How safe is Starmer’s premiership after his Mandelson vetting statement to MPs?

Despite his explanation and the need for political stability, the PM is still unpopular – and Olly Robbins has yet to give his side of the story

Labour MPs frustrated with the lack of a clear mission from Keir Starmer’s No 10 have often urged the prime minister to be more forceful in his arguments, to prosecute his values, to find an enemy to define himself against.

The prime minister has found one: Olly Robbins. Starmer prosecuted his case against the former Foreign Office chief on Monday with the vigour of his former life at the bar.

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Starmer will not be swayed by Trump’s ‘small and petty’ insults, says Lammy

Exclusive: deputy PM says UK will not join Iran conflict despite Trump’s sometimes ‘incomprehensible’ social-media barbs

Donald Trump’s insults towards Keir Starmer are “small and petty” and designed to put pressure on the prime minister to change his position on Iran, David Lammy has said, as he insisted the UK would not get dragged into the conflict.

The deputy prime minister argued the US president should be able to “disagree agreeably” with allies rather than publishing attacks on social media, and that US actions had “made things worse, not better” as far as global instability was concerned.

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Judgment day as Starmer faces Commons showdown over Mandelson scandal

Prime minister to deliver high-stakes statement to MPs over vetting controversy that has put his position in peril

Keir Starmer will deliver a high-stakes statement to MPs on Monday as he struggles to overcome fears inside his government that the Peter Mandelson vetting scandal could yet cost him his leadership.

In what is set to be a dramatic showdown, the prime minister will set out how Mandelson was able to take up his role as UK ambassador without the Foreign Office revealing it had overruled the decision to fail his vetting.

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Starmer is facing his judgment day over Mandelson missteps

Ahead of a showdown with MPs, prime minister looks like a man who is not really in control in his own government

Keir Starmer has spent much of the last 24 hours working on a plan for what senior government figures are already describing as his “judgment day”: his showdown with MPs on Monday over the latest Peter Mandelson revelations.

That the prime minister was apparently not told of Mandelson’s vetting failure has provoked incredulity across Westminster and accusations he sacked a senior civil servant to save his premiership.

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Starmer would have blocked Mandelson appointment if he had known about failed vetting, ministers say – as it happened

The prime minister’s leadership is still in the spotlight after Peter Mandelson was appointed US ambassador after he failed security vetting

Our Scotland correspondent Libby Brooks has written this piece on how Scottish voters are being attracted to Reform UK, and how it reflects attitudes to immigration.

It’s Monday evening in Aberdeen, and George Preston is wearing his union flag suit to the Reform UK rally. He joined the party in 2024 as it gained ground in the north-east of Scotland with its first councillor defections from the Scottish Conservatives.

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Starmer would have blocked Mandelson role over vetting failure, says Lammy

Deputy prime minister says it is ‘inexplicable’ top civil servant kept Downing Street in dark

Keir Starmer would have blocked Peter Mandelson from serving as the UK’s ambassador to Washington had he known he failed security vetting, David Lammy has said, as he attempted to shore up the prime minister amid damaging fallout from the row.

In his first public comments on the vetting affair, Lammy said it was “inexplicable” that Oliver Robbins, the former top civil servant who was forced out of the Foreign Office this week, had opted to leave Downing Street in the dark over the outcome.

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Labour claims Reform UK won’t protect women, as poll suggests Farage’s party heading for ‘seismic’ wins in May – UK politics live

Poll projects major political earthquake across Britain with Labour losing Wales and England’s Red Wall

In the light of what George Robertson, who led the strategic defence review for Labour, said about defence spending in his speech last night, there’s a good chance Kemi Badenoch will choose to raise this at PMQs later.

She may well raise the Times’s splash, which says Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, is proposing to raise defence spending by less than £10bn over the next four years.

The State of It political podcast from The Times and The Sunday Times has been told that Reeves is unwilling to break her fiscal rules or increase taxes to boost defence spending.

John Healey, the defence secretary, is pressing for a bigger increase as there are concerns that £10bn will not be enough, given the increasing likelihood that British forces will be deployed to Ukraine and the Middle East.

Lord Robertson produced his first SDR as Tony Blair’s defence secretary in 1998, and the historian David Edgerton noted then that Britain was committing itself “to acting primarily with the USA in a wide-ranging programme of global policing”. The structure of the armed forces is designed not for autonomous defence but because “the composition … is what allows Britain to be the USA’s principal partner”. Only 15% to 20% of spending, Prof Edgerton reckoned, related to purely national defence. In that sense, the model Lord Robertson now defends was never primarily about defending the UK at all. It was about plugging into a US system and piggybacking on its arms industry base.

The Treasury is right to question prioritising defence now. Cutting welfare would hit demand and weaken growth. As Khem Rogaly of the Common Wealth thinktank argues, defence spending provides a weak economic stimulus compared with public investment – and is even worse as a job creator. Moreover, the UK is not using higher defence spending to build its own independent military, but to reshape its armed forces around a US-style venture capital and tech ecosystem. With Mr Trump in office, there is no better time to ask: whose security are we funding – Britain’s or America’s?

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Trump warns US-UK trade deal ‘can always be changed’ with relations in ‘sad state’

President says he gave Britain ‘better deal than I had to’ but ally was ‘not there when we needed them’ on Iran

Donald Trump has threatened to row back on the trade deal the US signed with the UK last year, in his latest salvo against the British government over sharp differences about the US’s approach to the Middle East.

The US president said the economic deal struck with the UK, which cut some of his tariffs on cars, aluminium and steel, was “better than I had to” and that it could “always be changed”.

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Starmer’s ‘corrosive complacency’ on defence has put UK in peril, says ex-Nato chief

George Robertson says Iran war should be wake-up call to address military underfunding in scathing remarks

The British government has shown a “corrosive complacency towards defence” and put the UK “in peril”, according to a government adviser, in fierce criticisms of Keir Starmer’s military policy.

The former Nato secretary general and author of the government’s strategic defence review, George Robertson, believes Starmer was “not willing to make the necessary investment”, the Financial Times has reported.

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‘Hungary has chosen Europe’: EU leaders jubilant after Péter Magyar’s victory over Orbán

Congratulations pour in from across EU, with leaders from Spain, Poland, France, Britain, Denmark, Romania, Sweden and beyond hailing a new chapter

EU leaders heaped praise on Péter Magyar after his decisive election victory in Hungary against the long-serving prime minister Viktor Orbán, who many saw as a direct threat to Europe’s peace and prosperity.

The outpouring reflected a deep frustration with Orbán across the EU’s 27 member states and its institutions.

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Starmer implies he didn’t tell Trump he was ‘fed up’ about his impact on rising UK energy bills – as it happened

Prime minister says conversation with US president on Thursday night focused on need for ‘practical plan’ to open strait of Hormuz

Tony Blair, the former Labour prime minister, has joined those saying the government should allow drilling for oil and gas in the Rosebank and Jackdaw fields in the North Sea.

Both applications were approved by the last Conservative government, but then overturned by a court ruling. Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, has to make a decision about the revised applications operating in a quasi-judicial capacity, which means he has to follow due process and can’t take the decision purely on political ground.

The current debate [on energy policy] is deadlocked between two incomplete responses. The government argues the answer is to accelerate Clean Power 2030, focusing on decarbonising the electricity system as quickly as possible. The opposition argues that the answer is to expand domestic oil and gas production. Both positions contain elements of truth, but neither addresses the core strategic problem: outside the power sector the UK economy remains overwhelmingly dependent on fossil fuels, and electricity is still too expensive to support mass electrification.

The UK is caught in a self-reinforcing high-cost, low-electrification trap. High electricity costs suppress demand, slowing the uptake of electric vehicles, heat pumps and industrial electrification. Weak demand growth, in turn, means that the fixed costs of the system – from networks to long-term contracts – are spread across a smaller base, keeping prices high. The result is a system that is too expensive to electrify and therefore remains dependent on fossil fuels and exposed to global shocks …

The first of these vital measures will ban anyone from possessing or publishing harmful pornography that shows incest between family members, and sex between step or foster relations where one person is pretending to be under 18.

A further amendment will criminalise the publication and possession of pornography where an adult is roleplaying as a child.

This government is uncompromising in our mission to protect women and girls online, and we have taken action to stop tech firms from publishing this abusive content.

In February, we told platforms that they must remove reported non-consensual intimate images within 48 hours.

I greatly welcome the government’s plans to fully address harmful pornographic content such as incest, step-incest and the mimicking of child sexual abuse. This content that is freely and widely available online is deeply harmful, normalising child sexual abuse and abusive relationships within families …

Today the government has answered our calls for change, and I am delighted that once again the UK is leading the way on regulating this high harm industry.

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Israel’s attacks on Lebanon should not be happening, says Keir Starmer

In article for Guardian, PM also calls for Iran conflict to become watershed moment for future UK security

Israel’s continued attacks on Lebanon “shouldn’t be happening”, Keir Starmer has said on his visit to the Middle East, as he called for the Iran conflict to become a watershed moment for the future security of the UK.

In an article for the Guardian, the prime minister said the UK’s response to the crisis must involve a fundamental reset in terms of making the country more resilient, including by boosting defence and having closer links to Europe.

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Son of British couple detained in Iran calls on Starmer to press for their release

Joe Bennett says ceasefire presents ‘very opportune moment’ to raise case of his parents, Lindsay and Craig Foreman

The son of a British couple detained in Tehran on espionage charges has called on Keir Starmer to prioritise their case in the “very opportune moment” of a ceasefire in the Iran conflict.

Lindsay and Craig Foreman, from East Sussex, were arrested while on a five-day trip across Iran in January last year and have been held in Evin prison for 15 months.

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Defence secretary reveals UK navy foiled secret Russian submarine operation in North Sea – UK politics live

John Healey says navy forced Russia to abandon activity in month-long operation

In interviews this morning Yvette Cooper, the foreign secretary, declined to confirm reports that a Russian warship has been escorting two sanctioned Russian ships through the English channel.

Sanctioned Russian ships carry oil being sold to fund the war in Ukraine, and the UK government recently announced that the armed forces have been authorised to board these ships in British waters to stop them.

What I can tell you is that we have given permission now for action to be taken against the Russian shadow fleet. Operational decisions then have to be taken in the right way by the military.

There are indications of the way in which not just the Russian shadow fleet is operating, but also the way in which we are seeing increased Russian threats, not just to the UK, but across Europe as well.

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Starmer says UK wants to help with opening of Hormuz strait on Gulf visit

PM meets Mohammed bin Salman in Saudi Arabia before further visits to regional allies, who may see him as more reliable than Trump

The UK has a “job” to help reopen the strait of Hormuz, Keir Starmer has said, as Iranian reports said the key shipping route was closed again just hours after a supposed ceasefire.

The prime minister met British and local military personnel at an airbase in Taif, Saudi Arabia, at the start of what is expected to be a wider trip to Gulf allies, one billed as a mirror to his efforts to pull together a plan for how a ceasefire might operate in Ukraine.

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Antonia Romeo given powerful mandate to deliver No 10’s priorities

PM’s most senior civil servant now has task of rewriting civil service code and ‘making it recognised for improved productivity’

Antonia Romeo, Keir Starmer’s most senior civil servant, has been given a powerful new mandate to deliver his priorities, while Darren Jones, the No 10 chief secretary, has shifted to a role more focused on wider Whitehall reforms.

Romeo, who was promoted last month, took over the job of cabinet secretary and head of the civil service after an unsuccessful year in charge by her predecessor, Chris Wormald, who was not considered effective enough by No 10.

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UK government caps student loan interest rates at 6% from September

Minister says change for plan 2 and 3 loans in England and Wales will ‘protect borrowers’ from impact of global conflict

Millions of graduates will have the interest on their student loans capped at 6% from September as a temporary measure to protect them from the risk of rising inflation driven by war in the Middle East.

Ministers acted after months of criticism over the loans becoming a “debt trap” that often leave graduates in England and Wales paying tens of thousands more than the original loan amount.

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Trump uses Neville Chamberlain jibe to mock Starmer over stance on Iran

As UK PM resists pressure to back airstrikes, US president invokes British leader known for his policy of appeasement

Donald Trump has appeared to compare Keir Starmer to Neville Chamberlain in his latest disparaging remarks about the prime minister, who has refused to back the US-Israeli attacks on Iran.

The comments, during an Easter Monday event at the White House, underline Trump’s continued annoyance at Starmer’s scepticism about the aims and legality of the conflict, a view that has not been shifted by the US president’s jibes.

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Pepsi drops Wireless sponsorship amid criticism of Kanye West booking

Sponsor pulls out after Keir Starmer calls decision to book rapper who wrote song titled Heil Hitler ‘deeply concerning’

Pepsi has said it is withdrawing its sponsorship of a UK music festival that is due to be headlined by Kanye West after Keir Starmer joined criticism of the event.

The musician is understood to have not yet made an application to come to Britain and could be blocked under powers allowing the authorities to do so if his presence is deemed not conducive to the public good.

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Trump claims Starmer is weak as he mocks PM and UK aircraft carriers

Footage shows US president saying UK ‘should be our best’ ally and accusing PM of prevarication over sending ships

Footage has emerged of Donald Trump mocking Keir Starmer by claiming the prime minister said he would have to consult his team before deciding whether to send UK aircraft carriers to the Middle East.

In a new low for UK-US relations, Trump appeared to impersonate Starmer during an Easter lunch speech at the White House.

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