Markus Andrews

Your support helps us to tell the storyThis election is still a dead heat, according to most polls. In a fight with such wafer-thin margins, we need reporters on the ground talking to the people Trump and Harris are courting. Your support allows us to keep sending journalists to the story.The Independent is trusted by 27 million Americans from across the entire political spectrum every month. Unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock you out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. But quality journalism must still be paid for.Help us keep bring these critical stories to light. Your support makes all the difference.CloseRead moreCloseSir Keir Starmer mistakenly announced that Rachel Reeves would unveil five new freeports in Wednesday’s Budget, in what officials have reportedly dubbed a “total cock-up”.The prime minister told reporters that while freeports were a scheme inherited by the new Labour government, it plans to “maximise their potential”, saying they would “have this government’s stamp on them”. A press release accompanying the announcement claimed Ms Reeves would announce “five new freeports as part of the government’s package of measures to fix the foundations and rebuild the country”.But it is understood the government actually planned to announce new customs sites at five existing freeports that were previously announced by the Conservatives. A government official told the Financial Times it had been a “total cock-up with the comms”.While freeports can exist as a physical piece of infrastructure without customs sites, government sources told The Independent they do not class them as “operational” until they have designated tax and customs sites.Freeports are areas near shipping ports or airports where tariffs do not apply to imported goods.Firms in these areas also pay lower national insurance for new employees and lower property taxes.Plans to establish investment zones at 12 sites were announced by the Conservatives in 2023. Investment zones in England have the potential to create 89,000 additional jobs by 2033, bringing in a total of £11bn of private investment, the government said. Cabinet minister Pat McFadden defended the government’s plan, telling the BBC: “This is changes in five of the existing freeports that are coming out – these freeports have certain customs zones and tax-free zones and so on.“The view that we’ve taken of this, like a lot of things, is, if something’s working, can you improve it? If it’s not working, will you change it? And we take quite a pragmatic view of this.”But the Conservative Party described the situation as a “humiliating U-turn that will once again damage the already shrinking business confidence in this country”.Downing Street has been contacted for comment. More

Your support helps us to tell the storyThis election is still a dead heat, according to most polls. In a fight with such wafer-thin margins, we need reporters on the ground talking to the people Trump and Harris are courting. Your support allows us to keep sending journalists to the story.The Independent is trusted by 27 million Americans from across the entire political spectrum every month. Unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock you out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. But quality journalism must still be paid for.Help us keep bring these critical stories to light. Your support makes all the difference.CloseRead moreCloseMinisters fear up to 120,000 of the most vulnerable pensioners will miss out on money to pay their winter fuel bills after Rachel Reeves stripped the payment from millions of older people.The government is to write to the group next month to warn them they will lose out unless they apply for pension credits before Christmas. But many face months-long delays in processing forms, meaning they still may not receive the cash this winter, The Independent can reveal. Ministers have defended the change, saying they have to “get the money from somewhere” and blaming the last Conservative government for leaving a £22bn black hole in the public finances.But they have urged less well-off pensioners to apply for pension credit, under which they would still be eligible for the £200-300 winter fuel payment, designed to help with heating costs during the colder months.Now ministers are to write to tens of thousands of pensioners to warn they could still be eligible for the cash.Ministers are to write to 120,000 of the most vulnerable pensioners next month to warn them not to miss out More

Your support helps us to tell the storyThis election is still a dead heat, according to most polls. In a fight with such wafer-thin margins, we need reporters on the ground talking to the people Trump and Harris are courting. Your support allows us to keep sending journalists to the story.The Independent is trusted by 27 million Americans from across the entire political spectrum every month. Unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock you out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. But quality journalism must still be paid for.Help us keep bring these critical stories to light. Your support makes all the difference.CloseRead moreCloseTransport secretary Louise Haigh is being hailed for winning a personal victory in negotiations with the Treasury in preventing eyewatering bus fare hikes by as much as 650 per cent, it is understood.The embattled minister has had a difficult month after being briefed against by Downing Street in the P&O workers’ rights row which saw the ferry company’s owner DP World initially withdraw £1 billion of investment from the UK.But despite speculation that she could be an early ministerial casualty in Sir Keir Starmer’s government, Ms Haigh is thought to have emerged victorious in a fight with the Treasury over continuing with a cap on bus fares.Sir Keir Starmer announced on Monday the maximum bus fare will be £3 until the end of 2025 but only after fierce negotiating with chancellor Rachel Reeves and Ms Haigh’s Department for Transport (DfT).Ms Haigh is understood to have won a personal victory in negotiations with the Treasury over bus fares More

Your support helps us to tell the storyThis election is still a dead heat, according to most polls. In a fight with such wafer-thin margins, we need reporters on the ground talking to the people Trump and Harris are courting. Your support allows us to keep sending journalists to the story.The Independent is trusted by 27 million Americans from across the entire political spectrum every month. Unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock you out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. But quality journalism must still be paid for.Help us keep bring these critical stories to light. Your support makes all the difference.CloseRead moreCloseA Russian state-backed disinformation agency and three of its senior figures have been sanctioned by the UK over their attempts to destabilise Ukraine, the Government has said.Foreign Secretary David Lammy said sanctions had been applied to the Social Design Agency (SDA), three leaders directing its operations, and a partner company, Structura.The Government said the SDA is tasked and funded directly by the Kremlin, and has attempted to carry out a number of interference operations designed to undermine democracy and weaken international support for Ukraine in its war against Russia, through an online network of fake accounts and websites attempting to spread disinformation.The three senior figures sanctioned alongside the firms were named as Ilya Andreevich Gambashidze, the founder of the SDA, Nikolay Aleksandrovich Tupikin, the SDA’s chief executive and owner of Structura, and Andrey Naumovich Perla, the SDA’s project director.Today’s sanctions send a clear message; we will not tolerate your lies and interference, and we are coming after youForeign Secretary David LammyThe Government has accused the SDA of attempting to incite protests in half a dozen European countries this year alone, and said the two firms and its leadership are responsible for a vast online network known as Doppelganger, which floods social media with fake posts, counterfeit documents and deepfake material.However, the Government said these interference attempts have struggled to gain traction, and said the SDA has considered buying social media views.“(Russian President Vladimir) Putin is so desperate to undermine European support for Ukraine he is now resorting to clumsy, ineffective efforts to try and stoke unrest,” Mr Lammy said.“Today’s sanctions send a clear message; we will not tolerate your lies and interference, and we are coming after you.“Putin’s desperate attempts to divide us will fail. We will constrain the Kremlin and stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes.”The Government said it was committed to taking action against Russian information manipulation and would continue to take action against anyone it found to be carrying out activities on behalf of the SDA. More

Your support helps us to tell the storyThis election is still a dead heat, according to most polls. In a fight with such wafer-thin margins, we need reporters on the ground talking to the people Trump and Harris are courting. Your support allows us to keep sending journalists to the story.The Independent is trusted by 27 million Americans from across the entire political spectrum every month. Unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock you out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. But quality journalism must still be paid for.Help us keep bring these critical stories to light. Your support makes all the difference.CloseRead moreClose Fixing Britain’s troubled economy will be a long haul in a “harsh” fiscal environment, Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Monday, setting the stage for his government’s high-stakes first budget this week.Starmer hopes voters will accept his argument that higher taxes and limited public spending increases are needed to “fix the foundations” of an economy that he says has been undermined by 14 years of Conservative government. But his message — things will slowly get better — is a risky one in a high-speed political world.“It’s time to embrace the harsh light of fiscal reality,” Starmer said, telling voters that politicians must “stop insulting your intelligence with the chicanery of easy answers.”“I will never stand here and tell you to feel better, if you don’t,” he added during a speech in the central England city of Birmingham two days before Wednesday’s budget. “Change must be felt.”Starmer’s center-left Labour Party was elected July 4 after promising to banish years of turmoil and scandal under Conservative governments, get Britain’s economy growing and restore frayed public services, especially the state-funded National Health Service.Pumping money into health, education and other services is made harder by a sluggish economy, hobbled by rising public debt and low growth of just 0.2% in August. Starmer also says that on taking office he discovered a 22 billion pound ($29 billion) “black hole” in the public finances left by the Conservative government.The Conservatives say they left an economy that was growing, albeit modestly, with lower levels of debt and a smaller deficit than many other Group of Seven wealthy nations.Paul Johnson, head of independent think-tank the Institute for Fiscal Studies, said the budget hole is real, but that both Labour and the Conservatives were dishonest about the economy during the election.“It was obvious that they were either going to have to cut spending, which is what the previous government said they were planning to do, or increase taxes,” he told Sky News. “But of course, no party was willing to say that. That’s why we called it a conspiracy of silence at the time.”That means the budget is certain to include tax increases – though Labour has pledged not to raise the tax burden on “working people,” a term whose definition has been hotly debated in the media for weeks.Treasury chief Rachel Reeves – Britain’s first female chancellor of the exchequer — is widely expected to tweak the government’s debt rules so that she can borrow billions more for investment in the health system, schools, railways and other big infrastructure projects, and to raise money by hiking tax paid by employers, though not employees. She could also raise taxes on capital gains, arguing they do not form part of the main income of working people.Starmer said that “tax rises will prevent austerity and rebuild public services,” while “borrowing will drive long-term growth.”“There are no shortcuts,” he said.Starmer’s government set out its tough-medicine approach to the economy soon after being elected. One of its first acts was to strip millions of retirees of a payment intended to help heat their homes in winter. It was intended to signal determination to take difficult decisions, but spawned a sharp backlash from Labour members and sections of the public.It also sat awkwardly with news that Starmer had accepted thousands of pounds’ (dollars’) worth of gifts including clothes, designer eyeglasses and tickets to see Taylor Swift. After days of negative headlines, he agreed to pay back 6,000 pounds (almost $8,000) worth of freebies.Headlines about internal Labour feuds and “Swiftgate” flourished during the long wait for the budget, which is being delivered almost four months after the election, an unusually big gap.Labour “has been finding the adjustment into government a bit hard,” said Jill Rutter, a senior fellow at the Institute for Government think-tank. “There has been a sense that everybody is just in a holding pattern until we get the budget.”Starmer is a famously cautious politician, and Reeves, a former Bank of England economist, wants to be seen as a prudent guardian of the nation’s purse strings. Rutter said that part of the reason for the slow buildup to the budget is the memory of the economic turmoil unleashed by then-Prime Minister Liz Truss in October 2022. Truss resigned as prime minister after just 49 days in office when her plan for billions in tax cuts rocked the financial markets and battered the value of the pound.“Every chancellor is now scarred by the ghost of Liz Truss past,” Rutter said, noting that Reeves “clearly didn’t want to do a Liz Truss and do a rushed job.“The question is, does she do a good enough job on Wednesday that people think that she’s used that time well?” Rutter added. “The stakes are quite high for the government.” More

Your support helps us to tell the storyThis election is still a dead heat, according to most polls. In a fight with such wafer-thin margins, we need reporters on the ground talking to the people Trump and Harris are courting. Your support allows us to keep sending journalists to the story.The Independent is trusted by 27 million Americans from across the entire political spectrum every month. Unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock you out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. But quality journalism must still be paid for.Help us keep bring these critical stories to light. Your support makes all the difference.CloseRead moreCloseThe cap on bus fares will rise from £2 to £3 until the end of next year in a bid to ease pressure on the public finances, Sir Keir Starmer has confirmed. Laying the groundwork for Wednesday’s Budget, the prime minister said the existing cap will be replaced by the higher fare limit.In a speech in Birmingham, Sir Keir said he knows “how much this matters”, particularly to people who live in rural communities, but he lashed out at the previous Conservative government, saying they “only funded £2 bus fares until the end of 2024”.“That is the end of the funding in relation to a £2 capped fare,” he added.The decision comes ahead of a painful first Budget for Labour More

Keir Starmer refuses to rule out raising national insurance contributionsYour support helps us to tell the storyThis election is still a dead heat, according to most polls. In a fight with such wafer-thin margins, we need reporters on the ground talking to the people Trump and Harris are courting. Your support allows us to keep sending journalists to the story.The Independent is trusted by 27 million Americans from across the entire political spectrum every month. Unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock you out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. But quality journalism must still be paid for.Help us keep bring these critical stories to light. Your support makes all the difference.CloseRead moreCloseKeir Starmer has delivered a stark speech warning of “unprecedented” economic challenges during a visit to the West Midlands today.His speech comes ahead of Labour’s first Budget since coming into power on 30 October, where chancellor Rachel Reeves will lead one of the most anticipated fiscal events in over two decades.Speaking in Birmingham, Sir Keir said: “Politics is always a choice. It’s time to choose a clear path, and embrace the harsh light of fiscal reality so we can come together behind a credible, long-term plan.”The prime minister also defended tax rises which are set to come on Wednesday, saying “I will defend our tough decisions all day long,” adding: “it’s the only way to get the investment we need”He spoke as Labour faces a row over reported plans to raise employer national insurance contributions and capital gains, with critics arguing these measures would breach the party’s manifesto commitment to not raise taxes on “working people.”Addressing the row, Sir Keir said the UK’s working people “know exactly who they are,” repeating the term 24 times throughout the speech.We’ll be bringing you all the latest updates ahead of the big event here, on The Independent’s liveblog. Show latest update 1730124609Environmental campaigners criticise Labour’s bus cap increaseGreenpeace condemned Sir Keir’s decision to hike the bus fare cap, saying it “makes no political, economical or environmental sense whatsoever”.“This is a ‘tough decision’ the government did not need to make,” senior transport campaigner Paul Morozzo said.He added: “Not only are buses a critical lifeline to millions of people – particularly those on lower incomes – and the use of them a driver of economic growth, but it’s absolutely critical that we get more people out of polluting cars and onto cleaner public transport if we have any chance of tackling the climate crisis. Raising the fares by 50% will obviously won’t help achieve that.“A government that was truly prioritising the needs of the poorest in society would rethink this decision at the first opportunity, and provide young people especially the possibility to reach education and employment they would otherwise be shut out from”.Albert Toth28 October 2024 14:101730123109Keir Starmer confirms £2 bus fare cap will be hiked to £3 ahead of ‘tough’ BudgetThe cap on bus fares will rise from £2 to £3 until the end of next year in a bid to ease pressure on the public finances, Sir Keir Starmer has confirmed.Laying the groundwork for Wednesday’s Budget, the prime minister said the existing cap will be replaced by the higher fare limit.Archie Mitchell28 October 2024 13:451730121801Comment | It is time to cut interest rates – and give homeowners a breakWith inflation falling rapidly, the Bank of England is looking to cut interest rates, writes James Moore.He adds: “There are still reasons to be cautious but mortgage payers can look forward to light at the end of the tunnel.”Albert Toth28 October 2024 13:231730120437Changes to debt rule will not affect interest rates, says StarmerAsked about planned changes to the debt rule to borrow more for investment into capital expenditure, the Prime Minister said: “I’m not going to pre-empt exactly what the Chancellor will say on Wednesday, but I have been really clear that we have to move to a situation where we invest in the future of this country.“Where we invest to ensure that we get the better jobs that we need, we have the infrastructure that we need.“And so part of what we will say on Wednesday is, first, how we’re going to fix the foundations and deal with the problem we’ve inherited, but secondly, how then we rebuild the country.“And investment is an important part of that story. Precisely how that will take place will be set out in detail on Wednesday. I do not accept the proposition that it will have an impact on interest rates.”Albert Toth28 October 2024 13:001730119237Reeves to announce £240 million for services that help people into workThe Chancellor will announce £240 million in funding for services to get people back into work in the Budget, Sir Keir Starmer has said.The Prime Minister said in a speech: “Rebuilding Britain and delivering growth will take the skills and effort of all of us.“That’s why this Budget will also get Britain working. It will pave the way for reforms that tackle the root causes for economic inactivity and make sure that those who can work do work.“As a Labour Government, we will always help those who cannot support themselves, but the UK is the only G7 country for whom inactivity is still higher than it was before Covid.“And that’s not just bad for our economy, it’s also bad for all those who are locked out of opportunity.“So the Chancellor will announce £240 million in funding to provide local services that can help people back into work.”Albert Toth28 October 2024 12:401730118037Sir Keir Starmer confirms that the £2 cap on bus fares will riseSpeaking today, Sir Keir Starmer confirmed the £2 cap on bus fares would end, but promised a new £3 limit instead.The Prime Minister said: “On the £2 bus fare, first thing to say is the Tories only funded that until the end of 2024 and therefore that is the end of the funding in relation to a £2 capped fare.“I do know how much this matters, particularly in rural communities where there’s heavy reliance on buses.“And that’s why I’m able to say to you this morning that in the Budget we will announce there will be a £3 cap on bus fares to the end of 2025 because I know how important it is.”Albert Toth28 October 2024 12:201730116906We will do the “hard work” in this Budget says StarmerAsked if this will be the end of major tax rises under the current Labour government, the prime minister says he can’t give a “cast iron guarantee” as “we don’t know what will be around the corner.”“The tough stuff is coming from this Budget,” he says, “but we’re going to resist the temptation to say at no point ever will there be an adjustment to anything else in the future.”Albert Toth28 October 2024 12:011730116640“Every pensioner will be better off” says StarmerAsked if pensioners who are struggling with fuel costs should regret voting Labour, Sir Keir says he understand the concerns, but adds that Labour is “protecting the most vulnerable with pension credit,” and making sure all entitled pensioners are taking it up.But, he adds, Labour is also “fixing the foundations and stabilising the economy,” enabling a commitment to the triple lock to remain in place.Albert Toth28 October 2024 11:571730116434Mike Amesbury footage was ‘shocking’, Keir Starmer saysSir Keir Starmer has said the video of suspended Labour MP Mike Amesbury punching a constituent was “shocking”.The prime minister said: “Look, I’ve seen the video footage. It’s shocking. We moved very swiftly to suspend him as a member and as a member of parliament.“There is now a police investigation. In the circumstances, you’ll appreciate there’s not much more I can say.”Albert Toth28 October 2024 11:531730116404Analysis: Daring his detractors even before the Budget is a bad signThe fact that Keir Starmer is already daring his government’s detractors to say what they would do instead is a bad sign about what is coming.The language of tough decisions, and unprecedented challenges certainly laid the ground for a Budget to deal with a crisis.Normally politicians dare their critics to say what they would do after a Budget has been delivered. Starmer along with Rachel Reeves are the only ones who know what is coming. He is already predicting an assault on his government in the media and political sphere.We will get the details on Wednesday from the chancellor but the mood music is already distinctly gloomy.David Maddox28 October 2024 11:53 More