Category Archives: Politics

Drones, AI and new technology will dramatically change nature of war, UK defence review to warn

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MoD document expected to highlight dangers posed by Russia and China, and shortfall in UK troop numbers

Britain is facing “a new era of threat” with drones, artificial intelligence and other technologies changing the nature of warfare more fundamentally than at any other point in history, the government’s strategic defence review is expected to conclude on Monday.

The 130-page document written by three advisers to the prime minister, Keir Starmer, will warn of the “immediate and pressing” danger posed by Russia and is expected to try to draw heavily on lessons learned from the war in Ukraine.

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Future of world-renowned children’s centre in hands of Reform UK

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Pen Green, a model for Labour’s Sure Start, could face closure if Reform-led North Northamptonshire council fails to act

A world-renowned children’s centre that provided the model for Sure Start is on the brink of collapse, with its future in the hands of the newly elected Reform UK leadership of its local council.

The Pen Green Centre, which pioneered wrap-around care and learning for preschool children in one of the most deprived areas of the UK, was the blueprint for Labour’s totemic early years Sure Start programme in the late 1990s.

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Government sells final shares in NatWest 17 years after £45bn bailout

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Sale ends state ownership of the banking group, then known as Royal Bank of Scotland, after 2008 rescue

The UK has sold its final shares in NatWest Group, ending 17 years of state ownership since the £45bn taxpayer bailout that saved the bank from collapse at the height of the 2008 financial crisis.

The full privatisation of NatWest is a symbolic moment for the banking group – formerly known as Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) – and draws a line under the most tumultuous chapter in its near 300-year history.

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Gerry Adams’ BBC libel win risks more benign view of Troubles taking hold

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Concerns raised that hefty award to politician over Spotlight episode could lead to less hard-hitting journalism

For more than half a century, Spotlight has roved a beam over Northern Ireland, illuminating dark and overlooked topics. But now the flagship BBC documentary series is itself in the glare of scrutiny.

Gerry Adams’ victory in a libel case on Friday dealt a heavy blow to Spotlight and the BBC and raises questions over the programme and the impact of the case on journalism in the UK and Ireland.

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Mother of jailed British-Egyptian activist hospitalised after 242 days on hunger strike

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Laila Soueif continues protest against detention of Alaa Abd el-Fattah in Cairo

The mother of the imprisoned British-Egyptian human rights activist Alaa Abd el-Fattah has been admitted to hospital after spending more than 240 days on hunger strike.

Laila Soueif’s family said she had been admitted to St Thomas’ hospital in London on Thursday night with dangerously low blood sugar levels, but continues to refuse medical intervention that would provide her with calories.

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Gerry Adams awarded €100,000 damages in libel victory over BBC

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Former Sinn Féin leader sued broadcaster over allegation in documentary that he sanctioned murder of MI5 informant

Gerry Adams has won a defamation action against the BBC over a documentary that carried a claim he sanctioned the murder of an MI5 informant in 2006.

A jury at Dublin’s high court on Friday found that the BBC had not acted in good faith or in a fair and reasonable way and awarded the former Sinn Féin leader €100,000 (£84,000) in damages

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‘The ultimate liberty’: how Nigel Farage became a cryptocurrency convert

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Reform leader aims to make London a ‘crypto powerhouse’ and has previously hailed an ‘economic insurgency’

As Liz Truss prepared to make a U-turn on her mini-budget in October 2022, Nigel Farage discussed the economic instability on his GB News show. But he was not broadcasting from the channel’s studios in Paddington. Instead, Farage was speaking from a bitcoin conference in Amsterdam.

“With inflation forecast to perhaps get up to 20%, with increasing distrust of fiat currencies, people are looking for alternatives … Are you ready for bitcoin?” he said in his opening remarks.

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Reform UK to accept donations via bitcoin, Nigel Farage says

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Party leader says he wants UK to be a ‘crypto powerhouse’ during speech at Las Vegas conference

Reform UK will accept donations through bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, Nigel Farage has announced.

During an appearance at the Bitcoin Conference in Las Vegas, where he was introduced as a “UK presidential candidate”, Farage said: “As of now, provided you are an eligible UK donor … we are the first political party in Britain that can accept donations in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.”

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UK must consider food and climate part of national security, say top ex-military figures

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Former army and navy leaders urge government to think beyond military capability in advance of key defence review

Former military leaders are urging the UK government to widen its definition of national security to include climate, food and energy measures in advance of a planned multibillion-pound boost in defence spending.

Earlier this year Keir Starmer announced the biggest increase in defence spending in the UK since the end of the cold war, with the budget rising to 2.5% of GDP by 2027 – three years earlier than planned – and an ambition to reach 3%.

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Keir Starmer says Nigel Farage is ‘Liz Truss all over again’ – UK politics live

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Prime minister says ‘you cannot trust Farage with your future and your jobs’ as he gives speech in north-west England

When “something sounds too good to be true, it’s because it is too good to be true”, water minister Emma Hardy has said, reports the PA news agency.

Asked about the “threat” which Reform UK poses to Labour, Hardy told GB News:

I think it’s really important that any political party is held to account for the promises that they’ve made and we know – gosh, don’t we just know – what happened when [former prime minister] Liz Truss made her £45bn of unfunded tax cuts: the economy tanked, mortgages went up, rents went up, bills went up.

When something sounds too good to be true, it’s because it is too good to be true. If [Farage] wants to be taken seriously as a political party, then he needs to come up with some serious policies and he needs to be held to account.

Now, had I come on your programme and said, ‘do you know what? I’m just announcing £80bn of tax promises’, the first thing you’d have said to me is ‘I don’t believe you’.

The government must urgently summon the US ambassador to clarify what this court ruling means for Starmer’s recent deal with Donald Trump.

The levels of chaos from Trump’s economic policy is putting Liz Truss to shame.

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Trump says he warned Israel against attack on Iran as nuclear deal ‘very close’

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US president claims he told Tel Aviv he thought agreement on Tehran’s nuclear programme could come within weeks

Donald Trump has claimed he warned Israel against attacking Iran because he believed he was very close to a deal on Tehran’s nuclear programme in which US inspectors will be given unparalleled access to sites to ensure the country is not planning to build a nuclear bomb.

At a White House press conference on Wednesday, the US president confirmed he held talks last week with Israel and told them it was “not appropriate” to attack Tehran because he believed he could reach a deal within weeks.

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Police were ‘consulted’ over early prison release scheme, says Ministry of Justice

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Mark Rowley, Met commissioner, had said plans for England and Wales were made ‘without any analysis of the impact on policing’

The justice secretary, Shabana Mahmood, has hit back at the UK’s most senior police officer in a row over the impact of allowing thousands of criminals to serve their sentences in the community instead of being sent to jail.

The Ministry of Justice insisted on Wednesday that officials “consulted with police” including the Metropolitan police commissioner, Sir Mark Rowley, over proposed changes to sentencing policies introduced to ease prison overcrowding.

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UK accused of ‘garbled messaging’ as trade envoy visits Israel to boost links

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Lord Austin’s trip to ‘drum up business for Britain’ comes week after foreign secretary suspended trade talks

The coherence of the UK government’s policy towards Israel is under question after Labour permitted its trade envoy to boost commercial links one week after the foreign secretary suspended talks on a further trade deal.

The trade envoy, Lord Austin, was pictured on a visit to Haifa in a post on X shared by the UK’s embassy in Israel. The post welcomed Austin to the country as he visited a hi-tech “customs scanning centre”, a port and a light rail project that the embassy said showed UK and Israeli “cooperation at every stop”.

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Nigel Farage accused of ‘fantasy promises’ with expensive policy pledges

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Reform UK leader unveils plans to reverse benefit cuts and bring in tax breaks without explaining how they would be funded

Nigel Farage has been accused of leaving a multibillion-pound black hole at the heart of his party’s spending plans after unveiling a series of expensive policy pledges to be paid for by cutting nonexistent items of government spending.

The Reform UK leader laid out a series of economic promises at a speech on Tuesday designed to take advantage of disquiet among Labour voters at the government’s policies on taxes and benefits.

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Reform pledge to lift two-child cap aims to make having children ‘a bit easier for British families’ says Farage – UK politics live

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Leader says policy ‘not aimed at those who come into the country and suddenly decide to have a lot of children’

The co-leader of the Green party of England and Wales, Adrian Ramsay, has renewed his call for Russia to face greater sanctions. Posting to social media, the MP for Waveney Valley said “Putin has stepped up attacks on Ukrainian civilians because he thinks he’ll face no consequences. Much tougher sanctions are urgently needed to bring him into serious peace talks to end this horrific war.”

As well as appearing on the media round today, shadow chancellor Mel Stride has written for the Daily Mail, saying that the Conservatives continue to back the two-child benefit cap.

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UK must impose sanctions on Israel to meet legal obligations, say more than 800 lawyers

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Exclusive: Letter to PM signed by retired supreme court justices among others says lack of action will imperil international legal system

The UK must impose sanctions on the Israeli government and its ministers and also consider suspending it from the UN to meet its “fundamental international legal obligations”, more than 800 lawyers, academics and retired senior judges, including former supreme court justices, have said.

In a letter to the prime minister, they welcome Keir Starmer’s joint statement last week with the leaders of France and Canada warning that they were prepared to take “concrete actions” against Israel. But they urge him to act without delay as “urgent and decisive action is required to avert the destruction of the Palestinian people of Gaza”.

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MPs fear UK equality watchdog may take months to sign off gender guidance

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Exclusive: EHRC insiders believe process could drag on until after its chair is replaced in November

Formal guidance on how organisations should implement the supreme court ruling on gender may not be fully signed off for months, officials and MPs have warned, amid increasing worries about the capability of the government’s equalities watchdog.

While the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has promised to complete the process by the end of July, a series of insiders have told the Guardian they believe this may not happen until after the watchdog’s controversial chair, Kishwer Falkner, is replaced in November.

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Swinney demands Meta remove ‘racist’ Reform UK ad attacking Labour’s Sarwar

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Scotland’s first minister criticises byelection campaign video that claims his rival ‘will prioritise Pakistani community’

The SNP leader John Swinney has demanded that the owner of Facebook act on Reform UK’s “racist” byelection advert that attacks the Scottish Labour leader, Anas Sarwar.

The Facebook video, which incorrectly claims Sarwar has promised to prioritise Pakistani communities, is now subject to formal complaints from Scotland’s two main political parties. Scottish Labour contacted Meta, Facebook’s parent company, about the video two weeks ago and has yet to receive a reply.

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Labour blocks proposal for ‘swift bricks’ in all new homes

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MPs had previously backed Conservative amendment to ask developers to provide hollow bricks for endangered birds

Providing every new home with at least one “swift brick” to help endangered cavity-nesting birds has been rejected by Labour at the committee stage of its increasingly controversial planning bill.

The amendment to the bill to ask every developer to provide a £35 hollow brick for swifts, house martins, sparrows and starlings, which was tabled by Labour MP Barry Gardiner, has been rejected by the Labour-dominated committee.

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British Chagossians accuse UK government of betrayal over sovereignty deal

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Bertrice Pompe and Bernadette Dugasse won a brief victory in bid to stop transfer of Chagos Islands to Mauritius

Two women who brought an 11th-hour legal challenge to try to stop the UK transferring sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius have accused the government of betrayal.

British Chagossians Bertrice Pompe, 54, and Bernadette Dugasse, 68, who were both born on the largest of the islands, Diego Garcia, vowed to keep fighting to try to realise their dream of returning to their place of birth.

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