Category Archives: Politics

Revealed: Suella Braverman sets Home Office ‘No boats crossing the Channel’ target

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UK’s new home secretary upsets civil servants with speech on migrants, trashy TV and back-to-office call

The new home secretary has already prompted consternation among Home Office officials after telling them she wants to ban all small boats crossing the Channel, the Observer has learned.

During her inaugural address to departmental staff last Wednesday, Suella Braverman said a top priority would be stopping all Channel crossings. She has also asked all staff to watch “trashy TV” to help their “mental wellbeing”, a source said, specifically citing Channel 4’s Married at First Sight and First Dates as well as Love Island.

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How red flags were brushed aside to push through Rwanda deal

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Documents disclosed to high court case show repeated warnings about asylum processing plan

Until the then home secretary Priti Patel and Rwanda’s foreign minister, Vincent Biruta, sat together at a table in Kigali on 14 April and signed a deal to send asylum seekers to the east African country, few thought the agreement would actually happen.

Rumours had swirled for months about the controversial plans but nothing had come of previous Home Office ideas, both confirmed and unconfirmed, to halt the growing number of asylum seekers arriving in the UK on small boats, including wave machines in the Channel and a policy to turn around dinghies.

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King Charles to address nation as period of mourning for Queen begins

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Prime minister to meet new monarch as floral tributes are placed outside Buckingham Palace and elsewhere

The first full day of the reign of King Charles III has begun, with the new monarch travelling to London to meet the prime minister and prepare for a national address on Friday evening.

After staying at Balmoral overnight, the King will travel with Camilla, now Queen Consort, to the capital.

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White House warns Truss over efforts to ‘undo’ Northern Ireland protocol

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Biden administration says undoing the protocol would not be ‘conducive’ to a trade deal between the UK and US

The Biden administration has sent Liz Truss a message on her second day in office warning against “efforts to undo the Northern Ireland protocol”.

The warning came from the lectern in the White House briefing room, where spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre was asked about new British prime minister Truss’s first phone call with Joe Biden and whether a US-UK trade deal was discussed.

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Tory MP begins ‘net zero tour’ of UK to highlight benefits of action

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Chris Skidmore urges new PM to ignore ‘tiny vocal minority in Westminster’ arguing against climate target

Top green Conservative Chris Skidmore is to embark on a net zero tour to show that “normal people are getting on with” decarbonisation, and urge the new prime minister to ignore the “Westminster bubble” that is pouring scorn on the climate target.

Skidmore, a former energy minister, will on Thursday visit green schemes across north-west England, including a home insulation demonstration in Salford and a peat restoration project in Oldham.

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Malaria vaccine a step closer as experts urge Truss not to ‘turn off the tap’ on funding

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Chance to eradicate diseases such as malaria could be lost and UK innovation squandered if global health investment is cut, jab co-creator tells PM

The co-inventor of a groundbreaking vaccine that could eradicate malaria has implored Liz Truss not to squander cutting-edge UK innovation by “turning off the taps” on global health funding.

Speaking as successful results from the latest trials of the R21 vaccine were revealed, Prof Adrian Hill, director of Oxford University’s Jenner Institute, said it would be tragic if Britain cut funding just as scientists were poised to make “a real impact” against malaria.

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Government admits 50 firms were in VIP lane for test and trace contracts

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Health department had denied Covid testing priority lane but new disclosure lists firms including lab behind false negatives

The government has admitted that 50 firms were put in a “priority” lane for securing test and trace contracts worth billions, including Immensa, the company involved in a scandal over 43,000 false negative results.

The UK Health and Security Agency revealed the names of the 50 companies to the Good Law Project, the campaigning organisation that successfully challenged the government’s VIP lane for personal protective equipment (PPE) contracts in the courts.

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PM expected to reverse fracking ban as campaigners call for review’s release

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BEIS has been sitting on report delivered in early July into possible effect of fracking in UK

Liz Truss must publish a recently completed review on fracking in the UK, green campaigners have urged, amid expectations the new prime minister will lift the moratorium on shale gas drilling immediately.

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy has been sitting on a report delivered in early July by the British Geological Survey into the possible effects of fracking in the UK, including the danger of Earth tremors.

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Liz Truss set to announce £130bn energy bill bailout

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New PM expected to promise ‘immediate action to help people and businesses’ and end to fracking ban

Liz Truss will finally present her long-awaited plans to tackle soaring energy bills on Thursday, with some Tory MPs conceding this is already a make or break moment for her entire premiership.

The new prime minister is expected to announce to MPs that bills will be frozen at about £2,500 a year until 2024 as part of a package of support costing up to £130bn, funded by the taxpayer, as she tries to address the most significant economic crisis in a generation.

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Boris Johnson accused of intelligence tipoff that led to British Sikh’s alleged torture in India

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Labour raises questions in the Commons over Johnson’s alleged actions as foreign secretary in the case of activist Jagtar Singh Johal

Labour has accused Boris Johnson of authorising the sharing of intelligence that led to the imprisonment and alleged torture of a UK-based Sikh activist in India.

A Foreign Office minister refused to confirm or deny Johnson’s alleged involvement – during his time as foreign secretary – in the case of Jagtar Singh Johal, who has been detained for five years without trial.

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Liz Truss holds first cabinet meeting as Thérèse Coffey denies claim PM put loyalty before competence – UK politics live

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Health secretary says Truss did not focus too much on rewarding friends as new ministers attend first cabinet meeting

According to a report by Jason Groves in the Daily Mail, Liz Truss may announce an end to the ban on fracking this week. During the leadership campaign she said she wanted to allow fracking, but only in areas where there was a clear public consensus in favour.

On the Today programme this morning Lord Deben, the Tory peer who chairs the Committee for Climate Change, said fracking was not a solution to the UK’s energy problems. He explained:

The price of gas is not affected by the relatively small amount that we can get, in addition to the North Sea or indeed from fracking.

This is an international price and we would be paying the same price we got out of the fracked gas as we are for the gas we’re using now.

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Liz Truss cabinet: who are the other key players in PM’s top team?

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The prime minister has appointed ministers for the great offices of state. Here are some of the other members of her new government

Liz Truss has started to assemble her government, with the top posts going to Kwasi Kwarteng (the chancellor), Suella Braverman (home secretary), James Cleverly (foreign secretary) and Thérèse Coffey (health). Here are some of the other members of the new cabinet.

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Thérèse Coffey defends Truss against ‘cabinet of chums’ charge

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Deputy PM says newly appointed ministers will show ‘they’ve been considered, they’ve been competent’

The new health secretary and deputy prime minister, Thérèse Coffey, has defended Liz Truss from criticism that she has appointed a “cabinet of chums”.

The new prime minister is accused of making appointments to reward longstanding friendship and loyalty in the leadership contest, rather than competence.

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‘New PM, old problems’: Europe’s media reacts to Liz Truss’s first speech as prime minister

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Spain’s El País greets new PM saying ‘lack of charisma can be a political advantage in times of uncertainty’

Liz Truss’s purported lack of charisma and the “disastrous” economic situation facing Britain is the focus for much of the European media following the appointment of the country’s new prime minister.

The apparent differences in style between Boris Johnson and his successor was picked up by newspapers and websites across the political spectrum but the conclusions on Truss’s first speech in office were generally generous.

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Putin says Truss victory in Tory leadership vote ‘far from democratic’

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Russian president alludes to fact prime minister was chosen by party members, not by whole country

Vladimir Putin has said the way Britain chooses its leaders is “far from democratic”, a day after Liz Truss replaced Boris Johnson as prime minister.

In his first public comments on Truss’s appointment, the Russian president alluded to the fact she was chosen in a leadership ballot by members of the Conservative party, not by the whole country.

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Ukraine war and energy crisis on Truss agenda as British PM speaks to Biden

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The new British prime minister also spoke to Volodymyr Zelenskiy on her first day in office, pledging UK ‘assistance for the long term’

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the ensuing global energy crisis have emerged as a leading foreign policy priorities for Britain’s new prime minister Liz Truss, as she and her US counterpart Joe Biden promised to strengthen their relationship in face of Vladimir Putin’s aggression.

Truss’s call to Biden on Tuesday night followed a conversation with Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and focused on what she called “the extreme economic problems caused by Putin’s war”. Biden and Truss “reinforced their commitment to strengthening global liberty, tackling the risks posed by autocracies and ensuring Putin fails in Ukraine”, according to Downing Street.

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New prime minister Liz Truss returning to Westminster to appoint cabinet after meeting with Queen – UK politics live

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Latest updates: Liz Truss invited to form a new government after being confirmed as prime minister following Balmoral meeting

Johnson says it is the Conservatives who understand “the vital symmetry between government action and free market capitalist private sector enterprise”.

He is now rattling through a list of what he sees as his achievements in government: more police, new hospitals, more nurses. He even repeats the (false) claim that the government is on course to build 40 new hospitals by the end of the decade.

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Eustice defends ‘utter failure’ of efforts to cut raw sewage discharges in England

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Environment secretary responds to criticism of plan to stop ‘literal shit being pumped into rivers and seas’

The environment secretary, George Eustice, insisted the government was tackling the millions of hours of raw sewage discharges into rivers and seas in England as MPs demanded answers to a summer of water companies dumping effluent into holiday swimming spots.

Caroline Lucas, the Green party MP for Brighton Pavilion, said: “Literal shit is being pumped into our rivers and seas. The state of our water network is a national scandal and the government has utterly failed to take action.”

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‘Straight to business’: what the papers said about Liz Truss’s victory

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The new Conservative leader comes in at a time of crisis, and Tuesday’s papers make it clear she will need to make a fast start

The Liz Truss supremacy has begun with promises of bold plans to tackle a “bulging in-tray” of problems such as the cost of living crisis, according to the front pages of many of Tuesday’s newspapers.

With the usual speech and visuals from the steps of No 10 delayed by 24 hours thanks to the Queen’s “episodic mobility issues”, the papers had to make do with Truss smiling broadly after she defeated Rishi Sunak to take the Tory crown and later become Britain’s fourth prime minister in six years.

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Kremlin scathing over Truss but Kyiv praises Britain’s new PM

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Putin aide says relations could go ‘from bad to worse’ as Ukrainian pundits welcome new ‘iron lady’

Liz Truss’s imminent arrival in Downing Street as British prime minister has been greeted with scorn and scarcely veiled condescension from the Kremlin, but an outpouring of praise in Ukraine.

Vladimir Putin’s chief spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, expressed concerns that relations might deteriorate in comments to reporters shortly before Truss was announced as the winner of the Tory leadership race.

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