UK Politics

Your support helps us to tell the storyFind out moreCloseAs your White House correspondent, I ask the tough questions and seek the answers that matter.Your support enables me to be in the room, pressing for transparency and accountability. Without your contributions, we wouldn’t have the resources to challenge those in power.Your donation makes it possible for us to keep doing this important work, keeping you informed every step of the way to the November electionAndrew FeinbergWhite House Correspondent Michael Gove, who was a longtime U.K. Cabinet minister under successive Conservative Party governments, has been appointed as the editor of The Spectator, one of the world’s oldest political magazines.Wednesday’s announcement came little more than two weeks after billionaire hedge fund manager Paul Marshall bought the magazine via his company Old Queen Street Ventures. The Spectator has a long-standing reputation of supporting the Conservative Party and providing intellectual ballast to its discussions both in and out of power. Marshall is already the co-owner of U.K. channel GB News, which launched three years ago as a right-leaning, Fox News-style alternative to mainstream news channels. “Alongside his political and journalistic nous, Michael brings a love of books, philosophy, art, opera — and a mischievous sense of humor,” said Freddie Sayers, chief executive of new owner OQS. “He is perfectly suited to this role, and I can’t wait to work together to bring The Spectator to new audiences.” Gove, who served in the successive governments of Prime Ministers David Cameron, Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak, will take up his new role at the start of October. Gove served in a variety of Cabinet positions from 2010 until July, when the Conservative Party suffered its worst election defeat for nearly two centuries. The Tories lost power after 14 years, with the Labour Party taking the reins.Before he became a lawmaker after the 2005 general election, Gove had been a prominent journalist at The Times and considered a close confidante of its owner Rupert Murdoch.The Spectator is one of the world’s oldest politics and current affairs magazines, established in 1828 in London’s Old Queen Street, which has given its name to Marshall’s OQS venture. More

Your support helps us to tell the storyFind out moreCloseAs your White House correspondent, I ask the tough questions and seek the answers that matter.Your support enables me to be in the room, pressing for transparency and accountability. Without your contributions, we wouldn’t have the resources to challenge those in power.Your donation makes it possible for us to keep doing this important work, keeping you informed every step of the way to the November electionAndrew FeinbergWhite House CorrespondentDelegates at the Labour Party Conference in Liverpool have voted to reverse the government’s controversial cut to winter fuel payments, in a blow to Sir Keir Starmer.While motions at the party conference are non-binding, and the government is not required to respond to them, the vote highlights major division within the party over the controversial policy.In July, Rachel Reeves announced that older people not in receipt of pension credits or other means-tested benefits will no longer receive winter fuel payments from this year onwards.The decision came as part of a series of spending cuts to address a black hole in the public finances left by the previous Conservative government announced in July by the chancellor.The winter fuel payment is a payment of either £200 or £300 to help pensioners with their heating bills.Delegates at the Labour Party Conference in Liverpool have voted to reverse the government’s controversial cut to winter fuel payments, in a damaging blow to Sir Keir Starmer’s authority More

Your support helps us to tell the storyFind out moreCloseAs your White House correspondent, I ask the tough questions and seek the answers that matter.Your support enables me to be in the room, pressing for transparency and accountability. Without your contributions, we wouldn’t have the resources to challenge those in power.Your donation makes it possible for us to keep doing this important work, keeping you informed every step of the way to the November electionAndrew FeinbergWhite House Correspondent Members of Britain’s governing Labour Party dealt Prime Minister Keir Starmer a blow on Wednesday, rejecting his decision to cut payments that offset winter heating costs for millions of retirees.The vote on the final day of Labour’s annual conference is not binding, but it’s a setback to Starmer’s efforts to unite his center-left party around the contentious measure.Since winning office in July, Starmer has cautioned that the dire state of the public finances inherited from the last Conservative government means he must make hard choices such as ending the winter fuel allowance, worth between 200 and 300 pounds ($262 and $393), for all but the poorest pensioners.Trade unions that are among Labour’s funders and allies organized resistance to the cut at the conference in Liverpool, northwest England. They forced a vote on a demand for the decision to be reversed. It was narrowly passed in a show-of-hands vote amid cheers and jeers in the conference hall.“I do not understand how our new Labour government can cut the winter fuel payment for pensioners and leave the super-rich untouched,” said Sharon Graham, general secretary of the Unite union, to applause from delegates. “This is not what people voted for. It is the wrong decision and it needs to be reversed.”Unite boss leads ‘save the winter fuel’ protest at Labour conferenceThe government has promised the withdrawal of the heating allowance will be offset by an above-inflation increase in the state pension and other measures to reduce poverty.Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall told delegates that the cut “wasn’t a decision we wanted or expected to make.” But she argued that “this Labour government has done more to help the poorest pensioners in the last two months than the Tories did in 14 years.”Starmer tried to unite the party and appeal to a skeptical electorate in his first conference speech as prime minister on Tuesday, telling voters exhausted by years of political and economic turmoil that better times are on the way — if they swallow his recipe of short-term pain for long-term gain.He said he would make “tough decisions” — code for public spending restraint and tax increases — to achieve economic growth to fund schools, hospitals, roads, railways and more.Starmer acknowledged some of those decisions would be unpopular, but said: “We will turn our collar up and face the storm.” More

Your support helps us to tell the storyFind out moreCloseAs your White House correspondent, I ask the tough questions and seek the answers that matter.Your support enables me to be in the room, pressing for transparency and accountability. Without your contributions, we wouldn’t have the resources to challenge those in power.Your donation makes it possible for us to keep doing this important work, keeping you informed every step of the way to the November electionAndrew FeinbergWhite House CorrespondentWes Streeting has warned against “killing the NHS with kindness”, as he vowed not to back down in his mission to reform the health service.Giving a speech on the main stage of the Labour Party Conference in Liverpool, the health secretary said the NHS is “broken but not beaten”, accusing the previous Conservative administration of having betrayed the service by leaving it “totally unprepared for tomorrow”.Mr Streeting told delegates on the final day of the conference that the government won’t put “protecting the reputation of the NHS above protecting patients”.This came after Lord Ara Darzi’s independent investigation into the state of the NHS, published in September, concluded that the service is in a “critical condition” amid surging waiting lists and a deterioration in the nation’s underlying health.Referencing the report, the health secretary said: “I know the doctor’s diagnosis can sometimes be hard to hear. But if you don’t have an accurate diagnosis, you won’t provide the correct prescription.Wes Streeting has warned against “killing the NHS with kindness”, as he vowed not to back down in his mission to reform the health service More

Your support helps us to tell the storyFind out moreCloseAs your White House correspondent, I ask the tough questions and seek the answers that matter.Your support enables me to be in the room, pressing for transparency and accountability. Without your contributions, we wouldn’t have the resources to challenge those in power.Your donation makes it possible for us to keep doing this important work, keeping you informed every step of the way to the November electionAndrew FeinbergWhite House CorrespondentLabour delegates have voted in favour of a non-binding motion calling to reverse the controversial cut to the winter fuel payments for millions of pensioners.In an embarrassing blow to prime minister Sir Keir Starmer, he now faces mounting pressure over the policy that has been criticised for being disproportionately harmful to the poorest pensioners.The motion, tabled by Sharon Graham of the Unite union, was narrowly carried by a show of hands in a rowdy hall at the Labour Party annual conference.Sir Keir has emphasised the need for economic stability, but union leaders successfully argued that the cuts undermine Labour’s promise of change and are economically unsound.The outcome of the vote will now test Starmer’s ability to manage dissent within the party. Questions remain about whether he will reverse the policy or not.Union members campaigning at conference More

Your support helps us to tell the storyFind out moreCloseAs your White House correspondent, I ask the tough questions and seek the answers that matter.Your support enables me to be in the room, pressing for transparency and accountability. Without your contributions, we wouldn’t have the resources to challenge those in power.Your donation makes it possible for us to keep doing this important work, keeping you informed every step of the way to the November electionAndrew FeinbergWhite House CorrespondentWatch as Wes Streeting and Bridget Phillipson speak at the Labour Party conference on Wednesday 25 September.Mr Streeting, the health secretary, has called for a “national debate” about the prospect of banning smoking outside pubs.A restriction is being considered by the government as part of a range of measures which will be set out shortly, he has said.Ministers are examining what can be done to help smokers quit and to “deal with the scourge of second-hand smoke and passive smoke.”“We definitely want to see smoking phased out in our country, we committed to that in our manifesto,” Mr Streeting told Sky News ahead of his speech.“We want to make sure this generation of children are the healthiest generation that ever lived and therefore they will never be able to legally buy cigarettes.”Asked if he will ban smoking outside pubs, he said: “Look, that’s one of the measures that I’m considering, and I’m up for a national debate on this issue.” More

Your support helps us to tell the storyFind out moreCloseAs your White House correspondent, I ask the tough questions and seek the answers that matter.Your support enables me to be in the room, pressing for transparency and accountability. Without your contributions, we wouldn’t have the resources to challenge those in power.Your donation makes it possible for us to keep doing this important work, keeping you informed every step of the way to the November electionAndrew FeinbergWhite House CorrespondentSir Keir Starmer accepted £20,000 worth of accommodation to help his 16-year-old son study for his GCSEs, it has emerged.The prime minister was asked by the BBC about a £20,437 donation from Labour peer Waheed Alli between May and July, confirming that the sum was for somewhere his son could study “peacefully”.He told the broadcaster: “At the beginning of the election, which we didn’t know when it was going to be called, my boy was in the middle of his GCSEs.Keir Starmer came under renewed pressure over donations from Lord Alli More