Summary of the day …
The first minister of Wales, Vaughan Gething, is facing fresh turmoil after Plaid Cymru ended its cooperation agreement with the Labour-led government in Wales. Rhun ap Iorwerth, the Plaid leader, said he was deeply concerned that Gething had refused to hand back a £200,000 donation for his successful leadership campaign from a company whose owner was convicted of environmental crimes. The cooperation agreement was due to conclude at the end of the year. The decision will make it harder for the government to operate as it does not have an overall majority in the Senedd.
Jeremy Hunt has said further tax cuts are on the way in the autumn as he attempted to draw the battle lines for the next election by painting the Conservatives as tax-cutters and Labour as intending to raise tax. Rishi Sunak has repeatedly attacked Labour for not having “a plan” but the Conservatives today released a dossier saying Labour had a £38bn black hole in its costings and would have to raise tax to fund its policies.
In response, a Labour spokesperson said it was a “desperate attempt by the Tories to deflect from their £46bn unfunded tax plan” to abolish national insurance which Labour claims “could lead to higher borrowing, higher taxes on pensioners or the end of the state pension as we know it”. Hunt said it was “disgusting” and “fake news” that Labour were trying to scare pensioners by misrepresenting the policy which, he said, “we will only deliver it when it can be afforded.”
The chancellor also said the UK will look at the national security implications of a bid for Royal Mail by the Czech billionaire Daniel Křetínský, but indicated ministers were not opposed to the takeover in principle.
David Lammy has said the next election is a chance to “turn the page on the post-Brexit rancour” in the UK’s relationship with the EU after a “messy divorce”. He said an incoming Labour government would “approach those conversations in a positive manner”.
James Cleverly has again defended Rishi Sunak’s policy of deporting asylum seekers to Rwanda, saying it is “robust” despite what the home secretary declared was a “concerted effort” to prevent the policy going into operation.
The Post Office Horizon IT inquiry has confirmed that Jane MacLeod, who was general counsel at the Post Office from 2015 to 2019 at a time when the Bates v Post Office Ltd case was ongoing is not cooperating with the inquiry and will not appear as a witness.
A private member’s bill from Labour’s Emma Lewell-Buck that would make it easier for pubs to open for extended hours to celebrate national or local events is closer to becoming law, after it received an unopposed third reading in the Commons today.
Conservative peer Lord Kulveer Ranger, who was ennobled in Boris Johnson resignation honours list, is set to be banned from House of Lords bars for a year and from the chamber for three weeks after he was found to have bullied and harassed two people while drunk.
The Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) has said more than 500 of its members will walk out on strike from their Border Force officer posts at Heathrow airport on 31 May-2 June.
The personal fortune of Sunak and his wife, Akshata Murty, has increased by £120m in the run-up to the next general election, figures have revealed
The Paternity leave (bereavement) bill, which has already cleared the Commons and has support from both government and opposition benches, has passed its second reading in the House of Lords. It would grant paternity leave to fathers who lose their partner in childbirth.
It would close a loophole in law where an employee could find themselves denied paternity leave if their partner died in childbirth, despite the fact they would have a new baby and possibly other children to care for.
PA Media reports Labour peer Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent, who has sponsored the Bill in the Lords said:
You know that your only responsibility is now to the baby that you are holding as you try to keep going, just for them. But there are funerals to arrange, grief to try and manage, if that is even possible, paperwork to tackle and some form of plan to build about how you’re going to raise your new child without the love and support of your partner.
Everything takes time and work is the last thing on your mind – until you realise that, because you started a new job in the last four months, you have no rights to enhanced paternity leave.
So rather than up to a year to try and get yourself straight, you have a matter of days, and those are at the discretion of your boss.
This is not a time when someone needs their employer’s discretion, it is not a time when you want to think about anything other than getting through the day. This is a time when you need to fall back on a legal safety net, to know that you can take the time to focus on rebuilding your shattered life.
Will Hayward, Welsh affairs editor at WalesOnline, has posted to social media a quick analysis of the situation, suggesting that there is a risk that Vaughan Gething might now face a vote of no confidence in the Senedd that he has a potential to lose.
Hayward explained that it if Plaid Cymru decided to support a vote of no confidence tabled by the Conservatives, and Gething couldn’t get the support of Jane Dodds, the sole Liberal Democrat member Senedd, it would only take one Labour MS to vote against him. Labour have 30 members in the 60 seat Senedd.
Hayward said “I can’t see anyone who wants a long term career doing so, their own constituency members might turn against them” but pointed out that Gething’s position over the £200,000 donation is such that “there are some older members who have a maverick streak, will probably step down in 2026, and dislike Gething” and so it can’t be ruled out.
The thread is here …
A crash course on the bombshell that just dropped in Welsh politics
— Will Hayward (@WillHayCardiff) May 17, 2024
Plaid Cymru has just dropped out of the co op agreement with Welsh Labour.
This is a big threat to Wales' new First Minister Vaughan Gething.
Let me catch you up on how we got here & what it means:
[Thread]
Gething: Plaid Cymru 'walked away from opportunity to deliver for Wales' after it ends cooperation agreement
First minister Vaughan Gething has said he is “disappointed” that Plaid Cymru have ended their cooperation agreement with the Labour government, claiming they have “decided to walk away from their opportunity to deliver for the people of Wales.”
In a statement on Friday afternoon, Plaid Cymru Leader Rhun ap Iorwerth said: “Plaid Cymru has ended its cooperation agreement with the Welsh government with immediate effect.”
He cited being “deeply concerned that the first minister has failed to pay back the £200,000 donation to his leadership campaign from a company convicted of environmental offences” and “the decision to sack a member of the Government this week relating to matters that should be in the public domain already.”
Gething has been criticised for failing to hand back a donation for his successful leadership campaign from a company whose owner was convicted of environmental crimes.
In a statement, Gething said:
The cooperation agreement was about mature politics, working together on areas where we agree. While it was always a time-limited agreement, we are disappointed Plaid Cymru has decided to walk away from their opportunity to deliver for the people of Wales.
I would like to thank Siân Gwenllian and Cefin Campbell for their work through the agreement. By working together we have achieved a great deal, including free school meals for all pupils in primary schools, providing more free childcare, introducing a radical package of measures to create thriving local communities, helping people to live locally and addressing high numbers of second homes in many areas of Wales.
We will now look closely at how we can progress the outstanding cooperation Agreement commitments, including the Welsh language education bill and the white paper on right to adequate housing and fair rents.
Plaid Cymru also cited the sacking the minister for social partnership, Hannah Blythyn after the leaking of an exchange with fellow Labour members from the time of the pandemic when Gething said he was going to delete iMessages.
Blythyn has denied leaking them. Gething has said the messages were not about government business but ap Iorwerth suggested the messages should have been handed over to the Covid inquiry.
The cooperation agreement was due to finish at the end of the year. Plaid Cymru said it would “move onwards with a clear and continued commitment to scrutinising Labour’s record, and with a renewed determination to put forward bold ideas which match the people of Wales’s ambitions for our country.”
Andrew RT Davies, leader of the Welsh Conservatives, has responded to the news Plaid Cymru has terminated its cooperation agreement with the Labour government in Wales.
PA Media quotes him saying:
The end of Labour and Plaid Cymru’s coalition is simply an attempt to save face. Together, Labour and Plaid have worked together to divert resources away from the people’s priorities and towards vanity projects like putting more Senedd members in Cardiff Bay, and have been hand in glove on policies like the destructive sustainable farming scheme and 20mph. This move from Plaid means nothing and the Welsh public won’t be fooled.
Former Post Office general counsel Jane MacLeod confirmed as not appearing at Horizon IT inquiry
Away from Wales for a second, a significant development at the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry happened earlier. Jason Beer KC has been questioning Post Office CFO Alisdair Cameron.
At one point Cameron said that something would be better answered by Jane MacLeod, who was general counsel at the Post Office from 2015 to 2019 at a time when the Bates v Post Office Ltd case was ongoing.
Beer confirmed that MacLeod is not cooperating with the inquiry. He told Cameron “We are not going to hear from her. She lives abroad and won’t cooperate.”
Labour and Plaid Cymru entered the cooperation deal in November 2021, after elections in the May of that year when Labour won 30 seats in the Senedd, one short of an overall majority.
In its statement pulling out of its cooperation agreement with the Labour government in Wales, Plaid Cymru also cited the sacking of social partnership minister Hannah Blythyn.
Plaid Cymru leader Rhun ap Iorwerth said in the statement: “I am worried by the circumstances around the decision to sack a member of the government this week relating to matters that should be in the public domain already.”
Blythyn was sacked yesterday over an apparent leak of phone messages, with first minster in Wales Vaughan Gething saying:
Having reviewed the evidence available to me regarding the recent disclosure of communication to the media, I have regrettably reached the conclusion I have no alternative but to ask Hannah Blythyn to leave the government. It is of vital importance we are able to maintain confidence amongst government colleagues so that we work as one to focus on improving the lives of the people in Wales.
Blythyn has denied the accusation, saying “I am deeply shocked and saddened by what has happened today. I am clear and have been clear that I did not, nor have I ever leaked anything. Integrity is all in politics and I retain mine.”
My colleague Steven Morris reported yesterday on the pressure Vaughan Gething has been under over a £200,000 donation cited by Plaid Cymru in its statement ending its cooperation agreement with the Labour government in Wales. He wrote:
The BBC reported on Thursday that more than £31,600 of his leadership campaign fund, which included a £200,000 donation from a company called Dauson Environmental Group, whose owner, David John Neal, was convicted of environmental crimes, would go to the Labour party.
Andrew RT Davies, the leader of the Welsh Conservatives, said: “These donations are now a question for the whole Labour party. Labour campaigning may now be funded by cash from somebody convicted of environmental offences. Now we will learn if Labour have the courage of their convictions.”
In an earlier article on the issue, Morris noted:
Gething took £200,000 from a company whose owner was convicted of environmental crimes. The donation row has particular resonance in some areas, including the Gwent Levels, a precious, protected landscape in south-east Wales, where Neal illegally dumped waste.
Plaid Cymru ends cooperation agreement with Labour government in Wales
Plaid Cymru has announced it is ending its cooperation agreement with the Labour government in Wales with immediate effect, citing concerns over a donation to Labour’s leader in Wales, Vaughan Gething, as a factor.
In a statement the Plaid Cymru leader Rhun ap Iorwerth said he was “proud of the way in which the agreement demonstrated a new way of doing politics” saying it was a way of working constructively after “the chaos and uncertainty of Brexit and the Covid pandemic and the harm caused by the UK Conservative government.”
The statement continues:
At the same time, since becoming Leader, I’ve been determined to hold the Labour Welsh government firmly to account. I remain deeply concerned that the first minister has failed to pay back the £200,000 donation to his leadership campaign from a company convicted of environmental offences, and believe it demonstrates a significant lack of judgement. Money left over has now been passed on to Keir Starmer’s Labour party.
The statement ends:
Plaid Cymru will move onwards with a clear and continued commitment to scrutinising Labour’s record, and with a renewed determination to put forward bold ideas which match the people of Wales’s ambitions for our country.
Plaid Cymru ends cooperation agreement with Welsh government
Plaid Cymru has just announced that it has ended its cooperation agreement with the Welsh government with immediate effect.
More details soon …
Updated
The Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) has said more than 500 of its members will walk out on strike from their Border Force officer posts at Heathrow airport on 31 May-2 June.
PCS general secretary Fran Heathcote said:
We are keen to resolve this dispute but the Home Office must first put something on the table for our members to consider. The Home Office has said it is “open to discuss” a resolution but it only responded to our request for a meeting after we threatened further action. Until it comes back with changes to the roster that will benefit our members then the dispute will continue.
The officers will also stop working overtime for three weeks from 4 June.
PA Media notes that officers, who work in terminals 2, 3, 4 and 5, took four days of industrial action last month.
A pilot programme has unveiled the level of abuse directed at MSPs with almost 500 posts passed to Police Scotland, PA Media reports.
A programme set up last year has shown that, for the 38 participating MSPs, 461 threats were deemed serious enough to be passed to Police Scotland. On average, each MSP was on the receiving end of 12 abusive posts which were reported to police in less than a year.
In total, the tool used by Holyrood officials found almost a quarter of a million – 245,420 – online comments which met the search criteria for threatening or abusive language but, after an investigation by a security analyst, just over 8,000 were deemed to be abusive.
Lammy: next election a chance to 'turn the page on the post-Brexit rancour' in relationship with EU
David Lammy has said the next election is a chance to “turn the page on the post-Brexit rancour” in the UK’s relationship with the EU after a “messy divorce”. He said an incoming Labour government would “approach those conversations in a positive manner”.
Speaking at an event hosted by the Institute for Government, the shadow foreign secretary said:
The next election is an opportunity to turn the page on the post-Brexit rancour of the past, and the low point at which a UK prime minister described the French president as an enemy and during which we had an integrated review in which Europe was barely mentioned.
And actually, I thought it was most peculiar that it took more than 18 months in office for Rishi Sunak to actually visit our friends and allies in Berlin. This is extraordinary.
I want to get back to structured dialogue with the EU on the issues that matter. If we have the privilege of serving, and we’re not naive, of course there are always trade offs with the European Union. But we will approach those conversations in a positive manner.
Lammy was referring to comments made by Liz Truss before she was prime minister. In the penultimate Conservative leadership hustings in August 2022 she said that “the jury is still out” on whether the French president was “friend or foe”.
At the time Emmanuel Macron responded by saying the UK remained “a friendly nation” and strong ally for France “regardless of its leaders, and sometimes in spite of its leaders and whatever little mistakes they may make in a speech from a soapbox”.
Lammy had been asked the question today by a member of the audience who said they had left their role in the FCDO because of Brexit, and Lammy said it had clearly caused “low morale”.
Lammy said:
We had a very, very messy divorce. It was a divorce that went on for years. It was only really with the Windsor framework more recently that we sorted out the custody of the children.
We need to get back on trusted friendly terms, and I believe a Labour government can do that, building that trust back with a UK-EU security pact.
I think when I speak to European colleagues that they recognise the key challenges around war in the continent, the key challenges around energy and climate and over-dependency of unfriendly states particularly.
And they also recognise in a period of low growth across Europe, that there are opportunities for us continuing to work together.
So that’s the spirit into which we enter discussions with our European partners. And of course, it has been very important for me to visit Brussels, Paris, Berlin, other partners across the continent to build and rebuild those relationships.
Labour have continued to push their line that there is an unfunded £46bn tax cut in Conservative plans, with a video clip which uses images of a laughing Liz Truss and a clip of Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak facing off at question time.
The script of the video runs:
Here’s how Rishi Sunak’s £46bn unfunded tax pledge puts your state pension and our NHS at risk.
Rishi Sunak has a £46bn plan to scrap national insurance, and there’s a reason he won’t tell you how he’s funding it.
Last time the Tories tried to force through unfunded plans, they crashed the economy and you had to foot the bill. But Rishi Sunak’s unfunded tax pledge is even more expensive than Liz Truss’s.
To pay for it he could cut state pensions or increase the state pension age by five years. He could cut funding for the NHS or he could raise income tax.
When Keir Starmer asked him which one it would be, Sunak refused to rule any of them out.
Your state pension isn’t safe. Our NHS isn’t safe. And your bank account isn’t safe from Rishi Sunak.
This is why Rishi Sunak’s £46 billion unfunded spending commitment puts your state pension and our NHS at risk 👇 pic.twitter.com/mY3KIl2eBz
— The Labour Party (@UKLabour) May 17, 2024
Earlier today, while in the process of unveiling a document which he said showed that Labour had £38.5bn of unfunded plans, chancellor Jeremy Hunt called this attack “disgusting” and “fake news”. [See 10.05 BST]
He said:
[Labour] may try to distract people by claiming the government has its own black hole of £46bn pounds as a result of our ambition to abolish employee national insurance over time.
We’ve been explicit that we will only deliver it when it can be afforded. It will come through growth in the economy, and not by increasing borrowings or cutting spending. It is frankly disgusting to try to scare pensioners by misrepresenting that policy, but it won’t fool anyone.
Conservative peer Lord Kulveer Ranger, who was ennobled in Boris Johnson resignation honours list, is set to be banned from House of Lords bars for a year. He was found to have bullied and harassed two people while drunk.
The House of Lords Conduct Committee recommended he be suspended from the House for three weeks after an investigation into an incident in parliament’s Strangers’ Bar in January.
The committee’s report said Lord Ranger had been “visibly drunk” and made “various inappropriate comments” to a group of people in the bar.
He then returned to the same group and “acted aggressively, shouting and swearing”, calling them “fucking useless” and “invading their personal space”.
Lord Ranger said he did not recall the incident but was “deeply mortified at the descriptions of my behaviour”.
PA Media report committee said: “Lord Ranger’s bullying behaviour was prolonged in duration, with two separate incidents separated by up to an hour, alcohol was an important factor, and it led to a finding of harassment as well as bullying.”
The committee recommended he be banned from the House of Lords bars for 12 months to “underline the House’s disapproval of alcohol-related misconduct” and invited House of Commons authorities to institute a similar ban for its own facilities.
The suggested sanctions still need to be approved by peers, who are expected to vote on the recommendations in early June.
Lammy: Labour will address lack of 'grand strategy' in UK foreign relations
David Lammy has said that the UK has a lack of a “grand strategy” in its diplomacy and foreign policy which could lead to the UK being “buffeted by the tides of superpower competition” unless it changes course. He said a Labour government would enhance the existing strategy unit, form a “soft power council” of cultural influences, and recommended “doubling down” on the use of technology and AI to provide insight.
Noting that the world was going through a “vastly changing moment” the shadow foreign secretary argued that it was “commensurate with the period after the second world war when Britain was losing an empire and much of Britain lay in rubble.”
At that time, he said, Ernest Bevin “was deeply realist about us setting up Nato and about the importance of the nuclear deterrent. That’s grand strategy. And we need to get that back.”
Lammy said “we need to address and sometimes learn from the increasingly dynamic diplomacy approaches of countries like India, Brazil, and the UAE,” adding that the economic diplomacy of “our closest competitors, such as the French … can often feel more hard-headed and realist than our own.”
He told the event, hosted by the Institute for Government:
The last Labour government upgraded the-then policy planners function into an expanded strategy unit. Countries that execute international strategy effectively, from the US to Singapore, place a huge emphasis on such functions.
But at present, neither the FCDO nor the national security council is delivering the sharp, coherent international strategy which the country urgently needs.
Without such strategy we should expect to be buffeted by the tides of superpower competition, not only between the US and China, but also by the many rising powers who are threatening our competitive advantages economically and militarily.
He went on to say “We will build up and empower the existing strategy unit to put it at the heart of the organisation, making it a place to go for the sharpest geopolitical minds.”
Lammy pushed the increased use of technology by the UK’s diplomatic service. He said “We cannot meet the disruptive challenges of the 2020s with a 20th century diplomatic playbook. In an era of fiscal constraint, we need to work smarter, adapt our tools and make better use of technology.”
He then went on to recommend that the FCDO “should be doubling down on adopting AI and other emerging tech to generate insights and to free up staff to concentrate on frontline activity”. He wanted less time “spent by staff in King Charles Street, compiling biographies and background briefings.”
He said “diplomacy and development no longer operate within the old institutional boundaries” and announced Labour would set up what he called a “soft power council” which he said would bring together “figures from across the arts, culture, creative industries and academia to work together with the British Council and the BBC World Service to advance the national interests.”
I must confess that I paused the live stream of the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry while David Lammy was speaking, in order to listen to that, so I am running behind but two points of note that have just come up.
Firstly, Jason Beer KC has just drawn some ironic laughs after there was an issue with putting some documents up on screen, by echoing the Post Office’s own modified language about the Horizon system and saying “Perhaps we have some bugs … or even anomolies.”
Secondly, and more importantly, he also revealed that Paula Vennells has just supplied the inquiry today with a further 50 documents relevant to it. The former managing director of the Post Office is scheduled to appear to give her evidence over three days next week. Persistent late disclosure of documents to the inquiry has been repeatedly criticised by the chair and lead counsel of the inquiry.
By the way, I know there have been some questions in the comments and on social media about how legitimate it is for the government to have used civil servants in the Treasury to cost Labour policies.
The Institute for Government have just re-promoted an explainer they wrote on the topic earlier this year, which says:
Government ministers can ask civil servants to ‘cost’ policies proposed by opposition parties. This is usually coordinated by the Treasury, with the chancellor directing officials on which policies to look at. Other government ministers can ask officials in their own department to do the same, but any resulting figures must then be agreed with the Treasury.
All government policies are costed prior to announcement and MPs or peers, of any party, can request factual information on these costs via parliamentary questions. This means the opposition can in effect ask that civil servants produce costings for government policies, so successive governments have held the view that they should be able to ask for the same of opposition policies.
It is only government ministers, not special advisers, that can formally request that the Treasury cost opposition policies.
What is less clear is the extent to which the Conservatives will be able to pursue their frequent attack line that Labour “does not have a plan” when they have apparently produced detailed costings of multiple policy pledges.
A private member’s bill that would make it easier for pubs to open for extended hours to celebrate national or local events is closer to becoming law, after it received an unopposed third reading in the Commons today.
Labour’s Emma Lewell-Buck’s Licensing Hours Extensions Bill aims to simplify the “costly, overly bureaucratic, time consuming and restrictive” parliamentary process for extending permitted hours.
She said “Love for our pubs is strong across all of our constituencies, if there is one thing guaranteed to unite us it is sporting and royal events. We tend to gather for those events in our local pubs, because they are the beating heart of our communities.”
The topic has been a subject debate after England’s women reached the World Cup final last year in Australia. The match in Sydney kicked off at 11am on a Sunday UK time, and it caught the industry and politicians by surprise.
Under current rules, pubs need to apply five days in advance for notice to serve drink earlier than usual, or else MPs must approve a temporary national order to extend licensing hours, as happened for the platinum jubilee.
PA Media reports Conservative MP Nickie Aiken said she supported the Bill in parliament today, but raised concerns about the impact on residents who live near pubs and hospitality venues, saying “It is important to not to forget that such extensions will see an increase in consumption of alcohol and therefore likely, as often is the case, sadly result in an increase in antisocial behaviour and disturbances for residents.”
James Cleverly has again defended Rishi Sunak’s policy of deporting asylum seekers to Rwanda, saying it is “robust” despite what the home secretary declared was a “concerted effort” to prevent the policy going into operation.
He told PA Media in comments overnight that:
We’ve recognised that there has been a concerted effort to prevent this policy being deployed through legal challenge. And we’ve made sure that the law, the Safety of Rwanda Act, is robust, that it addresses the legal concerns that were highlighted to us.
Rwanda is a safe and welcoming country. They are keen to work with us, and it’s incredibly important that we have that deterrent. People are dying in the channel. People are being abused by people smugglers.
The Rwanda scheme is part of a deterrent, which is about saving lives and breaking the business model of criminal gangs. That’s why the prime minister, myself and the whole of government are so determined to deliver on it.
Labour leader Keir Starmer recently said he had “no doubt” that the government would eventually succeed in getting flights into the air, but that Labour would scrap the scheme if elected.
Back in November, Cleverly repeatedly failed to deny to broadcasters that he had previously called the Rwanda deportation policy “batshit”.
Labour have been having a hiccup with their social media attack on Jeremy Hunt, having initially tagged in the wrong Jeremy Hunt. Here is the current version …
Under @Jeremy_Hunt, this is the reality for working people 👇 pic.twitter.com/wcBrc3cky0
— The Labour Party (@UKLabour) May 17, 2024
Shadow foreign secretary David Lammy has been asked about his comments about Donald Trump, after apparent criticism from London mayor Sadiq Khan.
Khan had said “I understand on Trump. He’s a racist. He’s a sexist. He’s a homophobe. And it’s very important, particularly when you’ve got a special relationship, that you treat them as a best mate. If my best mate was a racist, or a sexist or a homophobe, I’d call him out and I’d explain to him why those views are wrong.”
The mayor’s comments came after Lammy, in a Washington DC speech, said he “gets the agenda that drives America First”, and insisted he would seek to find “common cause” with Donald Trump if the latter were elected president in November.
During an event at the Institute for Government today, answering notably rather carefully, Lammy cited his experience of visiting Ukraine, and said:
This is a profoundly serious moment. And it requires seriousness. That seriousness means that the special relationship between the UK and our American friends is core not just to our own national security, but the security of much of the world.
And so, just like Wilson, Nixon, Blair, Bush, whoever is in the White House, in a big, big election year in the US, or whoever is in number 10 in a big election year in our own country, of course, we must work together.
In 2017 Lammy said that Trump was a “racist Ku Klux Klan and Nazi sympathiser”, and that he vowed to “chain myself to the door of No 10” if the UK welcomed the US president on a state visit. He was asked by a reporter from the Daily Mail if those comments might now “imperil any potential trade deal” if there was a Labour government. Lammy said today:
Now that the truth is that you’re going to be hard pressed to find any politician, particularly politicians who were on the backbenches, who haven’t had something to say about Donald Trump.
I take very seriously the responsibility of being on the frontbench and the responsibility of finding common cause on behalf of the national interests of this country, and whether it’s in relation to our national security or the growth that our economy needs.
He then went on to say:
It feels pretty clear to me that the US has set its face against trade deals. That’s not particular to the UK. But the political establishment, both Democrat and Republican, is not focused on trade deals at this time. And therefore I think, unless that changes, we would be spending an awful lot of effort unnecessarily.
He also raised comments that the current foreign secretary David Cameron had made, saying “I think David Cameron put [Trump] in his book. So his was a really considered thought. And Cameron described him as xenophobic and misogynistic.”
The unusual set dressing for that Jeremy Hunt speech, with him behind a podium that said “Labour’s tax rises” in red, was inevitably going to be mocked by Labour.
Under @JeremyHunt, this the reality for working people 👇 pic.twitter.com/xQtnojBHCH
— The Labour Party (@UKLabour) May 17, 2024
Here is the document published by the Conservatives this morning which it says has costed out “absolutely clear policy commitments made by Labour”. In the introduction, the chancellor Jeremy Hunt says:
This document shows that Labour cannot and will not take the tough and responsible decisions required to build an economy that supports working people up and down the country. It lays bare that despite what they say, Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves are following the same old Labour playbook: higher public spending that will inevitably lead to higher taxes.
This detailed work, based on formal costings by HMT, and only including absolutely clear policy commitments made by Labour, shows that Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves are making billions of pounds of unfunded spending commitments with no plan to pay for them.
Whatever they say about these figures these are the numbers officials will present them with if they get into office. The result of this economic failure is a black hole of over £10bn a year by 2028-29 or nearly £38.5bn over the next four years.
This means one of two things – either Labour will break their fiscal rules or they will have to put taxes up. It would be the height of irresponsibility to break the fiscal rules. It would take us back to square one. It would mean an increase to VAT, or national insurance or income tax. This would be a hammer blow for families up and down the country.
The Labour policy commitments costed are listed by the Conservatives as:
Two million more NHS appointments
42 GP Hubs
Double NHS scanners
700,000 extra dentist appointments
8,500 mental health professionals
Bring back the family doctor
Free breakfast clubs – 1 hour at 50% take up
£2,400 teacher retention payment
Ofsted regional improvement teams
Mandatory Qualified Teacher Status
Skills England
Mental health support teams
300 new planners
13,000 PCSOs
Bus service reform
Insourcing
Decarbonising the power grid by 2030
Fair Pay Agreement: Social Care
Ukraine support
It suggests that Labour has committed to raising revenue in these ways:
Halving consultancy spend
Business Rates for private schools
VAT on private school fees
Carried Interest
Non-resident SDLT at 4%
Tackling the Tax Gap paper
Additional changes to non-domiciled status
Energy Profit Levy changes
You can download the pdf here.
Shadow foreign secretary David Lammy is giving a speech at the Institute for Government this morning, which you can watch here. We will bring you the key lines as they emerge.
The Bank of England governor, Andrew Bailey, has announced a big expansion of its operations in Leeds, with one in 10 officials to be based in the city within three years.
Bailey said the current 70-strong team at the central bank’s northern hub would swell sevenfold to 500 by 2027 through a combination of voluntary relocation and local recruitment.
The Liberal Democrats have also responded to chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s speech this morning, while also taking the opportunity to point out that he is potentially at risk of personally losing his seat in the general election.
Claiming that their analysis shows 6.5 million are now in a higher tax band after Hunt’s budgets, Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesperson Sarah Olney said:
Jeremy Hunt owes an apology to the millions of hardworking Brits who will be forced to pay more tax as a result of his swindling budgets.
The Conservative party is trying to take the British public for fools with this shameless attempt to erase Liz Truss’s botched budget and their unfair tax hikes.
Voters across the country and in his marginal Surrey constituency will see right through this. Jeremy Hunt cannot defend his record of soaring mortgages, rocketing food prices and crippling tax rises.
The Conservatives have issued this social media poster after Jeremy Hunt’s speech this morning, which all-but-confirms one of the main thrusts of the forthcoming general election campaign is going to be Labour and the Conservatives trading accusations of “unfunded” spending commitments and tax black holes.
NEW: The Treasury have today released formal costings on Labour's clearest policy commitments.
— Conservatives (@Conservatives) May 17, 2024
The figures show that Labour are making billions of pounds of unfunded spending commitments which can only be paid for by raising taxes. pic.twitter.com/HSqgsiQX8q
That mention of the Royal Mail reminds me to remind you that the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry is sitting today. Jason Beer KC is questioning Alisdair Cameron, CFO at the Post Office, who joined the business in January 2015.
You can watch it here.
Hunt: bids for Royal Mail will be scrutinised for 'national security considerations'
Another topic that cropped up in the questioning of chancellor Jeremy Hunt was his views on the potential sale of Royal Mail to Czech billionaire Daniel Křetínský, which he said would be subject to “national security considerations”.
He said:
As a rule, we welcome international investment in British companies, and we think that one of the reasons that we have attracted more foreign direct investment than anywhere else in the world than the United States and China is because of our openness to companies from overseas and to the additional, not just the capital they bring in, but also the expertise and the funding.
So we will continue with that approach.
But we do always look at national security considerations and make sure that in terms of our core infrastructure there are no risks to those going forward and any bid for Royal Mail would go through that normal process.
A long-mooted purchase of the Telegraph newspaper by a UAE-backed consortium was recnetly effectively killed by new legislation brought forward by the government that blocks foreign states from owning newspaper assets in the UK.
The owner of Royal Mail has backed a £3.5bn offer for the postal company by Křetínský, the part-owner of West Ham United.
Labour has said Jeremy Hunt’s speech was an effort by the Tories to deflect from its “£46bn unfunded” ambitions to abolish national insurance.
PA Media quotes a spokesperson saying:
This is another desperate attempt by the Tories to deflect from their £46bn unfunded tax plan that could lead to higher borrowing, higher taxes on pensioners or the end of the state pension as we know it.
All of Labour’s policies are fully costed and fully funded. Unlike the Conservatives, who crashed the economy, Labour will never play fast and loose with the public finances.
Jeremy Hunt would be better spent getting Rishi Sunak to confirm the date of the election, rather than putting out any more of these dodgy dossiers.
This is not the most unpredictable of attack lines from Labour, indeed despite at one point saying denying he could “look into a crystal ball and predict what is going to happen” in one of his replies, Jeremy Hunt specifically said earlier:
[Labour] may try to distract people by claiming the government has its own black hole of £46bn pounds as a result of our ambition to abolish employee national insurance over time.
This is nonsense, because unlike Labour’s commitments, which are for the next parliament, our ambition has no time commitment, because we’ve been explicit that we will only deliver it when it can be afforded.
It will come through growth in the economy, and not by increasing borrowings or cutting spending.
It is frankly disgusting to try to scare pensioners by misrepresenting that policy, but it won’t fool anyone.
On Sky News, political correspondent Rob Powell has said he found that event by Jeremy Hunt “a bit strange to be honest”, wondering “if they’d sort of booked the venue and then couldn’t get the deposit back” and so went ahead with it anyway even though there was nothing to announce.
It was, it should be noted, a purely political party event, not a government event, but Powell observed:
It feels like that was a speech that would be given if there was a general election coming up in mid June, in the same way that Keir Starmer’s speech yesterday felt like it could be coming a month before a general election.
[The Conservatives] were clearly wanting to zero in on what they think Labour will do, rather than what Labour has said they would do.
And also you have the strange spectacle as well of having Jeremy Hunt stood behind a sign saying “Labour’s tax rises” as he is saying the words “I had to put up taxes by £20bn a year.”
Jeremy Hunt has finished speaking now.
Jeremy Hunt has pushed back on being asked about “stealth taxes”, saying:
I would challenge the phrase stealth taxes. That suggests a tax that we’re not open about. We’re not talking about. We’ve been completely open about the fact that I had to put up taxes by £20bn a year in the autumn statement of 2022.
He went on to say:
I think it is very important that people understand that we did that. Because we had an extraordinary situation. The likes of which we’ve never seen before in our lifetimes. Two global shocks in quick succession.
In this bit of the answer he is initially being slightly disingenuous, because his 2022 autumn statement was not a result of those economic events, but directly as a result of the impact of Kwasi Kwarteng’s financial statement.
He did address this later, after being asked “do you agree with Theresa May’s assessment yesterday that Liz Truss’ government helped to undermine the public’s confidence in Conservative economic management?”
He replied:
Mistakes were made. And the first thing I did as chancellor was to reverse those mistakes. And I’ve been very open about that. To her credit, after appointing me as chancellor, Liz Truss did not stand in my way at all. And she told me very clearly I needed to do what I had to do. And I did.
Hunt says the Conservatives 'will bring down taxes'
The chancellor was asked if he would bring down what was described as “stealth taxes”, by which the questioner meant the freezing of income tax thresholds. Jeremy Hunt replied:
I can’t today tell you what will be in the Conservative manifesto for the next parliament. But what I can do is make a very clear argument that we will bring down taxes, and I can do so with credibility, because that is already what we have been doing.
And employee national insurance is the most economically damaging tax. And by cutting it we are helping to grow the economy the most, and that’s not just our view as Conservatives, it is what the independent Office of Budget Responsibility (OBR) say in their analysis.
Unlike the former prime minister who appointed him as chancellor, Liz Truss, clearly Hunt at the moment does not feel inclined to want to abolish the OBR.
Updated
Hunt: water quality problems in England are not a 'privatisation issue'
The chancellor has described as a “red herring” the notion that privatisation is the root cause of water quality problems in England.
Asked “People in the southwest are drinking unsafe water. We’ve seen sewage pumped into seas and lakes and rivers. Do you accept that your party has failed to ensure that the public have a clean safe water system?”, Hunt replied:
I have the misfortune to represent constituents who have been treated badly by Thames Water and I’m very familiar with these problems.
What I would say is that, again, the difficult decision we are taking as a government is to require water companies to invest more in their network than they have ever done before.
In fact, nearly £100bn pounds of operating expenditure predicted for the next five years.
And the only company that has more leaks than Thames Water, which represents my constituency, is Scottish water, which was not privatised.
So, to talk about this as a privatisation issue is a red herring.
The question is how we get the best investment in the water network going forward. And that is what we’re seeing.
The Daily Express and Daily Mail have both asked questions about the taxing of pensions. Jeremy Hunt is on combative grounds here. He is asked when calling Labour’s plans a “myth” is he accusing them of lying. He says:
Well, calling them a myth is about as rude as I get. But frankly, it is a lie. I don’t make any bones about it. It is fake news. And it is an absolute disgrace to try and win this election by scaring pensioners about a policy that is not true.
He stresses that the costings they are publishing today have been “done by the same Treasury officials that would advise a Labour government if they win the next election.”
It will be interesting to see if the Taxpayers’ Alliance have a view on Treasury officials being used to produce this kind of material ahead of a general election.
Jeremy Hunt has said it wasn’t a great insight that putting up taxes, “as I had to do in the autumn statement in 2022” is not popular.
He says “a future Labour government does not want to cut the tax burden, a future Conservative government will do.”
He says:
Our argument is this is about the future growth of the economy, because we can see looking around the world that more lightly taxed economies have more dynamic private sectors, they grow faster, and in the end that is more money for precious public services like the NHS.
The chancellor claims that adding up the cost of Labour’s commitments would add “the equivalent of two pence on employee national insurance.”
Hunt finishes:
So my challenge to the Labour Party today is simple. You refused to vote for the national insurance cuts in the budget, so come clean with the British people. Are you planning to reverse them? And if not, which other taxes will you put up to pay for your £38bn black hole?
Because on tax, jobs and welfare reform, there isn’t just clear blue water between the parties, there is deep blue water, an ocean of deep blue water.
That is the difference between more jobs or fewer jobs, more people on welfare or fewer, tax cuts or tax rises, more growth or less growth In short, a prosperous future. Or a poor one.
He did not appear to make any reference at all to Brexit as a factor in economic policy or the state of play of the economy.
Hunt is now taking questions – GB News went first, the Daily Express second …
Jeremy Hunt is claiming that they are publishing “50 new official costings of announced Labour policies that show their commitments cost a total of £59bn over the next four years.”
Hunt claims a Labour government would be 'damaging for every family in the country'
Jeremy Hunt has now moved on to criticising the prospect of a Labour government. He says “this is an election year. People won’t just make a judgement about our record, they make a choice about the future.”
He is making a case that jobs, welfare and taxes are a key dividing lines between the two parties, and that a Labour government will be “damaging for every family in the country.”
Name-dropping Angela Rayner, he says she wants to add “70 new burdens” to businesses. He say the Tories have over 14 years “painstakingly built one of the most flexible labour markets in Europe” which Labour plan to turn into “a French style inflexible labour market”.
He says:
Now it may sound good to offer full employment rights from day one and certainly pleases the unions. But if the impact is fewer new jobs, then the impact on young people and families up and down the country will be an unmitigated tragedy.
Hunt moves on to welfare, saying “Labour has said they are against sanctions. That will mean more people on welfare rolls, not less.”
He says “if businesses are going to find the workers they need, without depending on unlimited migration, we need to move people off welfare into work.”
He says “the final area of substantive difference between the parties is tax.”
He says in her recent major talk Rachel Reeves did not mention cutting taxes once.
He says:
They would like to criticise recent tax rises, thinking people don’t know what caused them. The furlough scheme, the energy price guarantee and billions of pounds in cost of living support. But Labour supported those policies, which is why it is playground politics to use those tax rises to distract debate from the biggest divide in British politics today. What happens to the tax burden next?
Jeremy Hunt accuses the Labour party of “taking people for fools” when they say that “living standards have fallen this parliament” without mentioning the pandemic or the energy crisis.
He said when he became chancellor in October 2022 “The Bank of England said we faced the longest recession in a century. The OBR said we would see the biggest fall in living standards on record. Families were worried about their future. But what actually happened, inflation has fallen to just 3.2% and is expected to fall further next week.”
Jeremy Hunt has started by saying he wants to dispel two myths about the British economy: “Firstly that our economy is doing worse than other similar countries. And secondly, that there’s not much difference between the economic policies of the two main parties.”
He says Rishi Sunak and him have “put the economy back on its feet”. He said it is recovering from three massive shocks: “the consequences of the financial crisis, a once in a century pandemic, and the 1970s style energy shock caused by the invasion of Ukraine.”
The chancellor is making it very clear what the topic of his speech is about – the backdrop behind him is emblazoned with the slogan “Labour’s tax rises”
Jeremy Hunt attempts to draw general election dividing line over tax
Jeremy Hunt, speaking in London, is expected to attempt to draw up an election battle line between the Conservatives and Labour over tax. He will warn that taxes will go up under any incoming Labour government, while promising that if the Conservatives were re-elected, they would go down.
He said:
With no plans to pay for their spending pledges, taxes will go up under any future Labour government as sure as night follows day.
And taxes will go down under a Conservative government because we will do the hard work necessary to keep our economy competitive.
Labour has repeatedly accused the Conservatives of presiding over the highest level of taxation for decades. Hunt is expected to insist in the speech that a new Conservative government would reverse tax increases which he said were driven by the pandemic.
Welcome and opening summary …
Good morning. Keir Starmer’s six pledges have had their tyres thoroughly kicked by government ministers and the media since he announced them yesterday morning, and we can expect reaction to them to continue to dominate politics today.
Here are your headlines …
Ministers were warned three years ago unpaid carers were being treated unfairly, a long suppressed government report reveals
New rules intended to reduce the use of antibiotics in farming in the UK have been criticised as weaker than their EU equivalent
Teachers’ workloads are being increasingly stretched by their pupils’ mental health and family difficulties, according to MPs critical of the government’s efforts to tackle staff shortages in England’s schools
UK’s oil and gas workers risk becoming “the coal miners of our generation,” warned Unite, urging Labour not to ban new North Sea licences without a clear plan to safeguard jobs
The personal fortune of Rishi Sunak and his wife, Akshata Murty, has increased by £120m, figures reveal
In the diary today we are expecting words from the chancellor Jeremy Hunt, and also from Scotland’s first minister John Swinney. The Commons will be debating private members’ bills.
There is also some business in the Lords, but the Scottish parliament, Senedd and Northern Ireland assembly have nothing scheduled. The Post Office Horizon IT inquiry will be hearing from Alisdair Cameron, CFO and former interim chief executive of Post Office Ltd.
It is Martin Belam with you today. I do try to read all of your comments, and chip in if I think I can be helpful, but the best way to attract my attention is via email. Drop me a line at martin.belam@theguardian.com, and I find it particularly helpful if you flag up typos/errors/omissions, thank you.
