Markus Andrews

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey has today set out a bold plan to help families weather the cost of living crisis with a one-year 2.5 per cent cut in VAT, paid for in part by an extended windfall tax on energy companies.Speaking to The Independent on the eve of his party’s annual spring conference, Sir Ed said Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak have failed to take the “radical” steps needed to shelter voters from what is shaping up to be the harshest economic storm for 50 years.He said the cut in VAT from 20 to 17.5 per cent would put an average £600 a year in the pockets of struggling families.The £18bn cost would be funded partly from borrowing – “the right thing to do in a one-off crisis”, he says – and partly from an increase in the “Robin Hood” tax on North Sea oil and gas giants demanded by Lib Dems.Having previously called for a £5bn levy, Sir Ed now says he would boost the take to somewhere around £10bn to reflect the additional profits being made “on the back of Putin’s aggression” in Ukraine.He said it was “bizarre” to see Mr Johnson opposing a levy in the Commons on Wednesday – effectively “defending the profits of oil and gas companies and refusing to do something for families”.This was another example of the Tories, for all their low-tax rhetoric, “taking voters for granted” when it actually comes to easing financial burdens on ordinary people, he said. The Lib Dem windfall tax was actually “more fiscally responsible” than Sunak’s energy discount – which would have to be repaid – while offering more help to households, he insisted.“The Tories seem to have lost their way,” Sir Ed told The Independent. “We’re a party of fair taxes. That’s what we’ve always talked about, as long as I’ve been in the party. And, at the moment, fair taxes requires tax cuts.”The cost of living initiative forms part of a conference which he said would focus firmly on the bread-and-butter issues which helped Lib Dem seize the seats of Chesham & Amersham and Shropshire North from Tories in recent by-election upsets.To the frustration of many of his members, it will also mean continuing his drive to shake off the party’s image as a single-issue anti-Brexit movement and swearing off calls for an imminent return to the EU – something Sir Ed says is “a long, long way off”.In place of a Rejoin message, the Lib Dems will be publishing a paper – product of a year’s research – setting out the practical problems caused by Mr Johnson’s Brexit deal to groups ranging from manfacturers to supermarkets, fishermen, farmers and musicians and proposing means of alleviating them.“It sets out ways we can improve on Johnson’s bad deal, reduce costs, make trade easier, rebuild relationships and trust with Europe,” said Sir Ed. “It takes people through the argument very much in a pro-European way – there’s no change on that. But it’s deeply practical, it’s realistic and it doesn’t ignore Leave voters.”Leave-voting farmers appalled at the way Johnson’s deals have cut them off from EU markets while paving the way for undercutting by Austalia and New Zealand were part of the coalition which delivered the seismic 37 per cent swing to Lib Dems in Shropshire North in December.And in typical Lib Dem fashion, the party leader says his troops aim to capitalise on local concerns to target more Tory seats in the so-called blue wall of traditionally Conservative constituencies.One key issue which rarely dominates political debate but where he feels the government is vulnerable is sewage.“This is coming from talking to voters on doorsteps,” he said. “So many Conservative MPs – including in blue-wall seats – voted in the way they did to allow utility companies to dump sewage in local rivers and streams and lakes. I mean, people don’t like that. They really, really don’t like that.”Just three weeks ago, Davey said he was putting his party on an election footing in case of an early poll if Johnson was forced out by Partygate. Today, he’s not so sure, saying only “we have to be ready whenever it comes”.He insists that Ukraine has not got the PM off the hook for lockdown-breaching Downing Street parties, which he confidently asserts “will come back to bite him”.And he was equally confident, for the leader of a party struggling to top 10 per cent in the polls, in stating that, whenever the election comes, “we think we can get rid of a lot of Tory MPs”.The vast majority of Lib Dem target seats – including Dominic Raab’s Esher & Walton – are Tory-held, and he said it was simply an “arithmetical truth” that if voters in many areas want to remove the Conservative government they will have to vote for his party.He once again denied any formal arrangement with Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour to carve up election battlegrounds.But he said that recent by-elections have made clear that the two parties are each making their own assessments of where to unleash campaign money and manpower and where to hold back.“Because we don’t have unlimited resources, you put those resources, if you’re sensible, in areas where you can win, and you don’t waste your resources in areas where you can’t win,” he said. “It’s just logic. I’m not privy to Labour’s discussions, but I’m sure they don’t have lots of money to waste either.”While restating that – unlike predecessor Nick Clegg – he would “never put the Conservatives back in”, Davey was warier about stating whether he would be ready to prop up a Starmer government in a hung parliament.And he insisted that his refusal to join Tories in government would be unchanged if they switched leader to someone less unpalatable than Johnson, such as Sunak or Liz Truss.“I’ve said all along that Johnson is unfit to be prime minister,” he said. “But they are all responsible. They allowed Johnson to become prime minister. They’re all Boris Johnsons now.”The Lib Dem spring conference takes place online from Friday to Sunday, apart for Sir Ed’s keynote speech to activists in York on Sunday. More

Boris Johnson has promised more sanctions on oligarchs linked to Vladimir Putin, after the UK slapped asset freezes and travel bans on Roman Abramovich and six others said to have “the blood of the Ukrainian people on their hands”.The prime minister said there could be “no safe havens for those who have supported Putin’s vicious assault on Ukraine” and promised the UK will be “ruthless in pursuing those who enable the killing of civilians, destruction of hospitals and illegal occupation of sovereign allies”.The long-demanded move means Abramovich-owned Chelsea Football Club can sell no more tickets or merchandise, and there will be a ban on transfers and new contracts. The projected £2bn sale of the club can go ahead only if none of the profit goes to the Russian billionaire.The club has been granted a special licence to allow it to complete the season, and tickets already purchased remain valid, but gloomy fans were resigned to a period of deep uncertainty after 19 years of rouble-fuelled glory.Chelsea Supporters’ Trust member Dan Silver said fans may have to swallow a “trophy wilderness” lasting as long as 10 years, but added: “So be it. We just want to make sure there is a Chelsea Football Club moving forward for us and for future generations.”Abramovich, 55, has always denied maintaining close personal or financial links with Putin. His ownership of Chelsea has long been seen as a form of insurance protecting him from being tied to the fortunes of the Russian president.But in an announcement on Thursday, the UK government said he has had a “close relationship” with Putin for decades, resulting in “financial benefit or other material benefit”.These included tax breaks for his companies, the buying and selling of shares from and to the state at favourable rates, and contracts linked to the 2018 Fifa World Cup.The businessman “is or has been involved in destabilising Ukraine” via the steel firm Evraz, in which he has a significant shareholding and which is “potentially supplying steel to the Russian military”, the statement said.Jets and yachts owned or chartered by Mr Abramovich, who is worth about £9.4bn, can now been seized.The other six individuals to be sanctioned are:Oleg Deripaska, an industrialist worth £2bn who has cultivated links with the British political establishment and famously hosted George Osborne and Peter Mandelson on his yacht. Deripaska has a multimillion-pound property portfolio in the UKIgor Sechin, known as Putin’s “right-hand man” and chief executive of the Rosneft state oil firm. Described by the Foreign Office as a “particularly close and influential ally of Putin”, he was already on the US and EU sanctions list and last week French authorities seized his yachtAndrey Kostin, a “close associate” of Mr Putin who has “long supported” the Kremlin as chairman of the sanctioned VTB bankAlexei Miller, CEO of state-owned energy company Gazprom, who is “one of the most important executives” backing the KremlinNikolai Tokarev, who is said to have served as a KGB officer alongside Mr Putin in the 1980s before rising to be president of the Russia state-owned pipeline company TransneftDmitri Lebedev, chairman of the board of directors of Bank RossiyaMr Johnson said there was “enough connection, enough link between the Putin regime and the individuals in question, to justify the action”.“I think when you look at what is happening in Ukraine, and you look to the casual rejection of every norm of civilised behaviour in bombing a maternity hospital, I think people in this country can see that people connected to the Putin regime need to be sanctioned, and that’s what we’re doing,” he said, during a visit to Liverpool.Britain’s list of 18 oligarchs sanctioned since the invasion began – not including Putin himself or foreign minister Sergei Lavrov – still lags well behind the EU and US.Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer called for fresh rounds of sanctions to go “further and faster”, saying he demanded Mr Abramovich be targeted weeks ago.“Every oligarch and those supporting Putin in any way should be sanctioned,” he told reporters on a visit to the Tapa military base in Estonia.But Mr Johnson said the government was proceeding “very carefully” in order not to infringe laws around property rights.Asked if there would be more measures against super-wealthy individuals in Russia’s power elite, he replied: “We’ve taken the powers to do that and certainly, you can expect to see that.”Britain will join allies from across the international community to “tighten the economic vice around the Putin regime”, he said.In the details of the sanctions placed on Mr Abramovich, the government described him as “a prominent Russian businessman and pro-Kremlin oligarch”.It added: “Abramovich is associated with a person who is or has been involved in destabilising Ukraine and undermining and threatening the territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence of Ukraine, namely Vladimir Putin, with whom Abramovich has had a close relationship for decades.”Foreign secretary Liz Truss said that “oligarchs and kleptocrats have no place in our economy or society. The blood of the Ukrainian people is on their hands. They should hang their heads in shame.”Abramovich put Chelsea up for sale on 2 March in the wake of Russia’s unprovoked invasion, promising to donate net proceeds to a charity benefitting “all victims of the war in Ukraine”. He has owned the club since 2003 and oversaw a record of 21 major trophies in 19 years. More

The UK government has eased customs rules for aid donations after confusion over post-Brexit bureaucracy left supplies meant for Ukraine stuck at the border in Dover for days.Charities and aid organisations exporting donated goods can now bypass electronic customs declarations which have been blamed for holding up lorries trying to reach Europe.Other customs formalities, such as needing to notify HMRC when the goods have been exported, were also lifted.The government said the rule changes – which will be temporary – were made in response to the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine but will apply to aid being sent to any destinations besides Russia and Belarus.Earlier this week charities said that five tonnes of donations for Ukraine had been held up at the port of Dover due to confusion over the new system of border checks.Britain’s exit from the EU single market and customs union led to a big increase in paperwork for goods crossing the border between the UK and the EU.A new electronic system, the Goods Vehicle Movement Service (GVMS), launched in January to facilitate the declarations needed to cross the Channel.Hauliers have complained that the system has caused the huge queues seen leading to Dover as even lorries with the right paperwork have been taking 15 minutes to clear the border.HMRC said it has changed the rules for drivers with aid shipments so that they will not be required to use the GVMS and can simply speak to customs officers or drive through a port.The changes will take effect immediately. More

The Partygate threat to Boris Johnson’s position has receded after Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross withdraw his demand for the prime minister to resign.The Moray MP was the highest-ranking Conservative to call for Mr Johnson to go after a spate of allegations of lockdown-breaching parties at 10 Downing Street during the Covid-19 pandemic.He was branded a “lightweight” by Johnson loyalist Jacob Rees-Mogg, but won the backing of his group of MSPs at Holyrood.But he today said that the international crisis triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is “not the time to be discussing resignations”.The humiliating climbdown came just hours after it was confirmed that Mr Johnson will attend next week’s Scottish Tory conference to speak to delegates about the war in Ukraine.It makes more remote the prospect of reaching the threshold of 54 MPs’ letters required to trigger a no-confidence vote in Mr Johnson’s leadership, even if the ongoing Metropolitan Police inquiry results in a fine for the PM.Opposition parties derided Mr Ross for his decision, accusing the Scottish Conservative leader of having “the backbone of a jellyfish”.Mr Ross said: “The middle of an international crisis is not the time to be discussing resignations, unless it’s the removal from office of Vladimir Putin.“There will be a time and place to debate Partygate but, as even [Labour leader] Keir Starmer said at the weekend, we should put that on pause while there is war in Europe.“It’s essential that we all fully support what the UK government is doing.“In light of Russia’s appalling actions, the government and prime minister need our backing, and they have mine and the whole Scottish Conservative party.“We should all be focused on what we can do to help the Ukrainian people in any capacity.”Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said: “We are right to be defending democracy in Ukraine, but that doesn’t mean we stop doing democracy at home.“This is a prime minister that has broken his own laws and shown contempt for the people of the UK.“Douglas Ross should not be using the Ukraine crisis to go back on his principles.“He knows Boris Johnson is not fit to be prime minister.”Scottish Liberal Democrat MSP Willie Rennie said: “Douglas Ross and the Scottish Conservatives have the backbone of a jellyfish.“Their limited welcome betrays a deep embarrassment that they are lumbered with a prime minister that they are ashamed of because of his double standards over parties in Downing Street.“It is difficult to change prime minister in the midst of an international crisis when we should be focusing on assisting the people of Ukraine, but he should have been gone long before now.” More

Priti Patel has cited the Windrush scandal as a reason not to allow open-door entry to Ukrainian refugees.Speaking in the Commons on Thursday the Home Secretary told MPs that visa restrictions imposed by the Home Office were necessary because of “something known as the Windrush scandal”.The scandal came about because the government’s “hostile environment” policies required people to show documentation they were never issued with when they arrived in the UK.As a result thousands of people – particularly those from the so-called “Windrush generation” who came to Britain after WWII were locked out of services like housing and healthcare.The government was pushed into paying compensation to the victims, who were mostly black Britons – though it has been criticised for being slow to do so.”What we are seeing, and it is important that we’re flexible in our response and we have been, is that there are many Ukrainians that do not have documentation,” Ms Patel said in response to an urgent question from shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper.”And if I may, Mr Speaker, I think this country and all governments, including probably a government that she once served in, will recognise that there was something known as the Windrush scandal.”As MPs on the opposition benches cried out in anger over her comments, the Home Secretary continued:”It’s important that everyone who arrives in the UK has physical and digital records of their status in the UK to ensure that they’re accessible to schemes.”They may holler on the other side by the process is absolutely vital in terms of the verification – notification and permission to travel, but importantly to give people the status when they come to the United Kingdom to have that right to work, the right to access some benefits and also the digital verification of their status. I think that is absolutely right.”Shadow foreign secretary David Lammy, who campaigned for the scandal’s victims, appeared to criticise the Home Secretary’s comments.Responding later on social media , he said: “Priti Patel, please listen to your government’s own Windrush Lessons Learned Review which said:”the Home Office must … change its culture to recognise that migration and wider Home Office policy is about people and, whatever it’s objective, should be rooted in humanity.”Britain has stood out among European countries in not offering an open door policy to Ukrainian refugees – with the government coming in for international criticism.At the start of the week French interior minister Gerald Darmanin, wrote a strongly-worded letter to his British counterpart Priti Patel, accusing the UK of a “lack of humanity” for not opening its doors.Ms Patel announced more measures to relax biometric checks on Thursday but Labour has said the measures will still result in delays. The opposition says emergency protection visas should be introduced, though it has also stopped short of calling the UK to emulate the UK’s open door policy and waive visas entirely. More

The Home Office should be stripped of its responsibility for helping Ukrainian refugees come to the UK, the Welsh first minister has said.Mark Drakeford said the department’s “long history” of running hostile migration and refugees regimes meant putting it in charge was “the wrong thing to do”.Labour’s most senior elected politician said Priti Patel’s department has long “demonstrated its incapacity” to do a good job on the issue and that a “dedicated group” should be set up at a UK level should be established.“Frankly, putting this in the hands of the Home Office is quite the wrong thing to do, the Home Office with its long history of ‘hostile regimes’ to people coming from elsewhere in the world,” he told the Commons Welsh affairs select committee on Wednesday.“The responsibility should be taken away from a department that has demonstrated its incapacity to mobilise to meet the response and put in the hands of a dedicated group of people at the UK level, who will do what is necessary to allow those people driven from their own homes and who temporarily in many cases wish to have sanctuary in the United Kingdom, to make sure that the actions of our government match the wishes of our people.”The Home Office has long been criticised for scandals involving the treatment or refugees and migrants, including the Windrush scandal.Mr Drakeford’s comments come as the UK is under pressure over its relatively closed door to Ukrainians fleeing Vladimir Putin’s invasion compared to other countries.EU countries have introduced an open-door policy and given all Ukrainian nationals access to housing and assistance – but Britain is requiring Ukrainians to apply for visas, with just some conditions relaxed.Just 300 visas were granted by the UK as of Monday, at a time when neighbouring Ireland had already admitted 1,800 people despite being remote from the warzone. The French government has accused the UK immigration regime of lacking humanity. The Home Office has been contacted for comment on this story.The Independent has a proud history of campaigning for the rights of the most vulnerable, and we first ran our Refugees Welcome campaign during the war in Syria in 2015. Now, as we renew our campaign and launch this petition in the wake of the unfolding Ukrainian crisis, we are calling on the government to go further and faster to ensure help is delivered. To find out more about our Refugees Welcome campaign, click here. To sign the petition click here. If you would like to donate then please click here for our GoFundMe page. More

The use of chemical weapons by Vladimir Putin in Ukraine may cross a “red line” which could trigger an international response, a British defence minister has hinted.Western officials say they are “seriously concerned” that Putin may deploy non-conventional chemical or biological warfare in Ukraine as he becomes increasingly frustrated with the slow progress of the invasion he launched two weeks ago.And the White House has warned that false claims by Moscow of a US-funded biological weapons programme in Ukraine was a “false flag” designed to pave the way for chemical attacks.Defence minister James Heappey today said Putin should “reflect very urgently” on how the international community has responded to other countries’ use of chemical weapons in the past.His comments were the closest any minister has yet come to spelling out the “red line” which could, if breached, provoke an active Western intervention in the Ukraine war.Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Mr Heappey said: “I don’t think it’s helpful to get into any firm commitment right now about where that red line sits, but I think President Putin needs to be very clear that when other countries have used chemical weapons it has caused an international response.“I think he should reflect very urgently on what has happened to other countries where they have used them.”He added: “President Putin needs to be clear that the use of chemical weapons is just the most despicable thing that anybody can imagine.“As horrid as the pictures we are seeing on our TV screens today of an artillery strike against a hospital (are), they are but nothing by comparison to the suffering and devastation that chemical weapons cause.”Asked later whether chemical weapons use could trigger an international response, Downing Street stressed that Boris Johnson considers Nato a “defensive alliance”.“It’s obviously the case that we and our allies will continue to monitor the situation closely considering the history of Russia and its proxies using chemical weapons, and the false allegations the Russian government has been making about others developing them,” said a No 10 spokesperson.Foreign secretary Liz Truss said it would be a “grave mistake” for Russia to use chemical weapons, but declined to say what the UK’s response would be.Asked if the use of such weapons would be a “red line” for the UK, and how it would respond in that situation, Ms Truss told CNN: “We are very concerned about the potential use of chemical weapons.“Now, of course, we’ve seen Russia use these weapons before in fields of conflict, but that would be a grave mistake on the part of Russia, adding to the grave mistakes that have already been made by Putin.”Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova claimed on Wednesday that invading troops had found documents showing Ukraine’s health ministry recently ordered the destruction of samples of plague, cholera and anthrax.She suggested this was proof of attempts to hide a military biological programme being developed by the Kyiv government with funding from the US Department of Defence.The claims have not been verified, and Western officials said on Wednesday that they appeared to be an example of a “false flag” operation designed to justify escalation of violence by Moscow as a purported response to manufactured threats from its enemies.“I think we’ve got good reason to be concerned about the possible use of non-conventional weapons, partly because we’ve seen what has happened in other theatres – for example in Syria – partly because we see a bit of setting the scene for that in the sort of false-flag claims that are coming out, and some other indications,” said one official.“It’s a serious concern for us.”White House spokesperson Jen Psaki said: “Russia has a track record of accusing the West of the very violations that Russia itself is perpetrating. In December, Russia falsely accused the US of deploying contractors with chemical weapons in Ukraine.“This is all an obvious ploy by Russia to try to try to justify its further premeditated, unprovoked, and unjustified attack on Ukraine.”Psaki added: “Now that Russia has made these false claims, and China has seemingly endorsed this propaganda, we should all be on the lookout for Russia to possibly use chemical or biological weapons in Ukraine, or to create a false flag operation using them. It’s a clear pattern.” More

The British government is facing ridicule after putting a photograph of the wrong person on an announcement about sanctions for Russian oligarchs.The Foreign Office on Thursday announced it would be sanctioning Dmitri Lebedev – chair of the board of Bank Rossiya.But an announcement posted on social media included a photograph of a completely different person.A graphic bearing Mr Lebedev’s name actually bore the picture of Dmitri Medvedev, a former prime minister of the country from 2012 to 2020.It was pushed out to the public via the FCDO’s social media channels.After users on social media pointed out the error with the post, it was deleted by officials – though without a correction.The measures against Mr Lebedev was part of a package announced on Thursday of new sanctions on seven individuals, including Roman Abramovich, the owner of Chelsea football club.The UK had previously been criticised for being slow to sanctions wealthy Russians with links to the Kremlin, compared to other countries like the EU.Liberal Democrat MP Layla Moran said the latest sanctions were a case of “shutting the door after the private jet has bolted”.Of the error, she added: “This is an embarrassing mistake from the Foreign Office. If an oligarch was sanctioned every time Liz Truss’s Foreign Office published a photo on social media, we’d have sanctioned the lot by now.”A spokesperson for the FCDO said: “This was an administrative error which was quickly spotted and rectified.” More