Starmer beats Trump to the line in race for trade deal with India

India has made concessions in trade negotiations, leaving UK heralding deal as ‘most significant’ since Brexit

It is not exactly the deepest and most comprehensive trade deal the UK has ever entered, but the timing of the announcement that Keir Starmer has clinched a free trade deal with India could not be more fortunate.

Over the weekend, the US president, Donald Trump, hinted he was on the verge of announcing his first trade deal, prompting speculation it could be with Japan, South Korea or India.

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Nigerians, Pakistanis and Sri Lankans face UK student visa crackdown

Applicants will be targeted by Home Office due to suspicions they are most likely to overstay and claim asylum

Nigerians, Pakistanis and Sri Lankans applying to work or study in the UK face Home Office restrictions over suspicions that they are most likely to overstay and claim asylum, Whitehall officials have claimed.

The government is working with the National Crime Agency to build models to profile applicants from these countries who are likely to go on to claim asylum.

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Tuesday briefing: The levers Labour might pull to counter a growing threat from Reform

In today’s newsletter: Can a partial U-turn on the winter fuel allowance help the party set a new agenda – and keep support for Nigel Farage at bay?

Good morning. After Reform UK’s resounding success in last week’s local elections, Keir Starmer has faced relentless questions over how Labour will change tack to deal with the problem. Now, we may have the beginning of an answer.

On the front page of today’s Guardian, Pippa Crerar and Jessica Elgot report that Downing Street is seriously rethinking the cuts to the winter fuel payment – the policy that above all others summarised Starmer and Rachel Reeves’s shaky start to life in government. While a full reversal is not on the cards, No 10 sources say that the £11,500 threshold over which pensioners are no longer eligible for the allowance could be increased in the autumn.

Israel-Gaza war | Israel is to expand its military operations in Gaza in the coming weeks, with the aim of “conquering” and establishing a “sustained presence” in the Palestinian territory, Israeli officials have said.

Film | Donald Trump’s threat to impose 100% tariffs on movies made outside the US could wipe out the UK film industry, ministers have been warned, as they came under immediate pressure to prioritise the issue in trade talks with the White House.

Charities | Macmillan Cancer Support is to scrap its £14m-a-year specialist advice service, which helps tens of thousands of people every year, in what has been described as a betrayal of vulnerable patients. With the charity’s income falling behind its expenditure, it said that the service was no longer sustainable.

Wildfires | After the warmest start to May on record, a wildfire has destroyed about 5,000 hectares (12,500 acres) of moorland on Dartmoor in Devon. Emergency services were called to the blaze at about 2.25pm on Sunday, and firefighters spent almost 24 hours at the scene before it was extinguished on Monday.

VE Day | The UK marked the 80th anniversary of VE Day with military pomp before large crowds who had gathered in central London. The royal family and war veterans were among the attendees at a 1,300-strong military procession while street parties were held around the UK.

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Britain has one of most difficult voter registration processes, report finds

UK system makes it a ‘real outlier’ among liberal democracies, according to study examining 62 countries

The UK has one of the most difficult voter registration processes among liberal democracies, according to research that examined 62 countries.

Requirements to actively register to vote, meet strict deadlines before polling day and cast a ballot at specific polling stations make the UK a “real outlier internationally”, academics at the University of Manchester found.

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UK ministers to meet bank bosses over lending to small businesses

Rachel Reeves concerned that lenders’ restrictions are holding back growth in the SME sector

Ministers will meet bank bosses on Tuesday to discuss how big lenders can support the government’s growth strategy as concerns mount inside Whitehall that small businesses are struggling to access the funds needed to make vital investments.

Senior executives from HSBC, NatWest and Lloyds are expected to explain how they will meet the government’s mission to increase lending after criticism from business groups about the lack of credit available after the pandemic.

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MPs warn social care needs substantial investment to fix ‘broken’ system

Cross-party group’s report emphasises risk of failure after finding 3.5 million people not getting care they need

A cross-party group of MPs has warned attempts to reform adult social care are doomed to fail unless ministers accept major investment is needed to overhaul a “broken” system that was failing millions of people.

Reform of social care was typically seen by governments as a “burden” on the taxpayer, and a “drain on resources” rather than a positive boost to people’s lives, the NHS and the economy, said the health and social care select committee.

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Starmer praises ‘selfless dedication’ of armed forces before VE Day anniversary

PM writes of ‘debt that can never be fully repaid’ in letter marking 80 years since end of second world war in Europe

Keir Starmer has praised the “selfless dedication” of those who have served in the military before the anniversary of VE Day as the government unveiled a new £50m support system for veterans.

In an open letter to mark 80 years since the end of the second world war in Europe, the prime minister said the sacrifice made by members of the armed forces was a debt that could “never fully be repaid”.

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Reform UK to resist housing asylum seekers in its council areas, chair says

Echoing comments by Nigel Farage, Zia Yusuf says judicial reviews, injunctions and planning laws will be used

Reform UK has vowed to use “every instrument of power” to resist housing people seeking asylum in areas where it now controls councils, its chair has confirmed.

Zia Yusuf, the party chair and a major donor, acknowledged Reform may not be able to stop people seeking asylum being put up in hotels where the Home Office has contracts with accommodation providers.

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UK politics: New Reform mayor suggests 10% cut to council workforce – as it happened

Andrea Jenkyns says she wants a ‘lean, mean local government’ and says she is ‘up for a fight’ with unions

The Conservatives will come back from their poor results in the local elections but it will have to be a “slow and steady” effort, party leader Kemi Badenoch has said, PA reports.

She told the BBC’s Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme: “I am sorry to all of those councillors who’ve lost their seat”.

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Badenoch says more children, not immigration, will help with ageing population

Conservative leader’s remarks to BBC suggest she may develop policies that encourage women to have more children

People should be having more children rather than the UK relying on immigration to deal with an ageing population, Kemi Badenoch has suggested.

The Conservative leader said the UK needed to answer the question of how we “make sure we can deal with [an] ageing society, people not having enough children”.

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Now Farage not Starmer is feeding public’s appetite for change

The Reform UK leader has somehow dodged responsibility for the economic damage of Brexit and is winning over disaffected Labour voters

There was a time when any election campaign featuring the name Nigel Farage would have featured the word “Brexit” just as prominently.

And yet, almost a decade after Farage orchestrated Britain’s great EU schism, and with the Reform leader emerging as a bigger political threat than ever, at this week’s local elections Brexit was not a word on the lips of voters.

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Labour targets international students claiming asylum after losses to Reform in local elections

Exclusive: Ministers understood to be drafting white paper this month in move to reduce legal migration

Ministers will crack down on international students applying for asylum in the UK in a move designed to tackle migration figures, after a series of bruising losses to Reform in the local elections.

An immigration white paper setting out the proposed reforms in mid-May will include measures to bring down the numbers of UK student visa holders who make asylum claims, the Guardian understands.

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Treasury threatens Defra with £4bn bill if Thames Water nationalised

Exclusive: Treasury threat an example of ‘scare tactics’ to help force through private sector deal, sources suggest

Whitehall officials have been at loggerheads over the fate of Thames Water since the Treasury told the environment department that it would have to meet the cost of a multibillion pound temporary nationalisation.

Britain’s biggest water company recently came within days of running out of money. Thames is in a desperate race to find a buyer willing to inject cash, with the US private equity firm KKR in pole position.

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Anti-immigrant Reform UK makes broad gains in English local elections

Labour-Conservative dominance challenged by Nigel Farage’s Trump-aligned party, which has control of at least six county councils

Britain’s anti-immigrant and Trump-aligned Reform UK party has made sweeping gains in English local elections, challenging the traditional political dominance of the country’s two main parties, Labour and the Conservatives.

Nigel Farage, the Reform leader, claimed his party had overtaken the Tories as the UK’s main opposition after Reform won control of at least six county councils, one mayoralty, and narrowly defeated the governing Labour party in a parliamentary byelection in what had been considered a safe seat.

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Reform UK’s victories are just the latest chapter of political fragmentation

Farage’s party has benefited this time as voters flee the main parties, but there are faultlines within its own coalition too

Fragmentation in British politics is not new. Disillusionment with the choices on offer is not new. The two-party share of the vote has been below 70% in four of the last six elections. Six months before the 2019 general election the Brexit party topped the EU election results with the Liberal Democrats in second. The 2024 general election had the lowest two-party share in the modern-party system.

What is driving this change? Political scientists talk about the demand and supply sides of electoral politics. The voters are the demand side, what types of parties and positions they want to vote for. They do not always get their wish. Who appears on the ballot paper is the supply side of the electoral equation. Increasingly, it is everyone.

Professor Paula Surridge is deputy director at UK in a Changing Europe and professor of political sociology at the University of Bristol

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Farage has declared a new dawn before, but this time things could really be different

Slicker presentation, a shift away from two-party politics and now hundreds of new councillors mean Reform is likely here to stay

In May 2014, Nigel Farage stood in front of the television cameras and declared his party’s victory in the European elections was “about the most extraordinary result that has been seen in British politics for 100 years”.

A year later, the Conservatives won an unexpected majority at the general election, restricting Ukip to just a single seat, with Farage failing in his attempt to win South Thanet.

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UK sand eel fishing ban remains in place despite EU legal challenge

Creatures make up the bulk of seabirds’ diet but are fished for commercial pig food

A ban on fishing for sand eels in UK waters will remain in place despite a legal challenge from the EU.

The small, silvery eels make up the bulk of the diet of seabirds, but they are fished for commercial pig food. A lack of sand eels means seabirds such as puffins can starve to death.

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Is Nigel Farage’s quest to rid Reform of ‘amateurism’ paying off?

Runcorn win was much bigger than polls implied, suggesting overall effectiveness of ground campaign

For the last few months, Nigel Farage has been promising to professionalise his Reform UK party, saying its general election result of five seats had been hampered by the party’s “amateurism”.

Friday’s narrow victory in the Runcorn and Helsby byelection suggests his strategy is starting to bear fruit. Not only did the party win a seat in which it came a distant third less than a year ago, but it did so with a much bigger swing than implied by the national polls – demonstrating the effectiveness of the party’s ground campaign.

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Reform wins Runcorn byelection by just six votes in blow to Labour

Result will heighten government’s fears it could lose scores of MPs to Nigel Farage’s party at next general election

Nigel Farage’s Reform UK has dramatically won the Runcorn and Helsby byelection by just six votes in a blow to Keir Starmer’s premiership.

The hard-right party narrowly overturned Labour’s 14,700-vote majority in the first full-scale electoral test of Starmer’s government and set a new record for the smallest majority at a parliamentary by-election since the end of the second world war.

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MPs urge David Lammy to intervene as British man remains in jail in India

Jagtar Singh Johal’s hopes of being freed on bail have been dashed for now despite being cleared of charges in one case

Hopes that Jagtar Singh Johal, a British Sikh man held in an Indian jail for seven years, would be released on bail were dashed on Thursday when his case was deferred by the Indian supreme court possibly until after the summer, prompting calls from MPs for the UK to intervene.

The foreign secretary, David Lammy, is due to meet Johal’s brother again next week.

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