Johnson’s plans for a major list of peerages has come under criticism, with the Lord Speaker saying it could erode “public confidence in our parliamentary system”.

The House of Lords Appointment Commission (Holac), the body responsible for vetting peerages, is holding up the outgoing prime minister’s plans, Whitehall sources told the Sunday Times, who also reported that such moves could be restricted in future.

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Rishi Sunak says as PM he would cap number of refugees UK accepts

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Tory leadership candidate’s pledge follows favourite Liz Truss’s claim she would extend Rwanda scheme

Rishi Sunak, who is battling with Liz Truss to win the backing of the Conservative grassroots in his attempt to replace Boris Johnson, has announced plans for an annual cap on the number of refugees the UK accepts.

The former chancellor, who trails Truss by 24%, according to a YouGov poll of Conservative members earlier this week, will on Sunday promise to tackle illegal migration and regain control of the UK’s borders if he becomes the next Conservative leader and prime minister.

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