Markus Andrews

Boris Johnson has claimed that Vladimir Putin would not have launched his “crazy, macho” attack on Ukraine if he were a woman.The prime minister said the Russian president was a “perfect example of toxic masculinity” as he joined Nato leaders in Madrid to discuss a radical overhaul of the western defence alliance.Mr Johnson told German broadcaster ZDF: “If Putin was a woman, which he obviously isn’t, but if he were, I really don’t think he would’ve embarked on a crazy, macho war of invasion and violence in the way that he has.”The PM added: “If you want a perfect example of toxic masculinity, it’s what he’s doing in Ukraine.”Mr Johnson also argued that “you need more women in positions of power” as Nato prepared to discuss an expansion of troop numbers, and membership bids by Finland and Sweden.Defence secretary Ben Wallace appeared to agree with the PM’s assesment of the Russian leader, saying: “Putin’s view of the world is a small man, macho view of the world.”The cabinet minister told LBC: “You rarely hear the phrase small woman syndrome. You always hear small man syndrome and I think he’s certainly got it in spades.”There was also a surprising endorsement for Mr Johnson’s comments from the SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon.She told Good Morning Britain: “I think it is important we don’t generalise. Women make mistakes as well as men make mistakes…. But I do think women tend to bring more common sense and emotional intelligence and reasoned approach.”The prime minister will ask Nato allies to step up their defence spending in the face of the threat from Moscow – despite a scathing attack from his own defence secretary Ben Wallace on the UK’s “smoke and mirrors” military budget.Mr Wallace said UK forces had for too long survived on “a diet of smoke and mirrors, hollowed-out formations and fantasy savings” – after calling for the PM to commit to a 20 per cent spending increase.The prime minister said he would “leverage” Britain’s military spending to “drive greater commitments from other people”.Figures shared by Nato show that the proportion spent by Britain on its military has declined to 2.12 per cent over the past year – falling for the second year in a row.But the UK government said its defence spending was projected to rise to 2.3 per cent of GDP this year due, partly due to £1.3bn of support committed to Ukraine.It comes as Turkey agreed to support Finland’s and Sweden’s bids for Nato membership, secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg said on Tuesday night.“I am pleased to announce that we now have an agreement that paves the way for Finland and Sweden to join Nato,” Mr Stoltenberg told reporters on the side-lines of a NATO summit in Madrid.“Turkey, Finland and Sweden have signed a memorandum that addresses Turkey’s concerns, including around arms exports and the fight against terrorism,” Mr Stoltenberg added.Mr Johnson said earlier that “progress” had been easing concerns from Turkey about Sweden in particular over the Kurdish militant groups given a home there. More

Boris Johnson has revealed that he had a “frank” exchange with Argentina’s president Alberto Fernandez about British sovereignty of the Falkland Islands at the G7 conference.The PM shared his displeasure that the subject was raised when the leaders met at the margins of the summit in Germany shortly after the 40th anniversary of the war over the South Atlantic islands.Asked if he was disappointed Mr Fernandez had brought up British control, Mr Johnson told reporters: “Yeah”, before saying he had offered a reminder that the matter was settled.“It had been decided decisively over many, many years, and I saw no reason for us to engage in a substantive discussion about it,” the PM said on his journey from the G7 to the Nato summit in Madrid.He added: “I made the point that we were spending a lot of our time talking about Ukraine, where the principle at stake was the right of sovereign independent people to determine their future.”The undeclared war in 1982 between Britain and Argentina, following the invasion of the islands by General Leopoldo Galtieri’s junta, claimed the lives of 255 British forces personnel.According to the Argentine delegation’s statement after the G7 meeting, Mr Fernandez said the Falklands were a “colonial enclave” and told the sovereignity issue was different to Ukraine.The president is also said to have asked the prime minister for the re-establishment of flights to the islands from Argentina.“I understand that our friends in the Argentinian delegation have presented this as being a more acrimonious conversation than it was,” Mr Johnson said on Tuesday. “I would say it was frank, free – but it seemed to me to be friendly.”Asked what he had said to Mr Fernandez, he added: “I just said it had been 40 years ago since the UK had – at the cost of sacrificing many lives – had vindicated principle that the Falkland Islanders should have the right to determine their future under basic diplomatic principles and have the right to be British.”Meanwhile it emerged that Mr Johnson and French president Emmanuel Macron drank whisky together at the G7 summit in Bavaria on Sunday night, according to a UK government source.“The PM is not a big drinker, nor a late-night party animal,” said the official, revealing that Mr Johnson was up early on Monday morning for a swim.Mr Johnson has also enjoyed “ongoing banter” with Canadian counterpart Justin Trudeau about the infamous photos of Vladimir Putin’s bare-chested horseback rides.“Trudeau ran around the lake as the prime minister was swimming in it,” said the source. “So the banter about riding bareback and imitating Putin and displaying their pecs got a new lease of life.” More

A unilateral decision by parliamentary authorities to rip up plans for the restoration of the Palace of Westminster could result in billions of pounds in extra costs, decades of delay and “extraordinary” health and safety risks, a spending watchdog’s report has warned. The report by the Commons public accounts committee said there was “no justification” for the decision by the Commissions which run the Houses of Commons and Lords to abolish a sponsor body set up just three years ago to oversee the massive project and instead seek to do the job themselves.The shock decision in February derailed the sponsor body’s plans finally to present a business case for the works in 2023, more than 20 years after the renovation of the crumbling Victorian landmark was first discussed.It came after criticism from MPs including Jacob Rees-Mogg of the 2019 decision that both Houses should be moved out of the historic building while works take place. The commissions have called for reconsideration of alternative options, despite an earlier study saying that keeping MPs in place could add as much as 48 years and £11bn to the project, currently estimated to cost at least £7-£13bn and last a minimum of 19 years.Today’s report criticised “unacceptably slow” progress on renovation, warning that the likely start date for major works was being “pushed back by many years because of repeated attempts to revisit the basis of the programme”.Disagreements among MPs on how the work should be done were “a major cause of the delays”, the report said.“Until parliament decides what it wants, and sticks to it, it will be almost impossible for any sponsor to deliver any programme, particularly as the composition and therefore the view of parliament itself can change at least every five years.”The committee warned that delay was not cost-free, pointing to the 25 fire incidents and 13 cases of falling masonry in the Palace since 2016, during which period House authorities have spent £140m on temporary fire safety systems alone.The cross-party committee condemned an “unacceptable cloak of secrecy around the programme”, after House authorities failed to report an asbestos incident for three months.And the committee said there was “no evidence to justify” the commissions’ decision to abolish the sponsor body, which was set up to take decisions out of the hands of politicians whose focus is on the five-year electoral timetable rather than the minimum 19-28 year period of the works.Parliamentary authorities’ proposal that they should take on oversight of the work “does not seem viable”, given their previous performance with the renovation of the Elizabeth Tower – better known as Big Ben after its famous bell – which saw the original £29m budget almost triple. “The House authorities have unilaterally taken this massive, critical project of huge national, historical, cultural and political significance back to the drawing board; reversing decisions by both Houses, with no justification for wrecking the plan that was underway – if tortuously slowly – and no assurance that they can actually deliver the works they now envisage,” said committee chair Dame Meg Hillier.“This cannot be acceptable in anyone’s book.“It is inconceivable that this building at the heart of our nation’s life should be allowed to deteriorate further – or worse, that those working or visiting the Palace are put in physical danger – by the inability of the current generation of residents to come to and stick to a decision about how to proceed.”The Prospect union, which represents many parliamentary staff, backed the report’s findings.“Delays and poor decision-making are increasing the risk of disaster for the building and the thousands of people who work there,” said general secretary Mike Clancy.Ministers’ insistence on looking for an alternative to a full-scale “decant” of parliament into a different venue during works was “baffling”, he said.“Ministers need to drop the political soap opera and ensure that the safety of staff in the building is put first,” he said. “The cheapest, quickest and safest solution has been shown to be a full decant. Keeping the estate operational during the restoration will not even save money.” In a statement, the two commissions said that they had proposed a new approach to the restoration project, drawing on expert advice, because of “concerns” expressed over the costs and timescales put forward by the sponsor body.“The new approach is designed to ensure maximum value for money and will see essential safety-critical works start sooner than was originally proposed,” they said.“The commissions’ proposals have been published in full. Engagement with the parliamentary community on these proposals is currently under way. Members of both Houses will have the final say, and it is intended that they will have the chance to debate and decide on the commissions’ proposals before the summer recess.” More

A former president of the country that has the world’s biggest elephant population has issued a heartfelt plea to Boris Johnson’s government to finally outlaw imports of body parts from hunted animals, after an outcry when ministers postponed a ban.Ian Khama, who criminalised trophy-hunting in 2014 during his decade as president of Botswana, warned that every day without a ban on hunting trophy imports took elephants nearer to extinction.“I hope very much that this time they will stick to it because every day that we lose, we are losing many animals out there in different parts of the world,” he said.“So it’s very important that this is addressed sooner rather than later because the rate of decline of wild species means we’re going to see more and more of these animals becoming endangered and going extinct.”The former president, officially known as Seretse Khama Ian Khama, spoke to The Independent before the launch of a heavyweight report by cross-party MPs and peers with testimony from experts in support of a trophy ban.Renowned conservationist Jane Goodall, who is also at the Westminster launch on Wednesday, said: “The hunting lobby will work hard to preserve the status quo. If we want to maintain our reputation as an animal-loving nation, all hunting trophies should be banned. Time is of the essence.”According to the all-party parliamentary group on trophy-hunting, the report is the most comprehensive inquiry into the practice ever produced in the world. Published just before the seventh anniversary of the killing of Cecil the lion by Walter Palmer, the 278-page document includes “confessions” from British trophy-hunters about shooting monkeys and cats out of trees for “fun”, and carries harrowing descriptions of injuries inflicted on “big game” animals by British hunters. The report, the result of a six-month parliamentary inquiry, carries some previously-unseen photos of British trophy-hunters with lions, elephants, giraffes, hippos and other animals.Trophy-hunting, which unlike poaching is legal, is almost always carried out by wealthy shooters from richer countries who pay large sums, often under guidance, to kill popular species.The new report also identifies British firms that offer hunting holidays to shoot endangered animals and reproduces their price lists.After many years of being lobbied by conservationists, ministers last year drew up the Animals Abroad Bill, which included a ban on imports of trophies, such as heads, tails, ivory and even entire carcases.But the bill was dropped from this year’s Queen’s speech, to the dismay of supporters.Conservative MP Henry Smith has introduced a private member’s bill with a ban, which has government support so stands a good chance of becoming law when it goes to parliament in November.It was very disappointing when the UK government postponed its bill containing a ban, the former president said.He is locked in a fierce war of words with his successor, Mokgweetsi Masisi, who lifted Botswana’s trophy-hunting ban in 2019.Asked whether the onus should be on the new president to ban trophy-hunting rather than rely on UK action, Lt Gen Khama said: “It’s a two-pronged approach. When I was president, I believed it was my responsibility to contribute towards the conservation of nature by banning hunting, and it’s also the responsibility of others, like in the UK, to ban imports of hunting trophies.“And if we all work together, we will achieve a healthy planet. Global Britain means leading the world by example.”The Animals Abroad Bill, which would also have outlawed fur and foie gras imports, was reported to have been vetoed by cabinet members claiming it was not a serious issue.In response, the Botswanan former leader said: “Would you say global warming is a soft, cuddly issue because people don’t think about it every day walking around?“The ceiling is sinking lower and lower and eventually we’re going to be engulfed by polluted air and loss of rainforest. We are slowly strangling ourselves to death.“Nature affects our own livelihoods so it’s not soft and cuddly – it’s very urgent.“The rate at which animals are being slaughtered, we’re heading for a situation when there will be very few left and they’ll be seen only in zoos.”Environment secretary George Eustice assured the lobbyists that the government would do everything it could to ensure the private member’s bill passed, and Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner also pledged her party’s supported, according to Eduardo Goncalves, founder of the Campaign to Ban Trophy Hunting.Lt Gen Khama said controversial attempts by Botswana’s wildlife authorities to hold a sale of ivory stockpiles were driven by “greed and corruption”.The country is a founder member of Africa’s Elephant Protection Initiative, which opposes ivory stockpiles from “leaking” onto the illegal market, fuelling further killing.Last year’s quota for trophy hunting animals in Botswana was around 2,279.A government spokesperson said: “We are committed to banning the import of hunting trophies from thousands of endangered and threatened species.“This ban will be among the strongest in the world, leading the way in protecting endangered animals – and we welcome the private member’s bill that will deliver this crucial step forward.” More

MPs should block the Australia trade deal because the government has broken a promise to allow it to be scrutinised properly, a damning report says.Ministers are condemned for trying “to rush it through” – despite evidence that farmers will suffer and the climate crisis has been sacrificed – even as Canberra pauses on ratifying the agreement.MPs are supposed to be given time to consider if any new trade deal protects human health, animal welfare and the environment before the ratification process begins.But the Commons international trade committee says it was denied full information until 6 June – yet ratification of the Australia deal has already begun and will conclude on 20 July.Angus MacNeil warned damage from the deal might not be “fully uncovered” – pointing out how ministers praised the Northern Ireland Protocol, but are now tearing it up.“This could have damaging effects for businesses and communities across the UK,” he warned, calling the lack of scrutiny “beyond belief”.Calling for ratification to be delayed, Mr MacNeill added: “The government rushed the scrutiny of the Northern Ireland Protocol, and we can all see the consequences of that now.”The committee will demand answers from Anne-Marie Trevelyan, the international trade secretary, when she gives evidence on the Australia trade deal on Wednesday.She is accused of dodging scrutiny until after kickstarting ratification under the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act (CRaG) – the MPs noting her appearance “follows eight requests”.The deal has huge political significance for the government – as the first post-Brexit agreement with a new partner – but is forecast to add just 0.08 per cent to the economy and not until 2035.Ministers say it will allow young backpackers to visit Australia for longer and give greater certainty to scientists, lawyers and other professionals seeking visas.But tariffs will be scrapped immediately on imported beef and lamb, up to a “cap” on sales expected many times the current level of Australian meat sold in this country, alarming farmers.The government’s own impact assessment revealed the deal will cost farmers and food producers almost £300m – despite Boris Johnson’s vow to “protect’ them.There is also anger over the UK secretly dropping a pledge to bind Australia to the 1.5C global temperature rise target at the heart of the last year’s Cop26 climate negotiations.A Lords committee raised fears that “deforested land” in Australia will be used to produce beef and cereal for the UK and “pesticides banned in the UK”.Ministers say the deal will boost trade by £10.4bn by 2035 – a 53 per cent increase – of which £6.2bn will be UK exports to Australia, such as cars, Scotch whisky and UK fashion. More

Labour’s Lisa Nandy will accuse levelling up secretary Michael Gove of behaving like “a Grant Shapps tribute act” as she warns the government is putting its head in the sand over the crisis facing essential public services.Ms Nandy will on Wednesday warn that there is “a perfect storm looming on the horizon” as local councils struggle to cope with the cost pressures imposed by high inflation.Her comments come after the Local Government Association warned of cuts to services such as bin collections, pothole repairs and adult care as soaring energy prices and inflation drain £3.6bn from annual budgets over the next few years.Labour has accused transport secretary Mr Shapps of acting as a spectator in the recent rail strikes, after he refused to get involved in negotiations between employers and unions.Now Ms Nandy is urging Mr Gove to “get a grip” on inflation pressures by holding urgent talks with councils to head off disruption to crucial services.Speaking to the LGA conference in Harrogate on Wednesday, the shadow levelling up secretary will say: “We need an active government that doesn’t sit on its hands but seeks out unions and employers to square this circle together. We have just seen our railways grind to a halt while the transport secretary refused to lift a finger.“So I say to Michael Gove – the country doesn’t need a Grant Shapps tribute act.“Convene a meeting, without delay, with the explicit aim of reducing pressure on councils so they can maintain services and support the staff who are the beating heart that sustains them.”Ms Nandy will warn that all councils and their workers face a “new crisis” which threatens services communities rely upon.She will call for support for “the local government cleaners, home care workers, refuse collectors and teaching assistants, the people who kept this country going during the pandemic at great personal cost and who now can’t feed their own families on the money they earn even as they care for ours”.And she will urge Whitehall to “ease the pressure” on town halls by acting as a partner to local authorities.Labour said Ms Nandy will lay out plans to give more powers to communities in order to “smash up a century of centralisation” and “restore power to people who will use it to rebuild from the ground up”. More

Boris Johnson will call on Nato allies to step up their defence spending in the face of the Russia threat, despite a scathing attack from his own defence secretary Ben Wallace on the UK’s “smoke and mirrors” military budget.The prime minister said he would “leverage” Britain’s military spending to “drive greater commitments from other people” ahead of crucial talks with fellow Nato leaders at a summit in Madrid. But Mr Wallace said UK forces had for too long survived on “a diet of smoke and mirrors, hollowed-out formations and fantasy savings” – after calling for the PM to commit to a 20 per cent spending increase.It came as the new head of the British Army, General Sir Patrick Sanders, warned that any further cuts to Army troops – set to shrink from a target figure of 82,00 to 72,500 – would be “perverse”.The row erupted after it emerged that Mr Wallace had written to the PM to ask him to hike military spending to 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2028. The defence secretary fears the target will not be hit without significant new commitments.Mr Wallace told the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) think tank on Tuesday: “If governments historically responded every time the NHS has a winter crisis so must they when the threat to the very security which underpins our way of life increases.”Labour also accused the PM of “breaking” his own 2019 manifesto promise on defence spending, after a senior government source said the pledge to hike annual military spending by 0.5 per cent above inflation may no longer be met.The government official said the country’s post-Covid finances meant there had to be “a reality check on things that were offered in a different age”.Speaking to reporters on his journey to Madrid, Mr Johnson defended his record on defence spending and dismissed the above-inflation manifesto target – saying “you don’t look at inflation as a single data point”.The PM said the UK’s own spending this year would be 2.3 per cent of output, well above Nato’s 2 per cent minimum target. On asking other countries to be more ambitious, Mr Johnson said the Ukraine invasion “requires us all to step up … the UK is doing so”. Labour’s shadow defence secretary John Healey said: “The prime minister keeps breaking his defence pledges to the British public. With threats increasing and rising Russian threats, ministers must reboot defence plans and halt army cuts now.” More

Stella Creasy has said she will table an amendment to the British Bill of Rights to establish women’s access to abortion as a human right.The Labour MP for Walthamstow told The Independent abortion rights in the UK are “more fragile than people realise” as she warned many Britons are unaware abortion is still criminalised in this country.Ms Creasy’s announcement comes after the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade – the landmark decision that legalised abortion nationwide in 1973. Millions of women in America have subsequently lost their legal right to terminate a pregnancy, with over half of US states expected to ban abortion or heavily restrict policies in the wake of the decision. Some states are set to ban abortions even when a pregnancy is as a result of rape or incest or when the woman’s life is at risk due to pregnancy complications.Ms Creasy said her amendment to the British Bill of Rights, which will be tabled when the legislation is published at second reading, pushes the message “abortion is a human rights issue”.The politician, an outspoken campaigner for abortion rights, added: “Roe v Wade gave women in America a constitutionally protected right to an abortion. We have never had that right in the UK. “What the dismantling of Roe v Wade teaches us is we cannot wait for further attacks. Nobody thought the Supreme Court would roll back on a right it had granted.”Abortions are still deemed a criminal act in England, Scotland and Wales under the 1967 Abortion Act. If any medical professional delivers an abortion out of the terms of the act, they are at risk of facing criminal punishment.Legislation passed in 1861 means any woman who ends a pregnancy without getting legal permission from two doctors, who must agree continuing with it would be risky for the woman’s physical or mental health, can face up to life imprisonment.Ms Creasy said she has consulted lawyers who informed her establishing abortion as a human right is “within the scope” of the Bill of Rights. She said votes on abortion are not subject to the party whip as they are issues of conscience and she expects MPs to be given a free vote on the amendment.The politician noted she wrote the legislation that specifically states women in Northern Ireland have a protected right to access abortion services as a human right.“Women in England, Wales and Scotland don’t have the same protection,” Ms Creasy added.In Northern Ireland, abortion was banned in almost all circumstances, even rape and incest, with women seeking terminations facing life imprisonment, until it was legalised in October 2019. While abortion has been decriminalised there, abortions still remain hard to obtain due to services not being commissioned because of a stalemate at Stormont.Ms Creasy urged anyone concerned about abortion rights to contact their MP to ask them to pledge to back her amendment – adding it could pave the way for abortion to be decriminalised.”Bringing in a human rights framework would inevitably progress the argument that healthcare is not a criminal matter,” Ms Creasy added.The legislation, which will serve as a successor to the Human Rights Act, will be debated in the Commons at the legislation’s second reading which is expected to happen in the coming weeks.Reflecting on the dismantling of Roe v Wade in the US, Ms Creasy said: “I’ve always learned we don’t mourn, we organise. I am very clear we must stand in solidarity with sisters in America. If we get this in to the British Bill of Rights, it sends a message abortion is a human rights issue.”Ms Creasy hit out at “all those commentators who say this could never happen in the UK” – adding they don’t realise “how much pressure” MPs are under from anti-abortion activists.Ms Creasy noted the UK government initially planned to stop so-called telemedicine measures, which involve taking pills to terminate a pregnancy, as they were under pressure from people who were “behind the scenes”.Before Covid hit the UK, getting the first tablet, mifepristone, for a medical abortion required a visit to an abortion clinic. But after lockdowns were rolled out to contain the spread of the virus, the government allowed the medication to be sent by post to be taken at home after a phone consultation.At the end of March, MPs voted to make at-home early medical abortions permanent in England, with 215 politicians voting for the measure and 188 against.The politician’s comments come after Danny Kruger, the Conservative MP for Devises in Wiltshire, on Tuesday warned the UK should not be “lecturing” America about abortion rights. Mr Kruger provoked criticism for saying he does not agree with people who “think that women have an absolute right to bodily autonomy in this matter”.For years, abortion providers, charities, medical bodies, and MPs have been calling for abortion to be decriminalised in the UK. They want to see abortion law extricated from criminal law and monitored in a same way to other medical practices – with the British Medical Association in favour of the decriminalisation of abortion in the UK. 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