Mini-budget 2022: pound crashes as chancellor cuts stamp duty and top rate of income tax – live

Tax cuts to cost Treasury around £37bn in 2023-24, official figures reveal

There are no urgent questions in the morning, and so Kwasi Kwarteng, the chancellor, will be delivering his statement soon after 9.30am.

The Commons starts sitting at 9.30am, but they always begin with prayers in private, and so Kwarteng will be up a few minutes later.

The last time they did it one third of the beneficiaries were people buying second homes or buy to let, so we are sceptical that this is the magic bullet to increase homeownership. What we really need to do is to build more houses and to help get people onto the property ladder by increasing the supply of housing.

When this has been done before, it has often fuelled an already hot market and many of the beneficiaries have been people buying a second or third home, rather than the first time buyers that we really want to help who are often trapped in private rented accommodation where they’re paying as much in rent every month as they would in a mortgage.

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‘Not every measure will be popular’: Truss says voters may not like all her pro-growth measures – UK politics live

Latest updates: prime minister says she is willing to implement unpopular policies to try to boost growth in the UK

Rosie Cooper has indicated that she intends to stand down as Labour MP for West Lancashire to take up a new job as chair of the Mersey Care NHS foundation trust. In her statement announcing the move Cooper says that events in recent years have “undoubtedly taken their toll” – a reference to Cooper being targeted by a neo-Nazi who was jailed for life in 2019 for plotting to kill her.

Cooper’s statement implies she will resign and trigger a byelection. At the last election she had a majority of more than 8,000 over the Conservatives, and in a byelection Labour would be expected to hold the seat very easily.

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Fireball seen over UK confirmed as meteor after day of confusion

Experts revise initial assumption that sighting was space junk linked to Elon Musk’s satellite programme

A fireball seen over many parts of the northern UK has been confirmed as a meteor after a day of confusion about its identity.

The fireball was visible above northern England, Northern Ireland and Scotland as it blazed across the clear night sky just after 10pm on Wednesday night.

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Fireball seen over Scotland and Northern Ireland was ‘space junk’, say astronomers

UK Meteor Network says object in night sky most likely a deorbiting satellite from Elon Musk’s SpaceX

A fireball seen over Scotland and Northern Ireland is likely to have been space junk from Elon Musk’s satellite programme, according to astronomers examining it.

The UK Meteor Network said the fireball was visible for 20 seconds just after 10pm on Wednesday night. It received almost 800 reports from Scotland, North Ireland and northern England.

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Thousands queuing overnight in Edinburgh to pay respects to Queen Elizabeth II – latest updates

Queen’s coffin will travel from the Scottish capital to London on Tuesday

The Press Association reports:

The Australian prime minister has faced backlash from the business and health care sector following the announcement of a one-off bank holiday to mark a national day of mourning for the late Queen.

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With sorrow and song, Scotland bids emotional farewell to ‘our Queen’

Service of thanksgiving at St Giles’ Cathedral in Edinburgh pulses with history as nation pays its respects

The people of Scotland, from prime ministers to benefit claimants, have said an emotional goodbye to their Queen as her coffin was set at rest in the “parish church of Edinburgh” where she was first given the Scottish crown 69 years ago.

Psalms the Queen used to sing in Crathie Kirk on the Balmoral estate were set to soaring organ music as hundreds of dignitaries attended a service of thanksgiving for her life at St Giles’ Cathedral.

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Queen’s coffin leaves Balmoral en route to Edinburgh

Cortege passing through villages of Royal Deeside where many considered monarch a dear neighbour

The Queen has commenced her final journey from her beloved Balmoral estate in Aberdeenshire and is heading down the north-east coast to Edinburgh.

The cortege carrying her coffin left Balmoral at about 10am and was making slow progress through the villages of Royal Deeside, allowing the thousands who lined the route to bid a final farewell to the country’s longest-serving monarch and the woman many locally considered a dear neighbour.

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Boris Johnson accused of intelligence tipoff that led to British Sikh’s alleged torture in India

Labour raises questions in the Commons over Johnson’s alleged actions as foreign secretary in the case of activist Jagtar Singh Johal

Labour has accused Boris Johnson of authorising the sharing of intelligence that led to the imprisonment and alleged torture of a UK-based Sikh activist in India.

A Foreign Office minister refused to confirm or deny Johnson’s alleged involvement – during his time as foreign secretary – in the case of Jagtar Singh Johal, who has been detained for five years without trial.

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Scottish group scraps period dignity role after abuse for hiring man

Jason Grant’s appointment as Tay region’s period dignity lead had prompted anger on social media

A new regional role promoting period dignity across Tayside has been scrapped after the group involved received threats and abuse for appointing a man.

Last month, Jason Grant was announced as the period dignity regional lead officer for the Tay region in what was believed to be the first role of its kind in Scotland and the result of Holyrood’s groundbreaking women’s health legislation.

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Scotland school and waste service strikes called off after ‘credible’ pay offer

Unison, GMB and Unite suspend industrial action day after Nicola Sturgeon hosted talks

A wave of strikes across waste services and schools in Scotland has been called off after a “credible” new pay offer.

Hundreds of schools and nurseries were set to close over three days next week as support staff joined industrial action, along with a second wave of strikes by refuse workers that had already seen bins overflowing and piles of accumulated rubbish in Scotland’s major cities.

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Gypsies and Travellers fear missing out on energy bills support

Government urged to ensure thousands living in park homes in Great Britain receive £400 payments

Gypsy and Traveller groups are calling on the government to ensure thousands of households living in park homes are not excluded from its energy bills support scheme this winter as bills soar.

The scheme will pay out a total of £400 to all households in Great Britain with a domestic electricity connection between October and March, with monthly payments administered by their energy supplier.

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Scottish refuse workers’ strike to continue as union rejects pay offer

Unite says offer from Scotland’s councils is unacceptable and ‘represents a waste of precious time’

Refuse workers in Scotland will continue to strike next week after the Unite union rejected the latest offer from local authorities.

Council cleansing staff across much of the country are striking over pay. A strike in Edinburgh that led to rubbish building up in the streets during the city’s festival fringe – the busiest time of year for the city – is due to end on Tuesday morning. But further action in other council areas is planned.

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Playing music in childhood linked to a sharper mind in old age, study suggests

Researchers find link between learning instrument while young and improved thinking skills later in life

The ageing rocker clinging on to their youth may be a figure of mockery, but research suggests they should be envied for their sharpness of mind.

Researchers have found a link between learning a musical instrument in youth and improved thinking skills in old age. People with more experience of playing a musical instrument showed greater lifetime improvement on a test of cognitive ability than those with less or no experience, a paper from the University of Edinburgh has said.

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Kenyan tea pickers on Scottish-run farm to pursue health issues in UK court

Prolonged bending to gather tea for James Finlay Kenya is argued to accelerate ageing of pickers’ backs by up to 20 years

More than a 1,000 Kenyan tea pickers who say that harsh and exploitative working conditions on a Scottish-run tea farm have caused them crippling health complaints can now pursue their class action in an Edinburgh court.

Lawyers acting for the tea pickers have won an order from the court of session, Scotland’s highest civil court, telling James Finlay Kenya Ltd (JFK) to abandon attempts to block the suit through the Kenyan courts.

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British Sikh activist ‘tortured in India after tip-off from UK intelligence’

Lawyers for Jagtar Singh Johal say he was given electric shocks after unlawful arrest in Punjab in 2017

A British Sikh campaigner is facing a possible death sentence after the UK intelligence services passed on information about him to the Indian authorities, according to a high court complaint.

Lawyers for Jagtar Singh Johal from Dumbarton, Scotland, say he was tortured, including being given electric shocks, after his unlawful arrest in the Punjab in 2017 where he had travelled for his wedding.

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‘Why does the school hate me?’: how former MI6 spy’s Scottish dream turned sour

At security debriefings, Aimen Dean and his family fell in love with the Highlands. Three years later, they feel rejected

Aimen Dean remembers the moment he and his wife, Saadia, decided to make their home in Scotland. They had toured the Highlands and were standing on the battlements of Edinburgh Castle, looking out over the city’s skyline.

Dean already knew Scotland: as one of the UK’s key spies, operating in the highest levels of al-Qaida, he had visited the country in secret six times before, to be debriefed by MI6 officers at safe houses deep in the Highlands or, on one occasion, a hotel on the island of Iona.

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Father who spied on al-Qaida accuses Edinburgh school of discrimination

Inquiry opens into St George’s after Aimen Dean claims it singled out his daughter over fears he was a security risk

One of the UK’s leading private schools is under investigation after being accused of discrimination against the daughter of one of the west’s most important spies, a former al-Qaida bomb-maker credited with saving thousands of lives.

Aimen Dean, who spied for British intelligence inside the terrorist network for eight years, has made a formal complaint against St George’s School in Edinburgh, claiming it singled out his five-year-old daughter because other parents feared he was a security risk.

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Plan to offer young people £50,000 to move to Scottish islands scrapped

Islands bond idea, dismissed as ‘election gimmick’ by critics, found to be unpopular with islanders

Controversial proposals to offer a £50,000 welcome grant to encourage more young people and families to stay on or move to Scottish islands have been scrapped after a consultation found that islanders themselves did not believe the scheme was the right way to tackle depopulation.

The Scottish government announced that the proposed islands bond, which was dismissed as a gimmick by critics and attracted initial inquiries from as far afield as Ecuador, would not go ahead after an analysis of consultation responses found that those in favour of it were largely non-islanders.

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Sunak and Truss rule out freezing energy prices at leadership hustings

Rival candidates questioned in Perth after frontrunner Truss makes belligerent remarks about Sturgeon

Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss have ruled out freezing energy prices by claiming it would be an expensive, short-term fix that would fail to solve the underlying problem with soaring energy costs.

The Conservative leadership contenders were questioned on whether they would back Labour’s new strategy to fix the domestic energy cap during a leadership hustings at Perth Concert Hall on Tuesday night.

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Number of EU citizens moving to UK plunges post-Brexit – report

Data shows just 43,000 EU citizens received visas for work, family, study or other purposes in 2021

The number of EU citizens moving to the UK has plunged since Brexit closed the doors to low-paid workers, according to a report.

The dramatic decline in migration from the EU has hit hospitality and support services hard. But the Migration Observatory (MO) at the University of Oxford and ReWage, a group of independent experts, have said that while Brexit “exacerbated” chronic labour shortages in Britain, it was not the only cause.

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