UK Politics

The Conservatives have urged the government’s independent ethics adviser to investigate whether Sir Keir Starmer risked a conflict of interest during the selection process for the new football watchdog’s chairman.In a letter to Sir Laurie Magnus, the ethics adviser, the Tories are demanding further scrutiny over donations Sir Keir received from David Kogan. Mr Kogan was named in April as the government’s preferred candidate to chair the Independent Football Regulator.The new watchdog is designed to bolster the financial sustainability of clubs across the football “pyramid” and prevent major teams from joining breakaway leagues.This call for an inquiry follows a previous probe that found Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy breached the code on public appointments by failing to declare donations she had received from Mr Kogan, a media rights expert.An investigation was launched in the summer after the revelation he had donated money to both Sir Keir and Ms Nandy, as well as other Labour figures.David Kogan, pictured, made donations to Starmer during the 2020 Labour leadership race More

Sir Keir Starmer is poised to slash £150m from Britain’s contribution to the international fight against Aids, tuberculosis (TB) and malaria, putting 255,000 lives at risk, The Independent understands. The government is preparing to announce its contribution to the Global Fund as soon as next week, in one of the first major decisions since announcing it would dramatically reduce foreign aid to pay for defence spending.The prime minister is expected to pledge £850m towards the Global Fund’s work over the next three years – a 15 per cent reduction compared with the previous pledge of £1bn in 2022, which itself was down from a pledge of £1.4bn in 2019.The government has indicated that it will use Britain’s aid budget to contribute to the humanitarian response in Gaza, Sudan and Ukraine, as well as in support of global health. It has named the Global Fund, along with the global vaccine alliance Gavi, as organisations that are in line to receive a bigger share of its aid spending. Nevertheless, the cut in aid could threaten the Global Fund’s plan to raise $18bn (around £14bn) to save 23 million lives between 2027 and 2029. Worldwide NGO the ONE campaign calculates that a £1bn commitment by the UK would save 1.7 million lives, so a £150m drop would see an estimated 255,000 lives lost. Former secretary of state for international development Sir Andrew Mitchell said the cut in aid was “a bitter pill to swallow”, adding: “Not just for the many thousands of people who will lose their lives, but also for the many people in Britain who are proud of the work Britain has led in preventing death from malaria, HIV/Aids and tuberculosis, which is now being curtailed by the first Labour government ever to cut development spending.”Keir Starmer is following in Donald Trump’s footsteps by slashing foreign aid More

A British man who would “dream about being like James Bond” was jailed Friday for seven years after trying to spy for Russia.Howard Phillips, 65, was found guilty in July for trying to pass information about former Defense Secretary Grant Shapps, whom he knew, to two men who he believed were Russian intelligence agents. However, the ‘agents’ were undercover British intelligence agents.“You were prepared to betray your country for money,” Justice Bobbie Cheema-Grubb told Phillips at his sentencing hearing at Winchester Crown Court, in the south of England.The judge said that Phillips had “a personality with narcissistic tendencies and an overblown sense of his own importance.”The trial heard that Phillips intended to assist Russian agents between the end of 2023 and May 2024 — Shapps was defense secretary between August 2023 and July 2024 when his Conservative Party was ousted from power and he lost his seat in Parliament at the general election.Specifically, the trial heard how Phillips had tried to hand over Shapps’ contact details as well as the location where he kept his private plane to “facilitate the Russians in listening on British defense plans.”The defendant’s ex-wife told the court that Phillips “would dream about being like James Bond,” and watched films about the British secret services because he was “infatuated with it.”In a victim impact statement read to the court, Shapps expressed his shock at learning of Phillips’ activities. He recalled going to dinner at Phillips’ home in 2002.“What is unacceptable is one individual’s reckless behavior exposing my entire family to the extremely serious risks that come from a foreign intelligence service’s activities,” he said.Bethan David, head of the Crown Prosecution Service’s Counter Terrorism Division, said the conviction sends “a clear message to anyone considering spying for or assisting Russia.” More

Labour deputy leader Lucy Powell’s views on party policy “really irritate me”, former shadow culture secretary Thangam Debbonaire has said. The Labour peer accused Ms Powell of “giving a running commentary and undermining” the government after she said plans to break the manifesto pledge on tax rises would damage “trust in politics”. Ms Powell had said the government “should be following through” on its pledge not to raise income tax, national insurance or VAT, amid mounting speculation Rachel Reeves is preparing to do so at the Budget.Thangam Debbonaire accused Labour’s new deputy leader of ‘giving a running commentary’ More

Angela Rayner is in talks to write a book just weeks after being forced to resign from the government over a tax scandal.Sir Keir Starmer’s former deputy is speaking to publishers about the prospect, according to The Times. Ms Rayner quit as Labour’s deputy leader and housing secretary in September after she was found to have breached the ministerial code over questions about the stamp duty she paid on a home on the south coast.The Independent understands that nothing is as yet set in stone about a book, but there is a lot of interest around the prospect. Ms Rayner, the MP for Ashton-under-Lyne, was one of the most left-wing voices in the cabinet before her departure, and secured more than 50 per cent of the final round votes from Labour members when she was elected in 2020.The former deputy’s resignation triggered a wider reshuffle of Starmer’s top team More

Rachel Reeves has reportedly told the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) that she intends to increase income tax in her upcoming Budget.The Chancellor told the watchdog that a rise in personal tax is one of several “major measures” planned for the Budget at the end of the month, according to The Times.She is said to be considering a 2p rise in income tax and a 2p cut in national insurance, which would cancel out the burden on workers and move it onto other groups, such as landlords and pensioners.The cut to national insurance could be limited to people earning below £50,270 per year, while earnings over the threshold would still be subject to a two per cent rate, the newspaper reports.The OBR will produce an impact assessment from her proposals to be presented to the Treasury on Monday, ahead of the Budget on November 26.Campaigners opposed to the Rosebank oil field have urged the Chancellor to investigate a deal between the majority owner of the field and Shell (Justin Tallis/PA)Proposals put to the OBR are not binding, but would indicate the government plans to break its manifesto pledge not to raise income tax.Such a move could generate as much as £6 billion to help repair public finances, according to the Resolution Foundation think tank, which supported a ‘two up, two down’ package.The Foundation assessed that the chancellor would need to require tax rises of at least £20 billion a year by 2029-30 to meet her fiscal rules.Speaking to the same reported plans, AJ Bell assessed that pensioners would be the hardest hit.An individual taking a pension of £35,000 would see their tax bill rise by almost £450 under the proposal, they found.Some self-employed individuals who pay income tax but not national insurance would also be affected.Scott Gallacher, director at Rowley Turton, told FT Adviser that while the impact on landlords may not garner much public sympathy, the furore around the scrapping of the winter fuel allowance “shows that granny is off limits as far as the Great British public is concerned”.Reeves signalled in a speech on Tuesday that she could break the pledge in order to put “the national interest” ahead of “political expediency”.Asked if she was willing to raise income tax, she said, without explicit affirmation: “If you’re asking what comes first, the national interest or political expediency, it’s the national interest every single time for me and it’s the same for Keir Starmer too.”She also signalled that the government could raise spending to offset rising energy costs.“As I take my decisions on both tax and spending, I will do what is necessary to protect families from high inflation and interest rates, to protect our public services from a return to austerity and to ensure that the economy that we hand down to future generations is secure,” she said.Raising income taxes could help repair a hole of some £30bn in Britain’s public finances, but would likely come at a political cost.The chancellor has said all will have to “contribute” to “to build the future of Britain”. More

One of the prisoners mistakenly released from HMP Wandsworth handed himself in amid mounting pressure on David Lammy over his handling of the fiasco, as the hunt continues for a registered sex offender who is still at large. Billy Smith, 35, was pictured grinning on Thursday morning as he gave himself up three days after being released in error, having been sentenced to 45 months for multiple fraud offences. Wearing a tracksuit, the criminal was filmed hugging his partner and enjoying a cigarette on the jail steps before turning himself in. The latest blunders were blamed on clerical errors in a system under “relentless strain”.Meanwhile, the justice secretary insisted he was “not equipped with all of the detail” when he appeared at PMQs on Wednesday and repeatedly failed to answer questions on whether there had been another mistaken release since Epping hotel migrant Hadush Kebatu was wrongly freed last month.Speaking as builders broke ground at a new 1,700-cell prison in Leicester, Mr Lammy said: “I first found out about this on Wednesday morning. I was in the department, both learning from officials, but also preparing for Prime Minister’s Questions.Algerian sex offender Brahim Kaddour-Cherif, 24, and fraudster Smith More

Labour’s new deputy leader Lucy Powell has warned Rachel Reeves not to break her manifesto pledges and raise taxes, saying voters have to be able to “trust” the government. After both the chancellor and the prime minister refused to repeat the promise not to hike income tax, national insurance or VAT, Ms Powell said there was “no question” the party should keep its pledges. She also said it was urgent the government lift the two child benefit cap in full in this month’s Budget. Chancellor Rachel Reeves (Justin Tallis/PA) More