Markus Andrews

Elton John has issued a strongly worded statement warning the government that the UK is in danger of losing “a generation of talent” over the “gaping holes” in its trade deal with the EU.As The Independent revealed earlier in the year, despite Boris Johnson’s vow to “fix” the crisis – triggered by his Brexit deal – no talks have taken place and artists have merely been promised advice on the daunting barriers they now face.On Thursday 10 June, John shared a post to his Instagram revealing that he – along with his partner and Rocket Entertainment CEO David Furnish, Marshal Arts’ Craig Stanley and Lord Paul Strasberger – met with Lord Frost “to spell out the damage the trade agreement he negotiated with Europe is doing to the UK’s music industry”.John warned that, due to the trade deal, new and emerging artist will be unable to tour Europe freely – “an essential part of their education and development” – due to the prohibitive nature of the newly required visas, carnets and permits.“Despite this looming catastrophe, the government seems unable or unwilling to fix this gaping hole in their trade deal and defaults to blaming the EU rather than finding ways out of this mess,” the 74-year-old said.“The situation is already critical and touring musicians, crews and support staff are already losing their livelihood.”John stressed that he was not writing out of concern for artists who currently tour arenas and stadiums: “We are lucky enough to have the support staff, finance and infrastructure to cut through the red tape that Lord Frost’s no deal has created.”“This gravest of situations is about the damage to the next generation of musicians and emerging artists, whose careers will stall before they’ve even started due to this infuriating blame game,” he wrote.John said that had he faced the financial and logistical obstacles that young musicians do, he doubted he would be where he is today.“During our meeting Lord Frost said trying to solve this issue is a long process,” he wrote. “Unfortunately, our industry doesn’t have time. It is dying now. The government have broken the promise they outlined in 2020 to protect musicians and other creative industries from the impact of Brexit on tours to Europe.“They now need to find solutions in both the short and long term to ensure the UK music industry continues to thrive.”He concluded his statement by pointing to a “window of opportunity” created by the halt on touring the pandemic has caused.“I call on the government to sort this mess out or we risk losing future generations of world-beating talent,” he said. “This is about whether one of the UK’s most successful industries, worth £111bn a year, is allowed to prosper and contribute hugely to both our cultural and economic wealth, or crash and burn.”Last month, a legal opinion obtained by the Incorporated Society of Musicians (ISM) dismantled the reasons given for the government’s failure to secure a visa waiver agreement (VWA) with Brussels.The organisation also said the EU has no fewer than 28 such deals in place, which means performers in countries including Colombia, the UAE and Tonga can tour more easily than UK artists.“Despite what MPs have been told by ministers, the latest legal advice has shown that it is entirely possible for the government to create an agreement,” said Deborah Annetts, the ISM’s chief executive.“With the music sector now looking beyond coronavirus, it is still virtually impossible for many creative professionals to work in Europe on a short term or freelance basis.” More

Oxford students should be given compensation if they miss out on teaching due to an academic boycott over a controversial statue, Downing Street has said. Around 150 lecturers have announced they will refuse to do discretionary work at Oriel College, a constituent part of the institution.The boycott is in response to the college’s decision not to remove the statue of imperialist Cecil Rhodes, who as prime minister of the Cape Colony expropriated land from black Africans and effectively barred them from voting. “I think students rightly expect to get a good deal for their investment in higher education and we would expect universities to take appropriate action should any student be seriously affected by these actions, which could include compensation,” Boris Johnson’s official spokesperson told reporters at a briefing in Westminster. “We fully believe in protecting academic freedom, but universities have duty to maintain access to good quality tuition as a priority, especially given the disruption the pandemic has caused students already.”The extent of any disruption the boycott may cause is unclear as the academics have said they will continue to take part in graduate supervision of Oriel students at master’s and DPhil level, and deliver lectures at which the college’s students may be present.Mr Rhodes was a white supremacist who believed that the “English race” were “the first race in the world”. He said he supported expanding the British empire as it would mean “every acre added to our territory means the birth of more of the English race who otherwise would not be brought into existence”. In his will he funded postgraduate scholarships at Oxford University. In a statement, the academics taking part in the boycott said: “The collegiate university can only effectively and credibly work to eradicate racism and address the ongoing effects of colonialism today if all the colleges do so. Oriel College’s decision not to remove the statue of Cecil Rhodes undermines us all.“Despite votes in favour from its student common rooms and despite an earlier vote of the governing body expressing their wish to remove it, Oriel has now decided not to.“Faced with Oriel’s stubborn attachment to a statue that glorifies colonialism and the wealth it produced for the college, we feel we have no choice but to withdraw all discretionary work and goodwill collaborations.”Students at the college have voted for the statue to be removed and the college’s governing body previously backed the decision. But the College’s governing body now says the statue will not be removed for now due to the cost of taking it down. “In light of the considerable obstacles to removal, Oriel’s Governing Body has decided not to begin the legal process for relocation of the memorials,” it said in a statement three weeks ago.Instead it said it would focus on the “contextualisation of the College’s relationship with Rhodes, as well as improving educational equality, diversity and inclusion amongst its student cohort and academic community”.Education Secretary Gavin Williamson last month backed the decision not to remove the statue, describing it as “sensible and balanced” and claimed calls to take it down amounted to “censoring history”.Downing Street’s intervention came after a senior academic suggested that the college should place a sign saying “Sorry” around the neck of the statue.Robert Gildea, professor emeritus of modern history at Oxford, one of the signatories of the boycott, said it was a way of “putting pressure” on the college after many alternatives had failed.”One of the options offered by the commission was to retain and contextualise, so if the college put up a notice explaining who Cecil Rhodes was that would be fine,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.”If the college put a placard around his neck at lunchtime today saying ‘Sorry’ that would also be fine.”Professor Gildea added that sculptor Antony Gormley’s suggestion that the statue be turned round to face the wall was also a “very interesting idea”. More

The diplomatic circus better known as the G7 summit is beginning to arrive in Cornwall.Leaders from the world’s seven biggest advanced economies – including US president Joe Biden and German chancellor Angela Merkel – will gather in Carbis Bay and St Ives this weekend for talks on everything from climate change to coronavirus.Just last night, Boris Johnson flew (yes, flew) from London to Newquay for the jamboree.But residents living in this little corner of south west England are very much divided about such an event being foisted on them.While some say it will help put the place on the global map, others have raised questions about the weeks of disruption they have already faced, the risk of Covid-19 spread, the environmental damage being done and the sheer astronomical cost of the summit. > > Follow all the latest G7 summit updates live here Some have described the town as now resembling a military encampment with naval boats in the bay, road checks appearing at various points and military grade fencing being erected across the area. Some 5,500 police officers – many of them armed – and hundreds of military are on duty there.Others have been left aghast by the environmental damage being done. Trees have been hacked down to build meeting rooms and roads have been resurfaced, while a constant stream of articulated lorries is bringing in diggers, building materials, security equipment and manpower.Some suggest that lavishing tens of millions on security is entirely incongruous in what is England’s poorest region.The Independent’s Colin Drury has been reporting from Carbis Bay and St Ives in recent days and will be here to answer your questions about how the town is responding to being at the centre of the summit.He will be joined on the phone by Oliver Baines, a Cornwall organic farmer and Extinction Rebellion co-ordinator who will be stewarding protestors through St Ives as your questions come in.Put your questions in the comments below and we’ll answer as many as we can from 3pm on Friday June 11. All you have to do is register to submit your question by 1pm on Friday.If you’re not already a member, click “sign up” in the comments box to leave your question. More

People told to self-isolate by NHS Test and Trace were not offered financial support matching their lost salaries because of the government’s fear that the system would be “gamed”, Matt Hancock has said.The revelation was branded “absolutely disgusting” by Labour, who said the government had put people’s lives at risk by making it financially difficult for them to stay away from work after potentially coming into contact with coronavirus.Critics have blamed stingy support for undermining the impact of test and trace, with surveys suggesting that 80 per cent or more of those identified as contacts of Covid-19 sufferers ignoring orders to stay home.A one-off payment of just £500 has been offered to people on low incomes who are told to self-isolate for 10 days after being identified as contacts.And Mr Hancock today told a joint inquiry by the House of Commons health and science committees that the payments were not set at a more generous level or made universal because of fears that the system would be abused.Asked by health committee chair Jeremy Hunt why people were assured they would not lose out financially if they forfeited salary due to self-isolation, Mr Hancock replied: “The challenge that we had with that proposal is the extent to which it might be gamed.“Because after all, a contact gives test and trace their contacts. You wouldn’t want a situation where if you tested positive you could then enlist your entire friendship network to get a £500 payment.”Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner said that the refusal to offer more generous financial support contrasted strongly with the government’s award of lucrative coronavirus contracts to businesses with links to the Conservative party.And she highlighted Mr Hancock’s shareholding in a firm owned by his sister which won an NHS contract, which led to him being judged by No 10 ethics adviser Lord Geidt to have breached the ministerial code of conduct.Ms Rayner said: “Today Matt Hancock said the government didn’t support people to isolate because the system would be ‘gamed’. Truly disgusting.“The only person gaming the system is Matt Hancock, who broke the ministerial code and gave a contract to his sister’s company that he owns 20 per cent of.“Of course Matt Hancock is an expert at ‘gaming the system’ after giving a contract to his pub landlord and giving £2 billion in contracts to Conservative donors and mates.“Matt Hancock’s contempt for the working people whose lives he put at risk is absolutely disgusting.”During today’s evidence session, Mr Hancock denied playing any role in awarding coronavirus contracts, but confirmed that he had passed on requests from contacts to supply the government with Covid-19 kit, telling MPs: “When people came forward with potential leads, I would feed those into officials. Absolutely.” More

Health secretary Matt Hancock has rejected Dominic Cummings’ claim that he lied to Boris Johnson over testing for people going into care homes in the early months of the coronavirus outbreak, telling MPs that clinical advice at the time was that this was the wrong thing to do.Mr Hancock was confronted with a series of bombshell allegations from the prime minister’s former top adviser as he gave evidence to two Commons committees, who last month heard Cummings say that the health secretary should have been sacked “15 to 20 times” for his failings over Covid-19.But he issued a veiled warning to MPs not to give credence to the former adviser’s claims, telling them: “I’m not responsible for anybody else’s testimony, but I am really pleased to have the chance to come here to be able to tell you the truth.”He insisted that he had only ever told the PM that he would ensure patients were tested before entering care homes “when tests were available”, which was not the case for some months after the pandemic struck.And he said that medical experts warned that, with the four-day turnaround for Covid tests available in March 2020, there was a danger that patients would catch the virus in hospital while awaiting responses and be sent to care homes with false negative tests.“On care homes, throughout we followed the clinical advice,” Mr Hancock told the joint inquiry of the Commons health and science committees. “The evidence has shown that the strongest route of the virus into care homes was community transmission. Staff testing was the most important thing for keeping people safe in care homes. That’s the clinical advice we received.”He denied Mr Cummings’ allegation that the prime minister hauled him in to explain why patients had been released to homes without tests. Asked whether Mr Johnson expressed surprise about the situation when he came out of hospital following treatment for Covid in April 2020, Mr Hancock replied: “Not that I can remember.” Public Health England later found only 1.6 per cent of cases in homes involved people bringing the virus in from hospitals, he said.The health secretary said he had “no idea” why Mr Cummings had taken against him and pointedly told MPs that “government has operated better over the past six months” since the adviser’s resignation in November.He insisted he had received “wholesome support” from Mr Johnson throughout the pandemic and learnt of Mr Cummings’ effort to get him sacked only because the adviser briefed newspapers about it.And he told the inquiry: “You can’t respond to a pandemic by pointing fingers.”Mr Hancock said it was “telling” that Mr Cummings had not provided documentary evidence to back up his allegations, as requested by the committees.And science committee chair Greg Clark said that the former adviser’s claims “must be counted as unproven” until Cummings hands over a cache of emails and text messages he is believed to hold.Mr Hancock rejected Mr Cummings’ claim that he always promised to “follow the science” in order to be able to blame the scientists if anything went wrong. He insisted he tried not to use the phrase, because politicians were “guided by the science” rather than following it unquestioningly.And he denied that he tried to blame the Treasury or NHS bosses for shortages of personal protective equipment at the start of the epidemic, telling MPs that he had simply requested the removal of a Treasury cap on the maximum price to be paid for PPE so that the UK could source supplies as prices soared worldwide.Mr Cummings last month told the inquiry that Mr Johnson’s top civil servant Sir Mark Sedwill had pushed for Hancock’s dismissal because he repeatedly lied about the coronavirus situation in official meetings.But asked today if he had ever said anything to the PM which he knew to be untrue, Mr Hancock replied: “No.”He said he had “absolutely no idea” whether senior civil servant Helen MacNamara had warned in March that there was “no plan” to deal with coronavirus and the government was going to kill thousands of people, as Mr Cummings sensationally claimed.“I don’t understand that testimony,” he said. “There was a plan and at that point we had published it.”As early as 31 January 2020, the government’s Cobra emergencies committee had signed off a worst-case planning assumption that as many as 820,000 people could die in the UK as a result of Covid-19, he told MPs. But it was not until early March that it became clear that the pandemic was following that worst-case course.Government has ‘operated better’ since Cummings left, says Hancock“Knowing that that was the reasonable worst-case scenario, we planned for it,” he told MPs.“The week beginning 9 March, what happened is that the data started to follow the reasonable worst-case scenario, and by the end of that week, the updated modelling, showed essentially that we were on the track of something close to that reasonable worst-case scenario.”Mr Hancock insisted he was right to say that “everybody got the Covid treatment that they needed”, because the NHS at no point became overwhelmed by the pandemic. Despite “local problems”, there was “never a national shortage of PPE”, he insisted.And he told MPs: “There’s no evidence that I have seen that a shortage of PPE provision led to anybody dying of Covid.”Mr Hancock said: “PPE provision was tight and it was difficult throughout the world, but we did manage. It was pretty close sometimes, but we did manage to ensure that … at a national level we had the PPE, and then distribution was a challenge to all areas.”Mr Hancock said he “bitterly regrets” that he did not early in the pandemic overrule the scientific consensus that people with no symptoms were unlikely to pass on coronavirus. He said that he had “an instinct” that transmission was occurring and raised the issue as early as 27 January 2020. But he said he was told by the World Health Organisation that reports this was happening in China were probably based on a “mistranslation”.It was only later that the government accepted asymptomatic transmission as a reality, requiring much stricter social distancing restrictions to rein in the outbreak, he said.And he told MPs: “I should have stuck to my guns and said ‘Even if it’s uncertain, we should base policy on that’.”Mr Hancock defended his claim that the government tried to put a protective ring round care homes from the start of the outbreak.“The most important words in that sentence are that we ‘tried to’,” he told MPs. “It was very hard for a number of reasons, some of which are fixed and some aren’t.”As health secretary, he said he had “extremely limited” powers over care homes, which are the remit of local councils. It was “extraordinary” that the Department of Health did not even have a list of homes, he told MPs.“We simply didn’t have the levers, and we had to invent a whole series of them,” said Mr Hancock.“We put in finding to make sure PPE was as available as possible. We set out guidance for care homes – the first guidance was on 25 February. Then later, when we had the testing capacity in July, we brought in weekly testing of staff, which I think is the single biggest improvement in terms of protecting residents.”Deaths as a proportion of residents were lower in the UK than in many European states, where some homes saw all residents die, he said.Mr Hancock defended his decision to set a target of carrying out 100,000 coronavirus tests a day.“The purpose of the target was to galvanise the system. It worked,” he said.“The prime minister was absolutely four-square behind me and gave me his full, whole-hearted support in hitting this target because he, like me, knew we needed a radical increase in testing.”Mr Hancock said that in January 2020 he had ordered a push to develop a vaccine as rapidly as possible.“I said I want one within a year and will throw the full resources of the state in making that happen,” he said.But he said that there would have been no point in the UK shutting its borders in spring last year to try to keep Covid-19 out, so long as China was allowing people to leave the country. He pointed to Italy and the US which suffered severe outbreaks despite tougher border restrictions. Clinical advice was that doing the same in the UK would have slowed the development of the disease by a week at most, he said.Mr Hancock said that the “number one challenge” facing the UK at the outset of the pandemic was the lack of a large-scale testing programme.He said that no-one was “better placed” to provide this capacity than the much-criticised Health Security Agency chief executive Dido Harding.Defending her performance, he told MPs: “Building a plane in flight is harder than flying a plane that has been built for a while… It was about the size of Tesco and she built it in six months.”Recent experience of the Delta variant in places like Bolton showed that the surge test and trace system was working in bringing case rates down, he said.He defended the decision not to make up the salary of those forced into quarantine, which critics say has led to as many as 80 per cent of people ignoring orders to self-isolate after coming into contact with the virus. Any such offer could have been “gamed” by people naming a wide range of friends and associates as contacts who might have been infected, he said. More

Matt Hancock has claimed the government has handled the Covid crisis “better” since Boris Johnson’s former top adviser Dominic Cummings left Downing Street last November.The health secretary rejected a series of allegations made by the former No 10 adviser during a parliamentary hearing on Thursday.He resisted the opportunity to get into a slanging match with the former adviser.But he gave a clear signal to MPs that they should not take Cummings’ evidence as gospel, telling them: “I’m not responsible for anybody else’s testimony, but I am really pleased to have the chance to come here to be able to tell you the truth.”Mr Hancock claimed he had “no idea” why Mr Cummings had taken against him – and said he was not the only one who believed the pandemic response had been smoother since the strategist’s departure. He added: “I think the best thing to say about this – and this will be corroborated by lots of people in government – the best thing to say is that government has operated better in the past six months.”Mr Hancock claimed he had ‘wholesome support’ of Mr Johnson throughout the pandemic, and accused Mr Cummings of being behind negative press briefings against him last year.Asked if he knew Mr Cummings wanted the prime minister to fire him, the health secretary replied: “Yes – because he briefed the newspapers at the time. Somebody briefed the newspapers. I now have a better idea of who it was.”Mr Hancock denied lying to Mr Johnson, telling MPs on the joint inquiry of health and science committees that he had always been driven to behave with “honesty and integrity”.Striking back at Mr Cummings’ claims he had “repeatedly” lied to senior officials at No 10, Mr Hancock said: “It is telling that no evidence has been provided yet.”Regarding Mr Cummings’s claims that he told Mr Johnson in March 2020 that people being discharged to care homes would be tested, Mr Hancock said: “On care homes, throughout we followed the clinical advice.” Mr Hancock was reportedly summoned to No 10 for a meeting on 4 May last year to explain whether he had misled the prime minister on care homes and testing.But the minister said he could not recall Mr Johnson expressing any surprise about the care home situation after he returned to work following his own illness in late April. “Not that I can remember,” the health secretary said.Mr Hancock also told MPs he did not say PPE shortages were the fault of the chancellor Rishi Sunak or NHS chief Sir Simon Stevens, and did not accuse them of blocking approvals.Responding to allegations made by Mr Cummings that he had tried to shift blame, the minister said: “That is not a fair recollection of the situation.”He added: “Getting hold of PPE was always a huge challenge … there was never a point to which NHS providers couldn’t get access to PPE, but there were huge challenges.”Mr Hancock was also asked about allegations Mr Cummings made suggesting that he used the “following the science” line as a way to blame scientists if things went wrong and this was something the health secretary discussed with Mr Johnson.Mr Hancock told MPs he did not think that was true, adding: “My approach throughout has been that we are guided by the science, I try not to say that we follow the science.”At the outset of the hearing science committee, chairman Greg Clark said MPs had not received any written evidence from Mr Cummings to back up his claims, or any explanation as to why it had not been provided. More

Boris Johnson is welcoming leaders from around the world to the UK on Friday as he hosts the latest G7 summit.The gathering marks the first time the leaders have come together in almost two years due to the coronavirus pandemic, with Covid-19 expected to be one of the main items on the agenda.The UK prime minister has called on his fellow leaders to commit to vaccinating the world against Covid by the end of next year.Follow G7 summit live: Latest developments ahead of world leaders’ meetingThe occasion also sees Joe Biden make his first overseas visit as US president since entering the Oval Office in January and he is expected to use the trip to try to build an alliance of democracies as a counterweight to China, with the White House saying they expect G7 leaders to announce a new initiative to provide financing for physical, digital and health infrastructure in the developing world as an alternative to the “belt and road” measures being offered by an increasingly dominant Beijing.The leaders are also expected to discuss issues including climate change and getting more children into education around the world.Here’s everything you need to know.What is the G7?The Group of Seven (G7) countries brings together some of the world’s richest democracies – the UK, US, Canada, Japan, France, Germany and Italy, along with representatives of the EU.Where is the summit happening?The UK holds the rotating presidency so has responsibility for hosting the summit, which will take place between Friday and Sunday at Carbis Bay in Cornwall, despite objections from the locals.Who else is attending?Alongside Mr Johnson and Mr Biden, Canada’s Justin Trudeau, Japan’s Yoshihide Suga, France’s Emmanuel Macron, Germany’s Angela Merkel and Italy’s Mario Draghi will represent their respective countries.The EU will be represented by commission president Ursula von der Leyen and council president Charles Michel.Australia’s prime minister Scott Morrison, South Korean president Moon Jae-in and South African president Cyril Ramaphosa will all attend as guests, while India’s Narendra Modi will participate via Zoom due to the ongoing coronavirus crisis in his country, currently the world’s epicentre.What are the potential problems facing the prime minister?The summit is an opportunity for Mr Johnson to push his “Global Britain” agenda, which attempts to place the UK at the centre of the world stage and make a success of life after the EU.But the days leading up to the summit have seen a damaging row within his own party over the decision to cut international aid spending from 0.7 per cent of national income to 0.5 per cent, with Mr Johnson’s predecessor Theresa May warning that “the damage it does to our reputation means that it will be far harder for us as a country to argue for change” around the world.Will Brexit be an issue?Well, when is it not? The ongoing row between the UK and EU over the Northern Ireland Protocol is likely to loom large after violent clashes returned to the country earlier this year.Unusually for the G7, Brexit minister Lord Frost will be in attendance and the prime minister will hold talks with Ms Von der Leyen as well as his continental counterparts.US president Mr Biden also takes a keen interest in the issue of peace in Northern Ireland given his own Irish ancestry, with the White House warning against any British conduct that might imperil the Good Friday Agreement.Are protests expected?Extinction Rebellion activists have made clear they intend to stage a series of demonstrations calling on the G7 to do more to tackle climate change.The Kill the Bill movement will also protest against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, meaning security will be tight and some 5,000 extra officers drafted in from around the country to support Devon and Cornwall Police.In total, 6,500 officers and staff will be deployed in the operation, with 1,000 of them effectively living on a ship moored in Falmouth.Additional reporting by agencies More

Joe Biden is set to intervene in the UK-EU’s post-Brexit trade dispute when he meets Boris Johnson for the first time on Thursday.The US president will tell the prime minister not to let the row over Northern Ireland’s trading arrangements put peace at risk when the pair meet in Cornwall this afternoon ahead of the three-day G7 summit.G7 summit live: Latest developments ahead of world leaders’ meetingIn the US president’s first overseas visit, aides said he will stress the need to “stand behind” agreements made in the Northern Ireland Protocol, the element of the Brexit deal which has triggered a huge row.What influence can Joe Biden really have on trade disputes?Mr Biden’s close interest in Brexit-related issues affecting Ireland will mean that the dispute over the protocol will feature heavily in discussions with both UK and EU leaders over the coming days of intense diplomatic activity in Cornwall.The US president took the extraordinary step of ordering America’s most senior diplomat in London, Yael Lempert, to deliver a “demarche” – a formal diplomatic reprimand – in a meeting with Brexit minister David Frost last week, according to The Times.The newspaper reported that government minutes of the meeting said: “Lempert implied that the UK had been inflaming the rhetoric, by asking if he would keep it ‘cool’.”The US diplomat is said to have indicated that if Mr Johnson accepted an EU offer to follow the bloc’s rules on agricultural standards, Mr Biden would ensure that it would not “negatively affect the chances of reaching a US-UK free trade deal”.Until now, the Downing Street has rebuffed the EU’s offer of “agri-food” alignment, fearing any agreement tying the UK to the bloc’s standards would damage the chances of a comprehensive free trade deals with other parts of the world. More