Afternoon summary
Updated
Starmer says Labour would prioritise stimulating growth over raising taxes as means of funding better services
Keir Starmer has told the Economist that a Labour government would prioritise stimulating growth over raising taxes. In an interview, asked if he accepted the tax burden needed rise to closer to the European average, to fund European-quality public services, he implied that he didn’t. He replied:
I resist the idea that the first place you go is tax, and I think that it’s very important for me to say that as leader of the opposition wanting to be the Labour prime minister, heading a Labour government. Because the instinct is always to think that’s where Labour wants to go first, and it isn’t because we’ve got to get economic growth.
I do think that through the model I’ve been describing we have the potential for that [growth] which doesn’t involve huge change to the tax regime. We have obviously set out some changes that we want to make: what we do about the non-dom status, which we said we would get rid of and use the proceeds to fund the expansion of the NHS workforce; the private-equity loopholes; private schools. So we’re prepared to say when we are looking at tax changes where we want to go.
Quite often we’re challenged on capital-gains tax. We don’t have plans actually on capital-gains tax. It’s important that I make that clear.
But I, and Rachel [Reeves], intend to resist the pull that so many people urge on us that the first place a Labour government goes is to tax. The first place the next Labour Government will go is to grow.
NEU teaching union urges government to revive talks on teachers' pay
The National Education Union has urged the government to revive talks on teachers’ pay.
In a statement to mark today’s strike by teachers in England, Kevin Courtney and Mary Bousted, the NEU joint general secretaries, said Gillian Keegan, the education secretary, “looking foolish” through her refusal to reopen talks. They said:
On Tuesday, NEU teachers working in England’s schools and sixth form colleges will again be on strike. But it is never too late for the government to come to its senses and pick up the phone …
Teachers have lost 23% in real terms against RPI inflation since 2010, with pay losses significantly worse than those for other professions …
The education secretary has washed her hands of the matter, but she risks looking foolish. Her abdication of responsibility is failing teachers, parents and children. Gillian Keegan has a chance now to correct the course of this dispute and return to the negotiating table. She needs to realise that this issue is not going away and must start treating it with the seriousness it deserves.
Sunak says values of UK and Italy now 'very aligned' as he welcomes Italian PM Giorgia Meloni to No 10
Rishi Sunak has said that the values of Britain and Italy are now “very aligned” at a Downing Street meeting with his Italian counterpart, Giorgia Meloni.
Meloni leads the far-right Brothers of Italy party. She became prime minister last autumn, only three days before Sunak took office, as head of a coalition government described as the most rightwing administration to run Italy since the second world war.
Her arrival at No 10 was marked by a protest, with campaigners highlighting her government’s hardline approach to refugees.
Speaking to reporters before they spoke in private, Sunak paid tribute to Meloni’s “very careful handling of the Italian economy”. He went on:
I think the values between our two countries are very aligned, which is why we can work so well together on shared challenges, whether it’s responding to Putin’s illegal invasion in Ukraine, where again I pay tribute to your leadership, but also tackling illegal migration, which is something that is common to both of us.
In response, Meloni said that Italy and the UK had a “strong partnership”. And she praised the illegal migration bill, which passed its third reading in the Commons yesterday. Addressing Sunak, she said:
We have nations that … have a strong partnership since decades, but I think there is much more that we can do on many topics on which we are on the same side – defence, Ukraine.
Tackling traffickers and illegal migration is something that your government is doing very well.
I’m following your work and I absolutely agree with your work and I think there are many things that we can do together.
As PA Media reports, Sunak and Meloni will sign a memorandum of understanding which Sunak said will strengthen co-operation on reducing irregular migration, defence and the response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. They will also head to Westminster Abbey together for a private tour.
Updated
Physiotherapists in England vote to accept NHS pay deal
The Chartered Society of Physiotherapy says its members working in the NHS in England have voted to accept the government’s pay offer.
They are the third union to accept. Members of Unison and the Royal College of Midwives have also voted in favour. But members of the Royal College of Nursing voted against.
There are around 20,000 CSP members working in the NHS in England. About 65% voted in favour, and 35% against, on a 60% turnout.
Claire Sullivan, the director of employment relations at the CSP, said:
Our members have voted clearly to accept this offer and we will now cast our votes at the NHS staff council accordingly.
While falling short of what our members, and all NHS staff, deserve, the money on offer will go some way to helping to offset the rising costs of 22-23, while also providing the certainty of a 5% increase for the current pay year.
The government should be in no doubt that the offer was accepted with reluctance and that further work is urgently needed to ensure pay levels are restored to pre-2010 levels without delay.
Commenting on the result, a government spokesperson said:
The decision by a clear majority of Chartered Society of Physiotherapy members to accept the pay offer demonstrates it is fair and reasonable and can bring this dispute to an end.
The Royal College of Midwives and Unison, the largest health union, have already accepted the offer. Other unions are finalising their ballot results, and we hope it secures their support.
Updated
Only 200 people saw Tory election leaflet wrongly saying no ID needed at polling station, MPs told
A reader has asked me this.
We all know that there is a requirement for voter ID so why are the Tories in Norwich printing on their leaflets that it isn’t needed, is that really their only tactic to win!!
It is a reference to this story, about Conservatives in Norwich distributing a local election leaflet wrongly saying people did not need ID to vote in the local elections.
This story has attracted more attention that normal election leaflet reports do. That is probably because opposition parties suspect the new law requiring people to have photo ID if they want to vote is at least partly inspired by the hope that it will result in fewer non-Tories voting. Some people may have casually assumed that this is what the Norwich Tories were up to.
But it would not make sense for a party trying to maximise its vote to give false information to the people it hopes will actually be voting for it, and that is just one reason why the best explanation is the one that has been given; it was a cock-up.
During the urgent question in the Commons earlier on photo ID, Rachel Maclean, the levelling up minister, was asked about this. She told MPs:
I will directly address the remarks about the Norfolk leaflet. The people responsible apologised straight away. It went through, I am told, 200 doors. It was a mistake.
Updated
BBC chair Richard Sharp braced for publication of potentially damaging report into his appointment tomorrow
A potentially damning report into how Richard Sharp, the BBC chair, was recommended for the job by Boris Johnson is expected to be published on Friday.
Sources say the report, by the barrister Adam Heppinstall KC, is likely to come out on Friday morning, and confirmed that the expectations are that it could be damning read for Sharp.
The former Conservative party donor was appointed in 2021, but it subsequently emerged that he had failed to reveal, while applying, that he had helped an acquaintance seeking to offer a secret £800,000 personal loan guarantee for Johnson, the then-prime minister, who was struggling with money issues.
MPs have criticised Sharp for “significant errors of judgment” in failing to declare the potential conflict of interest, and the commissioner for public appointments asked Heppinstall to carry out an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the appointment.
A report in the Financial Times earlier this month quoted one figure familiar with the report as saying it would make “grim’ reading for Sharp.
Updated
Cleverly calls for extension of Sudanese ceasefire, urging generals to 'protect the people'
James Cleverly, the UK’s foreign secretary, has made a direct appeal during a statement in the House of Commons in London to the two generals whose forces are battling in Sudan, Martin Belam reports. Cleverly said:
With regard to an extension of the ceasefire, we are pushing hard for that and we are amplifying the voices of those in the region, and more widely, that this is in the best interests of Sudan.
I would say here at the dispatch box for either of the generals who might be watching this statement, that if they aspire to be the leader of Sudan, demonstrating a willingness to protect the people of Sudan would be a very important starting point.
Martin has more on his Sudan live blog.
Updated
RCN was 'not able to come clean with members' about strike date error, court told
PA Media has also filed more on what Andrew Burns KC, the barrister representing the government at the RCN hearing this morning, told the court. PA says:
Andrew Burns KC said there had been a “significant U-turn” by the RCN after it told its members it would contest the health secretary’s case.
The court was told that the union’s barrister was on the Strand outside the Royal Courts of Justice in central London.
Burns said the RCN’s decision not to appear came after “several hours of silence” on Wednesday and that it appeared there was “some internal paralysis” as it tried to work out “how to get themselves out of the hole that they have got themselves in”.
He said it appeared the union was not willing to concede that the 2 May strike was unlawful, adding that the RCN had said “it means no disrespect to the court by not attending”.
Burns said that, with RCN representatives outside the court building, it was “difficult to see how that is consistent with respect to the court process”.
The barrister warned that nurses were “at risk of regulatory sanction if they take unlawful strike action”, with the RCN having a “heavy duty” to protect their members.
Steve Barclay, the health secretary, was “very troubled” that nurses were being put in an “invidious position” and there was concern over an alleged “abdication of responsibility” by the RCN, the court heard.
“They looked at the calendar, they’ve realised the mistake they’ve made and the secretary of state is very concerned that the RCN is not able to come clean with its members,” Burns said.
“The RCN have been incompetent when looking at the calendar.”
Updated
Judge says allowing RCN to let strike extend into 2 May would have been more than 'minor breach of statute'
The Royal College of Nursing did not attend the court hearing today where it was decided that the strike on Tuesday 2 May would be unlawful. PA Media has filed more on what was said by the judge, Mr Justice Linden, about the RCN’s decision to stay away. PA says:
A judge was told the union did not want “to give credence to what it fervently believes is an unnecessary and misguided application” by the health secretary, Steve Barclay, to have proposed strike action on 2 May declared unlawful.
Ruling in the government’s favour on Thursday, Mr Justice Linden said recent communications from the RCN’s lawyers did not address why the government’s interpretation of the law may be “wrong”.
He said a witness statement provided by the RCN general secretary, Pat Cullen, “strongly suggests that although she cannot bring herself to say it” the government’s interpretation of the law was “correct”.
The judge said the question for the court was whether a six-month period within which the union could take strike action following a ballot of its members expired at midnight on 1 May or midnight on 2 May.
“A six-month period, of which November 2 2022 is the first day, ends at midnight on May 1 2023,” the judge said.
He said industrial action called by the RCN, if it took place on Tuesday, “will therefore be unlawful”.
The judge said it was a “concern” that the RCN did not attend the hearing and ordered the union to pay £35,000 of legal costs …
The judge said Thursday’s hearing was over the interpretation of the law, with it not being the court’s role to enter into the competing positions of the pay dispute.
He said he took into account “the interests of the public”, including those who may require treatment on Tuesday.
“In coming to this view, I make clear that I do not regard calling industrial action on Tuesday as a minor or technical breach of the statute,” he said.
Updated
Steve Barclay says RCN left him with no choice but to go to court to block unlawful strike
Steve Barclay, the health secretary, has said he had no choice but to take the RCN to court to stop its strike on Tuesday 2 May. In a statement after today’s court hearing, he said:
I firmly support the right to take industrial action within the law – but the government could not stand by and let plainly unlawful strike action go ahead. Both the NHS and my team tried to resolve this without resorting to legal action, but unfortunately, following a request from NHS Employers [see 1.06pm], we took this step with regret to protect nurses by ensuring they are not asked to take part in an unlawful strike.
We welcome the decision of the high court that the Royal College of Nursing’s planned strike on 2 May is illegal.
In his statement Barclay said he was continuing to urge the RCN to “do the right thing” and agree “derogations” (exemptions) from the strike starting on Sunday to protect critical services.
Updated
Northern Ireland bracing for cuts in health, education and policing
Northern Ireland voters are bracing themselves for swingeing cuts in health, education and policing with “profound concern” being raised by one of the most senior civil servants in the country, Lisa O’Carroll reports.
RCN may fail to win ballot to authorise further strike action, Tory chair of health committee says
Pat Cullen, the RCN general secretary, said this morning that the court ruling telling the union it must shorten its strike could make members more likely to vote for another round of strikes. (See 12.17pm.) The current mandate for strike action is about to run out.
But Steve Brine, the Conservative MP who chairs the Commons health committee, told Radio 4’s World at One that he thought the union might fail to win a fresh ballot on strike action. He explained:
I think Pat Cullen is an incredibly difficult position.
Before Easter she was urging her membership to accept this deal. She said it was a good deal, a reasonable deal.
And now the membership have turned on her, and not by big numbers did they reject this either.
So I don’t think it is a given that if they reballot they will get an indication for more strike action.
Brine pointed out that Unison and the Royal College of Midwives had already voted to accept the pay deal rejected by the RCN. He also said he thought there was a “fair to reasonable chance” that the NHS Staff Council would accept the pay offer made to nurses and other NHS staff at a meeting next week, at which point it would be implemented.
RCN members voted by 54% to 46% to reject the pay offer in the ballot ending earlier this month. There was a 61% turnout.
For a union strike ballot to be valid, it is not enough for members to vote in favour. There also has to be a 50% turnout. That is why it is thought the union might have trouble winning the ballot it is planning for further strike action.
Updated
No 10 says survey after local elections will establish data on people unable to vote because of lack of photo ID
At the Downing Street lobby briefing the PM’s spokesperson was asked about government policy on recording data about people trying to vote without photo ID. He defended the decision not to record information about people turned away at the door, before they enter polling stations, after being told by greeters about the need for photo ID. He explained:
Some polling stations may choose to station a greeter at the door, but there’s no requirement for those staff to record information.
This is because there are many reasons people may choose to turn away, including that they may not have been passing by the polling station to vote in the first place, and it’s impossible to do this with any level of accuracy.
The spokesperson said that, as well as collecting data from inside polling stations, the government would run a “nationally representative public opinion survey” after the local elections asking people whether they voted and if not, why not.
Updated
Here is Peter Walker’s story about Rachel Maclean’s much-criticised response to an urgent question earlier about the recording of data about people lacking voter ID in the local elections. As Peter points out, it was an unusual UQ in that the most comprehensive answer came from Clive Betts, the Labour MP who tabled the question in the first place.
In an unusual move, after the UQ was over, Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the speaker, said that as chair of the speaker’s committee on the electoral commisson, he wanted Maclean to write to him to confirm what the actual situation was.
Updated
NHS managers criticise RCN for not backing down earlier in dispute over strike dates
NHS Employers, which represents managers in the NHS, has said the RCN should have rescheduled its strike as soon as it was told it could not lawfully continue into Tuesday 2 May, instead of waiting for a court hearing to resolve this.
Danny Mortimer, chief executive of NHS Employers, said:
The RCN could and should have resolved this significant issue of the legality of its strike sooner.
More than a week ago now NHS Employers approached the RCN to query whether its mandate for strike action expired at midnight on May 1 2023, and not the May 2 they had appeared to suggest.
The RCN vigorously rejected our assertion and we were left with no choice but to ask the secretary of state to seek the view of the courts.
Clarity has now been achieved, not least for RCN members, and the judge has confirmed the position we set out last week: any strike action occurring on May 2 would be illegal.
Workplace accidents increasingly ignored by UK safety regulator
Employers are increasingly likely to go unpunished after workplace accidents, ministers have been warned, as figures show the number of investigations dropped by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) due to insufficient resources has surged. Aubrey Allegretti has the story here.
Public won't support government decision to take nurses' union to court, says RCN chief
Here are some more lines from what Pat Cullen, the RCN general secretary, said to the media after the government won a court ruling saying the final day of the union’s proposed strike would be unlawful.
Cullen claimed that the public would not support the decision by the government to take the RCN to court. She said:
Today, what I have said is this is no way to treat the nursing staff in England. It’s no way to drive a wedge between government and the very people that are holding this health service together …
[The government] have won their legal [case] today. But what this has led to is they have lost nursing and they’ve lost the public.
They’ve taken the most trusted profession through the courts, by the least trusted people.
She said the RCN would go ahead with the strike, starting on Sunday 30 April, and that it would continue into Monday 1 May – but not into Tuesday 2 May, as originally planned, as a result of the court decision.
She urged Steve Barclay, the health secretary, to reopen talks on pay. She said:
He can continue, if he wishes, to drag [nurses] through court proceedings. But what he needs to do is get into a negotiating room and start to talk to the nurses of England, sort out this dispute and allow them to get back to their work.
She said the RCN was sorry for the disruption caused by the strike to patients – but she said the government was to blame. She said:
Every day that we have taken strike action we’ve said we’re sorry. We’re sorry for those 7.2 million people-plus that are sitting on waiting lists.
We’re sorry that we haven’t been able to fill the tens of thousands of vacant posts by getting this government into a room and negotiating properly and decently for nursing.
That’s what our aim is, to address those waiting list to make sure people get a decent NHS in this country and they just continue to crumble under this government.
No 10 says it is 'regrettable' it had to go to court to get RCN to accept its second strike day would be unlawful
Downing Street has said it was “regrettable” that it had to take the Royal College of Nursing to court to get it to halt the second day of its 24-hour strike.
Asked about the high court ruling that strike action on 2 May would be unlawful, the PM’s spokesperson told reporters:
I think, firstly, it is obviously regrettable that it had to come to court action in the first instance.
The government never wanted to take this to court. We did indeed try every possible way to avoid a court case.
The NHS presented the RCN with clear legal evidence that their planned strike for 2 May was unlawful. We asked them to call it off. The RCN refused. That’s why the NHS asked the government to intervene and seek the view of the court.
Late yesterday, Steve Barclay wrote to the RCN, to[its leader] Pat Cullen again, and asked them to call off their final day of the strike given we were confident that it was not legal. They refused again.
Updated
The RCN did at least win a minor victory at the high court on costs, my colleague Daniel Boffey reports.
One thing that the RCN will be able to trumpet is that the government’s lawyers asked for £47,884 in legal costs to be paid by the union and the judge said they were too high. Awarded £35,000. The hearing lasted under two hours. https://t.co/LHVJ5zR91I
— Daniel Boffey (@danielboffey) April 27, 2023
Updated
RCN chief claims court defeat on strike date could make nurses more likely to vote for further action
Pat Cullen, general secretary of the Royal College of Nursing, has said the government’s decision to take the union to court, leading to a ruling that it must shorten its planned 48-hour strike by 20 hours, could make nurses even more determined to vote for further strike action.
In a statement, she described it as “the darkest day of this dispute so far”. She said:
The full weight of government gave ministers this victory over nursing staff. It is the darkest day of this dispute so far – the government taking its own nurses through the courts in bitterness at their simple expectation of a better pay deal.
Nursing staff will be angered but not crushed by today’s interim order. It may even make them more determined to vote in next month’s re-ballot for a further six months of action. Nobody wants strikes until Christmas – we should be in the negotiating room, not the courtroom today. Our strike will now finish at midnight on the Monday as we have ensured safe and legal action at all times.
Photograph: James Manning/PA
Updated
Nurses to cut short strike as court rules second day of action unlawful
A strike by tens of thousands of nurses starting this Sunday will be cut short after a high court judge ruled the plans as being partly unlawful, Daniel Boffey reports.
UK to tighten rules on online gambling after long-awaited review
In the Commons Lucy Frazer, the culture secretary, has just delivered a statement on the gambling white paper. My colleague Rob Davies, who has written a book on the gambling industry, is covering the announcement. Here is his story.
Defence minister rejects Labour's claim that British support for Ukraine is 'flagging'
Labour has claimed that British support for Ukraine is “flagging”. John Healey, the shadow defence sectetary, made the claim in a Commons urgent question, telling MPs:
The government has got to be able to do more than one thing at once, and the defence secretary [Ben Wallace] has 60,000 MoD [Ministry of Defence] staff.
I am concerned that the momentum behind our military help is faltering and that our UK commitment to Ukraine is flagging. No statement on Ukraine from the defence secretary since January, no new weapons pledged to Ukraine since February, no 2023 action plan for Ukraine first promised last August, no priorities set for the Ukraine recovery conference in London in June.
Now, the prime minister said in February that the UK ‘would be the first country to provide Ukraine with longer-range weapons’. What and when?
Healey ended by saying:
The British public are strongly behind Ukraine. They want to know that the government is not weakening in its resolve to support Ukraine, confront Russian aggression and pursue Putin for his war crimes.
In response, Andrew Murrison rejected the Labour claim. He said 14,000 Ukrainian troops had been trained in the UK and that Britain was ‘“leading in Europe” in support for Ukraine.
While he said he understood why Labour wanted to attack the government, he went on:
The UK is more than playing its part – we are leaders and I’m really proud of that, and so should the British people be …
The UK will stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes and will spend another £2.3bn on military support to Ukraine this year.
Updated
Starmer says his 'gut feeling' on reading Diane Abbott's race letter was 'it's shocking' and 'antisemitic'
Keir Starmer was interviewed on ITV’s Good Morning Britain this morning, and he was questioned at some length by Kate Garraway about Diane Abbott and her race comments in a letter to the Observer that led to her being suspended by the party.
Labour has refused to give any clue as to whether she is likely to be readmitted soon, or whether this might be used as an excuse to stop her standing for the party at the next election. Garraway asked if Abbott might receive more lenient treatment in light of the fact that she herself has endured a huge amount of racist abuse throughout her career.
Starmer acknowledged this. He said:
Let me acknowledge what Diane has had to put up with for many, many years, because I think she probably suffered more abuse, obviously racial abuse, than any other person in public life, certainly any other politician. And that is terrible, and it should be condemned and called out. And she should be supported in that.
But Starmer also repeated his condemnation of what she said in her letter, and how it implied a “hierarchy of racism”.
When Garraway asked again if Abbott might be “forgiven” because she was a victim of racism herself, Starmer just said an investigation was under way. But when Garraway asked Starmer what his “gut feeling” was, Starmer replied:
My gut feeling is it’s shocking. My gut feeling is that it’s antisemitic, and that I’m determined to change the Labour party so that the Labour party and antisemitism are not mentioned in the same sentence.
We’ve done a huge amount of work on that, and I was really pleased that many in the Jewish community feel much more confident in the Labour party than they did. But this battle against antisemitism is never over.
'My gut feeling is that it is shocking and that it is antisemitic.'
— Good Morning Britain (@GMB) April 27, 2023
Sir @Keir_Starmer is asked whether he would forgive Diane Abbott following the comments she made in a letter.
He tells @kategarraway and @adilray that he is determined to change the Labour party. pic.twitter.com/q6KFTd8TzT
Updated
Minister criticised by MPs after failing to give clear answer about how photo ID voter data will be recorded
In the Commons Rachel Maclean, the levelling up minister, has still refused to give a clear answer to Clive Betts’ question about whether a record will be made of the number of people who leave after being told at the door of a polling station by a “meeter and greeter” that they won’t be able to vote without photo ID.
Pressed again for an answer on this, she says that data on people who are turned away because they don’t have the right ID, and who then return with the right ID, will be recorded by the clerk at the desk where ballot papers are issued.
Labour’s Stephanie Peacock asks what will happen if people are turned away before they reach the issuing desk, and if they do not return. Will those figures be recorded.
Maclean claims she has already addressed this.
Labour’s Matt Western says the obvious solution would be to have a clerk collecting data outside the polling station, as people arrive.
Maclean does not address the question, but says she disagrees with what Western said about the system being flawed.
The SNP’s Pete Wishart says Maclean’s answers show what a “mess” the system is. The government is not even recording data on the people it is disenfranchising, he says.
He says he is glad Scotland has nothing to do with this system.
(The photo ID law applies in Scotland for general elections, but not for local elections, as in England.)
Updated
Maclean tells MPs that the last Labour government required photo ID for voting in Northern Ireland. She claims fears that this would lead to people being disfranchised did not materialise.
Earlier, in response to opposition claims that the policy was all about voter suppression (reducing the chance of non-Tories voting), she said Labour required party members to provide photo ID when they turned up to vote to select a Labour candidate.
Updated
David Davis, the Tory former Brexit secretary, says he is “very uncomfortable” about the policy. He says that Clive Betts raised a good question and that Rachel Maclean should write to all MPs giving a clear answer.
Maclean did not give that assurance. But she claimed the new ID system had raised confidence in the electoral process.
Updated
In response to Clive Betts, Rachel Maclean, the levelling up minister, said the government was very concerned to get its data collection correct.
She said there would be two forms of data collection: the ballot paper refusal list, and the voter identification evaluation form.
She claimed 98% of people already have the correct photo ID they need.
And she said she would follow this up in writing with a reply to Betts.
Updated
Clive Betts, the Labour chair of the levelling up committee, tabled the urgent question.
In his response to Rachel Maclean, he says that at some polling stations people will be met be a “meeter and greeter” before they enter. At that point they will be told they need photo ID, and some people may then leave to go and collect their ID.
He says the government is committed to keeping details on how many people are not allowed to vote, once they are in the polling station, because they do not have ID. But he says it is not clear if the figures will include information about people turned away before they even get inside, because they have been told by the “meeter and greeter” they need it.
He says full figures should be collected.
Updated
In the Commons Rachel Maclean, a levelling up minister, is responding to an urgent question about recording details of people who cannot vote in the local elections because they do not have photo ID (which will be required for the first time under new legislation).
She says staff at polling stations will record details of anyone turned away, partly in case there is a complaint and partly to get data on how the system is working.
She says the government will publish a number of reports on the policy, with the first out by November 2023.
Updated
Cleverly defends attendance of China's vice-president at coronation, saying Bejing decided who would come
The fact that the local elections are only a week away means the coronation is just over a week away (if the results are dire for the Tories, at least something else will dominate the headlines all week), and today the Daily Telegraph has splashed on complaints about China being represented at the ceremony by Han Zheng, the vice-president who oversaw the suppression of democracy protests in Hong Kong in recent years, including the imposition of the national security law.
TELEGRAPH: Architect of Hong Kong crackdown to attend Coronation #TomorrowsPapersToday pic.twitter.com/BVxKS7SW8D
— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) April 26, 2023
Iain Duncan Smith, the former Tory leader and one of the MPs most critical of China, is quoted in the article. He told Times Radio this morning that Han had been deeply involved in genocide, torture and other human rights abuses committed by the Chinese government. He went on:
I think the government has been less than strong. I have to tell you this, I hate to say it about my government.
In a separate interview, James Cleverly, the foreign secretary, defended the invitation, saying it was for China to decide who actually attended on its behalf. He said:
We don’t invite individuals. What we do is we invite a representative or two representatives from each country with which we have a diplomatic relationship. And that includes China.
Who China sends, indeed, which person any country sends as their representative at the coronation, is rightly a decision for that country.
Updated
There are two urgent questions in the Commons today, on photo ID for voting and Ukraine; two statements, on gambling and Sudan; as well as the usual Thursday statement and questions on next week’s Commons business.
FROM 1030
— Labour Whips (@labourwhips) April 27, 2023
1 UQ – Clive Betts on recording voters who are denied a vote because they don’t have valid ID
2 UQ – @JohnHealey_MP on Ukraine
3 Statement - @lucyfrazermp Gambling White Paper
4 Business Statement @PennyMordaunt
5 Statement - Sudan update @JamesCleverly
Updated
Steve Barclay 'absolutely not' a bully, says James Cleverly
James Cleverly, the foreign secretary, has been giving interviews about Sudan this morning. (See 9.48am.) But he was also asked about last night’s Guardian story saying officials from the Department of Health have “raised concerns” about Steve Barclay’s alleged conduct towards civil servants.
Cleverly told Sky News that Barclay was “absolutely not” a bully. He said:
I’ve worked with him on a number of occasions.
He has made a statement making it absolutely clear that there have been no reports.
His statement is clear and completely unambiguous, and I am completely convinced that that is accurate.
British nationals should leave Sudan immediately, says foreign secretary
British nationals trapped in Sudan have been warned by the government that there is “no guarantee” of getting them out of the increasingly violent country after the ceasefire ends and they should leave immediately. Alexandra Topping has the story here.
And Martin Belam has further coverage on our Sudan live blog.
Labour claims a child born today has only a 30% chance of home ownership by age 50
Good morning. A week today, people in England will vote in local elections. The campaigns have not received huge coverage in the national media, but this is the biggest set of elections in the four-year local election cycle and the results will be an important test for Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer.
Today, Labour is focusing on housing, with the eye-catching claim that a child born this year has less than a one in three chance of owning a home by the time they are 50. In truth, no one really has a clue what the housing market will look like half a century into the future, but this is how Labour justifies the claim.
A child born today has a 30% chance of owning their home when they’re 50:
74% of people aged 45-54 were homeowners in 2009-10. In 2021-22 this had fallen to 65.5%. Assuming this trend continues, and home ownership rates drop around eight percentage points per decade, this would fall to around 30% in 2071-72.
In an interview with the Today programme, Lisa Nandy, the shadow levelling up secretary, said there were two problems with the current system.
We’ve got too little demand because too many people who are desperate to own their own homes can’t access mortgages and can’t get on to the housing ladder because of the affordability crisis.
And at the same time we’ve got too little supply because the government isn’t building enough homes.
If you solve one without the other, you get real problems, as we saw with George Osborne’s help to buy scheme which aimed, rightly, to get more people on to the housing ladder, but didn’t increase supply at the same time, and artificially inflated prices.
Nandy said Labour wanted to get more houses built, and that it was “absurd” for the government to abandon mandatory housebuilding targets. She also said Labour would reform the planning system in favour of more affordable housing.
But she also said the party wanted to make it easier for people to get mortgages. “Our solution is a form of state-backed mortgage insurance,” she said. In a briefing on this, Labour said:
Labour will introduce a state-backed mortgage insurance scheme, with the state acting as guarantor for prospective homeowners who struggle to save for a large deposit. This will be modelled on similar successful schemes in other countries, such as Canada and Australia, where mortgage insurance increases the supply and reduces the cost of high loan-to-value (LTV) mortgages.
Asked if she wanted to see house prices lower, Nandy ducked the question, and just said she would like to see houses “much more affordable for people”.
Keir Starmer has said he wants to see home ownership rise to 70%. In 2020 the figure for England was 65%.
Here is the agenda for the day.
10.30am: The high court hears the government’s challenge against the Royal College of Nursing over the legality of its strike dates.
Morning: Keir Starmer and Angela Rayner, the deputy Labour leader, are on a visit in Lancashire.
After 10.30am: Lucy Frazer, the culture secretary, makes a statement to MPs about the gambling white paper.
11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.
Noon: Humza Yousaf takes first minister’s questions at Holyrood.
Afternoon: Giorgia Meloni, the Italian PM, meets Rishi Sunak in Downing Street.
And Chris Heaton-Harris, the Northern Ireland secretary, is due to make a statement about the budget he has set for the Northern Ireland executive.
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