UK Politics

Online tech giants will have to abide by new rules aimed at making sure they pay a fair price for news content under plans announced by Boris Johnson’s government.The Digital Markets Unit (DMU) will bring in a new code of conduct aimed at making sure Google and social media firms agree to “fair financial terms” for content published on their platforms.The tech watchdog will also be granted fresh powers to issue fines of up to 10 per cent of turnover for non-compliance, the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) said.The DMU regulator was set up last April with the aim of redressing the “imbalance” between tech giants such as Facebook and news publishers.Based within the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), the tech watchdog was instructed to boost competition, set fair prices for content, as well as giving users more control over their data.The DCMS has now confirmed it intends to go ahead with its proposals to further empower the regulator, following a consultation.However, it is unclear when exactly the changes will come into force, as the government has only said the necessary legislation will be introduced “in due course”.If legislation is passed, the DMU will have the power to enforce new tailored codes of conduct for firms dominating digital markets, outlining how they should treat their users and other companies fairly, with “tough sanctions” for those ignoring the rules.Digital minister Chris Philp said “the dominance of a few tech giants is crowding out competition and stifling innovation”.He added: “We want to level the playing field and we are arming this new tech regulator with a range of powers to generate lower prices, better choice and more control for consumers while backing content creators, innovators and publishers, including in our vital news industry.”Rocio Concha, director of policy and advocacy at Which?, said the Queen’s Speech on 10 May represented a “golden opportunity” for the government to introduce the legislation to empower the regulator.“The rules governing competition in the UK’s digital markets are in desperate need of an upgrade, so it’s encouraging that the government intends to introduce new rules to tackle the entrenched power of tech giants,” she said.“For the sake of UK consumers and businesses, it is essential that the Digital Markets Unit is properly empowered … the government must give it the tools it needs to do its job.”Owen Meredith, chief executive of News Media Association, also urged the government to take advantage of next week’s Queen’s Speech: “This pro-competitive and pro-innovation intervention is long overdue and we now urgently need to get on with passing this important legislation so the DMU has the tools it needs to get on with the job. “The Queen’s Speech on Tuesday is the obvious opportunity to take this forward via a Digital Competition Bill.” More

News that Durham Police will investigate claims that Keir Starmer broke lockdown rules will come as a blow to the Labour leader, who thought he had put the incident behind him months ago.But Labour will be relieved – and Conservatives furious – that the force held back the announcement of the new investigation, launched on 30 April, until after polling had closed in the local elections.Durham Constabulary announced in February that it would take “no further action” after viewing video of Sir Keir, taken through a window during a visit to the city in April 2021.The footage showed the Labour leader drinking from a bottle of beer, with other party workers in the same room, part of the constituency offices of City of Durham MP Mary Foy.At the time, the UK was in Step 2 of the phase-out of coronavirus restrictions, with pubs and restaurants permitted to serve outdoors, but indoor mixing between different households banned apart from for essential work reasons.Specific rules had been set out to allow Covid-secure campaigning for the 6 May local elections and Hartlepool byelection, which was the reason for Starmer’s visit to Durham that day.Since the pictures first emerged, Sir Keir and Labour have insisted that it was a work event and that any food or alcohol consumed was part of the normal requirement for people to eat and drink while working.Durham Police said in February they had reviewed the video footage and would take “no further action”.A spokesman said then: “We do not believe an offence has been established in relation to the legislation and guidance in place at that time.”However, the issue was revived last week by Tory MP Richard Holden, who wrote to Durham’s chief constable Jo Farrell urging her to reopen investigation.With local elections less than a fortnight away looking set to be dominated by Partygate, the move appeared part of a determined attempt by the Conservatives to take the sting out of Labour attacks.While deputy chief constable Ciaron Irvine did not at that point say the force would review the inquiry, his promise to make enquiries with the original investigation team was seized upon by the Tories and their supporters as an indication that Starmer was once again under suspicion.Labour’s position was undermined when the party was forced to admit that deputy leader Angela Rayner was present in the room, saying that its previous denials were mistaken.And Conservative-leaning newspapers devoted front pages day after day to the supposed scandal, establishing that a curry order totalling £200 was put in for up to 30 aides late that evening.Questions were asked over whether Starmer and his team went back to work, possibly as late as 11pm, after consuming the meal.The row provided Conservative candidates with a response to voters who raised Partygate on the doorstep, effectively suggesting that while Boris Johnson may have breached rules, other politicians were doing the same.It meant that Sir Keir was repeatedly forced onto the defensive in TV and radio interviews. And it made Labour campaigners hold back on criticisms of Johnson over Partygate, for fear of throwing the spotlight once more onto their own leader.Starmer always insisted he was happy to co-operate with police and was confident that they would find no Covid restrictions had been broken.‘We were working, we stopped, we ate,” he said. “No breach of the rules. No party.”Labour insists that the incident – branded “Keir’s beers” by critics – bears no comparison to the string of parties held in Downing Street during Covid restrictions.The Metropolitan Police are investigating 12 such events, including some which were explicitly intended as social events, including a number of leaving dos and a “bring your own booze” party in the No 10 garden.Some observers suggest that Starmer overplayed his hand by calling for the resignation not only of the prime minister but also chancellor Rishi Sunak after they received £50 fines for attending Mr Johnson’s birthday party in No 10 in June 2020.Suggesting that Mr Sunak’s inadvertent involvement, which arose from him turning up a few minutes early for a meeting, is a matter for resignation sets a very low bar, which may come back to bite Starmer if he is fined by Durham Police. More

The Conservative Party said he has ‘never bought a tin of baked beans in his life’ when quizzed about the cost of living crisis. Oliver Dowden was asked about supermarket own brand products on LBC after environment secretary George Eustice was criticised for suggesting consumers should swap to value goods as the cost of living crisis continues.He told the radio station: “I’m afraid I rarely get the opportunity to go to the shops, given my extensive duties as chairman of the Conservative Party, but when I pop down to my local Tesco’s, of course I buy own-brand products.“I wouldn’t know the price of a tin of baked beans – I’ll tell you why, I have never liked baked beans. I’ve never purchased a tin of baked beans in my entire life.”He got the price of a pint of milk about right, guessing it cost “around 50p”.Mr Eustice was branded “out of touch” as he was rounded on by political rivals and social commentators after saying shoppers could “contain and manage their household budget” by changing the brands they buy in supermarkets and elsewhere.Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said it showed how “out of ideas” the government is when it comes to understanding the issues facing those on the lowest incomes.The Liberal Democrats said the cabinet minister was living in a “parallel universe”, while Scotland’s first minister Nicola Sturgeon said that, for many people, there was “nothing” else they could cut to help make ends meet.Mr Dowden defended the government’s actions to help people with the cost of living and said more measures could be taken.He told BBC Breakfast: “No government is going to be able to buy people out of all of these problems, I just have to be honest with your viewers.“It’s not going to be possible, but we have taken unprecedented action”.He added: “You would expect when people are hurting – and I know people are hurting and I hear this on the doorstep and we all see it and I know your viewers will feel the same way – they’re sat around the kitchen table or in the front room thinking ‘how are we paying those bills?’.“It’s incumbent on the government to look to see every further measure that we can take but what I would say is that we’ve already taken an unprecedented amount of action”.The Tory chairman defended Boris Johnson over the partygate scandal and accusations he misled parliament as he downplayed Conservative losses and Labour gains in the local elections.He said: “Of course we’ve had some difficult results and you can see that in London.“I would say, though, that we are mid-term and it’s quite a mixed picture because you look elsewhere, whether that’s in Hartlepool or Nuneaton and Thurrock, we’ve actually made gains and I think if you take the whole picture of this, it really doesn’t demonstrate that Labour has the momentum to form the next government.”Additional reporting by Press Association More

Tory infighting has begun in Scotland as the party prepares to slip to third place in the local elections in what one frontbencher admitted are “disappointing” results.Under the popular Ruth Davidson, the Conservatives displaced Labour as the most popular Unionist party – but have lost more than 10 per cent of their vote in some wards, in early results.The elections guru John Curtice forecast that, while the Tory party had escaped its “worst nightmares” in England, it looked “highly likely that its fears north of the border will be realised”.Miles Briggs, a frontbencher at the Holyrood parliament, said his party had suffered from anger over the Partygate scandal and the fine handed to Boris Johnson for breaching his own Covid rules.He said voters had refused to cast their ballots in the main, rather than switching to other parties, but admitted: “There’s some good news but it’s really disappointing.”Asked about the impact of the No 10 parties, Mr Briggs said: “Yes I think that’s part of it. You can’t deny that and I think, speaking to people yesterday, they certainly weren’t happy with the actions of the prime minster and his team.”But one former Conservative member of the Scottish parliament called that “nonsense” and instead turned his fire on flip-flopping by Douglas Ross, the Scottish Tory leader.Mr Ross was one of the first Tory MPs to call on Mr Johnson to quit over the scandal – but then withdraw his letter demanding a no-vote confidence, after the Ukraine war broke out.“Whatever today’s results show Douglas Ross owns this, not Boris,” Adam Tomkins, a constitutional lawyer at the University of Glasgow, tweeted.“It was Douglas who U-turned, Douglas who flipped, and Douglas who backed the PM. He and his team need to own the consequences, not pass the buck.”The Scottish National Party is certain to win the elections, maintaining its iron grip on the nation’s politics as it pushes for s second independence referendum next year.Ian Blackford, the SNP’s Westminster leader, said: “The Tories are being rejected. Their vote is down and I think what really is important today is that the voters have sent a message to Boris Johnson.”However, on Glasgow City Council, the SNP leader was overtaken by the Scottish Greens on first preference votes in the city’s Langside ward.Susan Aitken suggested the co-operation agreement between the SNP and the Greens at Holyrood may have led to the surprise result in her ward.Scottish Labour took overall control of West Dunbartonshire Council – unseating minority SNP rule – after the proportional voting system left no party with a majority in any local authority area after the last elections, in 2017.Voters were electing more than 1,220 councillors across all of Scotland’s 32 local authorities, against a backdrop of the SNP’s commanding poll lead of around 45 per cent of the vote. More

The Conservatives have lost control of the southern Wokingham council to no overall control, after the Liberal Democrats won seats on the authority.The loss of Wokingham — the home of the Conservative MP John Redwood — comes after Boris Johnson’s party suffered a string of defeats at the local elections.The result in the town of Berkshire, England, will unnerve Tory strategists, with the party previously dominating the council over the last decade.After all 18 seats were declared, the Liberal Democrats gained five councillors, toppling the Tory council into no overall control on Friday afternoon.Daisy Cooper, the Lib Dem deputy leader, told The Independent: “This is another hammer blow to Boris Johnson’s Blue Wall which is now crumbling before his eyes.”Lifelong Conservative voters have said enough is enough. This country is gripped by a cost of living crisis for which Boris Johnson’s out of touch Government has no answers. “Conservative MPs like John Redwood in Wokingham need to start listening to their constituents who know the time is up on Boris Johnson as prime minister.”It comes after Mr Johnson admitted the Conservatives had endured a “tough night” following historic defeats in London to Labour, including Wandsworth, a seat held since 1978, and Westminster — a Tory council since its creation in 1964.Speaking to broadcasters, the prime minister referred to the local elections as “mid-term”, adding it was a “mixed-set of results”.As of 1.30pm, the Conservatives had lost 168 council seats, while Labour had gained 41 and the Liberal Democrats had won 77, including town hall seats in David Cameron’s former backyard of West Oxfordshire.In a message to activists earlier on Friday, Sir Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, claimed the results amounted to “an almighty shockwave that will bring this Conservative government tumbling down”.“The tectonic plates of British politics are shifting beneath Boris Johnson’s feet. And now it’s time for Conservative MPs to plunge him into the abyss,” he added.John Curtice, an elections expert, described the Lib Dem improvement as “relatively modest”, saying: “It’s up a couple of points as compared with 2018.”The party had won more seats than Labour largely because of the technicality of gains “in smaller, more rural councils where the wards are smaller, so you get more seats per person”. More

The head of a Conservative HQ unit devoted to defeating the Liberal Democrats has lost his battle for a seat on Somerset Council – to a Liberal Democrat.Hayward Burt has given advice to Tory grassroots organisations on how to see off the “yellow peril” in the Conservative heartland areas known as the Blue Wall which are under assault from Sir Ed Davey’s party.He delivered a “masterclass” to the Conservative Women’s Organisation in November on the subject: “Fighting the Lib Dems – Policies that win”.And he was on a regional party panel for which invitations read: “The Liberal Democrats are slowly working their wayacross the home counties and with May elections fast approaching, do you know the best way to fight off the yellow peril? Join us as we explore the options and listen to expert advice.”But in Thursday’s local elections for the new Somerset unitary authority, he came in third in Blackmoor Vale behind two Lib Dems, who took both of the ward’s seats.Mr Burt represents Blackmoor Vale, alongside fellow-Tory William Wallace, on South Somerset District Council – one of five councils being swallowed up into the new unitary authority from April next year.But both Burt and Wallace failed in their bid to join the new council, taking 1,443 and 1,328 votes respectively against Lib Dems Sarah Dyke on 1,814 and Nicola Clarke on 1,590.Ed Davey’s party went on to win overall control of the new Somerset Council.One Lib Dem source said: “In fairness, even the greatest political strategist couldn’t stop the backlash against Boris Johnson across the Blue Wall.“He is a one-man election-winning unit for the Lib Dems.” More

The Liberal Democrats are finally putting “the disaster” of recent election thrashings behind them with local council gains, a polling expert has suggested.Ed Davey’s party is celebrating making 58 early extra town hall seats after Thursday’s elections, including snatching Hull City Council from Labour, in an embarrassment for Keir Starmer.Perhaps more significantly, the Lib Dems have also taken seats from the Conservatives in places such as Stockport, Wimbledon, in south west London, and in David Cameron’s former backyard of West Oxfordshire.Perversely, only a Lib Dem revival can deliver a Labour victory at the next general election, by winning seats from the Tories in Blue-Yellow battlegrounds.Speaking in Wimbledon, Sir Ed claimed the results amounted to “an almighty shockwave that will bring this Conservative government tumbling down”.Voters have “had enough” of rising living costs, an NHS in crisis and of “a prime minister who breaks the law and lies about it”, he argued.“The tectonic plates of British politics are shifting beneath Boris Johnson’s feet. And now it’s time for Conservative MPs to plunge him into the abyss,” Sir Ed said.John Curtice, an elections expert, described the Lib Dem improvement as “relatively modest”, saying: “It’s up a couple of points as compared with 2018.”The party had won more seats than Labour largely because of the technicality of gains “in smaller, more rural councils where the wards are smaller, so you get more seats per person”.But Sir John told BBC Radio 4: “Even so, I think Liberal Democrats might just be hoping that, on this occasion – against a backdrop that was not particularly propitious for them – perhaps finally beginning to demonstrate some evidence of progress and recovery from the disaster of the 2015 general election.“It’s taken a long time. Maybe, maybe at least the foundations of recovery, or potential recovery at least, have been laid for them.”Sir Ed is also hoping to win control of Somerset County Council, in a result expected later – one that will be seen as a pointer to looming Westminster battles.A by-election is looming in nearby Tiverton and Honiton, where Neil Parish quit over his porn shame, while David Warburton, the Conservative MP in Somerton and Frome, is currently suspended.Labour blamed their loss of control of Hull – after more than a decade in power in the city – on a collapse of the Tory vote, which delivered victories to the Lib Dems.The party gained three seats, leaving it with 29 seats on the 57-seat council, compared with 27 for Labour and one independent. The Conservatives lost their last remaining seat.Daren Hale, the outgoing Labour council leader, told the BBC: “In the seats we held, our majority went up.“It was the collapse of the Tory vote, which, in a sense, the Labour party isn’t responsible for, that led to those seats changing hands.” More