End of day summary
Here’s a roundup of the key developments from the day:
Rishi Sunak has signalled he will struggle to achieve two of his five priorities: to halve inflation by the end of the year and to reduce NHS waiting lists in England, which he blamed on striking workers. The prime minister urged voters to trust him with the economy, as he admitted inflation was not falling as fast as he would like.
Nadine Dorries is failing to represent her constituents, Rishi Sunak has said in a rare attack on his senior Conservative colleague, who has refused to formally resign despite announcing her intention to do so almost two months ago. The prime minister criticised the former culture secretary, who has not spoken in the Commons for more than 12 months, saying “people deserve to have an MP that represents them, wherever they are”.
The Fire Brigades Union (FBU) is demanding a meeting with Suella Braverman to raise concerns over fire safety in asylum seeker accommodation, including the Bibby Stockholm barge. The FBU has written to the home secretary with concerns about a potential lack of entrance and exit points on the barge, narrow corridors and doorways and increased occupancy.
Grant Shapps has insisted that the Bibby Stockholm barge that will house asylum seekers is not a “deathtrap”. Rishi Sunak is now under increasing pressure to explain why the government persists in planning to use the barge, which has been condemned by refugee organisations for being costly, cruel and inhumane.
Housing asylum seekers on the Bibby Stockholm “floating prison” would be “inhumane” and risks “retraumatising” people who have escaped war zones and other “horrors”, the leader of a refugee charity has warned. Steve Smith, the chief executive of Care4Calais, also expressed his fear that the barge being prepared to accommodate more than 500 refugees at Portland, Dorset was an “accident waiting to happen”.
The bosses behind Britain’s multibillion-pound clean energy rollout gathered in Downing Street to discuss the government’s plan for green economic growth later on Wednesday. Grant Shapps, the energy secretary, is expected to meet the leaders of energy companies including EDF, SSE, Shell and BP, which are poised to invest billions in low- and zero-carbon projects.
Kemi Badenoch, the business secretary, has suggested electric vehicle mandates could hamper investment in Britain and lead to job losses, in a sign that another of the government’s green pledges is in doubt. The business secretary was discussing the automotive industry’s concerns about a rule to be introduced in January that will require manufacturers to ensure at least 22% of new sales in the UK are of emissions-free models, rising each year to reach 80% by 2030.
While Badenoch has made headlines by lobbying the cabinet to water down rules in the ban on new petrol and diesel cars, Labour has committed to the target. Louise Haigh MP, Labour’s shadow transport secretary, said: “The transition to electric vehicles is essential to net zero, essential to economic growth, and essential to the future of our automotive industry.”
Shapps has said it would be “irresponsible” not to grant new oil and gas licences in the North Sea and insisted the UK would “still meet our net zero targets”. The energy security secretary said that the North Sea basin was very mature and was “effectively running out”.
Scottish ministers will be able to spend hundreds of millions more on public services each year after striking a deal with the UK Treasury to lift restrictions on its budgets. The agreement will allow ministers in Edinburgh to double their annual borrowing to protect day-to-day spending to £600m.
The higher education minister, Robert Halfon, has decisively ruled out lifting the cap on student tuition fees in England, despite increasingly urgent predictions from vice-chancellors about the impact of declining funding on universities.
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Updated
Minister rules out lifting cap on student tuition fees in England
The higher education minister, Robert Halfon, has decisively ruled out lifting the cap on student tuition fees in England, despite increasingly urgent warnings from vice-chancellors about the impact of declining funding on universities.
In an interview with Times Higher Education (THE), the minister said he recognised that some universities were facing challenges, but he said raising student tuition fees in the context of a cost of living crisis was “just not going to happen, not in a million years”.
Halfon’s intervention will come as a blow to vice-chancellors, who say the £9,000 tuition fee, introduced in 2012 and increased to £9,250 five years later, is worth little more than £6,000 to universities, having been eroded by soaring inflation. The current freeze is in place until at least 2024-25.
It will also reignite the debate about the growing recruitment of international students, whose higher fees are used to help plug the funding gap created by the now-devalued domestic tuition fee, amid fears that some domestic students could lose out on places as a result.
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