Ben Wallace says ‘actions have consequences’ as schoolgirl who joined Isis is found in Syria
The security minister, Ben Wallace, has said he would not put officials’ lives at risk to rescue UK citizens who went to Syria and Iraq to join Islamic State, insisting “actions have consequences”.
“I’m not putting at risk British people’s lives to go looking for terrorists or former terrorists in a failed state,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
Continue reading...Ex-ambassadors and high commissioners say UK is weakened by ‘fiasco’
More than 40 former British ambassadors and high commissioners have written to Theresa May warning her that Brexit has turned into a “national crisis” and urging her to delay proceedings until the government has greater clarity about Britain’s likely future relationship with Europe.
The letter, signed by many of the most senior diplomats of the last 20 years, underlines concerns that British influence in the world will wane if the country leaves Europe’s trading and foreign policy bloc.
Continue reading...Labour leader struggling to balance conflicting forces in his party over Brexit
Jeremy Corbyn faces up to 10 resignations from the Labour frontbench if he fails to throw his party’s weight behind a fresh attempt to force Theresa May to submit her Brexit deal to a referendum in a fortnight’s time, frustrated MPs are warning.
With tension mounting among anti-Brexit Labour MPs and grassroots members, several junior shadow ministers have told the Guardian they are prepared to resign their posts if Corbyn doesn’t whip his MPs to vote for a pro-referendum amendment at the end of the month.
Continue reading...Government urged to make amends to ex-soldiers, who were underpaid and beaten
Pressure is mounting on the government to compensate and apologise to Britain’s last surviving African veterans of the second world war after three shadow secretaries of state called on their Conservative counterparts to acknowledge the systematic discrimination of colonial-era troops.
Labour’s Emily Thornberry, Nia Griffith and Dan Carden – the shadow foreign, defence and international development secretaries – demanded in a letter that Theresa May’s administration acknowledge the unfair treatment, launch an investigation into the matter, issue a formal apology and pay veterans compensation.
Continue reading...There are plenty of thoughtful, pragmatic remainers and leavers. They’re just not getting any airtime
Brexit has divided Britain – everyone says so. Families have been fractured, friendships blighted. Fury – yes, fury – hangs heavy in the air. Well, maybe. Perhaps it’s just the furious – the politicians, the punters, the pundits – who are getting all the airtime.
Just after the referendum I made a Panorama documentary in the West Midlands asking people why they had voted the way they had. The leavers, the majority, thumped their tubs in triumph. The remainers hung their heads in despair at the simple-mindedness of the leavers. Standard stuff.
Continue reading...Rolling coverage of the day’s political developments as they happen, including Theresa May’s statement to MPs about Brexit
This amendment would stop the government from running down the clock on the Brexit negotiations, hoping members of parliament can be blackmailed into supporting a botched deal.
The Labour MP Yvette Cooper has published details of her latest plan to ensure that MPs get the chance to vote to rule out a no-deal Brexit. Here are the key points.
This bill would require the prime minister and parliament to take crucial decisions by the middle of March at the very latest on whether the UK is leaving with a deal, without a deal or seeking an extension to article 50.
It forces the prime minister to tell us whether she wants to leave with no deal or to extend article 50 if she still hasn’t got a deal in place by the middle of March. This bill creates a parliamentary safeguard to prevent us drifting into no deal by accident, and to prevent those crucial decisions being left until the final fortnight. The risks to jobs, the NHS and security from no deal are too great for us to stand back and let the government drift.
Continue reading...Lack of participation at Middle East event reflects anger over US policy on Iran and Syria
Key European powers will offer only limited participation in a high-profile Trump administration summit on the Middle East starting on Wednesday, reflecting their growing anger over unilateral US policymaking on Iran and Syria.
The UK foreign secretary, Jeremy Hunt, will leave the Warsaw summit early, pleading Brexit Commons business, while France is sending a civil servant and Germany its junior foreign minister.
Continue reading...Corbyn accuses PM of running down clock, as May indicates waiting period on treaties could be waived
Theresa May has appealed to MPs for more time to push Brussels into agreeing to changes to her Brexit deal, in an update to the Commons that contained no new announcements and reiterated her opposition to a Labour compromise plan.
With negotiations over possible changes to the Irish border backstop at a crucial stage, parliament needed to hold its nerve, the prime minister said, adding that a Brexit motion to be debated on Thursday would reiterate those intentions.
Continue reading...As the world’s first junior cycle mayor, Lotta Crok wants to draw attention to the obstacles kids on bikes face – and inspire other children to cycle
During Amsterdam’s chaotic rush hour, nine-year-old Lotta Crok cycles to a very busy junction. “Look,” she says. “There’s traffic coming from everywhere. Four trams from four different directions. For a child on a bike that’s really confusing!”
Lotta is the first junior cycle mayor in the world and her working area is the Dutch capital. It is her mission to inspire children to cycle every day and draw attention to the obstacles that kids on bikes are facing.
Continue reading...Licensing law proposals also include more rigorous regime on driver background checks
Taxis and minicab drivers in England and Wales could be forced to install CCTV in their vehicles under government proposals to tighten up licensing laws.
Local authorities might also have to conduct enhanced criminal record and background checks on every driver.
Continue reading...PM will stress her continued focus on Irish backstop but EU indicates it will not give way
Theresa May hopes to convince the House of Commons on Tuesday to give her another fortnight’s grace to keep pushing for changes to the Irish backstop – despite the insistence of Michel Barnier that it is Britain that must compromise.
With 45 days to go until Britain is due by law to leave the EU, with or without a deal, the prime minister will address MPs about progress in the Brexit talks, No 10 announced on Monday.
Continue reading...But Rory Stewart says PM’s letter showed ‘a lot of common ground’ between parties
One of Theresa May’s ministers has said the prime minister has rejected Jeremy Corbyn’s Brexit plan of a customs union but insisted her letter to the Labour leader showed there was “a lot of common ground” between the parties.
“What’s happening here is not a shifting of red lines,” Rory Stewart, the prisons minister, told BBC Breakfast.
Continue reading...The former foreign secretary says UK must have ability to exit Irish backstop unilaterally
Meanwhile, the prisons minister, Rory Stewart, says Theresa May has rejected Jeremy Corbyn’s proposal for a customs union post-Brexit but suggested that the parties are closer together than some people think.
He told BBC Breakfast:
The prime minister remains very clear that she thinks that a very major economy like the United Kingdom needs to have the freedom to be able to make its own trade deals, so she’s disagreeing with Jeremy Corbyn’s suggestion that we enter a permanent customs union.
What she is saying is that we have a lot if common ground, a lot more common ground perhaps than people have acknowledged, on things like environmental protections, workers’ rights, making sure that we get investment into areas of the country which haven’t done as well out of the last few years as other parts of the country.
Related: Brexit: May has ruled out Corbyn's customs union plan - minister
Good morning, this is Haroon Siddique sitting in for Andrew Sparrow again. I’ll be attempting to keep you up to speed with the most significant politic developments of the day. Given the number of comments the blog attracts, if you want to get my attention, the best way is probably to Tweet me.
Ahead of the Brexit Secretary Stephen Barclay’s meeting with the European chief negotiator, Michel Barnier, in Brussels this evening, Boris Johnson has insisted that the Irish backstop must be amended to give the UK a unilateral out within a specified time period.
The argument is now about how to get out of the backstop. And how to make sure that the UK isn’t locked in that prison of the customs union. I think that you would need to have a time limit.
It [the deal] would have to give the United Kingdom a UK-sized exit from the backstop. We would have to be able to get out by a certain time and we would have to be able to get out of our own volition. The most promising way forward is to do what is called the Malthouse compromise.
"The pound will go where it will."
Ex-Foreign Sec @BorisJohnson downplays the possibility of the pound's value falling and prices increasing in the event of a no deal Brexit #r4today https://t.co/X1j9RC8rg8 pic.twitter.com/ClreIOdGoM
Tory strategist’s pitch detailed how CTF Partners would spread negative stories and press Fifa to ‘restart bidding process’
Sir Lynton Crosby offered to work on a campaign to cancel the 2022 Qatar World Cup and get it awarded to another country in return for £5.5m, according to a leaked plan that gives a rare insight into the activities of one of the world’s best-known political operatives.
The detailed pitch document – “a proposal for a campaign to expose the truth of the Qatar regime and bring about the termination of the 2022 World Cup in Qatar” – was written in April last year and personally signed by Crosby.
Continue reading...James Brokenshire says Commons will have chance to block no-deal departure
The government has sought to buy Theresa May more time to put together a workable Brexit deal by promising MPs another say by the end of the month, as business leaders said the process was now in the “emergency zone”.
The communities secretary, James Brokenshire, said that if no finalised deal were put to the Commons by 27 February, MPs would again be given an amendable motion to consider. This would give them the chance to block a no-deal departure or make other interventions.
Continue reading...Nissan’s bombshell for the city has dented confidence, but citizens draw strength from their football team
Andrew Cammiss got up at four yesterday morning to set off on a 250-mile trip to Oxford for a third division football match. “I took my lad Niall who’s named after my favourite player,” he reveals. Along with other club legends Peter Reid and Kevin Phillips, an image of Niall Quinn is inked on the 39-year-old superfan’s body. “It takes my mind off things. Tattoos show my love for the lads.”
By “things” he means the latest kick in the teeth to his home city. Nissan has scrapped plans to manufacture the X-Trail sport-utility vehicle there. Despite reassurances that the cancellation does not imperil the plant, which employs about 7,000 people, Cammiss fears the worst. “I’ve a cousin and uncle who work there. Everyone knows someone who works there. If Nissan goes we’ll be gutted for a bit, but we’ll get used to it. There’s always the football.”
Continue reading...Theresa May faced cross-party calls to sack her transport secretary, Chris Grayling, last night, after the calamitous collapse of a no-deal Brexit ferry contract handed to a company with no ships.
Senior Tories said the prime minister had turned “a blind eye” to Grayling’s decision to award the £13.8m contract to Seaborne Freight to run ferries between Ramsgate and Ostend, despite widespread derision and accusations that it had been awarded illegally.
Continue reading...Exclusive: recruiters told military-style operation could stay open for two years
The government has started to recruit civilians to work in an emergency command and control centre being set up to make sure Britain runs smoothly in the aftermath of a potential no-deal Brexit.
Briefing notes issued by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) to recruitment agencies state the EU Exit Emergencies Centre (EUXE) could stay open “potentially for two years”.
Continue reading...Goods dispatched in coming days may not arrive until after 29 March deadline
British exporters sending goods to far-flung destinations in the coming days risk being locked out of harbours around the world as a no-deal Brexit looms, business leaders have warned.
Independent trade experts and the UK’s biggest business groups said exporters could be dispatching goods from UK ports imminently that would not arrive until after the 29 March deadline. This raised the prospect of goods being stuck in ports or facing hefty additional costs in the event of a disorderly Brexit.
Continue reading...No 10 and EU announce new negotiations on the ‘speed’ of post-Brexit trade talks
Theresa May clashed with Jean-Claude Juncker and Donald Tusk during Brexit talks in Brussels but has secured agreement for a fresh round of formal negotiations to break the impasse.
A meeting with the European commission president was described as “robust”, with Juncker resolutely rebuffing May’s demand for a renegotiation of the withdrawal agreement.
Continue reading...