Starmer faces take a look at of Labour self-discipline after SNP proposes vote on ending two-child profit cap – UK politics dwell

Keir Starmer should take “quick steps” to repair the “broken” House Workplace settlement scheme for EU residents within the nation earlier than Brexit to avert a repeat of the Windrush scandal, campaigners have stated.

Grassroots organisation the3million and 75 different organisations, together with extremely revered immigration regulation corporations, civil rights teams and NGOs, have written to the prime minister to hunt a wholesale assessment the House Workplace’s implementation of the Brexit withdrawal settlement (WA).

It was supposed to ensure EU residents rights however has already ended up with a authorities defeat within the excessive courtroom.

Andreea Dumitrache, communications supervisor at the3million, stated:

If the prime minister is critical about repairing the connection between the UK and the EU, then he has a golden alternative to take action, by taking fast steps to repair the EU settlement scheme. We imagine this may be a big present of goodwill in the direction of the EU, relieving tensions and opening the door in the direction of a greater relationship with an in depth ally.

The letter requires efforts to clear the 137,000 backlog of EU residents nonetheless ready for a call on their standing by the House Workplace. Amongst different proposals, it additionally says the federal government ought to abandon the House Workplace’s resolution to “expire” UK residence playing cards held by some EU residents on 31 December.

The letter says:

We’re recommending tangible steps that you could take as a brand new authorities to repair the damaged immigration system, so folks can entry their rights and justice, discover belonging within the UK, and proceed to play their half in our financial system and society.

David Lammy met households of hostages murdered or held in Gaza by Hamas on his go to to the Center East, PA Media experiences. PA says:

The international secretary used his journey to name for an instantaneous ceasefire, together with the discharge of all hostages and a speedy improve of assist into Gaza.

In Israel, he “spoke with families whose loved ones were murdered and taken hostage by Hamas”, the International Workplace stated right now.

Photographs shared on social media confirmed him embracing and shaking arms with these affected.

In conferences with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Mohammad Mustafa, prime minister of the Palestinian Authority, on Sunday, Lammy additionally made the case for working in the direction of a two-state answer to the battle.

He introduced that the UK will present one other £5.5m this yr to UK-Med to fund its work in Gaza. The medical assist charity sends skilled humanitarian medics, together with these working within the NHS, to crisis-hit areas. The funding can be used to assist the continued work of its area hospitals and the emergency division at Nasser hospital.

Lammy stated: “The loss of life and destruction in Gaza is insupportable. This battle should finish now, with an instantaneous ceasefire, complied with by either side. The combating has received to cease, the hostages nonetheless cruelly detained by Hamas terrorists must be launched instantly, and assist have to be allowed in to achieve the folks of Gaza with out restrictions.

“I’m assembly with Israeli and Palestinian leaders to emphasize the UK’s ambition and dedication to play its full diplomatic function in securing a ceasefire deal and creating the area for a reputable and irreversible pathway in the direction of a two-state answer.

“The world wants a protected and safe Israel alongside a viable and sovereign Palestinian state. Central to that is to see an finish to increasing unlawful Israeli settlements and rising settler violence within the West Financial institution.

“Here, in what should be a crucial part of a Palestinian state, alongside Gaza and East Jerusalem, we need to see a reformed and empowered Palestinian Authority.”

Nick Thomas-Symonds, the minister for EU relations, has stated that having “a strong UK-EU alliance is vital”.

In a press release issued forward of his assembly in Brussels right now with Maroš Šefčovič, the European Fee vice-president who leads for the EU on Brexit negotiations with Britain, Thomas-Symonds stated:

Our authorities is dedicated to resetting the connection with the European Union, to strengthen ties, reinforce our safety and sort out limitations to commerce.

The EU and Member States are among the many UK’s closest mates and allies. With battle in Europe, and shared international challenges, in areas resembling local weather change and unlawful migration, a powerful UK-EU alliance is significant.

A reader asks:

What number of payments does a monarch’s speech sometimes comprise?

It relies upon. There isn’t a set quantity, however usually it mentions round 25 to 30 full payments, after which a handful extra payments to be revealed in draft over the subsequent 12 months. Final yr’s king’s speech contained 21 payments, the bottom quantity for nearly a decade, however the authorities didn’t anticipate to get via a full session forward of the election. In Could 2022 the queen’s speech contained 38 payments.

However, because the parliamentary session goes on, governments nearly all the time discover themselves introducing new payments not within the queen’s or king’s speech, and so it’s by no means a complete information to what’s developing.

On the weekend No 10 stated the federal government was “working on more than 35 bills to deliver an ambitious parliamentary session that will be built on a bedrock of economic security, to enable growth that will improve the prosperity of our country and the living standards of working people”.

The Guardian has revealed a frontrunner this morning saying the king’s speech ought to embrace a dedication to abolish the two-child profit cap. (See 11.02am.) Right here is an extract.

Sir Keir Starmer needs to finish baby poverty. Certainly one of his defining 5 missions is to “break down barriers to opportunity … to make sure there is no class ceiling on the ambitions of young people in Britain”. And final yr he pledged his authorities can be “laser-focused on poverty”.

High quality phrases, and this week provides the possibility to show them. Amid the proposed legal guidelines on this authorities’s first king’s speech needs to be one which scraps the two-child cap on advantages. It impoverishes youngsters, penalises ethnic minorities and humiliates ladies who’ve been raped. Unfair and morally repugnant, it’s “the worst social security policy ever”, say tutorial consultants. And authorities ministers know this.

The coverage was dreamed up by George Osborne as chancellor, argued for by David Cameron as prime minister and at last launched by Theresa Could and Philip Hammond in 2017. Underneath the cap, households on profit obtain a fee for every of their first two youngsters from baby tax credit score or common credit score, however no extra for any extra offspring. Bigger households lose out on £3,455 a yr for every baby – an enormous sum, particularly for these on low incomes.

And right here is the article in full.

Keir Starmer faces a attainable take a look at to his authority within the Commons subsequent week after the SNP stated that it could desk an modification to the king’s speech saying the two-child profit cap needs to be abolished.

In a letter to the Scottish Labour chief, Anas Sarwar, the SNP’s chief at Westminster, Stephen Flynn, stated that “the moment Keir Starmer stepped into Downing Street, the Tory two-child cap became the Labour party two-child cap”.

Flynn stated Sarwar ought to instruct Scottish Labour MP to again the SNP modification. In a press release he stated:

The 2-child cap is pushing 1000’s of Scottish youngsters into poverty – and scrapping it’s the naked minimal the Labour get together authorities should do whether it is critical about tackling poverty.

I urge Keir Starmer to incorporate it in his programme for presidency this week however, if he fails, the SNP will lay an modification to abolish it instantly. It’s shameful and it should go now.

Labour MPs opposed the two-child profit cap when it was proposed by the Conservative chancellor George Osborne, and plenty of of them have harshly condemned it as a result of it’s a main trigger of kid poverty.

However Keir Starmer has repeatedly refused to decide to eliminating the coverage, which the Decision Basis says would price £2.5bn, saying that he’ll solely decide to insurance policies he is ready to fund. Within the run-up to the election this stance turned emblematic of his dedication to point out that he put fiscal duty forward of heeding to the considerations of leftwingers.

However it’s not simply leftwingers who’ve opposed the two-child profit cap. Earlier this yr the rightwing Tory former dwelling secretary Suella Braverman stated it ought to go.

Starmer has a working majority of 180, based on the Home of Commons web site, and there’s no likelihood of his shedding a vote on the king’s speech. Even when the SNP modification had been to go, it could not have legislative pressure. However the SNP clearly intends to make use of any vote as a campaigning mechanism, forcing Labour MPs unwilling to insurgent to vote towards an modification many or most of them could privately favour.

It’s for the speaker, Lindsay Hoyle, to determine what amendments get put to a vote. The SNP are actually the fourth largest get together within the Commons, not the third largest, and so they solely have 9 MPs, and that may make it tougher for them to get amendments chosen than within the final parliament. However the speaker usually selects a number of opposition amendments when MPs vote on the king’s speech, and in autumn final yr an modification from the fourth get together (then the Liberal Democrats) was chosen, and so there’s a good likelihood the Flynn modification can be put to a vote.

MPs will begin debating the king’s speech on Wednesday, and they’re going to vote on it subsequent week.

As Patrick Butler and Aletha Adu reported final week, the newest figures present {that a} document 1.6 million youngsters live in households affected by the two-child profit cap.

In her interview with Occasions Radio this morning, Lisa Nandy, the tradition secretary, kind of confirmed {that a} soccer governance invoice can be within the king’s speech on Wednesday. Requested if Labour would convey again the invoice, which was launched by the final authorities earlier this yr however dropped when the election was referred to as, Nandy replied:

Will probably be a high precedence for me, so I feel you may learn into that that there’ll be early motion from this authorities.

I’m very eager that it turns into a difficulty that we take get together politics out of and that we get behind the followers, we get behind grassroots soccer, and we get behind youngsters on this nation who deserve the best requirements.

Ministers aren’t presupposed to say upfront what can be within the king’s speech as a result of that’s deemed a discourtesy to Buckingham Palace, however that by no means stops the federal government letting the media discover out most of what it is going to comprise. Eleni Courea wrote a superb information on the finish of final week.

The soccer governance invoice, which had cross-party assist when launched by the Tories, will arrange an impartial soccer regulator to advertise groups’ monetary sustainability.

Lisa Nandy, the tradition secretary, stated this morning that the federal government needs “far more light, far less heat” in political debate within the UK. Increasing on what she stated on Sky Information (see 9.36am), she informed ITV’s Good Morning Britain:

We had the independence referendum in Scotland, we had limitless rows about Brexit that turned very polarising throughout the entire of the UK and notably in England, we discovered all these alternative ways to divide ourselves from each other, and I mirrored on it a number of years in the past, standing in a debate within the Home of Commons, the place I used to be listening to remain-supporting and leave-supporting MPs hurling insults at one another throughout the ground, calling one another traitors.

It’s no shock then that, once we stroll out on to the streets of Britain, we hear that language mirrored again to us, and that’s why I used to be so happy that the prime minister, his first intuition [yesterday, after the attempt to kill Donald Trump] was to get on the telephone to President Trump to precise our utter condemnation.

Our curiosity, as the brand new authorities, is firmly in taking a number of the warmth out of this very poisonous political debate that we’ve had, shedding much more gentle, far much less warmth, and displaying management in the way in which that we conduct ourselves in the direction of one another, however notably in the direction of political opponents that we disagree with.

Good morning. That is a kind of days when the principle focus of the information trade is certainly not on Westminster however on the US, the place individuals are nonetheless attempting to evaluate the implications of the tried assassination of Donald Trump. However the taking pictures on the Trump rally could have an effect on the UK, partly as a result of it might have an effect on who wins the presidential election in November but in addition as a result of it has revived curiosity in what could be accomplished to cut back the polarisation, aggression and violence that has marred politics on either side of the Atlantic lately.

Final week Lisa Nandy, the tradition secretary, stated that new Labour authorities wished to finish the period of tradition wars. This morning she has been on the media, in interviews that had been lined up when it was anticipated that the soccer can be the highest story of the day, and, within the gentle of the try to kill Trump, her name for a calmer type of political debate has added resonance. As Peter Walker experiences, she had a vivid approach of expressing this on Sky Information the place she stated:

When youngsters had been turning on their TV units final evening throughout England, each single one among them may have been capable of see themselves mirrored in that staff. And in doing so he’s informed an inclusive story concerning the nation that we could be.

It has felt very tough for folks to really feel a part of our nationwide story, and it’s firmly my intention that this authorities can be completely different, can be much more Gareth Southgate, and much much less Michael Gove.

The period of division wants to finish, and I feel this staff and Gareth Southgate specifically has proven the management that we’d like in some actually tough occasions for this nation. So we owe him an infinite debt, no matter he decides to do sooner or later.

Peter has the total story right here.

America just isn’t the one physique with a management contest within the autum. The Conservatives have to seek out somebody to interchange Rishi Sunak, and later this week we predict to get some particulars from the get together as to what the timetable for the competition can be. Sunak himself has stated he’ll keep in place as chief till the method is underneath approach, however he has not dedicated to remaining till his substitute as been elected and there was discuss of an interim chief standing in if the election continues till the get together convention in October, or past.

This morning a senior Tory stated Sunak ought to keep till the brand new chief has been elected. Andrew Mitchell, the shadow international secretary, stated that, though he thought Sunak’s intuition was “almost certainly to go”, he thought he ought to keep on. He informed Occasions Radio:

An interim chief just isn’t, in my opinion, the most suitable choice. The best choice is to hunt to steer Rishi to stay. It’s not an enormously very long time within the scope of issues. It’s most likely until mid to finish November …

I feel his intuition is sort of definitely to go. I hope that he received’t. I hope he’ll keep until November for the explanations that I’ve described. And on the 1922 Committee assembly final week, there was a widespread feeling of sympathy and respect for Rishi Sunak. And I’m positive that if he does keep, that would be the overwhelming feeling of the get together.

Mitchell stated the get together ought to maintain the management election after the get together convention, because it did in 2005. He defined:

I feel we should always play it lengthy. I feel the instance of Michael Howard in 2005 is an effective instance, permit members of the Conservative get together, the nation, to see what’s on provide from the gifted group of people that will little question put their names ahead …

I very a lot hope that what the get together will determine to do is to reflect what Michael Howard did in 2005 and permit the get together convention the area for candidates who’re providing themselves to say what they might do for his or her get together, say what they might do for his or her nation, and that members of the get together, members of parliament, can then take a view because of that showcasing.

The Home of Commons just isn’t sitting right now, and there may be not a lot within the diary for the day. However we’re getting a foyer briefing from Downing Road at 11.30am, David Lammy, the international secretary, is in Israel the place he has a gathering with the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and Nick Thomas-Symonds, the minister for EU relations, is in Brussels for a gathering together with his EU counterpart, Maroš Šefčovič.

If you wish to contact me, please put up a message under the road (BTL) or message me on X (Twitter). I can’t learn all of the messages BTL, however when you put “Andrew” in a message aimed toward me, I’m extra prone to see it as a result of I seek for posts containing that phrase. If you wish to flag one thing up urgently, it’s best to make use of X; I’ll see one thing addressed to @AndrewSparrow in a short time. I discover it very useful when readers level out errors, even minor typos (no error is simply too small to appropriate). And I discover your questions very fascinating too. I can’t promise to answer to all of them, however I’ll attempt to reply to as many as I can, both BTL or generally within the weblog.