Document to reiterate radical 2017 commitment to ‘sector-wide collective bargaining’
Labour’s manifesto will reaffirm plans for the most dramatic shift in conditions for employees in Britain since the 1980s – including changing the way wages are set for 20 million workers.
The “clause V” document, which will be agreed by senior party figures at a meeting on Saturday, is expected to be launched by Jeremy Corbyn next week.
Continue reading...Jeremy Corbyn will announce free internet plan in speech in Lancaster, while prime minister is in Oldham
Johnson is now asked whether he has done enough for the flood victims. He says you can never do enough for someone who has suffered in a flooding. Of course there’s always more you can do, he says, but he will make sure that the insurers don’t “weasel out of their obligations” to the flood victims. His government has put far more into flood defence than previous Labour governments, he says, 2.6bn.
They move on to migration. Is net migration going to rise and fall under a Conservative government? Johnson says “it’s a great thing” that there are “more EU nationals in the UK than ever before”. Once we come out of the EU, in January, we will take control of our borders, the PM says. When pressed for particular target numbers, Johnson says he doesn’t want to play the numbers game. He says the problem is uncontrolled immigration, and that this is what Labour wants to pursue. He brings up an Australian-style point-based immigration system again. Is a brain surgeon or a porter getting more points? His analysts haven’t decided yet, the PM says.
Over 20 years, the debate about freedom of movement has become skewed by a hostile narrative. By Rachel Shabi
Few chance encounters have had a greater political impact than Gordon Brown’s fateful meeting with Gillian Duffy on an April morning in Rochdale in 2010. When the then prime minister was caught on a hot mic calling the Labour-voting pensioner a “bigoted woman” – after she cornered him with complaints about immigrants “flocking” into Britain – it did not just sink his floundering campaign. It set the tone for the way immigration would become the most toxic issue in British politics for the decade to come.
When New Labour came to power in 1997, just 3% of the public cited immigration as a key issue. By the time of the EU referendum in 2016, that figure was 48%. During those intervening years, the issue came to dominate and distort British politics – exactly according to the script established by Bigotgate. Brown’s gaffe both consolidated and gave credence to a political coding that would shape everything that came after: the “hostile environment”, the Windrush scandal, the EU referendum and the revival of Britain’s far right – deploying a narrative in which sneering, out-of-touch, big-city politicians who favour foreigners and open borders are hopelessly oblivious to the struggles and the so-called “legitimate concerns” of ordinary working people (who, in this scenario, are always white).
Continue reading...PM cancels stop-off in Glastonbury after being heckled on visit to school
Boris Johnson has been accused of refusing to meet members of the public and running scared of protests during a visit to Somerset.
Johnson was in south-west England to try to bolster the campaigns of Tory colleagues against strong Liberal Democrat challenges. But in Taunton he was heckled by protesters as he visited a school and a planned stop-off at a bakery on the edge of Glastonbury was ditched.
Continue reading...More people given temporary status as backlog of unresolved cases reaches half a million
The proportion of EU citizens being granted a temporary, more precarious “pre-settled status” in the UK has continued to rise, the latest Home Office statistics show, and the backlog of unresolved cases has grown to more than half a million, causing unease among campaign groups that support EU nationals living in Britain.
All of the estimated 3.4 million EU citizens resident in the UK must apply for settled status if they want to continue living here legally after Brexit. The latest EU settlement scheme statistics show that 590,300 people applied for settled status in October, bringing the total number of applications to 2,450,000.
Continue reading...At least 11 media workers have been murdered in the country since President Andrés Manuel López Obrador took office
Mexico’s new human rights commissioner has questioned if journalists are actually killed in the country, which has become a cemetery for reporters over the past two decades – and has not become any safer since the arrival of a leftwing government late last year.
After being elected commissioner on Tuesday night, Rosario Piedra Ibarra blithely responded to reporters’ questions on the murder of reporters in the country by asking, “They’ve killed journalists?”
Continue reading...Britain will lose influence in international affairs after it leaves the EU, the outgoing president of the European council has said. Speaking at the College of Europe, Donald Tusk said Brexit would be the 'real end' of the British empire
Continue reading...Donald Trump cared more about investigating his political rival Joe Biden than the fate of Ukraine, according to dramatic testimony from a key witness in the first impeachment inquiry hearing before the American public. As Adam Schiff, the Democratic chair, gaveled the House intelligence committee into session, cameras from every major network carried the proceedings to millions of Americans, some of whom were encountering the allegations against Trump for the first time
Continue reading...The prime minister delivers the first big set-piece speech of the campaign as Labour pledges £26bn extra per year for NHS
That’s all from us for this evening. Thanks for reading and commenting. For a comprehensive rundown of the day’s events, see my colleague Andrew Sparrow’s daily election briefing:
Related: Andrew Sparrow's election briefing: Johnson won't change Brexit stance to please Farage
Related: Boris Johnson heckled over floods but does not apologise for 'slow response'
Hoey also said complained that MPs had spent the last two years trying to thwart Brexit, telling LBC:
We’ve had two years of parliament – a remain parliament – doing everything they can to stop us leaving; by different methods and some not so serious as others. But most of the Labour MPs in there and a substantial number of Conservatives have tried to stop it.
Continue reading...Government working ‘round the clock’ to help deluged regions, prime minister says
Boris Johnson declined to apologise over his government’s slow response to the flooding across parts of the north of England, insisting that a huge amount of work was going on to help and compensate victims.
The prime minister faced difficult questions over whether enough had been spent on flood defences in deluged regions of Yorkshire, the east Midlands and Lincolnshire, after giving a speech on how he would give billions of pounds to research and development.
Continue reading...Minister says planned new legislation could be used in response to rights violations
Foreign Office ministers have for the first time threatened to use new sanctions laws against individuals in Hong Kong found guilty of human rights abuses during the government’s efforts to suppress street protests.
The threat, picked up on social media by Hong Kong protesters, was made in a letter from the minister for Asia and the Pacific, Heather Wheeler, setting out the government’s response to the crisis.
Continue reading...Gauke said he would contest South West Hertfordshire seat he has held since 2005
The former Tory cabinet minister David Gauke has announced he will stand as an independent candidate at the general election.
The former justice secretary said he would contest the South West Hertfordshire seat he has held since 2005.
Continue reading...Hillary Clinton has said she is 'dumbfounded' as to why the UK government has not yet published a report on alleged Russian interference in British politics. Speaking to BBC's Radio 4 Today programme, the former US presidential candidate said: 'Every person who votes in this country deserves to see that report before your election happens.'
Continue reading...Party says it has experienced ‘sophisticated and large-scale attack’
The Labour party has said it has experienced a “sophisticated and large-scale cyber-attack” on its digital platforms.
A Labour spokeswoman said the attack had “failed” because of the party’s “robust security systems” and that they were confident no data breach had occurred.
Continue reading...Simon Coveney says ‘law must apply to all’ after Conservative promise to end ‘unfair’ trials
Ireland has expressed concern over a Conservative party pledge to change the law to protect former soldiers in Northern Ireland from possible prosecution over deaths during the Troubles.
The Tories have promised to end what they describe as “unfair trials” of soldiers accused of unlawful killings in Northern Ireland by amending the Human Rights Act to exclude any case dating from before the act came into force in 2000.
Continue reading...Ex-secretary of state says it is unacceptable to keep report from public before election
Hillary Clinton has called Downing Street’s suppression of a report into potential Russian infiltration of British politics “damaging, inexplicable and shaming”.
The 2016 US presidential candidate told the Guardian it was “incredibly surprising and unacceptable that in your country there is a government report sitting there about Russian influence and your current government isn’t releasing it”.
Continue reading...Foreign secretary lambasts Labour leader for saying Evo Morales was forced out by coup
Dominic Raab, the UK foreign secretary, has accused Jeremy Corbyn of putting Marxist solidarity ahead of democracy after the Labour leader said Evo Morales had been forced to resign as Bolivia’s president due to a military coup.
Morales stood down on Sunday after 14 years in power following a report by the Organization of American States found that “clear manipulations” of the voting system in the first round of elections on 20 October had occurred. The findings prompted the military and civilian police to call on him to stand aside.
Continue reading...Party leader announces election climbdown in effort to avoid splitting leave vote
Nigel Farage has said the Brexit party will not field any candidates against the Conservatives in the 317 seats they won at the last general election, after Boris Johnson committed to leaving the EU by 2020 and pursuing a Canada-style trade deal.
Farage said his party’s climbdown came after months of trying to create a leave alliance with the Tories, but he felt it was time to put the country before his party and make a “unilateral” move.
Continue reading...Party leader has stressed benefits of immigration, but some fear policy could hurt Labour in Tory seats
Labour activists are urging Jeremy Corbyn to incorporate the radical pro-migration policy passed at the party’s conference into its manifesto this week as the Tories prepare to weaponise the issue in the election battle.
Senior Labour figures are expected to meet on Monday to thrash out the details of the party’s policy, but a final decision will not be made until next weekend.
Continue reading...While hi-tech cosmopolitan centres like Milan flourish financially and culturally, former industrial towns continue to decline
Night-time haunts go in and out of fashion, but the Bar Basso in Milan, which opened in 1967, remains one of the city’s most venerable social institutions. Embodying a very Milanese combination of stylish prosperity and tasteful design, it is a favourite destination for the area’s creative elite and the discreetly wealthy.
Tucked away in a corner, Pierluigi Dialuce is explaining why, if a political nightmare unfolds in the rest of Italy, the city he has made his home will be able to cope.
Continue reading...