Category Archives: Conservatives

C of E refutes claims of ‘conveyor belt’ of asylum seeker fake conversions

Posted on by

Suella Braverman and a former priest accuse church but Justin Welby says its role has been mischaracterised

The Church of England has refuted a claim that it operated a “conveyor belt for asylum seeker fake conversions”, saying parish records disproved the eye-catching allegation.

Churches have been at the centre of a storm over “fake conversions” in the past week after it emerged that Abdul Ezedi, the Afghan man suspected of a chemical attack on a woman and two children in Clapham, was granted asylum on his third attempt after converting to Christianity. Police said on Friday that Ezedi was believed to be dead.

Continue reading...

Major Tory donor among 13 new peers named in honours list

Posted on by

Entrepreneur Stuart Marks reportedly featured on – but was removed from – Boris Johnson’s resignation honours list

A major donor to the Conservative party who reportedly featured on Boris Johnson’s original resignation honours list is among 13 new peers announced by the government on Friday evening, eight of them Conservatives.

Stuart Marks, a technology entrepreneur who has served as a senior treasurer for the Conservatives, has been given a life peerage, an official announcement said. He has personally donated £119,500 to the party and another £56,500 through his company.

Continue reading...

Rishi Sunak paid effective tax rate of 23% on £2.2m income last year

Posted on by

Low capital gains rate and US location of funds mean tax bill of £508,000 much less than under top income rate of 45%

Rishi Sunak paid more than half a million pounds in tax in 2023 after making a £1.8m profit on his holding in a US investment fund, a summary of his tax affairs shows.

The prime minister published the document on Friday, showing he paid a tax bill of £508,308 in the financial year 2022-23 on overall earnings and gains of £2.23m.

Continue reading...

Local authority leaders criticise Sunak’s call for ‘restrained’ council tax rises

Posted on by

Prime minister’s comments ‘remarkable’ given government cuts to town hall funding in England, say LGA bosses

Council leaders in England have criticised Rishi Sunak for demanding that local authorities show “restraint” in putting up council tax bills, saying the government is to blame for underfunding.

The prime minister on Friday called for authorities to be “restrained in the council tax rises they put in place”, saying it was “incumbent on local councils to be respectful of the demands on people’s family budgets”.

Continue reading...

Kemi Badenoch says death threats have ‘intensified’ since publication of Nadine Dorries book – UK politics live

Posted on by

Business secretary says people have ‘latched onto’ claims made in Nadine Dorries book that puts forward elaborate conspiracy theories

BMA junior doctors’ committee co-chairs Robert Laurenson and Vivek Trivedi said in a statement:

We have made every effort to work with the government in finding a fair solution to this dispute whilst trying to avoid strike action.

Even yesterday, we were willing to delay further strike action in exchange for a short extension of our current strike mandate.

In a show of goodwill, the BMA provided the Health Secretary with an option to delay further strike action.

She was asked to extend the current strike mandate for a short period - and thus allow talks to continue with the aim to achieve a resolution for this year’s dispute.

Continue reading...

Wes Streeting says Labour would reform NHS dentists’ contract within days of taking office – UK politics live

Posted on by

Shadow health secretary says much of Tory NHS dental plans ‘lifted from what Labour has announced’

During her media round this morning Victoria Atkins, the health secretary, faced awkward questions about funding for NHS dentistry.

In an interview on BBC Breakfast, she repeatedly refused to confirm that the budget for NHS dentistry has fallen over the past decade.

Seeing a minister duck and dive on the reality of dental funding cuts will be hard to swallow for millions who have been left waiting for so long under this government.

The reality is they’ve left our dental services to rot and now think they can rebuild it with a handful of toothpicks.

Continue reading...

Rishi Sunak accused of personally holding up deal to end doctors’ strikes

Posted on by

Exclusive: Sources say PM has blocked talks due to concerns about knock-on effect of more generous pay offer

Rishi Sunak has been accused of personally holding up a deal to end doctors’ strikes in England despite warnings from the health department and NHS England that waiting lists will continue to soar unless the industrial dispute is resolved.

Sources told the Guardian it had been made “abundantly and repeatedly” clear to the prime minister that there would be no progress on his pledge to drive down NHS waiting lists until a deal was struck.

Continue reading...

Sunak ‘out of touch’ for betting £1,000 on Rwanda plan’s success, says Labour

Posted on by

PM also criticised for saying ‘the facts speak for themselves’ when asked if Keir Starmer was a terrorist sympathiser

Rishi Sunak has been called “out of touch” after taking a £1,000 bet with Piers Morgan on whether deportation flights to Rwanda will take off before the general election.

Morgan said to the prime minister on TalkTV: “I’ll bet you £1,000 to a refugee charity you don’t get anybody on those planes before the election. Will you take that bet?”

Continue reading...

Rishi Sunak says his parents wanted him to speak without an accent to ‘fit in’

Posted on by

PM says he experienced racism as a child and that his parents sent him for extra drama lessons so that he could ‘speak properly’

Rishi Sunak has spoken about the racism he experienced as a child and how his parents were so determined he should fit in and speak without an accent that he was sent for extra drama lessons.

“You are conscious of being different,” he told the deputy political editor of ITV News, Anushka Asthana. “It’s hard not to be, right, and obviously I experienced racism as a kid.”

Continue reading...

Jeremy Hunt suggests tax cuts in budget won’t match last year’s £20bn giveaway – UK politics live

Posted on by

The chancellor said he wanted to manage people’s expectations ahead of the spring budget

The UK needs a government guided by clear purpose, Reeves says.

Labour has set out five missions. But they are all tied to the economic mission – to raise growth.

These are the symptoms of economic decline.

Continue reading...

Northern Ireland will no longer automatically have to follow EU laws under deal to restore power sharing, DUP leader says – politics live

Posted on by

The DUP has endorsed a deal with the UK government to restore power sharing in NI, paving an end to two years of political deadlock

This is from Michelle O’Neill, the Sinn Féin leader in Northern Ireland and first minister designate in the power sharing executive.

I welcome the public declaration by DUP Leader Jeffrey Donaldson that power-sharing will now be restored.
The parties will come together later today. We have much to do to confront the challenges facing our public services, workers and families which require urgent action.

Continue reading...

Kemi Badenoch is member of ‘Evil Plotters’ Tory WhatsApp group

Posted on by

Exclusive: Business secretary who has told party rebels to stop ‘stirring’ and back PM is in group along with Michael Gove

Kemi Badenoch is a member of a Conservative WhatsApp group called “Evil Plotters” despite telling party rebels to “stop messing around” and get behind Rishi Sunak, the Guardian can reveal.

The business secretary, who consistently comes out as the favourite cabinet minister in polls of Tory members, has criticised party colleagues for “stirring” up suggestions that she could replace the prime minister.

Continue reading...

Chancellor considers further national insurance cut to take heat off Rishi Sunak

Posted on by

Jeremy Hunt targets further reduction in ‘jobs tax’ in March budget

The government is considering handing workers another tax cut with a further reduction in national insurance, amid desperate attempts to move on from a campaign to destabilise Rishi Sunak by the Tory right.

With frustration within the cabinet that the Conservative party has been unable to free itself from internal warring over Sunak’s immigration plans and leadership, the prime minister and his chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, are focusing on the tax cuts that will frame their election pitch.

Continue reading...

Voters think Labour would be better than Conservatives on housing and house prices

Posted on by

Opposition would do better on issues including the economy, health, education, the environment, immigration and crime, public says

More than twice as many voters believe a Labour government would be better for housing than the Tories, according to the latest Opinium poll for the Observer.

The survey shows Labour is well ahead of the Conservatives on most issues including the economy, health, education, the environment, immigration and crime, and level pegging on ones it has traditionally lagged way behind on, including defence.

Continue reading...

Labour vows to reform ministerial severance pay after Tories handed £1m last year

Posted on by

Individuals deemed unfit for office still walked away with payments from taxpayers, says shadow Cabinet Office minister

Labour has pledged to reform the rules surrounding ministerial redundancy payments after it emerged that the high turnover of cabinet ministers under the past three prime ministers generated a severance bill worth more than £930,000 in the last financial year.

Since 1991, sacked ministers under the age of 65 have been able to claim thousands of pounds in redundancy pay as long as they have been out of a ministerial post for at least three weeks. The receive the payments irrespective of how long they have stayed in their latest post, or the circumstances under which they left.

Continue reading...

Tory donors deny funding poll for group working to oust Sunak

Posted on by

Donors close to Boris Johnson and hedge fund boss behind GB News say they had no involvement in polling

Conservative donors have been rushing to deny funding polling for a group working to oust Rishi Sunak, as David Frost was warned he could lose the whip if rival party backers were involved.

Senior Tory figures are scrambling to figure out the mystery donors behind the Conservative Britain Alliance, which funded a £40,000 poll, fronted by Lord Frost in the Telegraph, that predicted a Labour landslide.

Continue reading...

Michelle Mone and the PPE Medpro investigation – podcast

Posted on by

After the peer admitted to lying about her involvement in lucrative government PPE deals during the Covid crisis, the fate of her high-profile lingerie company raises further questions. David Conn reports

When Michelle Mone sat down for an interview with the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg last month it was against the backdrop of serious allegations that she had been facing since 2020. Mone and her husband, the Isle of Man-based businessman Doug Barrowman, are the subjects of a long-running National Crime Agency investigation into allegations of bribery and fraud in their securing of £200m in government contracts for a company, PPE Medpro.

She admitted to Kuenssberg that she had lied for years when denying her involvement in the lucrative PPE deals, emphasising in the interview that she was a ‘very successful individual businesswoman’.

Continue reading...

Nicola Sturgeon regarded Boris Johnson as ‘a clown’ because of his handling of Covid, inquiry learns – UK politics live

Posted on by

Former Scotland first minister used expletives in private messages about former UK PM’s handling of pandemic

At the Covid inquiry hearing in Edinburgh Liz Lloyd, Nicola Sturgeon’s former chief of staff, was asked about her wanting a row with the UK government. (See 11.35am.)

Asked if she was looking for a spat, Lloyd replied:

I was looking for a spat with a purpose.

It had been shown in the past that they would sometimes change their mind if they felt that pressure and I wanted them to change their mind.

Sturgeon said his address was “fucking excruciating” and that the UK communications were “awful”. Sturgeon also told Lloyd: “His utter incompetence in every sense is now offending me on behalf of politicians everywhere.”

Lloyd said she was “offended” on behalf of special advisers everywhere. Sturgeon replied: “He is a fucking clown.”

Continue reading...

YouGov called on to confirm who commissioned poll on Sunak defeat

Posted on by

British Polling Council asks pollsters if there are documents showing who commissioned controversial surveys

The British Polling Council (BPC) is looking into controversial YouGov polling used by Conservative plotters to call for Rishi Sunak to be ousted.

The two polls, which YouGov said were commissioned by a mysterious group called the Conservative Britain Alliance with Tory peer David Frost acting as the intermediary, caused shock waves in Westminster when they were published in the Daily Telegraph last week.

Continue reading...

Rwanda flights: Britain reminded of obligation to obey ECHR orders

Posted on by

Ignoring urgent orders to halt flights would break international law, says head of European human rights court

The UK would break international law if it ignored emergency orders from the European court of human rights to stop asylum seekers being flown to Rwanda, the head of the court has said.

Síofra O’Leary, the ECHR president, told a press conference there was a “clear obligation” for member states to take account of rule 39 orders, interim injunctions issued by the Strasbourg-based court.

Continue reading...