Markus Andrews

Dominic Raab has dismissed a whistleblower’s revelations about the chaotic Afghan evacuation as coming from a “junior desk officer” and insisted it was a success.The former foreign secretary hit back at the devastating evidence from Raphael Marshall – but did not deny that only 5 per cent of people at risk from the Taliban takeover received help.Mr Raab called the evacuation a “heroic and herculean effort” which got out 15,000 people and argued any delays were because of the situation in Kabul, not blunders at home.“We did everything we could,” he insisted, describing the UK effort as “a record that those involved, particularly those working on the ground, should be proud of”.He denied he was demoted to justice secretary because of his dismal handling of the crisis in August, or that his job was at risk again because of the whistleblower’s revelations.Asked if, as alleged, he “did not fully understand the situation”, Mr Raab told BBC Breakfast: “I don’t accept that. This is from a relatively junior desk officer.”Mr Marshall has alleged that tens of thousands of Afghans were left stranded following the fall of Kabul, because of chaos and confusion in the Foreign Office – blaming Mr Raab directly.The turmoil led to “people being left to die at the hands of the Taliban”, he said, alleging the former foreign secretary delayed vital decisions and insisted on evidence being presented better in a spreadsheet.The testimony has alarmed Tom Tugendhat, chair of the Commons foreign affairs committee and a former soldier – who has pointed to “failures of leadership around the Afghan disaster”.“These failures betrayed our friends and allies and squandered decades of British and Nato effort,” he said.“The evidence we’ve heard alleges dysfunction within the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and substantial failings throughout the Afghanistan evacuation effort.“The evacuation has been described as a success by some, but these allegations point to a very different story – one of lack of interest, and bureaucracy over humanity.”In his evidence, Mr Marshall disputed whether a No 10 claim to parliament that all emails from Afghans attempting to leave the country had been processed by 6 September was accurate.And he revealed there was uproar at the Ministry of Defence when Boris Johnson ordered an Afghan animal charity be given priority for evacuation.“There was a direct trade-off between transporting Nowzad’s animals and evacuating British nationals and Afghan evacuees, including Afghans who had served with British soldiers,” he said.But Mr Raab denied that claim, telling Sky News: “That’s just not accurate. We did not put the welfare of animals above individuals.”And, asked of his demotion was the result of his handling of the crisis, he replied: “Those are decisions for the prime minister, but I am pretty confident from what he said to me that it wasn’t in relation to Afghanistan.” More

Labour MP and former minister Harriet Harman has announced that she will stand down at the next general election. She confirmed the news on Tuesday morning by publishing her email to Camberwell and Peckham Labour Party members on social media. In it, she wrote that it had been an “overwhelming honour” to be an MP “representing and working for the people of Camberwell and Peckham for nearly 40 years”. She said that she could leave the Commons “now confident that Labour is gaining strength under the leadership of Keir Starmer and the new team he has appointed.”As the longest-ever continuously serving female MP in the House of Commons, Harriet Harman was given the nickname “Mother of the House” by prime minister Theresa May in 2017. She has worked with eight different Labour leaders and under seven different prime ministers. She has also won her London seat eleven times since she first took it in a 1982 by-election. Under Tony Blair, she was secretary of state for social security and the first minister for women. In the statement announcing her intention to stand down, she wrote: “I entered the Commons as one of only 11 Labour women MPs in a parliament that was 97 per cent men. Now there are 104 Labour women and across all parties women MPs are a “critical mass”. But there remains much more to de done till women genuinely share political power with men on equal terms and until women in this country are equal.”She continued: “I will leave the House of Commons with my feminism, my belief in Labour and my enthusiasm for politics undimmed.”Harriet Harman, 71, has held a raft of posts within the Labour party, including two brief stints as leader after Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband stepped down. In her email she said she remained proud of the achievements of the Labour government; referencing the introduction of the national minimum wage, the right to civil partnership, Sure Start children’s centres and the Equality act. Two other long-serving Labour MPs, Barry Sheerman and Dame Margaret Hodge, have also announced their plans to step down at the next general election. More

Dominic Cummings has implied that Downing Street is covering up Christmas parties during lockdown last year, saying it is “very unwise for No 10 to lie” after the prime minister’s spokesperson explicitly told reporters “there was not a party”.Boris Johnson’s former chief adviser also alleged some political journalists attended gatherings at the PM’s flat.Last week the Daily Mirror reported two events took place at Downing Street last year in the run up to the festive season. Boris Johnson allegedly gave a speech at a farewell gathering for former aide Cleo Watson last November, during the second national lockdown.The other event is said to have been a staff Christmas party in December, where games were played, food and drink were served and guests stayed past midnight.At this time, under Tier 3 Covid rules, Christmas parties and lunches were explicitly banned in London as social mixing indoors was prohibited.On Monday, the prime minister’s spokesperson explicitly denied that such a party took place last December.He said: “There was not a party, and Covid rules have been followed at all times,” but declined to say whether an internal investigation had been carried out.He added: “As press secretary set out on a number of occasions when questioned about this originally, there was not a party and Covid rules have been followed at all times.”When asked how he could be certain that no regulations were broken at the event last December, he said: “I don’t need to get into the positions we’ve taken. It is simply just a statement of fact”.The spokesperson added that there was an intention to have a Christmas party at Downing Street this year, although a date for such an event has not yet been confirmed.Following these statements, Mr Cummings took to Twitter to chastise the prime minister.He said: “V unwise for No10 to lie about this but PM set the course of lying on covid in spring when he decided to start rewriting history, deny herd immunity plan, etc”.The prime minister’s former chief adviser also accused political journalists who may have attended the Downing Street parties of “trying to bury” the story.“NB some lobby hacks were also at parties in No10 flat so trying to bury this story…” he said on Twitter.Mr Cummings himself infamously broke coronavirus rules during the first nationwide lockdown by driving to Durham.He stopped working at Downing Street in November 2020 after losing a power struggle and reportedly being told to “never return” by the prime minister.Since then, he has taken to criticising the government, taking aim at the prime minister over Brexit and Covid response policies. More

Government plans to ban the judicial review of asylum cases are likely to lead to people being wrongly deported to dangerous countries, parliament’s human rights committee has warned.In a scathing report the cross-party joint committee said government plans put people at “risk of grave human rights violations”.Dominic Raab’s courts bill going through parliament would make the rulings of upper immigration tribunals final – overturning an earlier Supreme Court ruling that says judges can look at them again.The bill is part of a wider crackdown on the judiciary planned by the government, which wants to stop the courts blocking government policies. It comes after years of court defeats for the Conservative government when its policies were found unlawful – on issues ranging from benefits to Brexit.Other provisions in the bill will also make it harder for judges to “quash” government policies and declare them retrospectively unlawful. The committee says these plans should be dropped, describing them as an “unfair and unreasonable” change that could leave people “suffering from the consequences of an unlawful decision”.Committee chair Harriet Harman said human rights would be rendered “meaningless” unless the they could be enforced and ministers who broke them held to account.In the report the cross-party committee of MPs and peers argue that the government should instead introduce reforms such as time-limits on judicial reviews for asylum cases.This approach would avoid the “nuclear option” that would see people facing “heinous” violations to their rights because of legal errors.The report says: “Given that ‘Cart’ judicial reviews predominantly concern immigration and asylum claims, the Joint Committee finds that their removal could result in people being wrongfully removed from the UK, putting them at risk of grave human rights violations in their country of origin.”Judicial supervision of the Upper Tribunal protects against legal error. While only a small proportion of Cart judicial review applications are successful, those applications may prevent individuals being wrongly removed from the UK to face the most heinous human rights violations. “The government should introduce procedural reforms, such as changes to the time-limits for bringing Cart judicial review, and assess their impact, before pursuing the ‘nuclear option’ of ousting judicial review from Cart cases.”Committee chair Ms Harman said: “Human rights are meaningless unless people can enforce them and those who breach rights are held to account. Judicial review is of fundamental importance in allowing someone who claims their rights have been breached by Government action to take the Government to court. “Governments should welcome that accountability not seek to dilute it. This bill dilutes the power of the courts to order redress and should be amended. The plan to carve out further areas from judicial review scrutiny should be resisted.”A Minister of Justice spokesperson said: “Our changes will give judges the flexibility and powers they need to ensure the Government is held to account, while tackling those who seek to frustrate the court process. “We note the JCHR’s report and will respond in due course.” More

Labour’s Ed Miliband has accused the business secretary of “running away” from questions in the House of Commons as hundreds of people brace for an 11th night without power following Storm Arwen. MPs tore into the government’s response to the power outages in the Commons on Monday with about 1,600 households still without electricity 10 days on.Shadow climate minister Mr Miliband claimed people in Scotland and the North of England have been treated like “second class citizens”. He said Kwasi Kwarteng, who was not present in the Commons, had “run away from questions in this House”.Mr Miliband said: “There are very serious issues here and the minister has had to come up with a hastily arranged dog-ate-my-homework excuse where he claims the Secretary of State is on the phone to Northern Power Grid at the moment, where he could have been on the phone before this statement or after this statement.“It is an insult to people in the North of England and an insult to people in this House.”The government’s own energy minister Greg Hands said it was “completely unacceptable” that many homes were still without power – as a fresh storm threatens to cause more chaos on Tuesday.Prime Minister Boris Johnson has now promised to restore power “by tomorrow at the latest” – after failing to deliver on a pledge to fix the problem by the end of last week.Labour has accused the Government of neglecting the North. Quoting a Conservative councillor from northern England, Mr Miliband said: “‘If this happened in London or in the South East everything would have got thrown at it’. They are his words. Aren’t people in the North entitled to think he is right? They have been treated as second-class citizens.”Labour’s Kevan Jones said: “There is something seriously wrong with Northern Power Grid, not with the engineers and individuals who are out restoring power but with the management and senior management of that company.”Mr Hands, who is also the Conservative MP for Chelsea and Fulham, said: “I’m glad to say that 99.8 per cent of those affected by the storm have had their power supply restored so far.”But this is not good enough, it is completely unacceptable that around 1,600 were still in this position as of this morning, but the situation is improving each hour.”He added: “I have been assured by the network operators that all efforts are focused on having power restored to those households (still without power) in the next day.”Residents in the North East have spoken of losing hope and feeling “fed up and angry” as they face an 11th night without power.Stewart Sexton, 57, who lives in Alnwick, Northumberland, with his partner, said Northern Power Grid has promised their power will be restored within 24 hours every day since it was cut on 26 November.He said: “It’s exhausting, it’s wearing us down, and it’s a constant worry. Every day seems to bring a new problem.”On day nine there was torrential rain and our village started to flood. That was mainly because of the storm debris.”What happened was that then flooded our village water works – it flooded our sewage system. Our neighbour couldn’t use his toilet without it flooding.”I had to clear standing water from the road, which got my clothes wet, and then return to a house without heating.”From my window I can see a snapped telegraph pole and cables lying on the ground.”The weather forecast is dreadful. We have not got any hope at all. It’s awful, it’s the futility of it.”Another Alnwick resident, Anna Elson, 49, said she is also travelling to a family member’s house with her 13-year-old son for a hot meal and a shower. She and her son suffer from rheumatoid arthritis, a condition worsened by the cold.Ms Elson said: “The village was left to cope on its own for too long, there are a few medically vulnerable residents here, including me.”No phone signal doesn’t help and makes us feel more vulnerable. Help has started to come but people feel it should have been a lot sooner.”Friends have offered help and the village has come together,” she added.”But we are fed up and angry at the lack of response we have had.”The Energy Networks Association said it had reconnected 99 per cent of homes that lost power following damage caused byStorm Arwen. But there are fears that Storm Barra, set to bring gale force winds of 80mph on Tuesday, could cause further disruption. Kwasi Kwarteng visited a Northern Powergrid call centre in Penshaw near Sunderland this weekend. He said he believed the power grid system could be made “a lot more resilient”.”We will have a review, we will see if the distributor companies have enough infrastructure, we may even have enforcement action if necessary,” he added.The long delays have prompted energy regulator Ofgem to warn it will take action against network companies who failed to restore power to customers quickly enough.It has also agreed with firms to lift the £700 cap on compensation which could be offered to those stuck without power.The change will allow those affected to claim £70 for each 12-hour period they have no electricity, after an initial £70 for the first 48 hours of any cut. More

As few as one in 10 confirmed Covid cases are analysed for the omicron variant, health chiefs have admitted, as “community transmission” of the strain was confirmed.Only half of UK testing facilities are able to carry out genetic sequencing of positive PCR tests, which is needed to identify the variant feared to be more transmissible and, to some extent, vaccine-evasive.It means only 10-20 per cent of positive results are sequenced, although a further 10 per cent are assessed for the absence of the S gene, cases which are likely to be omicron.The health secretary Sajid Javid acknowledged the gap in sequencing and told MPs he is “expanding” other omicron testing methods to all centres, but was unable to say when that will happen.The admission came as Mr Javid said there were 336 confirmed omicron case across the UK – a number which is likely to be a severe underestimation.“This includes cases with no links to international travel. So, we can conclude that there is now community transmission across multiple regions of England,” he told parliament.Some would be “feeling ill” while others have no symptoms, he told MPs, adding: “None of them, as far as I am aware, have been hospitalised.”The update came as No 10 confirmed that laws requiring mask-wearing and costly travel tests will remain in place into the new year without a Commons vote if necessary.Ministers had vowed to lift the restrictions before Christmas if possible, but their own scientific advisers have warned it will take longer to assess the threat from the omicron variant.Mr Javid said the picture is still uncertain, but “the window between infection and infectiousness may be shorter for the omicron variant than for the delta variant”.“We don’t yet have a complete picture of whether omicron causes more severe disease or, indeed, how it interacts with the vaccines,” he said.“We can’t say for certain at this point whether omicron has the potential to knock us off our road to recovery.“We are leaving nothing to chance. Our strategy is to buy ourselves times and to strengthen our defences while our world-leading scientists assess this new variant and what it means for our fight against Covid-19.”The UK Health Security Agency told The Independent that only 10-20 per cent of positive PCR tests undergo genomic analysis because labs lack the capability.Meanwhile, the latest Covid figures revealed 51,459 new coronavirus cases, which means the trend over the past seven days is 9.1 per cent up on the previous seven days.The 811 new hospital admissions and 41 deaths within 28 days of a confirmed lab result mean both are still on a downward trend – but only just.The emergency regulations, announced on 27 November, mean confirmed and “suspected” contacts of omicron cases must isolate for 10 days. However, it can take more than one week to carry out genetic sequencing – and there are thought to be stark regional differences in how likely that is to take place.In his Commons statement, Mr Javid said the government is using “other methods” to detect likely omicron cases, such as the presence or absence of the S gene.“We are expanding that as well so that all testing centres will be able to do it very soon,” MPs were told. More

A Conservative councillor for North Shropshire who was only elected in May has defected to former actor Laurence Fox’s right-wing Reclaim Party, an embarrassment for the Tories ahead of a key by-election in the county.Anthony Allen’s decision to join Mr Fox’s “anti-woke” political outfit comes as the region prepares to vote on Owen Paterson’s successor as local MP after the ex-Northern Ireland secretary resigned over his part in the “Tory sleaze” affair that has dogged the party this autumn.Mr Allen, a 45-year-old cab company owner turned councillor for Market Drayton, said in a statement: “I’ve resigned my membership to the Tory party and joined the Reclaim Party. The Conservatives simply aren’t conservative any more.”He added that the governing party had, in his opinion, “gone soft on illegal immigration, they’ve lost control of taxation and are obsessed with crippling green taxes nobody wants”.His defection was cheered by Mr Fox, scion of the celebrated acting dynasty turned populist provocateur who ran an unsuccessful bid to become London mayor earlier this year.“Anthony is our first councillor, but – watch this space – he won’t be our last” he said, adding: “I’d urge any other dissatisfied councillors out there to get in touch.”As a mayoral candidate, Mr Fox promoted himself as a Covid-19 sceptic, declining to wear a face mask during public appearances and declaring that he would not get vaccinated until 2023 by which point he said he would be satisfied it was safe to do so.His new vehicle is similarly preoccupied with freedom of speech issues as well as more zeitgeisty concerns like defending statues of historic figures such as Edward Colston and Cecil Rhodes against calls for their removal from public places.In an open letter on the Reclaim website, Mr Fox argues that mainstream politicians “have lost touch with the people they represent and govern” and that “our public institutions now work to an agenda beyond their main purpose”.He continues: “The people of the United Kingdom are tired of being told that we represent the very thing we have in history stood together against. We are all privileged to be the custodians of our shared heritage.“We can reclaim a respectful nation where all are included and none are ashamed to have somewhere to call home.”Mr Fox was joined by party deputy leader Martin Daubney on Twitter on Monday as he unveiled Mr Allen in a new video, the trio posing in the Oswestry chill in front of a vintage anti-aircraft gun while a stirring orchestral recording of “Jerusalem” played faintly in the background.Leaping on Mr Allen’s echo of the Brexiteers’ war cry to “take back control of our country”, one commentator joked: “They are taking back the taking back control.”Mr Daubney, a former member of Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party who represented the West Midlands in the European Parliament between 2019 and 2020, is running as Reclaim’s candidate in the North Shropshire by-election.He is up against the Conservatives’ Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst, Labour’s Ben Wood, Helen Morgan of the Liberal Democrats, Kirsty Walmsley of Reform UK and Duncan Kerr of the Green Party in battling to succeed Mr Paterson.The field also includes UKIP’s Andrea Allen, Alan “Howling Laud” Hope of the Official Monster Raving Loony Party and Boris Johnson impersonator Drew Galdron, among others. More

David Cameron should appear before the Grenfell Tower inquiry after making comments that were “ridiculing” health and safety in the years before the fire, a lawyer has said.The former Prime Minister made speeches regarding red tape and regulation that had effectively relegated citizens to “a bonfire”, said a barrister representing some of the bereaved and survivors.Michael Mansfield QC told the public inquiry into the 2017 blaze, which claimed 72 lives, that Mr Cameron should appear at a hearing to explain what he meant by his words.In 2010, Mr Cameron had said he wanted to “scrap health and safety rules that put people off”, Mr Mansfield said, and followed this the year after by saying “the shadow” of health and safety was holding people back, adding that this was not “how a great nation was built” and that “Britannia didn’t rule the waves with arm bands on”.Mr Mansfield said such speeches were “ridiculing, humiliating health and safety, and relegating citizens, as it were, to effectively a bonfire”.

He needs to be here to answer what he meantMichael Mansfield QCHe quoted Mr Cameron as having referred to the “health and safety monster” in 2012.Mr Mansfield said: “We say he needs to be here to answer what he meant. Because if it’s going to be sent through his proteges, through his ministers, whatever, that he didn’t mean what he said, well let him come and say that.“But this is what he did say, ‘to kill off the health and safety culture for good’.”Mr Mansfield, still quoting Mr Cameron, added: “I want 2012 to go down in history not as just the Olympics year or Diamond Jubilee year, but the year we banished a lot of pointless time-wasting from the economy and British life once and for all.“It has become an albatross around the neck of businesses, costing them billions of pounds a year, a feared health and safety monster to be slain, so that businesses feel they can get on, they can plan, they can invest, they can grow, without feeling they’re going to be strangled by red tape and health and safety regulation.”Mr Mansfield told the inquiry it was important to “recall” and “relive” the atmosphere of that time “because it could happen again unless it is banished as an approach”.Module six of the inquiry’s second phase is taking a close look at building regulations and the published guidance on fire safety, including detailed consideration of Government policy on relevant aspects.As Monday’s hearing opened, inquiry counsel Richard Millett QC urged organisations involved in the inquiry and witnesses to it to “fully embrace their obligations of candour and openness and face up to the stark realities that they reveal”.He said: “Their written submissions tend to suggest that they have been drafted with fingers crossed. We would urge the witnesses to come in this module to approach their evidence in the full spirit of cooperation and make concessions unhesitatingly where justified on the material.”In a statement to the PA news agency, a spokesman for Mr Cameron said: “As prime minister, David Cameron advocated a sensible new approach to health and safety regulations to ensure that they protected people and were applied where needed rather than unnecessarily overwhelm businesses with red tape.” More