Vote was triggered by Labour MP’s resignation and is first byelection under current prime minister
The first Westminster byelection since the resignation of Boris Johnson and Liz Truss and the financial fallout from the mini-budget takes place on Thursday.
Polls are set to close at 10pm in the City of Chester in the first electoral test for Rishi Sunak.
Continue reading...Tory-led Essex authority is on brink of bankruptcy and has appealed to government for emergency bailout
A Tory-led council has admitted a series of disastrous investments in risky commercial projects caused it to run up an unprecedented deficit of nearly £500m and brought it to the brink of bankruptcy.
The staggering scale of the catastrophe at Thurrock council in Essex – one of the biggest ever financial disasters in local government – is contained in an internal report made to the council’s cabinet, which reveals it has lost £275m on investments it made in solar energy and other businesses, and has set aside a further £130m this year to pay back investment debts.
Continue reading...PM is stuck between two wings of party and at risk of Commons defeat on pro-renewables amendment
Rishi Sunak is scrambling to find a compromise on permitting onshore wind amid a growing backbench Conservative rebellion, though No 10 remains fearful of a backlash from MPs who oppose windfarms.
The U-turn on backing onshore wind projects would directly contradict a pledge by Sunak during his leadership campaign but Downing Street has sought to frame it as government policy.
Continue reading...Representatives of Eurosceptic insist he had been left with no option but to appeal to European court of human rights
Lawyers for Owen Paterson have admitted the irony of the former MP bringing a case against the UK government at the European court of human rights, despite having previously called on Britain to “break free” of the court entirely.
Representatives for Paterson, a prominent Eurosceptic Conservative who resigned last year in the midst of a lobbying scandal, issued a statement on Monday insisting he had been left with no option but to appeal to a court whose authority he had previously questioned.
Continue reading...Opposition to unveil plan to reverse biodiversity loss rather than simply halting it, which is government’s current target
The government will not be able to achieve its nature targets by 2030, even though they are “embarrassingly poor”, the shadow environment minister and leading wildlife groups have said.
Next week at the Cop15 biodiversity conference in Montreal, Alex Sobel will be discussing Labour’s “science-led, joined-up plan to tackle the climate and ecological emergency”. The plan will aim to reverse biodiversity loss by 2030, rather than simply halting it, which is the government’s current target.
Continue reading...Richard Drax reported to have visited Caribbean island for meeting on next steps, including plans for former sugar plantation
The government of Barbados is considering plans to make a wealthy Conservative MP the first individual to pay reparations for his ancestor’s pivotal role in slavery.
The Observer understands that Richard Drax, MP for South Dorset, recently travelled to the Caribbean island for a private meeting with the country’s prime minister, Mia Mottley. A report is now before Mottley’s cabinet laying out the next steps, which include legal action in the event that no agreement is reached with Drax.
Continue reading...Tory MP becomes latest member of party to get behind push to drop moratorium imposed in 2014
The president of the Cop26 climate summit Alok Sharma has become the latest Conservative party MP to support lifting the ban on new onshore windfarms.
Sharma has joined his former boss Boris Johnson, who nominated him for a peerage, in backing an amendment to government legislation in an attempt to drop the moratorium on onshore wind.
Continue reading...Veteran Streeter and junior minister Davison, who was thought of as a rising star, say they will step down
Two more Conservative MPs have said they will not stand at the next election, as the party gears up to select its parliamentary candidates.
The veteran Sir Gary Streeter and Dehenna Davison, who was thought of as a rising star, were the latest Tories to decide it was time to leave the Commons, with recent opinion polls predicting the Conservatives could lose more than 200 seats.
Continue reading...With a deadline to declare their intentions nearing and facing likely election defeat, as many as 50 may opt not to stand
Matt Hancock has just a few days left on I’m a Celebrity before he returns from the safety of the Australian jungle back to the more poisonous environment of the Palace of Westminster.
But this week, more Conservative MPs are pondering ways to get out of there – as a deadline approaches to give notice that they intend to stand at the next election.
Continue reading...‘Hefty chunk’ of documents handed over to committee last week, four months after request
The privileges committee inquiry into whether Boris Johnson misled the Commons may be delayed until January, after No 10 finally handed over a cache of evidence relating to Partygate four months after it was requested.
The Guardian understands that the autumn deadline for beginning oral evidence sessions, in which the former prime minister will be called as a witness, has been abandoned. Instead, sources said the highly anticipated sessions could be pushed back to after Christmas.
Continue reading...Home secretary faces five legal challenges over crisis at Manston processing centre for asylum seekers
Suella Braverman is facing five legal challenges over a crisis at Manston processing centre but insisted that people seeking asylum in small boats and their smugglers were to blame for the chaos.
The home secretary told MPs that legislation planned to tighten the asylum system would not come before parliament this year. Her most senior civil servant has not yet signed off a £140m deal to send asylum seekers to Rwanda as “value for money”, it emerged.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Doctors suffering ‘moral distress’ at their powerlessness to help most vulnerable, says head of the Royal College of GPs
Ill patients are refusing sicknotes from their GP because they cannot afford time off work, while physicians suffer “moral distress” at their powerlessness to do more to help the most vulnerable, the new leader of Britain’s family doctors has revealed.
More patients are experiencing asthma attacks or other serious breathing problems because they cannot afford to heat their homes, said Dr Kamila Hawthorne, the chair of the Royal College of GPs, while many have reported deteriorating mental health due to financial stress.
Continue reading...Eric Pickles says former health secretary did not consult Acoba before appearing on reality TV show
Matt Hancock breached the government’s business appointment rules by not consulting the watchdog before appearing on I’m A Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!, the chair of the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments (Acoba) has said.
In a letter to the chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster, Oliver Dowden, Eric Pickles wrote: “I am writing to you in my capacity as chair of the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments to bring to your attention a breach of the government’s business appointment rules.
Continue reading...Exclusive: senior staff submit multiple complaints about deputy PM’s first stint at justice ministry
Dominic Raab is facing multiple formal complaints from Ministry of Justice (MoJ) civil servants over allegations of bullying behaviour during his previous stint running the department, the Guardian has been told.
The justice secretary has vowed to “thoroughly rebut and refute” the two official complaints he is already facing, one from the MoJ and one from his time as foreign secretary, but further formal allegations will be a blow to his attempts to clear his name.
Continue reading...Latest updates: Labour’s Keir Starmer is speaking to the CBI
Starmer says Britain is trapped in a “vicious cycle of stagnation”.
The UK has had the worst record for growth in centuries, he says. He says a new model is needed. And this should be a turning point.
They put our public finances in a perilous position, wasted the chance to transform our potential in an era of low interest rates, and created an economy with weak foundations.
But the war didn’t ban onshore wind. The war didn’t scrap home insulation. And the war didn’t stall British nuclear energy.
Continue reading...Prime minister stresses ‘enormous benefits and opportunities’ of Brexit before business leaders
Rishi Sunak has laid down a red line for any new attempts to improve post-Brexit trade with the EU and managed to quell a rebellion among furious Tories – but kept open the possibility of closer ties with Brussels.
The prime minister dismissed suggestions the UK could pursue a Swiss-style relationship with the bloc, while a senior business leader called the row a “sideshow” and No 10 sources pointed the finger of blame at the chancellor, Jeremy Hunt.
Continue reading...Capital budget of £12bn a year to shrink to £11.7bn, putting Tories’ claim 40 hospitals in England will be built or renovated in doubt
Plans by the government to construct and renovate 40 hospitals in England could be delayed because of new analysis suggesting the health and social care department’s capital spending budget faces a real-terms cut of £700m next year, according to the Liberal Democrats.
With some hospitals said to be in dire need of repair, the health secretary twice refused to say on Sunday that the NHS was functioning properly and instead admitted it was under “severe pressure”.
Continue reading...Some MPs would like Jeremy Hunt to revise tax rises, fearing impact on ‘squeezed middle’ and backlash from red wall areas
Tory MPs are desperately hoping that a surprise spring economic revival will allow Jeremy Hunt to alter his tax-raising plans, amid warnings that the chancellor’s “stealth tax” autumn statement will extinguish the party’s election hopes.
While concerns have already been raised on the right of the party over the extent of the £25bn in tax rises announced by the chancellor last week, figures from across the party said that “emotional and mental exhaustion” had blunted a greater immediate backlash.
Continue reading...Analysis of ONS figures suggests average woman’s salary has fallen from £30,250 in 2010 to £29,680 today
Women are £570 a year worse off than they were before the Conservatives came into power 12 years ago and the autumn statement will leave them even worse off, Labour has claimed.
Citing analysis of ONS figures, Labour said that in real terms, the median full-time female worker’s salary has fallen from the equivalent of £30,250 in April 2010 to £29,680.
Continue reading...Chancellor defends tax rises as Institute for Fiscal Studies says UK now entering a ‘new era’ of higher taxation
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has conceded that Boris Johnson’s hard Brexit deal has caused damaging trade barriers with the European Union, as he said immigration will be “very important” for the economy.
Hunt insisted the UK would find a way to improve trading ties with the EU without rejoining the single market.
His comments came after the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) said Brexit caused a “significant adverse impact” to trade volumes and business relationships between UK and EU firms.
Asked if rejoining the single market would boost growth, the Chancellor told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme:
I think having unfettered trade with our neighbours and countries all over the world is very beneficial to growth.
I have great confidence that over the years ahead we will find outside the single market we are able to remove the vast majority of the trade barriers that exist between us and the EU. It will take time.
I don’t think it’s the right way to boost growth because it would be against what people were voting for when they supported Brexit which was to have control of our borders and membership of the single market requires free movement of people.
So I think we can find other ways that will more than compensate for those advantages.
There needs to be a long-term plan if we’re going to bring down migration in a way that doesn’t harm the economy.
We are recognising that we will need migration for the years ahead - that will be very important for the economy, yes.
They don’t look obviously deliverable. If you take the spending cuts that are in place and subtract out the protected departments like health and defence, you end up with really big falls in those unprotected departments.
Hard to see how given the legacy of austerity, given public sector wages are already lagging behind and given this is effectively tying the hands of governments, it’s really hard to see how those will be delivered.
What we saw yesterday was the biggest deterioration in the overall forecasts since the OBR started producing these forecasts.
What is doing the damage here is higher interest rates.
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