Politics

Labour will look to build a closer trading relationship with the EU if it wins the next election, Sir Keir Starmer has said. The Labour leader spent the weekend meeting fellow centre-left leaders in Montreal, Canada, including the country’s prime minister Justin Trudeau. The party has long been critical of the deal negotiated by the

Sir Keir Starmer has refused to guarantee the tax burden – currently the largest since the Second World War –  would not increase under Labour. While the opposition leader told Sky News’ Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips programme he wanted it to come down “for working people”, his “laser focus” was on growing the economy.

Sir Keir Starmer has described Conservative Party claims that Labour’s plans on immigration would increase asylum seeker numbers as “nonsense”. Speaking exclusively to Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips, from a summit in Montreal, the Labour leader maintained the government has “no control” of UK borders. He said: “What concerns people is that basic idea that

Rishi Sunak was persuaded not to quit as chancellor over his COVID lockdown fine after discussions with executives working for media mogul Rupert Murdoch, it has been claimed. Mr Sunak is reported to have shared a draft resignation statement with allies after both he and Boris Johnson were fined for attending the then-prime minister’s birthday

Susan Hall, the Conservative candidate for London mayor, is reported to have liked tweets praising controversial former minister Enoch Powell. Ms Hall, who will go up against Labour’s Sadiq Khan in the mayoral election next May, liked a message in February 2020 quoting the far-right, anti-immigration politician as saying: “It’s never too late to save

The government has officially launched an independent investigation into how terror suspect Daniel Khalife was able to escape from Wandsworth prison. The investigation will look at several issues including whether the relevant protocols were in place and applied correctly, whether there was sufficient staffing and whether Khalife was held in the right category of prison.

Labour has promised to end the use of hotels for asylum seekers if it gets into power at the next election. Outlining its latest policy pledges, the party said it would also clear the growing backlog of asylum cases and speed up the return of those who fail to meet the threshold. As a result

The NHS will receive a £200m boost from the government ahead of the busiest months of the year for them. The winter resilience fund is aimed at supporting the health service so it can attend to patients as quickly as possible amid record waiting lists. Last month, NHS England said 7.6 million people were waiting

Labour has confirmed it would seek to negotiate a returns agreement for migrants with the EU if it wins power, as it accused the government of having “lost control of our borders”. Shadow Cabinet Office minister Nick Thomas-Symonds said the “objective” was to secure a returns agreement to establish “management and control of the system”.

Sir Keir Starmer has branded the prime minister “inaction man” over the problems facing the UK’s schools and prisons. Mr Sunak has been greeted with a number of problems on returning to Westminster from the summer recess, including a crisis involving concrete in public buildings, the escape of a terror suspect from prison and allegations

The UK government will not intervene to stop a pilot drug consumption room in Scotland, Alister Jack has said. The Scottish secretary said ministers at Holyrood now have “no more excuses” to act after he made the commitment in the House of Commons. SNP MPs had pressed the Westminster government to outline its position after

From the pensions triple lock to the cost of mortgages, Brexit to tuition fees: many of the biggest political questions of recent years have been framed as a contest between the often-conflicting interests of younger and older voters. The intergenerational friction has come to the fore this week amid the debate about the pensions triple

The Conservatives reportedly dropped two potential candidates to become MPs after MI5 warned that they could be spies for China. The security service contacted the Tory Party last year and in 2021 advising the pair should not be included on the central list of candidates, according to The Times. The newspaper reported the pair had

The level of illness among the UK population is costing lives and harming the economy, a report has warned – after the number of people off work due to long-term sickness hit another record high. More than 2.6 million people now do not have jobs because of their health, according to latest employment data from

A lack of cyber security experts in Whitehall should “send a chill down the government’s spine”, according to a new report. The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) said there was a “digital skills shortage” across departments, with just 4.5% of the civil service made up of tech professionals – compared to between 8% and 12% in

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Health Secretary Steve Barclay will today meet health experts as they seek to “mitigate winter pressures” hitting the NHS this year. The pair will hold a roundtable with clinical leaders in Downing Street, aiming to “improve performance and drive forward planning” to ease the impact on the health service in

Angela Rayner wasn’t wearing her trademark chunky boots when she addressed the TUC conference in Liverpool But she put the boot into Labour’s trade union critics in a powerful speech, ending with a call for the unions to “come together, stand together and campaign side by side”. No stilettos, either, just a pair of smart

Downing Street has said it remains “committed” to the pensions triple lock amid a debate about its cost to the public purse. The triple lock is a government promise to raise publicly funded pensions by the level of average earnings, inflation or 2.5% – whichever is the highest. It means the state pension could rise

Angela Rayner declared the battle to win over voters at the next general election is “getting started” as she revealed Labour’s vision to boost workers’ rights. In a speech at the TUC conference in Liverpool, Labour’s deputy leader gave a “cast iron commitment” to push through an employment rights bill in the party’s first 100

Rishi Sunak has refused to say whether he was personally warned about potential health risks for asylum seekers on the Bibby Stockholm after bacteria was discovered on the barge. All 39 asylum seekers were removed from the vessel, which is currently docked in Portland, Dorset, on Friday after Legionella bacteria was found in the vessel’s