Sunak’s press secretary says Downing Street not shown legal basis for rebel amendments, despite this being offered and asked for
Rishi Sunak starts with the usual spiel about his engagements, and how he has got meetings with colleagues.
Rishi Sunak is taking PMQs in 10 minutes.
Continue reading...Paul Kagame also says he would be happy for the scheme to be scrapped
Rwanda’s president has said there are limits to how long attempts to implement an asylum deal with Britain can “drag on”, indicating he would be happy for the scheme to be scrapped.
Paul Kagame’s comments on Wednesday came before Rishi Sunak faced a potentially leadership-ending rebellion by Conservative MPs threatening to vote down his Rwanda deportation bill on Wednesday night.
Continue reading...Stephen Bradshaw, former Post Office investigator, tells Horizon IT inquiry this was ‘probably not’ appropriate
Back at the Post Office inquiry Julian Blake says Stephen Bradshaw, the Post Office investigator, seems to show a “lack of reflection” on his role in miscarriage of justice events in a witness statement he supplied.
Bradshaw says he has reflected on what he said in his statement, because some of what he said was “completely wrong”. But he says he was told what he should say by lawyers.
Stephen Bradshaw, who was an investigation manager for the Post Office, said a statement signed by him declaring the Post Office’s “absolute confidence” in the Horizon IT system was written by lawyers.
A statement signed by Bradshaw in November 2012 said: “The Post Office continues to have absolute confidence in the robustness and integrity of its Horizon system.”
The average response time in December for ambulances in England dealing with the most urgent incidents, defined as calls from people with life-threatening illnesses or injuries, was 8min 44sec, PA says. This is up from 8min 32sec in November and is above the target standard response time of seven minutes.
Ambulances took an average of 45min 57sec last month to respond to emergency calls such as heart attacks, strokes and sepsis, PA says. This is up from 38min 30sec in November, while the target is 18min.
Response times for urgent calls, such as late stages of labour, non-severe burns and diabetes, averaged 2hr 37min 5sec in December, up from 2hr 16min 47secin November, PA says.
Some 13% of ambulance handovers in England last week, or 12,225 patients, were delayed by more than an hour, PA says. This was up from 12% a week earlier, but is below this winter’s current peak of 15%, recorded in the week to 10 December.
Nearly one in three patients arriving by ambulance at hospitals in England last week waited more than 30 minutes to be handed over to A&E teams, PA says. Some 28,189 delays of half an hour or longer were recorded across all hospital trusts in the week to 7 January. This was 31% of the 91,234 arrivals by ambulance, where the handover time was known. The figure is up from 29% in the previous week, but is not the highest so far this winter, which was 34% in the week ending 10 December, PA says.
Continue reading...Labour leader hits out at perceived criticism as he attacks Tory record on child health
Keir Starmer has said he is “up for the fight” of defending the “nanny state” as he announced plans to improve child health under a Labour government, including supervised toothbrushing in schools.
The Labour leader said that children were “probably the biggest casualty” of the Tories’ sticking-plaster approach to politics over the past 14 years, adding that, if the government were a parent, they could be charged with neglect.
Continue reading...Labour leader was director of public prosecutions when three cases brought by CPS resulted in convictions
Keir Starmer has denied he was aware of Crown Prosecution Service prosecutions against post office operators caught up in the Horizon IT scandal when he headed the agency.
The Labour leader’s comments came as calls grew for the former Post Office boss Paula Vennells to hand back £3m in bonuses earned during her period in charge.
Continue reading...Business minister Kevin Hollinrake to give statement on Horizon scandal and what the government plans to do
James Chapman, a former political editor of the Daily Mail who worked as special adviser for David Davis when he was Brexit secretary for about a year until he left convinced that Brexit was a terrible mistake, says he does not think the “back to square one” line really works as an attack line against Labour.
The trouble with Sunak’s latest slogan is that I suspect a large number of voters think Britain is so broken under the Tories that “going back to square one” sounds like a wholly positive idea
Continue reading...PM appears to rule out spring election after recent speculation it could be held in May
Starmer says being in opposition is frustrating, and he accuses the Tories of treating it as performance art.
He is now on the passage about his career in public service that was posted earlier. See 9.12am.
If you’ve been breaking your back to keep trading, steering your business through the pandemic, the cost-of-living crisis, the challenge of Brexit and the chaos of Westminster.
If you’ve been serving our country, whether in scrubs or the uniform of your regiment and what you want now is a politics that serves you, then make no mistake - this is your year.
Continue reading...Statement is clearest sign yet party is willing to drop one of its flagship policies in face of Conservative attacks
Keir Starmer has ruled out breaking Labour’s fiscal rules to meet its green investment targets if it wins the election this year, in the clearest sign yet that the party is willing to scale back one of its flagship policies in the face of Conservative attacks.
The Labour leader told an audience in Bristol on Thursday that he would not borrow £28bn to spend on green projects if it meant breaking a separate promise to reduce government debt as a proportion of economic output.
Continue reading...In a speech in the west of England, Labour leader will say he wants British people to believe in politics again
A Labour win at this year’s election will improve the mood of “a downtrodden country”, Keir Starmer will say, as he hopes to inject a note of optimism into what is set to be one of the most bitterly fought campaigns in recent history.
The Labour leader will set out his pitch to voters at a speech in the west of England on Thursday marking the beginning of what Labour believes will be a five-month lead-up to the election.
Continue reading...Chief strategist uses examples from around world to urge against complacency, warning ‘polls do not predict the future’
Labour’s poll lead could collapse in the weeks before the general election, the party’s chief campaign strategist has told shadow ministers, as he warned them not to be complacent going into the election year.
Morgan McSweeney, Labour’s director of campaigns, recently gave a presentation to the shadow cabinet in which he showed MPs what happened in the months before eight different elections from around the world. In each case, the clear favourite lost after their poll lead disappeared in the weeks leading up to the vote.
Continue reading...Airstrikes against Houthi rebels and the prospect of a year-long Gaza conflict will test cross-party thinking at Westminster
Two developments in the past 48 hours could test the cross-party consensus in Westminster on the conflict between Israel and Hamas: the signal sent by the Ministry of Defence that it is prepared to join the US in launching airstrikes against Houthi sites in Yemen, and statements by the Israeli political and military leadership that the war may take months or even a whole year to complete.
Labour has so far largely concurred with UK government policy, which in turn has largely shadowed thinking inside the White House.
Continue reading...Shadow front bencher says Keir Starmer would not have resignation honours after ‘appalling spectacle’ of ex-prime minister ‘rewarding cronies’
Labour last night promised there would be no resignation honour’s list issued by Keir Starmer if he were to become prime minister, as outrage grew over the list of peerages, knighthoods and other rewards showered by Liz Truss on those associated with her disastrous 49 days in office.
Shadow leader of the House, Lucy Powell, told the Observer: “The appalling spectacle of Truss rewarding her cronies for helping her crash the economy and cause mortgage misery for millions demeans politics.
Continue reading...Party historian MP Jon Cruddas questions readiness for power of leader with few ties to movement’s roots or ideology
A key centre-left Labour MP says Keir Starmer appears to lack a clear sense of purpose due to his detachment from his party’s traditions, and casts doubt on whether he can become one of its more successful prime ministers.
In A Century of Labour, a book published to mark 100 years since the formation of the first Labour government on 22 January 1924 under Ramsay MacDonald, Jon Cruddas says that Starmer – while clearly a “decent” and “principled” man – “remains an elusive leader, difficult to find”.
Continue reading...Insiders fear further watering down of party’s flagship economic policy could leave leader open to charges of ‘flip-flopping’ by Tories
Labour is considering scaling back ambitious plans to borrow £28bn a year to invest in green jobs and industry amid fears the Conservatives will use the policy as a central line of attack in the general election campaign.
The Guardian understands that Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves will discuss the party’s flagship economic policy next month, with senior Labour figures pushing to drop the £28bn commitment entirely while others want to retain key elements of the plan.
Continue reading...Labour leader also reiterates support for ‘two-stage solution’ as ‘the only way this is going to be resolved’
Keir Starmer has joined Rishi Sunak in calling for a sustainable ceasefire in Gaza, as the political rhetoric continues to shift away from unqualified support for Israel’s assault in line with moves from the US and others.
Some senior Conservatives were even more explicit. Ben Wallace, a former defence secretary, said Israel’s “killing rage” risked it losing international support, and Alicia Kearns, who chairs the Commons foreign affairs committee, said she believed Israel had broken international humanitarian law.
Continue reading...Former Tory peer claims she never concealed her link to PPE Medpro from officials dealing with the contract
Mark Harper, the transport secretary, has announced in a written statement that Transport for London is getting a capital funding settlement worth £250m for 2024. It will fund upgrades to the Piccadilly line. Sadiq Khan, the mayor, welcomed that announcement but, as the Evening Standard reports, said “a decent long-term funding settlement” from the government was still needed.
Rishi Sunak has said that too many civilian lives have been lost in Gaza – but declined to back Ben Wallace’s claim that Israel is engaged in a “killing rage”. (See 10.27am.)
Israel obviously has a right to defend itself against what was an appalling terrorist attack perpetrated by Hamas, but it must do that in accordance with humanitarian law.
It’s clear that too many civilian lives have been lost and nobody wants to see this conflict go on a day longer than it has to.
Continue reading...Sunak’s approval increases slightly after surviving potential rebellion over Rwanda bill
Labour’s lead over the Conservatives is now at 13 points, the lowest since before the party conferences, according to the latest Opinium poll for the Observer.
Both Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak’s approval ratings have stayed steady since they both saw a big hit to their ratings last week. Starmer’s net approval is now -9, while Sunak’s net approval is now -29, a 3-point increase from a week ago.
Continue reading...The prime minister faced PMQs for the final time before the Christmas recess
Rishi Sunak is about to take PMQs. It will be the last of 2023.
Here is the list of MPs down to ask a question.
Continue reading...James Cleverly says deportation bill contains ‘novel measures’ as MPs debate it
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, a former lord chief justice of England and Wales, has said the government should not try to ignore the jurisdiction of the European court of human rights. In an interview for a podcast called the Judges, he said:
If you have subjected yourself to a court, and it was our voluntary decision to do so, then you have to take the rough with the smooth and if they’ve decided [the court] have this jurisdiction then you ought to follow it.
You can’t expect others to respect the law if you say you won’t respect the law of someone else.
You ought to actually be able, within a set period of time, say a fortnight, to investigate, decide, give him one right of appeal – why you should have more than one right of appeal I simply don’t understand – and remove them.” But, he concedes, it costs money.
Britain is a practical nation – always has been. People can’t afford Christmas. If they call an ambulance this winter – they don’t know if it will come. 6,000 crimes go unpunished - every day. Common sense is rolling your sleeves up and solving these problems practically, not indulging in some kind of political performance art.
This goes for stopping the boats as well. It’s not about wave machines, or armoured jet skis, or schemes like Rwanda you know will never work.
Continue reading...Labour leader to attack Tory ‘psychodrama’ and ‘self-importance’ in speech marking four years since last election
Labour will end the Conservative “psychodrama” and return government to the “mundane stuff”, Keir Starmer will pledge, in a plea to the “red wall” voters the party is targeting.
His “changed” party is committed to national security and careful management of taxpayer money, he will emphasise in a speech that has been moved to Buckinghamshire from a northern constituency in order for the Labour leader to stay close to Westminster as MPs prepare to vote on the government’s Rwanda bill.
Continue reading...