Markus Andrews

Customers will be given stronger protections against water firms under government plans to restore trust in the beleaguered industry. Steve Reed is setting up a new water ombudsman with legal powers to resolve disputes, rather than the current voluntary system that is thought to lack teeth.The environment secretary is embarking on “the biggest overhaul of water regulation in a generation” amid growing anger at poor service, spiralling bills and the pollution of Britain’s waterways. He pledged on Sunday to cut pollution in Britain’s rivers in half by the end of the decade, eliminating it completely by 2035. And on Monday he will outline the latest changes, which will expand the role of the Consumer Council for Water (CCW), bringing the sector into line with other utilities by creating a legally binding consumer watchdog.Consumers will get stronger protections against water firms says Steve Reed More

The defence secretary will call for a 50-day drive to arm Ukraine when he chairs a meeting of Kyiv’s allies on Monday.John Healey is set to argue that the West should again boost its military support for Ukraine in an effort to bring Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table.Donald Trump has already threatened to impose “very severe” tariffs on Russia if it does not agree to a ceasefire by 2 September, 50 days on from the US president’s announcement that he would sell “top-of-the-line” weapons to Nato that could then be given to Ukraine.On Monday, Mr Healey will use a meeting of the Ukraine Defence Contact Group (UDCG) to back Mr Trump’s proposal and pledge that the UK will “play our full part in its success to bolster Ukraine’s immediate fight”.Calling for more support from Western allies, he is expected to say: “Alongside this, the US has started the clock on a 50-day deadline for Putin to agree to peace or face crippling economic sanctions.“As members of the Ukraine Defence Contact Group, we need to step up in turn with a ‘50-day drive’ to arm Ukraine on the battlefield and force Putin to the negotiating table.”US president Donald Trump and Russia’s president Vladimir Putin are seen during the G20 leaders summit in 2018 More

Steve Reed has said he is “not at all surprised” Reform UK is consistently beating Labour in the polls. The environment secretary said Nigel Farage’s party poll lead is a “reflection of people’s disenchantment with politics”. “ I am not at all surprised, because we just had 14 years where people were promised so much, and all of those promises were broken,” he told BBC One’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg. Steve Reed said that ‘the British public will see the change they voted for over the coming months and years’ More

Rachel Reeves is eyeing up a £5bn pre-Budget windfall as the government considers selling off seized cryptocurrency to plug a hole in the public finances. The Home Office is reportedly working with police forces to offload at least £5bn worth of Bitcoin and other currencies taken from criminals.It is planning to develop a storage system for the currencies to handle their sale, it has emerged, as concerns about Labour’s spending plans mount ahead of the autumn Budget. Rachel Reeves needs to find billions to balance the books ahead of her Budget this autumn More

Labour will leave Britain with the cleanest rivers on record by cutting sewage pollution from water firms in half by 2030, the environment secretary will say. Steve Reed will promise on Sunday to make the UK’s rivers the cleanest since records began with a £104bn investment to rebuild the country’s crumbling sewage pipes.Mr Reed will also roll out a set of strict new rules to slash pollution and a “root and branch” overhaul of the way water companies are regulated. Environment secretary Steve Reed (right) and energy security and net zero secretary Ed Miliband (left) are joined by Jeremy Biggs of the Freshwater Habitats Trust during a visit to the Ock and Thame Farmers floodplain restoration project, in South Hinksey, Oxfordshire More

Rough sleeping has almost doubled since Covid, a damning report found, with Andy Burnham calling on Sir Keir Starmer to make tackling homelessness a “moral mission”.The Greater Manchester mayor piled pressure on the prime minister to follow the success of the region in offering housing to the homeless. “If you set people up to succeed – they largely do,” Mr Burnham said. He added: “Tackling homelessness is not just an economic imperative, but also a moral mission.” Andy Burnham said tackling homelessness must be a ‘moral mission’ More

Ministers “have their fingers in their ears” over the ongoing Birmingham bin strikes, the boss of one of Britain’s biggest unions has said. The prime minister and Angela Rayner must “get in the room, sort it out and stop letting this continue for no reason,” Sharon Graham warned. The outspoken Unite chief said she is not the prime minister’s “favourite trade union leader… probably because I call things out”. Sharon Graham said Unite members would vote to ditch Labour ‘without a shadow of a doubt’ More