Category Archives: Politics

Keir Starmer to warn Labour that battle with Reform is ‘fight for soul of the nation’

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Exclusive: PM says history will not forgive his government if it fails to confront and defeat the populist right

Keir Starmer will warn the Labour party that it is in a “fight for the soul of the nation” and that history will not forgive his government if it fails to confront and defeat Reform UK and the populist right.

Speaking to the Guardian ahead of a vital conference for his leadership, he said he would tell disgruntled party members that now was “not the time for introspection” and infighting.

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Labour restores whip to two more child benefit cap rebels

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John McDonnell and Apsana Begum were among last still suspended for July 2024 rebellion

Labour has restored the party whip John McDonnell and Apsana Begum 14 months after they lost it for rebelling over the two-child benefit cap, the Guardian understands.

The pair had the whip reinstated after a conversation on Friday with Jonathan Reynolds, who became Labour’s chief whip in a reshuffle earlier this month.

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IOPC investigators allegedly said Nottingham stabbings inquiry was ‘politically motivated’

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Mother of victim Barnaby Webber says allegations about watchdog staff have left families asking whom they can trust

Police watchdog investigators who are alleged to have described an inquiry into the 2023 Nottingham stabbings as politically motivated are “disrespectful and inhumane”, the mother of one victim has said.

Emma Webber said new allegations about staff at the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) had left families asking whom they could trust.

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Farage endangering women by failing to condemn paracetamol claims, says Bridget Phillipson

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Labour deputy leader candidate criticises ‘scaremongering’ on autism and says party must be firmer in tackling Reform

Nigel Farage is “endangering women’s health” by failing to condemn Donald Trump’s claims that using paracetamol during pregnancy causes autism, Bridget Phillipson has said.

The education secretary and minister for women said she had used the painkiller throughout her second pregnancy, and she warned that Reform’s connections with medical conspiracy theories including anti-vaccine rhetoric made the party a danger to public health.

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Keir Starmer says digital ID cards an ‘enormous opportunity’ for the UK

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PM to set out plans for compulsory ‘Brit card’ but faces opposition from civil liberty groups over privacy concerns

Digital ID cards present “an enormous opportunity” for the UK, Keir Starmer has said, as the government braces for a civil liberties row over the proposals.

The prime minister will set out the measures on Friday morning at a conference on how progressive politicians can tackle the problems facing the UK, including addressing voter concerns around immigration.

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Labour MPs call for action to tackle deprivation in coastal ‘sea wall’ seats

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Exclusive: Group warn coastal communities need greater investment to reduce inequality and fight off threat from Reform

A group of Labour MPs representing coastal areas will demand urgent action to tackle deprivation in their seats, warning a lack of progress could leave them vulnerable to Reform.

They will use the party conference this weekend to call for an equivalent of the London Challenge, which turned around failing schools in the capital under Tony Blair’s government, but with a focus on post-16 training and apprenticeships.

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‘History will remember who showed up’: Keir Starmer faces call to attend Cop30 summit

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Response from leaders and key climate figures comes after PM’s aides advised non-attendance over concerns Reform may attack him

Leading climate figures and Labour MPs have urged Keir Starmer to attend the crucial Cop30 climate summit this November, after aides advised him not to attend for fear of attracting the ire of the Reform party.

Simon Stiell, the UN’s climate chief, said: “Cop30 is where leaders are expected to come and roll up their sleeves, make deals to help their nation’s economy transition faster, creating more jobs, and guide the world on what next steps we take together.”

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Fighter jets purchase would put UK in breach of nuclear treaty, says CND

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Legal opinion for campaign group says deal amounts to reversal of UK’s commitment to nuclear disarmament

Britain will violate its nuclear disarmament obligations if Labour presses ahead with the £1bn purchase of 12 F-35A fighter jets, according to a specialist legal opinion prepared on behalf of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND).

Two international lawyers argue that the government’s plan to reintroduce air-launched nuclear weapons for the RAF will break a key provision of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT) signed by the UK and 190 other countries.

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Washington backing plan for Tony Blair to head transitional Gaza authority

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Reported proposal for international body to oversee Gaza for up to five years counters UN-backed plan for faster transition to Palestinian rule

The White House is backing a plan that would see Tony Blair head a temporary administration of the Gaza Strip – initially without the direct involvement of the Palestinian Authority (PA), according to Israeli media reports.

Under the proposal, Blair would lead a body called the Gaza International Transitional Authority (Gita) that would have a mandate to be Gaza’s “supreme political and legal authority” for as long as five years.

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Sadiq Khan hits back at ‘racist, sexist, misogynistic and Islamophobic’ Trump

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Khan’s comments come after US president used speech at UN to call London mayor ‘terrible’

Sadiq Khan has hit back at Donald Trump, accusing the US president of being “racist, sexist, misogynistic and Islamophobic” after he used a speech at the UN to call the London mayor “terrible” and claim the city was being steered toward “sharia law”.

Trump’s remarks on Tuesday night provoked anger among Labour figures, with the health secretary, Wes Streeting, praising Khan as someone who “stands up for difference of background and opinion”.

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Nigel Farage swans around peddling hate on Nick Ferrari’s phone-in | John Crace

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From immigrants eating the king’s waterfowl to sharia law in London, it’s all there in our Nige’s relativist world

“Attention all swans! Attention all swans! You are not safe! Immigrants from inferior cultures have been seen loitering with intent to kill in royal parks. They want to eat you alive. Be very vigilant. All offenders who are caught will be punishable under sharia law.”

Never say that a half-hour phone in with Nigel Farage on Nick Ferrari’s LBC morning show is anything but educational. Listen and learn. It’s an object lesson in how to perfect the 30-minute hate. Soon to become compulsory if Reform win the next election.

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Andy Burnham says Britain needs ‘wholesale change’ as Labour MPs prepare for conference – UK politics live

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Manchester mayor urges Keir Starmer to reveal plans to deliver reform but denies he is plotting to replace PM

Wes Streeting, the health secretary, has described Nigel Farage over his comment implying Donald Trump might be right about paracetamol posing a risk to pregnant women. (See 10.23am.)

Dangerous and irresponsible.

This man is a snake oil salesman and it’s time people stopped buying.

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Tories demand inquiry into claims Labour’s McSweeney misled elections watchdog

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Starmer’s chief of staff used ‘false excuse’ for failing to declare donations to his former thinktank, Tories claim

The Conservatives have called for an investigation into Keir Starmer’s beleaguered chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, after allegations that he tried to mislead the elections watchdog over donations to a Labour thinktank he ran while in opposition.

The organisation, Labour Together, was fined £14,250 by the Electoral Commission in 2021 over its handling of almost £740,000 of donations. The Tories have claimed that it used a “false excuse” of administrative errors.

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Mahmood vows to change modern slavery laws after bid to deport Eritrean man thwarted

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Appeal court rejects home secretary’s attempt to appeal against blocking of return of man to France under ‘one in, one out’ deal

Shabana Mahmood has announced plans to change modern slavery laws to prevent migrants from making last minute attempts to “frustrate a removal” after her bid to appeal in a trafficking case was thrown out by the court of appeal.

The home secretary had applied for permission to appeal against a high court ruling temporarily blocking the removal of an Eritrean asylum seeker to France under Labour’s “one in, one out” scheme so that he had more time to gather evidence in support of his trafficking claim. Three appeal court judges rejected her application.

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Ed Davey calls for UK to import US cancer researchers hit by Trump cuts

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Lib Dem leader to use conference speech to urge extra funding for mRNA research and accuse Nigel Farage of cheering US funding reductions

The UK should import US scientists whose cancer research projects have been cut by Donald Trump, Ed Davey will argue at a Liberal Democrat conference that has focused heavily on how the party can respond to hard-right populism.

In his closing speech, Davey will also criticise Nigel Farage, saying the Reform UK conference applauded the Trump administration’s decision to slash funding for mRNA vaccines, which are being trialled as a way to offer personalised immunotherapy treatment for some cancers.

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Disabled Nigerian man living in UK for 38 years wins appeal against deportation

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Anthony Olubunmi George, who arrived in 1986 and has no criminal convictions, given right to remain

A disabled Nigerian man who has lived in the UK for almost 40 years has won an appeal to stay in the country despite the Home Office wanting to deport him.

Anthony Olubunmi George, 63, came to the UK at the age of 24 in 1986. He has not left the UK since and has no criminal convictions. He had two strokes in 2019 that left him with speech and mobility issues.

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Reform branded ‘threat to democracy’ over Farage plan to remove thousands of migrants with leave to be in UK – politics live

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Nigel Farage says Reform UK would scrap the main route that migrants take to gain British citizenship

Farage and Yusuf are now taking questions.

Q: [From the BBC’s Iain Watson] Will you withdraw the £230bn figure, because it has been withdrawn by the thinktank that produced it?

What we are attempting to do today is to make people realise that large-scale migration into Britain, where 50% at least of those that come, will never work and live off the British state, is actually making this country substantially poorer.

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Farage vows to scrap indefinite leave to remain, placing thousands at risk of deportation

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Reform UK plans to force non-citizens to apply for visas with high salary thresholds and no access to NHS services

Nigel Farage has said Reform UK would scrap the main route that migrants take to gain British citizenship, leaving tens of thousands of legally settled people facing deportation unless they met strict rules.

Farage said the plans would tackle the “Boriswave” – the increase in the number of legal migrants who came to work in the UK under post-Brexit migration rules established under Boris Johnson. Much of that increase was because of schemes from Ukraine, Hong Kong and Afghanistan to settle refugees.

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Zarah Sultana drops legal threat over feud with Jeremy Corbyn

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MP ‘determined to reconcile’ with former Labour leader after fledgling party’s membership sign-up row

Zarah Sultana has said she will call off legal action after a public row with Jeremy Corbyn over the fledgling party they were to co-lead.

The Coventry South MP acknowledged people felt “demoralised” after the quarrel over her push for members to sign up to Your Party, the political outfit she established with the former Labour leader.

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Lib Dems should ditch Ed Davey’s stunts and talk policy, survey finds

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Thinktank poll reveals voters unclear what party stands for despite photo opportunities winning more media coverage

The Liberal Democrats should drop their stunts and offer a more serious policy programme if they want to gain support among voters, according to a study presented at the party’s annual conference.

Polling by the More in Common thinktank, shown to Lib Dem members at the gathering in Bournemouth, suggested that while it has the scope to go beyond its historic total of 72 MPs at the last election, many voters tempted by the party remain uncertain about what it stands for.

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