Markus Andrews

Business Secretary defends government handling of energy crisisLabour accused the government of putting its “out of office on” during a string of crises.Prime Minister Boris Johnson is reportedly on a week-long holiday in a luxury villa on the Costa del Sol.His trip comes as millions of households will see the costs of living rise during the energy price crisis, removal of the temporary uplift in Universal Credit benefits, supply chain issues, and higher taxes from next year.Shadow chief secretary Bridget Phillipson said: “In the teeth of a crisis of its own making, the Govt has put its out of office on. “The PM has gone on holiday, no one knows where the Chancellor is, and this morning we understand the Business Sec has entered the realms of fantasy.”Her comments came after Kwasi Kwarteng, secretary of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), said on Sky News that he was working closely with chancellor Rishi Sunak to help companies survive the energy price crisis.An anonymous Treasury source disputed this claim and said of Mr Kwarteng: “This is not the first time the secretary has made things up in interviews. To be crystal clear the treasury are not involved in any talks.”Commenting on the spat, shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves said: “If the Treasury isn’t in talks with BEIS to help our vital industries during this Conservative government’s energy crisis, then why on Earth aren’t they? “What is the Chancellor actually doing?”Show latest update

1633877621‘Energy crisis could lead to more winter deaths’ – McDonnellJohn McDonnell has warned that the energy crisis during winter could contribute to more Covid-related deaths.The former shadow chancellor said he fears that – unless the government takes action – there “risk a surge in winter related deaths alongside the worrying risks from high rates of Covid infections & the spread of the winter flu.”But he cast serious doubt over the coming months in describing PM Boris Johnson’s government as “immobile”.Lamiat Sabin10 October 2021 15:531633875280£3m ‘wasted’ on asylum camp that was never used, Labour saysMinisters have been of “reckless spending” after spending £3 million on a “prison-style” asylum seeker camp that was later scrapped.Figures obtained by Liberty Investigates show that millions were paid to a construction firm to install hired portacabins on the site of Yarl’s Wood removal centre, in north Bedfordshire, at the end of last year.The plan was to house 187 people there for 13 weeks, but the units were never used.Shadow immigration minister Bambos Charalambous said: “This is a shocking example of Home Office incompetence and waste. “The government’s asylum system lacks compassion and competence. Their dithering has wasted millions of taxpayers money.”Here’s the full story:Lamiat Sabin10 October 2021 15:141633872616Patel ‘needs to come clean’ over Channel crossing crisis – LabourPriti Patel “needs to come clean” over her strategy to tackle the numbers of people migrating to the UK in small boats, shadow home secretary Nick Thomas-Symonds has said.It comes after a French minister accused the UK of paying none of the £54 million it pledged earlier this year to help stop thousands of people making the perilous journey across the Channel in small boats.Mr Thomas-Symonds told Sky News that the fact that more than 1,100 people crossed into the UK on Friday and Saturday shows withholding money from France “clearly isn’t working”.More than 17,000 people have entered the UK this way in 2021.The Labour MP said: “The Home Secretary needs to come clean because every single person risking their lives in that dangerous sea crossing of the English Channel is one too many.”He added: “I’ve always thought the Home Secretary needed to take a different approach.“Whilst of course the patrols at the coast preventing people getting out onto the water and risking their lives is hugely important – of course it is – what I fear the Home Secretary misses is the fact that nobody becomes a refugee in northern France.“We need to be tackling the people smugglers and these vile criminal gangs further away from the coast as well.”Lamiat Sabin10 October 2021 14:301633869957Iain Duncan Smith mocked for equating pandemic to the BlitzTory MP Sir Iain Duncan Smith has been ridiculed online for writing that people should go back to their workplaces as he claimed was done during the Second World War.The former work and pensions secretary said war-time workers “kept coming to the office – even when Hitler’s bombs were raining down.”Speaking about “all too many” civil servants these days, he said: “Instead of rising to that challenge, as the wartime generation would have done, they have thrown their hands up in despair – before locking the doors and scuttling off home, of course.“When I think of all the brave civil servants who went to work in the 1940s, determined to do their bit regardless of the threat from falling bombs, I wonder what has happened to us as a nation.”People on Twitter pointed out the differences between the pandemic and the Blitz.Lamiat Sabin10 October 2021 13:451633868072Pollster warns against overstating PM’s strength by ignoring average ratingsFocusing on successive poll leads rather than an average rating “often distorts the truth” and risks overstating the strength of Boris Johnson’s position, a senior research manager at Opinium has suggested.He added: “Australia has literally toppled a Prime Minister (arguably two) because they have been behind in ‘X number of Newspolls’.”Andy Gregory10 October 2021 13:141633867568Opinion: Conservative conference was a Tory Disneyland where Boris Johnson is Mickey MouseReflecting on her first time visiting the Conservative Party’s annual conference, Jordan Tyldesley writes: “For those who haven’t been, the conference is like Tory Glastonbury. “It’s a place where like-minded individuals can socialise and envisage a country in which fervent right-wing agreement is the norm. It’s a sort of compact Tory Disneyland and of course, Boris Johnson assumes the role of Mickey Mouse.“Within these confines, MPs and delegates are shielded from the disapproval that is in full throng just a short walk away. The event hall is a political market in which people go to shop for ideology, ideas and intellectualism but also cheese toasties and Tory souvenirs. “T-shirts adorned with “Boris, Boris, Boris” are sold but with the exception of one serious fan girl doing laps around the venue, they don’t appear to be popular.”Andy Gregory10 October 2021 13:061633866524Labour attacks ‘out of office’ government amid apparent internal disputeA dispute appears to have emerged between the Treasury and Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy [BEIS], after the business secretary told Sky News he was working closely with chancellor Rishi Sunak to help firms weather the energy crisis.An anonymous Treasury source not only disputed this claim to Sky News, but also launched a personal attack on Kwasi Kwarteng, saying: “This is not the first time the BEIS secretary has made things up in interviews. To be crystal clear the treasury are not involved in any talks.”The spat drew a withering response from senior Labour politicians, who accused the government of having “put its out of office on”.Andy Gregory10 October 2021 12:481633865322‘Reasonable’ for PM to be on holiday, business secretary saysThe business secretary has defended Boris Johnson for reportedly taking a holiday on the Costa del Sol as the government battles to stem the damage from the supply chain crisis on multiple fronts.“I believe he has gone away. I’m not sure where he’s gone,” Kwasi Kwarteng told Times Radio.“But what I would say is I am in regular contact with him. He’s also had a year-and-a-half in which he’s almost lost his life to Covid, his mother passed away very sadly two or three weeks ago and he may have decided to take a short break. I think that’s something reasonable.“I’m in regular WhatsApp contact with him, I spoke to him only a few days ago. I’m not sure when he’s supposed to have left the country.”Andy Gregory10 October 2021 12:281633864222Downing Street police deprive PM pizza over safety concernsMuch to Boris Johnson’s annoyance and hunger pangs, his fast-food deliveries often get turned away by police at the gates of Downing Street – according to a report.The Sunday Times reported that the pizza delivery “nightmare” happens even when officers are asked to let the deliveries through.The source said: “No matter how many times [Mr Johnson] says, ‘Please, please, please, can you let this pizza through’, they say, ‘No’.”Lamiat Sabin10 October 2021 12:101633863010Boris and his government ‘patently not in control’ – Tory peerWhile a poll shows that a majority of Tory members are happy with the state of their party, a peer described PM Boris Johnson as “lurching from crisis to crisis”.Michael Heseltine, who is a former deputy PM that served under Margaret Thatcher and John Major, said that the current government is “patently not in control”.He told Sky News that Mr Johnson’s promises to “level up” the country and “take back control” after Brexit ring hollow.Lord Heseltine said: “Can you show me any area where you think this government has actually achieved a greater degree of control? “It’s lurching from crisis to crisis and it is patently not in control.”Lamiat Sabin10 October 2021 11:50 More

The government’s energy secretary has said he is as “certain” as he can be that gas supplies will stay on this winter. Speaking on Sunday morning Kwasi Kwarteng also ruled out lifting the energy price cap in the spring, a move called for by energy companies to let them raise prices.And the cabinet minister said there would no prospect of imposing a new green levy on heating bills for at least a year during the crisis.”I’m very committed and convinced that we will have full energy supply,” Mr Kwarteng told Sky News.”I’m as certain as I could be. Because obviously this is a global issue, we’ve seen right across the world real supply chain pressures, you’ve seen the Chinese have power blackouts, they’re rationing supply, here in the UK our job is to make sure there is minimal disruption.”Mr Kwarteng last month accepted the coming winter could be difficult with rising prices and some energy firms going bust.Asked whether a green levy would, as reported, be imposed on gas bills, he told the BBC’s The Andrew Marr Show: “We’re not going to do that, certainly, in the period of the next price cap.”And asked whether he was absolutely sure that the lights would stay on this winter, he said: “Yes, I am.”But it comes after Energy UK chief executive Emma Pinchbeck said that that the industry was “worried” about some of its customers.It has been suggested that rising prices could lead to a shutdown of some commercial energy users as their operations became uneconomical.”I don’t actually know what the consequences for commercial users will be, though they are more exposed to the prices and they have to buy energy at the price we’re seeing on the market and the same for some of our generators,” she told Sky News.”I will tell you our members are increasingly worried about those customers, and on top of that I think it’s less clear what will happen to business customers.”The last thing to say on this is of course when we say commercial customers, it’s actually quite a big range – that’s everything from your local corner shop through to manufacturers of steel.”So I think it’s right [Kwasi Kwarteng] is talking to the energy intensive users but we would also like to see a bit of a focus on commercial customers as a whole, and thinking imaginatively about each kind of commercial customers and what sort of support they might need – but yes of course, we’re worried.”Mr Kwarteng’s appearance on broadcasters on Sunday appears to have caused some consternation in government. The cabinet minister had said he was engaging with the Treasury on ways Rishi Sunak’s department could help the energy industry, but a Treasury source told Sky News: “This is not the first time the BEIS secretary has made things up in interviews. To be crystal clear the Treasury are not involved in any talks”The barbed exchange prompted a response from Labour. Bridget Phillipson, Labour’s shadow chief secretary to the Treasury, said: “In the teeth of a crisis of its own making, the Government has put its out of office on. The Prime Minister has gone on holiday, no one knows where the Chancellor is, and this morning we understand the Business Secretary has entered the realms of fantasy.“The two key government departments responsible for the current cost of living crisis have spent this morning infighting about whether they were in talks with each other. What a farce. If government ministers can’t even tell the truth about each other, then what hope do we have for the challenges facing our country?“We need urgent answers on who exactly is running the show. The Government needs to get a grip because the British people are paying the price for the Prime Minister’s incompetence.” More

Britain’s Brexit chief has accused the EU of not listening to his demands on Northern Ireland in a heated series of late-night posts on Twitter.Lord Frost’s comments came after Ireland’s foreign minister Simon Coveney accused him of laying out red lines he knew the EU could not accept, to deliberately engineer a breakdown in relations.The UK’s Brexit minister said he preferred “not to do negotiations by twitter” but would proceed since Mr Coveney had “begun the process”.The Brexit minister wants to change the part of the deal relating to Northern Ireland but the EU says the UK must stand by what it has signed.But Lord Frost specifically wants to dump jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice over the Northern Ireland deal, which he signed up to during talks but now is having second thoughts about. Lord Frost claimed the UK’s concerns around the court were not new as the UK had raised them in July. But he added: “The problem is that too few people seem to have listened.”Mr Coveney, who leads for Ireland on Brexit, had said the EU was “working seriously to resolve practical issues with implementation of Protocol” but accused the UK government of creating “a new ‘red line’ barrier to progress, that they know EU can’t move on”He added: “…are we surprised?” And said the “real question was whether the UK government actually wanted “an agreed way forward or a further breakdown in relations”.The Irish foreign minister’s comments echos concerns in Brussels where some officials believe Lord Frost simply want to twitter a meltdown of the Northern Ireland agreement, which the UK has never fully implemented.The UK minister is due to fly to Lisbon on Tuesday to give a speech where he will repeat his threat to suspend the Brexit deal.The UK says if the EU does not significantly change the deal then it will trigger Article 16 and suspend it unilaterally. Brussels is expected to issue its formal response to the UK this week. More

Boris Johnson plans to hold the next general election in winter as he believes it would hurt Labour’s chances of victory, according to a report.It would be held in November or December 2023, four years after he led the Conservatives to an 80-seat majority.“Labour struggles to get their people out more than we do which gives us an advantage,” a cabinet source told the Mirror.“And we think people will begin to see the results of the PM’s levelling up agenda with roads being constructed and houses built in the midlands and the north.”Oliver Dowden, Tory party chair, was asked earlier in the week whether a 2023 election was planned. He said: “The PM has told me to make sure the Conservative Party machine is ready to go for an election whenever it comes.”He said the government was focused on “getting on with the job of making sure that we deliver for the British people” and was not speculating about elections.Under current law, the prime minister would need a two-thirds majority backing in parliament to hold an early election. But the Commons recently passed a bill that would repeal the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011. If it passes the Lords, the bill would grant the prime minister the right to call an election at his discretion.The 2019 election campaign saw canvassers trudging door-to-door in the wind and rain on dark winter evenings. When election day came it was the wettest on record but predictions that the weather would lead voter turnout to plummet were proved wrong. Turnout was 67.3 per cent, down just 1.5 per cent on the sunny vote of 2017 and higher than the four previous elections of the 21st century.A 2023 winter election would be only the second in the post-war era. But they were not uncommon before – five out of the 10 elections between 1900 and 1935 were held in winter. More

Boris Johnson is taking a week-long holiday in Marbella, according to reports.He left Britain on Friday and is reportedly staying in a luxury villa on the Costa del Sol in southern Spain.It was not clear whether his wife Carrie and son Wilfred were with him.A Spanish police source told the Mirror: “Officially we can’t confirm but unofficially he’s in a big luxury villa on the border between Marbella and Benahavis.”We have been made aware that the British prime minister is staying and so we are all being extra vigilant. We know how important he is globally and what a potential target he is so there are extra patrols over the next few days.”Downing Street has been approached for comment.The prime minister’s cut short his planned summer holiday in Somerset after just one day when the Taliban seized Kabul in August. He returned to the West Country shortly after the last UK troops left Afghanistan. His Scotland staycation last summer nearly ended in “catastrophe” after he was swept out to sea while paddle-boarding.His winter 2019 holiday to the Caribbean led to him being brought before the Commons standards committee due to a discrepancy over how the trip was funded.Spain was on the amber list for overseas travel until Monday when the traffic light system was scrapped. Fully vaccinated travellers are now only required to take a test on day two after returning to the UK. More

Ministers are mulling whether to stop providing free universal access to coronavirus tests amid concern at their cost, according to a report.Having poured tens of billions of pounds into its Test and Trace scheme, the government currently offers free PCR tests for those with Covid-19 symptoms, while also footing the cost for quicker lateral flow device (LFD) tests for anyone who needs one.But a report suggests that, ahead of chancellor Rishi Sunak’s budget later this month, a change to the current system is being discussed in the spending review negotiations taking place between the HM Treasury and the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC).“It’s agreed that universal access isn’t sustainable or necessary given high vaccination levels,” The Daily Telegraph cited a Whitehall source as saying. “We now need to decide what the parameters should be that reasonably qualify access to free testing.”The Treasury and Cabinet Office favour changing the system soon while DHSC and Downing Street are more cautious ahead of the possibility of a surge in cases in the coming months, according to the paper, which reports that Boris Johnson will have the final say on the matter.Approached for comment, the Cabinet Office and Treasury both declined to comment. The Department of Health pointed The Independent to the government’s winter Covid plan, published in mid-September, which states: “Over autumn and winter PCR testing for those with Covid-19 symptoms will continue to be available free of charge.”It adds: “At a later stage, as the government’s response to the virus changes, universal free provision of [lateral flow tests] will end, and individuals and businesses using the tests will bear the cost. “The government will engage widely on the form of this model as it is developed, recognising that rapid testing could continue to have an important, ongoing role to play in future.”Asked about the report by the Daily Record, a Scottish Government spokesperson said there were “no plans to end the universal offer of lateral flow tests”, adding: “They are vital in helping break the chains of transmission, by helping us identify people without symptoms but who could pass on the virus.” More

Homes are earning more than the people who live in them in huge swathes of England, blocking the way on to the housing ladder for millions of young people, Labour has warned.New analysis seen by The Independent found that in 40 per cent of the country, the average annual growth in domestic property prices last year outstripped the total average wage in the area.Labour housing spokesperson Lucy Powell said the figures were proof that the link between hard work and a stable home has been broken, after 11 years of a Conservative government which claims to support home-ownership.She said the disparity was denying huge numbers of people the opportunity to settle down, raise a family and build a career in the area where they grew up.While the widest gaps were seen in affluent areas – such as Elmbridge in Surrey, where the rise in home prices was almost four times the average local wage – property was also earning more than people in some of the northern and Midlands regions which Boris Johnson has promised to “level up”.And the phenomenon was particularly visible in attractive rural and coastal areas where local people compete for housing with wealthy second-home owners.In Hastings, on the south coast, where local people earn a gross annual wage averaging £20,298, property prices increased by an average £50,320 in the 12 months to July 2021, outstripping incomes by a factor of 2.5.In north Devon, house prices rose by 2.5 times the local average wage (£53,454 compared to £21,721), in Rutland it was 2.4 times (£52,756 compared to £21,939) and in Richmondshire in North Yorkshire by 2 times (£44,885, compared to £21,900).Large gaps were also seen in places ranging from Harborough in Leicestershire – where prices rose by twice the average wage – to Tendring in Essex (1.9), Wyre Forest in Worcestershire (1.9) and Bolton (1.2).In most parts of England, there were large areas where the cost of a home rose by more than average earnings – including 58 per cent of the southeast, 54 per cent of the east of England, 52 per cent of the southwest and 47 per cent of the West Midlands.In a bold attempt to grab traditional Tory territory, Labour declared itself “the party of homeowners” at its conference last month in Brighton, arguing that despite their rhetoric the Conservatives had shown themselves to be on the side of speculators and developers.They accuse Mr Johnson’s administration of putting rocket-boosters under soaring prices with a stamp duty cut which helped second-home owners and buy-to-let landlords, while making properties less affordable for families.Labour has said it would give local authorities and communities new powers to develop land for truly affordable housing and give local residents first dibs on new developments.The party would also close loopholes, which developers exploit to avoid building more genuinely affordable housing“The Conservatives treat housing as a commodity, not the bedrock of stable lives and life chances,” said Ms Powell.“Eleven years of Conservative government mean the link between hard work and getting on the housing ladder is broken for local people who want to put down roots in the community they grew up in.“The government should get on board with our ambitious housing plans, or get out of the way.“Our new settlement on housing would force developers to build more truly affordable homes by linking affordable rents to local incomes, and by making it cheaper and easier for councils to buy the land they need to build more homes and reimagine town centres. “We’ll also give first-time buyers and local people first dibs on new developments so they can’t just be sold off, off plan to second homeowners or foreign investors.“Labour is the party of home ownership, the Tories are the party of speculators and developers.”Dan Wilson Craw, the deputy director of the Generation Rent campaign, told The Independent: “When it comes to housing, the story of the pandemic has been a huge giveaway to property owners through the stamp duty holiday, while renters who have lost income have burned through their savings to stay on top of rent. “As a result, would-be first-time buyers are further from home ownership than two years ago.“If the government wants to restore faith in our economy, it must unpick the Ponzi scheme it has allowed the housing market to become. “That means building the homes people need, which will reduce rents and allow people to save, and reforming property taxes that encourage the hoarding and speculation that drive up prices.” More

The British government is to present the EU with a new legal text to rewrite the Northern Ireland Brexit protocol signed by Boris Johnson just two years ago.The UK wants to change the agreement it negotiated for Northern Ireland because it says it is not working – and wants to remove the role for the European Court of Justice (ECJ) in the accord.But the EU says the fundamental treaty cannot be renegotiated.Northern Ireland has been hit by shortages of goods, and community tensions have risen over the accord, with threats being made against staff at ports.In a speech in Lisbon on Tuesday, Brexit minister Lord Frost, who negotiated the agreement, will repeat his demands for it to be changed, which have so far been rebuffed by Brussels.He will claim: “Without new arrangements in this area, the protocol will never have the support it needs to survive.”This week, Maros Sefcovic, the EU’s Brexit lead, promised proposals to respond to the UK – but he said removing the ECJ’s role would cut Northern Ireland off from the single market.Lord Frost is expected to tell his audience in Lisbon that the relationship with the EU is “under strain”.“No one should be in any doubt about the seriousness of the situation,” he will say. “That is why we are working to reflect the concerns of everyone in Northern Ireland, from all sides of the political spectrum, to make sure that the peace process is not undermined. “The EU now needs to show ambition and willingness to tackle the fundamental issues at the heart of the protocol head on.”Lord Frost will add: “By putting the protocol on a durable footing, we have the opportunity to move past the difficulties of the past year.He will propose the new legal text to the European Commission as the “foundation” for a new protocol that aims to support the Good Friday Agreement.And he will say the European Commission had been “too quick to dismiss governance as a side issue”, claiming that “the role of the ECJ in Northern Ireland and the consequent inability of the UK government to implement the very sensitive arrangements in the protocol in a reasonable way has created a deep imbalance in the way the protocol operates”. The UK has threatened to trigger Article 16 of the protocol if its demands are not met – effectively suspending the deal. More