Politics

This week, Rishi Sunak made a surprise speech announcing delays to a number of key Conservative pledges aimed at cutting greenhouse gas emissions. But alongside a five-year delay to the ban on selling new petrol and diesel cars, and various changes to promises on oil and gas boilers, the prime minister also claimed he was

Rishi Sunak’s watering down of climate pledges is not a “cynical ploy” – but is rather the prime minister doing “what is right”, Business Secretary Kemi Badenoch has said. Last night, Mr Sunak announced a raft of changes to the UK’s climate pledges, including delaying the ban on the sale of new internal combustion engine

Today the cross-party climate consensus in place for many years was shattered. Minutes after Rishi Sunak’s press conference concluded, Labour announced they would reverse the most incendiary of all the PM’s promises – to move back the date to ban new petrol cars, from 2030 to 2035. This puts Labour and the Tories differences on

The home secretary has said that “we’re not going to save the planet by bankrupting the British people” in response to reports the government is looking at watering down its green pledges. Among the changes being considering are the pushing back of a ban on the sales of new vehicles with internal combustion engines from

Ken Livingstone, the former London Mayor and one-time figurehead of the Labour left, is suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, his family has announced. He is being “well cared for by his family and friends” as he lives a “private life” in retirement, they said in a statement issued to the PA news agency. It comes after

Health Secretary Steve Barclay has criticised the “increasing militancy” and “politically” motivated strikes, and said that is why new legislation to curtail walkouts is being introduced. Mr Barclay was speaking as consultants took industrial action today, with junior doctors set to join them tomorrow in the first joint strike in NHS history. The government is

The government has been accused of seeking to escalate industrial conflict rather than resolve it after outlining plans to extend its controversial anti-strikes legislation to doctors and nurses. The new regulations would mean doctors and nurses have to provide a certain level of cover after being issued with a “work notice” by employers on what

GB News breached impartiality rules after Chancellor Jeremy Hunt was interviewed by fellow Tory MPs Esther McVey and Philip Davies, Ofcom has found. An episode of Saturday Morning With Esther And Phil featured a pre-recorded interview that focused on the government’s approach to economic and fiscal policies ahead of the budget, which was announced four

Liz Truss is set to urge the government to cut taxes – and insist her plan to grow the economy would eventually have worked. A year on from her disastrous mini-budget, the former Tory prime minister will also say it was unfair to suggest her programme of tax cuts, amounting to £45bn, was unfunded. She

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 levelling up agenda is “steaming ahead”, a government minister has insisted – despite being unable to say whether the HS2 rail link will go to Manchester as planned. Policing minister Chris Philp said there were “spades in the ground” and “track being laid” for the rail line that will link London to the North

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

Rishi Sunak will not face a sanction for breaching confidentiality rules around the investigation into his failure to declare his wife’s shares in a childcare company that benefitted from the budget. Parliament’s standards committee, which scrutinises the behaviour of MPs, found Mr Sunak’s breach of confidentiality rules was “inadvertent”. Standards commissioner Daniel Greenberg opened an