Starmer rejects claim there are ‘strong arguments’ for suspending fiscal rules amid US tariffs – as it happened

Keir Starmer at Downing Street in London. Photograph: Eddie Mulholland/Reuters

6.01pm BST

Early evening summary

• Donald Trump’s unfolding trade war makes it even more “imperative” for the UK to improve its post-Brexit trading relations with the European Union, Rachel Reeves has said.

• Keir Starmer has rejected the claim that there are “strong arguments” for suspending the government’s fiscal rules in the light of the economic situation created by the Trump tariffs, describing the rules as “ironclad” and “non-negotiable”. (See 3.11pm.)

• Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs have put global growth at risk, the Bank of England has warned, heaping pressure on government finances and increasing the likelihood of “severe shocks” to the financial system.

• A deal to keep the blast furnaces at British Steel burning is “within sight”, a cabinet minister has said, as the government heads for crunch talks with the Scunthorpe plant’s Chinese owners aimed at avoiding nationalisation.

• The British government is bringing together foreign ministers from nearly 20 countries and organisations in an attempt to establish a group that can drive the warring factions in Sudan closer towards peace.

5.46pm BST

Richest 20% get 35% of the benefit of spending on roads and trains, says thinktank, calling for fairer spending settlement

The Liberal Democrats have been campaigning on potholes today. (See 5.01pm.) Keir Starmer has also campaigned on potholes recently, and you might assume everyone is in favour of fixing the roads.

They are – but to some people it matters more. Today the Resolution Foundation thinktank has published an interesting piece of research looking at how government spending benefits different income groups.

These are known as “in-kind benefits” and they are progressive. The average household gets “in-kind benefits” (health, education etc) worth £13,000, but for the poorest 20% of households they are worth £15,900, the thinktank says, while for the richest 20% they are worth £10,400. (These figures exclude public spending on matters like defence, where the benefits are collective.)

According to the Resolution Foundation, road spending is an exception. These are “in-kind benefits” that help the wealthy the most, it says.

Overall, legal aid, childcare, school spending and adult social care stand out as highly progressive forms of public-service provision: in each case, more than a third of total use is by the poorest fifth.

The big exception is transport spending on roads and trains. The poorest fifth only account for 13 per cent of road use and train spending, on average, compared with the richest fifth of households who consume more than a third (35 per cent) of all expenditure on roads and trains, because they travel an average of 1,100 miles annually by rail, against 350 miles for the poorest.

The Resolution Foundation says ministers should take these factors into account at the spending review and produce a spending package slanted towards helping low to middle-income families. It says:

A settlement for poorer Britain might tackle obstacles in the way of securing education, health and care plans (EHCPs) for children with special educational needs in poorer areas, where fewer are issued, despite the link between individual deprivation and special needs. The Department for Education could directly lift 100,000 children out of poverty if it were to fund free school meals for all families on universal credit. Spending on apprenticeships, meanwhile, could pivot towards youngsters seeking a first step on the career ladder: as it is, under-19s starting as intermediate apprentices have recently fallen by 30,000 while higher-level apprenticeships for the over-25s have soared by 45,000. And even within health, day-today NHS spending could be usefully tilted towards GPs, where the relative experience of poorer Britons is worst.