Tory leader says ‘Britannia Shield’ will not be a similar scheme to that protecting Israel after repeated questions from broadcasters
Asked if she will propose tax cuts in her speech tomorrow, Badenoch tells McCann that she will have to wait until her speech tomorrow at 11.15am.
(This is getting confusing. On BBC Breakdfast, Badenoch told Jon Kay the speech was at 12pm.)
It’s not going to be exactly like the Iron Dome. We haven’t called it an Iron Dome.
Continue reading...Group, whose constituencies have derelict or at-risk pools, are campaigning to make outdoor swimming available for all
Cooling, blue expanses of water have been a lifesaver for many lucky enough to live near a lido during the recent UK heatwave.
Now, a group of 20 MPs, along with the Fabian Society, are calling for this relief to be made accessible for all by getting water companies to fund the reopening of the country’s lost lidos.
Continue reading...Party representatives asked how they would fix a health service that is ‘on its knees’
In more disappointing news for the Tories, the Times is publishing an opinion poll that says that Reform have now overtaken them. Its political editor, Steven Swinford, has recently tweeted the story.
According to Savanta, the Labour manifesto featured 34 pictures of Keir Starmer while the Conservative manifesto had no pictures of Rishi Sunak.
Continue reading...PM, who left to attend an ITV interview, says ‘the last thing I wanted was for the commemorations to be overshadowed by politics’
I think it would be fair to say that children’s minister David Johnston is not having a vintage media round today.
First he was ambushed by Rishi Sunak issuing his D-day absence apology while the minister was literally out defending Sunak by repeatedly pointing out that he had been in France earlier in the day and in Portsmouth the day before [See 8.18 BST].
Continue reading...Exclusive: Over £2.5m for MPs such as Fox and Mordaunt in what will be the highest-spending UK election
Conservative donors have poured more than £2.5m into key election battlegrounds to shore up support for MPs, such as Liam Fox and Penny Mordaunt, who are in danger of losing their seats.
The 2024 election will be the highest-spending UK contest, after the government raised national election limits to £34m per party – leaving the Conservatives and Labour in an arms race to raise cash.
Continue reading...Worried MPs have concocted five-point plan of quick measures aimed at showing that the party cares about public’s priorities
Rishi Sunak is braced for a bruising week as Tory rebels flaunted plans for a 100-day “policy blitz” to secure quick wins if the local election results prove disastrous for the party.
The prime minister said on Sunday that he was not “distracted” by his personal ratings lingering at record lows. He refused to rule out calling a July general election amid mounting rumours that unruly MPs will attempt to oust him if the West Midlands mayor, Andy Street, and the Tees Valley mayor, Ben Houchen, are defeated on Thursday.
An attempt to end the junior doctors pay dispute with a 10-12% offer.
Further cuts to legal migration numbers, with a curb on the number of foreign students staying in the UK.
Vow to increase defence spending to 3% of GDP by 2027.
Introduce measures to jail prolific offenders and build rapid detention cells to increase prison capacity.
Cut the benefits bill, with a target to reduce payments for depression and anxiety.
Continue reading...Defence secretary says MPs must give the PM space as Tory figures appear to be vying for leadership
Conservative MPs looking for a new party leader need to allow Rishi Sunak to “get on with the job”, Grant Shapps has said.
Amid speculation that Sunak could announce an election next week in order to stave off potential challengers for the top job, the defence secretary said now was not “the time or place” to try to put another Conservative leader in place. The party is on its fifth leader since 2015.
Continue reading...Prospective contenders Badenoch, Braverman, Jenrick and Mordaunt abstained or voted against the ban
In his speech to the Tory faithful at the Conservative party conference in Manchester in October, Rishi Sunak declared that he wanted to ban smoking for future generations.
His announcement – confirming a plan first reported by the Guardian – was met with applause from grassroots members then. But Tuesday night’s vote demonstrates the challenges for a Tory prime minister championing what his own side deems an archetypal “nanny state” policy.
Continue reading...Rishi Sunak’s authority suffers blow as several Conservatives vote against bill, which clears first Commons hurdle with 383 votes to 67
At 12.30pm a transport minister will respond to an urgent question in the Commons tabled by Labour on job losses in the rail industry. That means the debate on the smoking ban will will not start until about 1.15pm.
Suella Braverman, the former home secretary, is one of the Britons speaking at the National Conservatism conference in Brussels starting today. The conference, which features hardline rightwingers from around the world committed to the NatCons’ ‘faith, flag and family’ brand of conservatism, is going ahead despite two venues refusing to host them at relatively short notice.
The current UK government doesn’t have the political will to take on the ECHR and hasn’t laid the ground work for doing so.
And so it’s no surprise that recent noises in this direction are easily dismissed as inauthentic.
Any attempt to include a plan for ECHR withdrawal in a losing Conservative election manifesto risks setting the cause back a generation.
Continue reading...Labour lead would soar to 24 points if Kemi Badenoch or Suella Braverman became leader, according to Opinium poll
Three out of the four Tory MPs seen as the most likely replacements for Rishi Sunak would fare even worse than the current prime minister in a general election battle against Keir Starmer, according to the latest Opinium poll for the Observer.
The Conservatives have been involved in a fresh bout of leadership speculation over the past week, after rumours surfaced of a plot to dump Sunak and replace him with Penny Mordaunt, the leader of the House, before the next election.
Continue reading...Allies of Commons leader say other future candidates for top job are trying to make her look disloyal
Penny Mordaunt’s rivals in a future Conservative leadership contest have been blamed for briefing coup rumours meant to ruin her chances of eventually taking over from Rishi Sunak, the Guardian has been told.
The Commons leader, who came a close third in the leadership contest won by Liz Truss in 2022, has in recent days been at the centre of speculation over an alleged plot to try to oust the prime minister to avert a general election disaster for the Conservatives.
Continue reading...The announcement ends weeks of speculation about the policy
Rishi Sunak has refused to apologise for the anti-trans jibe he made about Keir Starmer at PMQs yesterday, after being told Brianna Ghey’s mother would be listening in the public gallery.
Speaking to journalists in Cornwall, Sunak insisted that he was just making a point about Starmer. And he said that to link what he said to the death of Brianna, whose murder was partly motivated by transphobia, was “the worst of politics”.
If you look at what I said, I was very clear, talking about Keir Starmer’s proven track record of U-turns on major policies because he doesn’t have a plan.
A point only proven by today’s reports that the Labour party and Keir Starmer are apparently planning to reverse on their signature economic green spending policy.
But to use that tragedy to detract from the very separate and clear point I was making about Keir Starmer’s proven track record of multiple U-turns on major policies, because he doesn’t have a plan, I think is both sad and wrong, and it demonstrates the worst of politics.
Today’s announcement will give confidence to the oil and gas industry and those who stand to benefit from a fossil fuel energy system. For the rest of us, faced with unaffordable energy bills, fossil fuel-funded wars, and the floods, storms and droughts that the climate crisis brings, this is a deeply disappointing signal on the low level of ambition a future government has when it comes to the biggest challenge the world is facing.
Green investment doesn’t just deliver for the planet; it also benefits our health and economy. Cutting it would be shortsighted and cost the country dearly.
The UK is already lagging behind in the race to manufacture green steel, build electric vehicles, and develop giga-battery factories. Thousands of jobs are at risk if we don’t match the investment the US and the rest of Europe are making in these industries …
Continue reading...Prime minister says he knows people will be anxious about rate rise but ‘it is going to be OK’
Rishi Sunak has posted a thread on Twitter setting out what the government is doing to help people with the cost of living. It starts here.
He ends by saying “if we can hold our nerve” he is confident the plan will deliver.
Continue reading...Theresa May says parliament must punish MPs who break rules as Penny Mordaunt says Johnson ‘undermined democratic process’
At the Labour event Keir Starmer is now speaking. He starts with a jibe at the SNP, saying the tide is turning in Scotland.
Turning to energy policy, he says Labour wants to promote security.
Can we still achieve great things? Can we unite and move forward? Can we still change, can we grow, can we get things done, can we build things? New industries, new technologies, new jobs; will they come to our shores, or will the future pass us by?
You can put it even more starkly. Around the world people want to know, are we still a great nation? If the question is about the British people, the answer is emphatically: yes.
Continue reading...Boris Johnson accepts post of crown steward and bailiff of the Chiltern Hundreds after accusing PM of talking ‘rubbish’. This live blog is now closed
Full story: Boris Johnson formally steps down as MP
The EU has dashed UK hopes of an early review of the Brexit trade deal saying is unlikely to re-open talks until 2026.
European commission vice-president Maroš Šefčovič, who leads for the EU on Brexit matters, said the deal was only in force for two years and it would be pointless re-opening it until its full potential was realised.
If the decision is just to simply go for more divergence … some of the fundamentals of the withdrawal agreement and the TCA would be thrown into the shredder.
Rishi secretly blocked the peerages for Nadine and others. He refused to ask for them to undergo basic checks that could have taken only a few weeks or even days. That is how he kept them off the list – without telling Boris Johnson.
Continue reading...Lord president of privy council says coronation was ‘humbling day’ and democracy ‘is about dissent’
Penny Mordaunt has revealed how she took painkillers before her role of carrying the ceremonial sword during King Charles’s coronation.
Mordaunt, wearing a custom-made teal outfit with a matching cape and headband with gold feather embroidery, was the first woman to perform the role as lord president of the council. She was responsible for bearing the sword of the state and presenting the jewelled sword of offering to the king. They were two of four swords used during the ceremony, and it is a practice that dates back to the coronation of Richard the Lionheart in 1189.
Continue reading...Nonconsensual explicit images to be tackled in bill returning to parliament next month
Nonconsensual “deepfake” pornography and “downblousing” will be made illegal when the online safety bill returns to parliament in December, the government has announced.
Explicit images taken without someone’s consent, through hidden cameras or surreptitious photography, will be criminalised, including so-called downblousing pictures. A previous law banning “upskirt” voyeurism left a loophole that failed to tackle images that weren’t taken with the intent of photographing the victim’s genitals or buttocks.
Continue reading...Braverman reappointed to post after resigning days ago; James Cleverly retained as foreign secretary; Oliver Dowden becomes Cabinet Office minister
The BBC’s political correspondent, Nick Eardley, has just summed things up on BBC Radio 4 like this: “Liz Truss faced one of the most daunting entries of modern times, Mr Sunak faces an even more daunting one – plus he has to pick a cabinet that will unite the party.”
When he becomes PM, Rishi Sunak will be doing many things for the first time in modern politics – he will be the first PM of colour, the first Hindu, the youngest since William Pitt the Younger.
Continue reading...Rishi Sunak to meet monarch after Liz Truss chairs her final cabinet meeting at 9am
I’m Helen Sullivan, with for the next while. If you have questions or see news we may have missed, you can get in touch on Twitter here.
We’re expected to hear from Nadhim Zahawi, who made a dizzying U-turn from supporting Johnson to supporting Sunak yesterday, on Sky News at 07.05 this morning.
Continue reading...As Boris Johnson and Penny Mordaunt drop out, the 1922 Committee manages to dodge a democratic vote
It all panned out about as well as the Conservative party could have hoped. A new leader – the right leader, as far as MPs were concerned – elected in a matter of days. No general election. Heaven forbid. A failed state couldn’t be doing with that level of democracy. Never trust the people you’re intending to govern.
Not even a parochial, controlled election of the Conservative gerontocratic membership. That hadn’t worked out so well the last time they had tried it. No, now was the time to reduce the electorate from 180,000 down to 357 MPs. That was the way to govern the UK. Men and women who could be trusted to put the interests of themselves and their party ahead of those of the country. A higher calling than simple patriotism.
Continue reading...