Politics

A “loophole” that allowed a Palestinian family to be granted the right to come to the UK under a Ukrainian resettlement scheme was the subject of a lot of debate in the House of Commons today. Both the prime minister and leader of the opposition criticised a decision by a judge to allow the family

A leak inquiry will take place following reports that economic growth forecasts have been reduced by the government’s financial watchdog. Bloomberg reported that the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) had reduced its growth forecasts in data sent to Chancellor Rachel Reeves last week. Reduced growth could force the government to cut further spending or increase

A Palestinian family that fled Gaza has been granted the right to live in the UK following an appeal – after they applied to enter the country through a Ukrainian refugee scheme. The mother, father and their four children – who were aged seven, eight, 17 and 18 in September – were displaced after their

Angela Rayner has insisted the government can meet its target to build 1.5m homes over the next five years as ministers pledged an extra £350m for housebuilding. An extra £300m has been injected to the affordable homes programme, a move ministers believe will allow 2,800 additional homes to be built. More than half of these

Has Sir Keir Starmer picked a fight with a bat tunnel that – in time – he will eventually discover he just can’t win? For the last six months, the prime minister has singled out the most hated construction site in Britain for criticism – a kilometre-long, £100m shed to protect bats in Buckinghamshire from

Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour Party has a ruthless streak when it comes to suspending MPs who’ve brought the party into disrepute or failed to toe the line. It’s no surprise that Andrew Gwynne was sacked before the story of his outrageous comments on WhatsApp had even been published, given that Sir Keir has built his

More than 600 immigration arrests were made last month, as authorities carried out more than 800 raids, the Home Office has said. The Labour government points out this was a 73% increase compared to January last year – when the Conservatives were in power – and 352 arrests were made across 556 visits. Labour have

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage has said the party now has more than 200,000 members and is aiming to overtake the Labour Party’s total of 309,000. Speaking to delegates at a regional conference in Wiltshire, the Clacton MP called his party’s growth “truly extraordinary” since its founding in 2021 as the re-launch of the Brexit

Margaret Thatcher died on 8 April 2013. But the UK’s longest-serving post-war prime minister still casts a long shadow over politics today, more than a decade later. Only last week the Labour Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer cited her example in support of his deregulation plans. “In the 1980s, the Thatcher government deregulated finance capital…,”

Health minister Andrew Gwynne has been sacked over comments posted on a WhatsApp group. Mr Gwynne reportedly made antisemitic comments and ‘joked’ about a pensioner constituent, saying he hoped she died before the next election, according to the Mail on Sunday. In the WhatsApp chat, which contained Labour councillors, party officials and at least one

Dafydd Elis-Thomas, the former leader of Plaid Cymru, has died at the age of 78. Lord Elis-Thomas also served as the Welsh government’s culture, sport and tourism minister from 2017 to 2021. He served as his party’s leader between 1984 and 1991 and as MP for Merioneth, later Meirionnydd Nant Conwy, from 1974 to 1992.

Keir Starmer was touring the UK National Nuclear Laboratory in Preston when the Bank of England halved its 2025 growth forecast, cut interest rates for the third time in six months, warned of an uptick in inflation and said the national insurance hike on employers would hit prices and jobs more than expected.  It was

The Labour MPs who have set up a pressure group to counter the threat of Reform UK have been warned they risked promoting factionalism. Baroness Harman, a former deputy leader of the Labour Party, said setting up the group was also “problematic” because it gave the impression that those involved did not believe the leadership

The Foreign Office has revoked the accreditation of a Russian diplomat after a British official was expelled from Moscow last year. A Foreign Office spokesperson said the Russian ambassador to the UK, Andrei Kelin, had been summoned to a meeting with a senior British official to revoke the accreditation of the diplomat. “This is in

The Conservative Party is pledging to tighten immigration rules after Reform topped a landmark poll for the first time earlier this week. In her first major policy announcement as Tory Party leader, Kemi Badenoch is pledging to double the amount of time an asylum seeker needs to have been in the UK before claiming indefinite

Is history repeating itself in the row over Sir Keir Starmer’s voice coach Leonie Mellinger? After all, she is not the first person who has coached a prime minister to be caught in political controversy. After the Tories demanded a police probe, are there echoes of the row over Tony and Cherie Blair’s “lifestyle coach”