UK Politics

The minister in charge of the government’s emergency response to the heatwave has defended the UK’s vague laws about maximum temperatures at work.Kit Malthouse, who chaired chaired this weekend’s meeting of the Cobra emergency committee, cited the difference in temperature between offices and blast-furnace facilities as a reason why a maximum limit could be unworkable.Mr Malthouse was asked in the Commons by Labour MP Nadia Whittome whether the government would “legislate for maximum working temperatures” – a key demand of trade unions in light of the heatwave.The Trades Union Congress has previously called for a maximum temperature of 30°C, or 27°C for those doing strenuous work, while the GMB union on Monday union said 25°C should be the maximum.Responding for the government, Cabinet Office minister Mr Malthouse replied: “The law as it stands says that employers have an obligation to maintain a reasonable temperature at work. Recommended”They haven’t defined it because circumstances may change, so if you are working in front of a blast furnace that is different from working in an office.“What we may find, certainly for many people during this period, that actually being at work is cooler than being at home.”Under existing UK law, employers must make sure indoor workplaces stay at a “reasonable” temperature and also manage the risk of working outdoors in the heat.And under section 44 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 workers also have the right to withdraw from and to refuse to return to a workplace that is unsafe.Some countries in Europe and around the world have maximum workplace temperatures written into law or collective agreements. These laws usually apply to particular kinds of work, or have contextual conditions – a simple solution to the point about blast-furnaces raised by the minister.According to figures collated by the House of Commons library, in Spain places where sedentary of light work take place must be between 17°C and 27°C. The Spanish laws are applied while taking into account “limitations or conditions resulting from the particular characteristics of the workplace”.In Germany, a maximum temperature of 26°C is the norm, though this can be exceeded in certain conditions – such as if the outside temperature is higher. RecommendedTrades Union Congress general secretary, Frances O’Grady said: “We all love it when the sun comes out, but working in sweltering conditions in a baking shop or stifling office can be unbearable and dangerous. Indoor workplaces should be kept cool, with relaxed dress codes and flexible working to make use of the coolest hours of the day.“Bosses must make sure outdoor workers are protected with regular breaks, lots of fluids, plenty of sunscreen and the right protective clothing.” More

A Conservative police and crime commissioner has been banned from driving after being found guilty of five separate motoring offences.Caroline Henry, 52, who was elected to run the police service in Nottinghamshire last year, was banned from driving for six months and ordered to pay a £2,450 fine.The five separate speeding offences took place within the space of just 12 weeks, including two offences on consecutive days. More

Cutting taxes at the moment would “be a mistake”, according to a top official at the International Monetary Fund. Four of the final five Tory leadership candidates have pledged to cut taxes if they become prime minister. But not Rishi Sunak, who has argued that slashing taxes would fuel rising inflation. “I think debt-financed tax cuts at this point would be a mistake,” Mark Flanagan, who leads the IMF’s UK team, told BBC News. More

Labour have accused Boris Johnson of “clocking off”, after it was confirmed he will miss a meeting of the government’s emergency Cobra committee today to discuss the current heatwave.It came after Mr Johnson missed his third meeting on the UK’s first red extreme heat warning on Saturday, while attending a farewell party for close allies at Chequers.Instead, the prime minister was paying a visit to the Farnborough Air Show in Hampshire – just days after finding time to fly in a Typhoon jet with the RAF. Later in the day, Mr Johnson was due to defend his record in office from the despatch box as the Commons debates a confidence motion in the government.Downing Street said that today’s Cobra will be led by the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster Kit Malthouse, and insisted the prime minister was being constantly updated on the situation.The PM’s official spokesperson also confirmed that Mr Johnson will attend his final session of prime minister’s questions in the House of Commons on Wednesday.RecommendedIt followed speculation that he might duck the clash with Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer in order to travel to a memorial service for assassinated Japanese ex-PM Shinzo Abe.Mr Johnson’s spokesperson insisted it was “not unusual” for cabinet ministers, rather than the prime minister, to chair meetings of Cobra, which bring together top politicians, officials and outside experts to respond to emergencies.But shadow cabinet minister Lisa Nandy said the PM had “clearly clocked off”, adding: “And so have many of his ministers in his government.”The shadow levelling up secretary told Sky News: “We think the government ought to do a number of things: first is to turn up to work.”Ms Nandy called for a dedicated Cabinet Office minister to co-ordinate an emergency response to the soaring temperatures – predicted to top 40C over the coming days – and urged Whitehall to work with local areas to ensure resilience plans are in place to end the current “patchwork” approach.Starmer said: “I think for millions of people, particularly with the heatwave today, they’ll be saying ‘I want a government that’s focused on the day job, that’s getting on with resilience for today and tomorrow, however long this heatwave goes on, and focused on the cost-of-living crisis’.”Mr Johnson’s official spokesperson confirmed that Mr Malthouse will chair the Cobra meeting in Whitehall at 2.30pm. A Cabinet Office minister will also respond in the Commons to an urgent statement from Green MP Caroline Lucas on the government’s response to the soaring temperatures.The spokesperson said: “Kit Malthouse has made the point that he is taking the lead on the government’s response to the heatwave. He’s keeping the prime minister fully briefed, including over the weekend when the prime minister also spoke to a number of secretaries of state about the work they are doing.“It is not unusual in cabinet government for cabinet ministers to chair these sorts of things.”But Ms Lucas said: “The government is turning up at this national extreme heat emergency with a watering can, when we need a giant fire hose.“We are seeing a total absence of leadership. The prime minister refuses to chair the Cobra meeting taking place today, and is instead filling his time with lavish parties at Chequers and juvenile photo ops on an RAF fighter jet.“Tory ministers and MPs are branding Britons as ‘cowards’ and ‘snowflakes’ for taking precautions during the country’s first ever national heat emergency. And as a result, the government’s utter lack of preparedness for this crisis has been laid bare. Where are the guidelines for schools? For the NHS? For employers?”The PM notoriously missed a series of Cobra gatherings at the outset of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, staying at grace-and-favour residence Chevening to finalise details of his divorce and work on a book on Shakespeare.Asked what justification there was for the PM’s Typhoon flight from RAF Coningsby in Lincolnshire last week, the spokesperson said: “The Typhoon’s quick alert reaction role is an integral part of both UK and Nato security and the PM does have a specific role in directing RAF action in worst-case scenarios. So it is important he is aware of some of these capabilities they have.”Asked if he needs first-hand experience to understand this, the spokesman said: “It’s important that he has a detailed understanding of the working capabilities of the RAF.”Mr Johnson today compared taking the controls of the fighter jet to his experience as prime minister over the past three years, telling business leaders at Farnborough: “I hauled the joystick right the way back and we did a loop the loop… After three happy years in the cockpit, performing some pretty difficult if not astonishing feats, I am about to hand the controls over seamlessly to someone else.”Downing Street said a “range of measures” was in place to cope with the impact of the heat.The PM’s official spokesman said: “In the NHS, for example, we are increasing ambulance control room staff and on NHS 111.“There are specialist teams from Network Rail and Transport for London monitoring the impact of higher temperatures so they can keep services running.”The Department for Transport is in touch with port operators, highways agencies and the police to “check their contingency plans”.Recommended More

There is a “major hole at the centre of government” over the resilience of the UK’s critical national infrastructure to climate change, a parliamentary committee has warned.The Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy (JCNSS) said no ministers were currently responsible for the issue, and that the minister previously in charge had refused to give evidence.Amid a heatwave seeing the potential for new record temperatures in Britain, the committee released a letter hitting out at a “pattern of disrespectful behaviour by government ministers towards select committees”.It comes days after Priti Patel and Dominic Raab cancelled their appearances before other parliamentary committees because of the Conservative leadership election, despite remaining in their posts as home and justice secretary.The Home Affairs Committee and Joint Committee on Human Rights both voiced concerns over government accountability and the scrutiny of new laws.RecommendedThe JCNSS session was to examine how critical national infrastructure, which includes power networks, railway lines and roads, is being prepared for the effects of climate change.The committee said the Cabinet Office minister Michael Ellis was due to give evidence at a session on 4 July but cancelled days before with a letter saying he was “not best placed to give evidence at the session”, which he regarded as a “technical and specialist matter”. He remained in his post following the breakdown of Boris Johnson’s government but wrote to the committee claiming that other ministers would be more appropriate because he was a “convening minister only, rather than a minister with responsibility for the policies in question”.Dame Margaret Beckett, chair of the JCNSS, wrote to the head of the Cabinet Office, calling the letter “extraordinary”, pointing to written evidence from April where Mr Ellis called himself the minister “responsible for resilience and security” adding: “I am committed to tackling and improving the chronic risk posed by climate change”.Dame Margaret said: “The unfortunate impression that we are gaining from this exchange is that there are no ministers with responsibility for the resilience of critical national infrastructure to the effects of climate change, nor for cross-government climate adaptation efforts… this would be quite a shocking admission from the government at this stage in our inquiry, and one on which we might be forced to draw some quite damning conclusions in our forthcoming report. “It would suggest a major hole at the centre of government in preparation and planning on a crucial area of national security.”The committee chair warned that the incident “forms part of a pattern of disrespectful behaviour by government ministers towards select committees, including late cancellations and refusals to give evidence”.RecommendedThe exchange of letters was made public on Monday, which was forecast to see new record high temperatures in parts of the UK.The heatwave was having widespread effects on critical national infrastructure, with people urged to avoid unnecessary travel because of buckling railway lines and melting roads. More

Keir Starmer has ruled out striking “any” agreement with the Liberal Democrats after the next general election.The Labour leader had previously ruled out an electoral pact or coalition with the Scottish National Party, saying there would be “no deal going into the general election and no deal other side”.But he had not previously explicitly ruled out working with the Liberal Democrats, either as part of a coalition or under a looser supply and confidence arrangement.Asked specifically whether he would entertain a confidence and supply agreement with the Liberal Democrats in an interview with the Bloomberg news agency published on Monday, Sir Keir said: “I’m ruling out any arrangement.”Under a coalition agreement, MPs from both parties take jobs as government ministers, such as in the 2010-2015 Cameron government. RecommendedUnder a supply and confidence arrangement, a minority Labour government would be supported by the Lib Dems on major votes to keep it in power, in exchange for policy concessions. The arrangement is relatively common around the world, with Canada’s liberal government now propped up by the left-of-centre NDP under such a deal. The UK most recently saw such an arrangement between the Conservatives and DUP in 2017. The Lib Dems themselves have themselves strongly hinted they would be open to working with Labour, saying they want to oust the Conservatives – though deputy leader Daisy Cooper said in May it was “too early” to talk specifics. While Labour has opened up a consistent poll lead over the Conservatives in recent months, it may not be able to win a majority on its own because of the SNP’s dominance in Scotland. The liberals are thought to want electoral reform – a longstanding priority for the party – as the price for supporting a minority government. RecommendedThe Liberal Democrats have polled as high as 15 per cent in some recent surveys and have pulled off a string of stunning by-election successes in Conservative-held seats in the south of England. But the party has struggled to gain traction nationally since going into coalition with the Tories in 2010, which obliterated their levels of support. Despite a strong set of European Parliament elections in 2019 the party failed to capitalise in the general election later that year. More

It was the most striking moment so far in the U.K. Conservative Party’s contest for a new leader. The five remaining candidates were asked during a televised debate to raise their hands if they would let Boris Johnson serve in their Cabinet. Not a single hand went up.The contenders to replace Johnson are scrambling to distance themselves from the scandal-tainted politician who has resigned as party leader but remains Britain’s prime minister for a few more weeks — despite the fact that most of them have served in his government over the past three years.Johnson, meanwhile, has largely disappeared from the scene. He has not attended any government emergency meetings about a heat wave that is forecast to bring temperatures of 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) to Britain.On Friday, Johnson visited a Royal Air Force base and took a ride in a Typhoon fighter jet, with “Top Gun”-style footage later released by his office. He spent the weekend at Chequers, the country house that comes with the prime minister’s job, throwing a farewell barbecue for staff and friends. On Monday, Johnson attended the Farnborough Air Show and will return to Parliament for one of the final times as prime minister to extol his own accomplishments ahead of a largely symbolic vote of confidence called by the government in itself.RecommendedSteven Fielding, professor of political history at the University of Nottingham, likened Johnson to “a sulky teenager in the bedroom, just doing what he wants and shouting at the parents once in a while.”Political and media attention has turned to his would-be successors, who are slinging dirt at one another as they try to convince Conservative Party members they can rebuild trust in politics and defeat the opposition Labour Party at the next election, due to be held by 2024.Front-runner Rishi Sunak, who served as Treasury chief under Johnson until he resigned earlier this month, is under attack by rivals for spending billions to keep workers and businesses afloat during the coronavirus pandemic, and raising taxes to help pay for it.In a televised debate on Sunday, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss accused Sunak of hiking taxes to the highest level in 70 years. He argued the hikes were necessary to damp down soaring inflation, and accused Truss, who has promised immediate tax cuts, of peddling “something-for-nothing economics.”Penny Mordaunt, a trade minister who has emerged as a strong challenger in the contest, has appealed in vain for an end to “mudslinging,” much of which has been directed at her. She has been accused by opponents of wanting to make it easier for people to change gender — a hot-button issue for some Conservatives — and of neglecting her government duties in order to prepare her leadership bid.Conservative lawmakers will hold the latest in a series of elimination votes later Monday to reduce the number of candidates — already slimmed from an initial 11 — from five to four. Sunak, Mordaunt and Truss are widely expected to remain in the contest, with backbench lawmaker Tom Tugendhat or former Equalities Minister Kemi Badenoch facing elimination. Further rounds of voting are scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday to produce two finalists. The final pair will face a vote by about 180,000 Conservative Party members across the country. The winner is scheduled to be announced Sept. 5 and will automatically become prime minister, without the need for a national election.Fielding said that may prove problematic for the new leader, because who will be chosen by a Conservative membership — “primarily white, southern, very well-off” — with political priorities very different to the general electorate as a whole.Johnson won the Conservatives a commanding parliamentary majority in 2019, but he has been plagued by scandal since then, including being accused of misleading Parliament about government office parties that broke COVID-19 lockdown rules.Johnson clung to power despite being fined by police over “partygate,” but finally quit on July 7 after one scandal too many — appointing a politician who had been accused of sexual misconduct — drove ministers to resign en masse.Cabinet Office Minister Kit Malthouse, a long-time Johnson ally, argued that the party’s testy debate was healthy, and predicted Conservatives would reunite in a “spirit of harmony and love” after the leadership campaign.But Tim Bale, professor of politics at Queen Mary University of London, said that was overly optimistic.“The manner of Johnson’s departure unfortunately injected quite a lot of poison into the (party) bloodstream,” he said. “It will take time to work its way out.”Recommended___Follow all of AP’s coverage of British politics at https://apnews.com/hub/boris-johnson More

Penny Mordaunt will win the Tory leadership race and become the next prime minister, readers of The Independent have predicted.Ms Mordaunt received 48 per cent of the vote when readers were polled on who would become next Tory leader and Boris Johnson’s successor.Former chancellor Rishi Sunak came second with 23 per cent of the vote. Tom Tugendhat, who readers previously voted the frontrunner from a longer list in a recent reader poll, came third, with 15 per cent of the vote. Liz Truss and Kemi Badenoch got eight and six per cent respectively.A commenter with the name AnOldGoat said: “It’s extraordinary that the Tories are being forced to decide between five such dire candidates.“Mordaunt will edge out Sunak. It’s not impossible there will be a shock swing and one of them gets enough of a percentage that the other drops out.”Recommended‘Redthistle’ added: “Mordaunt is popular with the membership. Faced with the ultimate choice between Sunak and Mordaunt, they will choose Mordaunt.”The reader poll took place over the weekend, when the final five contenders took part in two televised debates.Reader ‘KD1958’ said on Friday: “Based solely on tonight’s C4 head-to-head, Tom Tugendhat, by a clear margin.”Some readers were disappointed there was not an option to vote “don’t care” this time around. Commenter Finbarr65 wrote: “There should be an option – “Don’t Care” [Each] one of them is as bad as the other.”On Monday, Sky News announced it has cancelled the final televised debate in the Tory leadership contest, after Mr Sunak and Ms Truss pulled out of the event.The pair were said to be keen to focus instead on the final ballot of Tory MPs on Wednesday, but there are reported to be fears that the previous two debates have inflicted “incredible” damage on the Conservative Party.Ms Truss and Mr Sunak butted heads on Sunday night in the second televised debate, with the ex-chancellor accusing the foreign secretary of offering “socialist” proposals in her bid for No 10.Deputy Labour leader Angela Rayner has called the Conservative leadership race “scarily embarrassing”.The next round of voting will take place tonight, with subsequent rounds if required until two candidates are left, who will then battle it out over the summer to win the support of Conservative members. Their choice of the next prime minister will be announced on September 5.RecommendedThe reader poll ran from Friday 15 July to Monday 18 July. There were 121 entries. Ms Mordaunt got 58 votes, Mr Sunak 28, Mr Tugendhat 18, Ms Truss 10 and Ms Badenoch seven.Follow the latest twists and turns via The Independent’s live blog. More