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ITV News journalist Paul Brand has hit out at the “grim” homophobic abuse he and his husband have received over his reporting on the Partygate scandal.Mr Brand, ITV’s UK editor, has been at the centre of reporting on Covid law-breaking in Downing Street and Whitehall.He has broken several agenda-setting exclusive stories on the affair, including a picture of Boris Johnson raising a glass at the leaving do of his former spin doctor, Lee Cain, published earlier this week.This has led some people online to speculate about who his sources are. A Tory MP also suggested that the image was linked to Mr Brand’s husband, Joe Cuddeford, a civil servant.Mr Cuddeford works for the Geospatial Commission, a government body, which is part of the Cabinet Office and uses location data to investigate economic and social opportunities.Writing to Twitter on Tuesday morning, Mr Brand said that he wanted to refute claims that his source is a family member.”So…there’s some pretty wild stuff being said about my family on here,” he wrote. “I haven’t tweeted so far as it’s never great to engage with conspiracy theories etc.”He added: “But it’s all got a bit OTT [over the top] lately, so to be clear nobody in my family is my ‘source’, attended any parties or was fined.”A number of homophobic tweets directed at Mr Brand and his husband were posted to Twitter on Tuesday. Some of the tweets, posted by anonymous accounts, remain online.Mark Jenkinson, a Tory MP, replied to a Twitter user with a blank avatar who had questioned if it was a “coincidence” that Mr Brand “keeps landing exclusive leaks”, given that his husband works for the civil service.The MP for Workington wrote: “It must be a coincidence, because he’s a deputy director in the Cabinet Office and the investigation was carried out by the…oh.”Mr Brand added in his post: “It’s been an education in how disinformation spreads. Inevitably it became pretty homophobic and grim so in order to protect the people I love I felt I had to tweet this.”Mr Jenksinson said he had never been “involved in any conspiracy theories about Paul Brand”. He said he was not implying that Mr Brand’s husband was involved in the leaks. More

Dame Joanna Lumley is calling on ministers to launch a parliamentary inquiry into medical research methods in the UK, warning that animal tests are “failing patients”.The actor, often dubbed a national treasure, is set to tell MPs that investment in “human-relevant” techniques would support economic growth and help the UK become a “science superpower”.In an address to MPs in the House of Commons on Monday, Dame Joanna will also urge the government to appoint a minister to lead a transition to medical experiments without animals.By law, all new drugs must be tested on a mouse or rat as well as a larger non-rodent mammal, usually a dog, pig or monkey, before they are given to people – but animals may not be used if there is an alternative.Around 2.88 million experiments were carried out in 2020 in Britain on living animals, including breeding genetically modified creatures, latest Home Office statistics show. Cats, dogs, horses and primates were used in one per cent of those.The most common tests were for the immune system, the nervous system and cancer. Some 4 per cent of experiments were classed as severe.Demonstrations outside a Cambridgeshire centre that breeds beagle puppies for experiments have been continuing daily since last summer.Advocates of animal testing for medical and veterinary research say it has led to life-changing discoveries, from new medicines and vaccines, including the Covid jab, to transplants, anaesthetics and blood transfusions.But Dame Joanna is set to tell a cross-party gathering of MPs that government policy on animal-based medical research is “failing patients”, with 92 per cent of new medicines tested on animals never reaching the market to benefit humans.She will tell policymakers: “Using animals in medical research is not only unethical, costly and unjustifiable, but it is being increasingly accepted among the scientific community that this practice fails patients.“New medicines which appear safe and effective in tests on animals often fail to be approved for market because they pose significant safety and efficacy concerns during human trials.”The award-winning actor and former Bond girl will present to parliament a report by Animal Free Research UK called Eight Steps to Accelerate Human Relevant Innovation which asks ministers, among other things, to promise laws to ultimately replace animal experiments with “human-relevant” methods and produce an action plan for encouraging widespread adoption of non-animal research.

Animal protection is an issue of vital importance which is rightfully climbing up the political agendaLuke PollardNew techniques promoted by the organisation include using organs on chips, cell cultures and stem cells. The Absolutely Fabulous star will add: “This government wants Britain to be a global leader. It certainly has the creative and innovative capacity to be so.“Now it truly has the opportunity to become a science powerhouse to lead the world to a more effective, kinder science which will benefit humans and animals.”Former shadow environment secretary Luke Pollard said: “Animal protection is an issue of vital importance which is rightfully climbing up the political agenda.“Of course, we cannot leave behind animal testing overnight, but we would like to see the UK position itself as a world leader when it comes to advancing medical science and animal welfare.”Government sources say banning animal research or phasing it out could lead to an increase in animal experiments abroad, where standards are lower.However, a report last year by the Centre for Economics and Business Research for Animal Free Research UK forecast that ramping up cutting-edge non-animal research would contribute £2.5bn to the UK’s GDP in 2026.The National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research (NC3Rs) is funding work to replace dogs with computers in experiments, among other projects.The Understanding Animal Research organisation said the 92 per cent failure rate of drugs included experiments without animals.Spokesman Chris Magee said: “Replacing animals in the biosciences is already a national priority, which is why the UK is home to the world’s leading centre for looking for animal alternatives, the NC3Rs.“Using animals in research is banned unless researchers have gained an exemption to the ban on ethical grounds, ie that it would be more ethical to do the experiment than not. “Most human and animal medicines are discovered using animals, including vaccines for Covid, cancer drugs and insulin, but key areas of work like conservation and product testing prevent more widespread suffering before it can occur.“Animals predict human safety on average 8 per cent of the time, although there are many reasons that most drugs will fail to make it to market. These include commercial reasons and trying drugs for diseases like cancer that didn’t show much promise in preclinical tests but might be worth a shot.”A Home Office spokesperson said: “The use of animals in science supports the development of new medicines and the safety of our environment, for the benefit of humans and animals.“The government is committed to the protection and welfare of animals and ensuring that animals are only ever used in science where there are no alternatives.” More

An ex-Labour MP must pay £434,435 to a parliamentary worker he sexually assaulted and harassed.Mike Hill, who was the MP for Hartlepool in north east England, was found to have infringed the Equality Act by sexually harassing and then sacking one of his former workers.A panel at the Central London Employment Tribunal discovered the 58-year-old “victimised” the woman as well as subjecting her to “unwanted conduct of a sexual nature”.A judgment published on Wednesday said Mr Hill was accused of sexually harassing and bullying the claimant, referred to as Ms A, over a 16-month period when he was in office.Mr Hill, who was an MP from 2017 until he resigned last year, has denied the allegations.In her witness statement included in the judgment, Ms A said Mr Hill sexually assaulted her on a number of occasions.The claimant said he got into bed with her in December 2017 and rubbed his genitals “against my bottom and had his arms wrapped around me and was feeling my breasts”.She said: “I managed to get out of the bed and went to the living room. I was crying and shaking because of the experience.”She said Mr Hill told her she was “overreacting”, must be “frigid or something” and there must be “something wrong” with her.The judgment said Mr Hill was also accused of coming into the woman’s bedroom on several occasions from December 2017 to February 2018.Mr Hill is also said to have sexually assaulted Ms A on a number of occasions in his Westminster office.Ms A said in her witness statement: “He often put his arms around the front of my body and brushed his hands against my breasts.“If I were standing up, he would always approach me from behind and he would hold me by my waist. I would always resist and would try to get him off me but did not always succeed.”She added: “Mr Hill would touch my bottom. When he first did this, I asked him not to do it again but, as he did then (and afterwards), he always played it down as if it was my problem and I was making more of it than I should.”The judgment also said Mr Hill terminated the claimant’s employment.The panel also found that he failed to give the claimant a promised pay rise, made her work through the summer recess despite a previous promise she would not have to, and refused to let her travel to work by car unless she submitted an occupational health assessment. The politician was also found to have not replied to emails and texts which the claimant sent about work.The judgment said the panel also heard that Ms A told Tory MP Andrew Bridgen of her allegations of sexual impropriety against Mr Hill.Mr Bridgen then accused Kate Hollern, a Labour MP, of warning him not to get involved in the harassment case.Ms Hollern quit as shadow minister in May 2021 after an employment tribunal heard that she tried to intimidate Mr Bridgen as a witness.In a previous statement, she said: “I am absolutely clear that any complaint of sexual harassment should be treated extremely seriously and had this been raised with me I would have taken the necessary action.“It was never my intention to undermine the support the complainant was receiving, which I was unaware of at the time. If that is what Mr Bridgen was led to believe, I apologise for my error in judgment in having the conversation.”Mr Hill was suspended from the Labour Party in September 2019 over the allegations were made but was reinstated in October of that year to fight the general election.He resigned from his seat in March 2021, prompting the by-election that saw the former red wall seat of Hartlepool swing dramatically to the Conservatives.Additional reporting by Press Association More

The cost-of-living crisis will “invariably” fuel a rise in crime and police should use “discretion” when deciding whether to prosecute people desperate to eat, the new HM chief inspector of constabulary has said.As inflation hit a 40-year high on Wednesday, which experts warned was unevenly impacting poorer households, Andy Cooke said that he expected a corresponding rise in petty crime will “be a challenge for policing to deal with”.“I think whenever you see an increase in the cost of living or whenever you see more people dropping into poverty, I think you’ll invariably see a rise in crime,” said Mr Cooke, a former chief constable of Merseyside Police who has worked in policing since 1985.His prediction will come as a political blow to Boris Johnson, whose desire to appear tough and effective on crime has seen him accused by the statistics watchdog of making “misleading” claims that levels of criminality have fallen under his leadership – when in fact the opposite was true.Asked how police could avoid being viewed as an extension of an uncaring state, Mr Cooke told The Guardian: “What they’ve got to bear in mind is what is the best thing for the community, and that individual, in the way they deal with those issue.“I certainly fully support police officers using their discretion – and they need to use discretion more often.”Mr Cooke said that he was not “giving a carte blanche for people to go out shoplifting”, but wanted officers to ensure cases were “dealt with in the best way possible”.Elsewhere in the interview, Mr Cooke – who took over as chief inspector of the constabulary last month – said that he hoped to pull the current charge rate of 6 per cent for recorded offences up to 20 per cent, and to ensure that every burglarly victim is visited by the police.He also reportedly lamented that policing was still recovering from Conservative-led cuts, and warned that surges in inflation and fuel prices were likely to impact police budgets.His comments came as Rishi Sunak resisted increasing pressure from his own benches to do more to help households struggling with soaring prices, including calls from Tory MPs for a windfall tax on energy firms’ profits, the immediate reinstatement of the £20 Universal Credit uplift and a trebling of the Winter Fuel Payment.But Conservative MPs nevertheless obeyed orders to vote down Labour’s demands for an emergency budget to tackle the crisis, as well as Liberal Democrat proposals to slash VAT from 20 to 17.5 per cent to save the average family £600.At PMQs, Sir Keir Starmer urged Mr Johnson to stop dithering and make an “inevitable U-turn” on a windfall tax on energy firms, highlighting differing views within Cabinet and describing their position as “clear as mud”. The prime minister said that “all sensible measures” will be looked at.Moving Labour’s amendment to the Queen’s Speech shortly afterwards, which included the call for an emergency budget, shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves claimed the crisis was a “consequence of Conservative decisions and the direction that they have taken our economy in over the last 12 years”.Ms Reeves accused the government of being “increasingly a rudderless ship heading to the rocks, while it is willing to watch people financially drown in the process”.Speaking at the CBI’s annual dinner hours later, the chancellor spoke of a “perfect storm” of supply shocks rocking Britain and warned that “the next few months will be tough”.Mr Sunak told businesses “we are on your side” as he urged them to “invest, train and innovate more”, promising to “cut your taxes to encourage you to do all those things” in the autumn budget.He added: “Our role in government is to cut costs for families. I cannot pretend this will be easy. The next few months will be tough, but where we can act, we will.”Additional reporting by PA More

Former Labour leader Lord Kinnock has said the hardest part of being married to someone with dementia is “the knowledge that the change is going to continue and they are ceasing, very gradually, to be the person that they have been”.Baroness Kinnock, 77, herself a former minister, was diagnosed in 2017 with Alzheimer’s disease, it was revealed earlier this year.Talking of his wife’s condition, he said: “Glenys is a highly articulate, immensely lively, funny woman, a brilliant cook, wonderful mother and grandmother – and in all of those areas she has lost capability.“She would meet every challenge, whether it was border guards in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, or a new recipe, she would take it on.He told TalkTV: “She’d get away with immensely challenging sometimes very dangerous situations with this hint of mischief – a special magic.“For that to be ebbing, gradually being erased by this disease, makes it difficult for her, sometimes makes her extremely frustrated and is a challenge to me. But I deal with it out of love.”The ex-Labour Party leader, 80, said he and his wife were lucky enough to have family support and to be able to afford carers for up to five hours each day.But, he added, for millions of others without resources the disease “can be quite devastating”.The couple learnt of her condition after a holiday when she had got her words confused. Lord Kinnock said: “She has supported me for 50 years and I’ve been helping her out for five so I’ve got a way to go to catch her up. But it doesn’t work like that as people who deal with the reality of dementia will tell you. You cope with it in a way that’s as near to normality as achievable.” More

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has announced that inflation hit 9.1 per cent in the year to April – the highest rate in 40 years.The Bank of England (BoE) has the mandate to keep Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation below 2 per cent. But governor Andrew Bailey said the bank is “helpless” in the face of global issues exacerbated by Russia’s war in Ukraine, including runaway energy costs and higher food prices.The consumer crisis has also been made worse by inconsistent wage growth that has failed to keep up with rising costs of living. Mr Bailey’s warning of rising unemployment has also triggered fears of “stagflation” – a combination of a stagnant economy and rising inflation.Chancellor Rishi Sunak is being urged to help people with their bills, amid warnings that the situation is set to get worse. The BoE expects the annual rate will peak at 10.25 per cent – more than five times its target – during the final quarter of the year, which could lead to the tightest squeeze on incomes since records began in the 1950s.CPI inflation reached 9.1 per cent in April, the highest rate since 1982.Between February – the month Russia invaded Ukraine – and March, inflation had risen by just 0.8 per cent. Then there was a jump of 2 per cent between March and April.April’s 9.1 per cent rate is more than quadruple the BoE’s 2 per cent target, that was last reported less than a year ago in July 2021.For three years, between 2019 and 2021, the rate of inflation largely stayed below 2 per cent.While the cost-of-living is increasing, people have not enjoyed similar boosts in their incomes to keep up with inflation. In terms of wages, growth of total pay – which means regular earnings or base salary, plus overtime and bonuses – had risen to 7 per cent as of April, after it had reached a high of 9 per cent in June last year.Growth of regular pay on its own has risen by just 4 per cent, after a high of 7 per cent last June.This leaves workers worse-off overall as they have to cope with the double-whammy of lower wages and inflation leaving them with less buying power.Fuel cap:
In April, Ofcom increased the energy price cap by 54 per cent – representing an average rise of about £700 – to £1,971.PM Boris Johnson has suggested that part of the rise in energy prices was because of the “tough” decision to sanction Russia following the invasion of Ukraine.As well as high gas and energy costs, fuel pump prices have reached new records, of 167.64p for petrol and 180.88p for diesel. The chancellor has been called on to do more to help people cope with the cost-of-living crisis.In response, Mr Sunak has claimed that the government is helping people by “saving the average worker £330 a year through reducing National Insurance contributions, changing Universal Credit to save over a million families around £1,000 a year, and providing millions of families with £350 each this year to help with their energy bills.”Measures including increasing the warm home discount by up to £600 – to help vulnerable people and pensioners pay rising energy bills – are reportedly under consideration.It comes after the government has dodged calls from opposition parties to impose a one-off windfall tax on energy and oil companies. Labour, Liberal Democrats, and SNP have said that the tax could fund financial aid for those struggling to pay bills.Cost of living: how to get helpThe cost of living crisis has touched every corner of the UK, pushing families to the brink with rising food and fuel prices.The Independent has asked experts to explain small ways you can stretch your money, including managing debt and obtaining items for free. If you need to access a food bank, find your local council’s website using gov.uk, and then use the local authority’s site to locate your nearest centre. The Trussell Trust, which runs many foodbanks, has a similar tool. Citizens Advice provides free help to people in need. The organisation can help you find grants or benefits, or advise on rent, debt and budgeting.If you are experiencing feelings of distress and isolation, or are struggling to cope, The Samaritans offers support; you can speak to someone for free over the phone, in confidence, on 116 123 (UK and ROI), email jo@samaritans.org, or visit the Samaritans website to find details of your nearest branch. More

Serving police officers are using food banks because their pay is too low to support their families amid the cost of living crisis, the home secretary has been told.The chair of the Police Federation, which represents almost 140,000 rank-and-file officers in England and Wales, said praise for their actions during the Covid pandemic had “amounted to nothing”.“Over the last decade, we have seen a real term pay cut of around 20 per cent and other costs haven’t stood still – gas, electric and fuel costs all continue to rise, and national insurance contributions increased,” Steve Hartshorn told a conference in Manchester.“Our members are told they are brave; they are told they do a unique job. They were thanked for putting themselves and their families in danger as Covid gripped the country, and yet that acknowledgement amounted to nothing.“It’s frustrating to see and hear from colleagues who are struggling to feed their families and going to food banks.”Mr Hartshorn addressed the home secretary directly during his speech, which received long and loud applause from police officers gathered from across the country.“Home secretary, what has gone wrong?” he asked. “Why are my colleagues one of the only groups of frontline public sector workers being penalised in their pockets?”He said he was “angered” to hear of experienced officers leaving policing “not because they want to, but because they can’t afford not to”, adding: “This cannot go on.”The Police Federation withdrew from the official police pay review body last year, saying it “no longer has confidence” in the home secretary following a pay freeze for officers earning more than £24,000.Ms Patel said the body paid an important role advising the government and urged the body to engage with it, but Mr Hartshorn said its “hands were tied by the government” and called it “anything other than independent”.He said that because police are unable to strike in law, they were being “denied the employment rights” of other public sector workers, adding: “The government cannot continue to treat the police as the poor relation of the public sector.”Police Federation delegates at the Manchester Central Convention Complex clapped and cheered an officer who asked why MPs’ pay had risen from £64,000 to £84,000 a year since 2009, while new police recruits had gone from £22,000 to £24,000.“Each sector has an independent pay review body, why is yours better than ours?” the officer asked.Another officer told the home secretary: “It’s about time you and your colleagues put your money where your mouth is and do something about the terrible state that our colleagues find themselves in.”One female officer challenged the home secretary on whether her family could survive on £1,400 a month but did not receive a direct answer.Another female officer, who said she had 23 years’ service, gave an emotional speech about her struggle with pay and told how she had to borrow £40 from her mother last weekend for petrol and her children’s school lunches.“We are desperately struggling to do the job we love and to make ends meet at home,” she added.Ms Patel said that the police and politics pay panels were separate and had “different” considerations, including the fact that police can take their pension at a lower age.The Police Federation chair called for the relationship between officers and the government to be reset, adding: “We mean no more gimmicks.”Ahead of the conference, the home secretary had announced that she would allow special constables to be armed with Tasers, but it was not among the federation’s priorities for change.They included increases in pay and annual leave provision, better psychological support for officers and the tackling of delays in misconduct investigations.In her speech to the Police Federation conference, Ms Patel said she was a home secretary who “champions many of [officers’] calls in government”.She highlighted the government’s push to recruit 20,000 more police officers, although the figure does not replace those lost in austerity since 2010 or the detectives, experienced officers or specialists who left.Ms Patel also hailed moves to extend the use of suspicionless stop and search and Tasers, saying she wanted to give police the “confidence to use their powers fairly, appropriately and in the right places”.But she also said police need to work to “create a better culture and higher standards” following the murder of Sarah Everard and a wave of scandals involving sexual offending by officers and allegations of misogyny and racism.“The public are in urgent need of reassurance,” the home secretary said. “I am unequivocal that unacceptable behaviour must be rooted out and called out. Lessons must be learned, and every necessary change must be made, without fear or favour.”A public inquiry, led by Dame Elish Angiolini QC, is underway and will look aqt issues including vetting and counter-corruption. More

Priti Patel has repeatedly overridden Home Office legal advice on immigration and asylum cases, adding to record costs for the taxpayer, The Independent can reveal.The department spent £35.2m on legal bills for lost cases and paid out a further £9.3m to people wrongly held in immigration detention in 2020-21.The figures stand at their highest level since the Conservatives came to power, having rocketed from £17.1m and £2.2m respectively in five years.Home Office sources told The Independent that Ms Patel and other Home Office ministers had rejected legal advice in individual cases on numerous occasions. Legal experts had shown clear instances where “immediately settling cases offered best value to the taxpayer, and set best precedent for presenting future cases to the courts”, a Home Office source said.The revelation comes as the government prepares to spend an undisclosed amount on sending asylum seekers to Rwanda, following a £120m up-front payment for the deal, and follows an official warning from the Home Office’s top civil servant, Matthew Rycroft, who said that the department was “uncertain” whether the scheme offered “value for money”.According to Home Office sources, lawyers acting for the government had clearly advised when the department was likely to lose an asylum case in several instances. Such advice has been “overridden on several occasions”, they added.The overriding of advice by the home secretary came late at night, the Home Office sources said, with clear expectations of a swift response. One former official said Ms Patel would become “fixated on individual cases”, adding that she “regarded the need for legal processes or adhering to protocols as an inconvenience”.Interventions by Ms Patel and her ministers had slowed down cases, wasted taxpayers’ money and resulted in more court decisions against the government, they added.The claims came as figures released by the Home Office in its annual report showed a sharp increase in adverse legal costs, which are incurred when cases are not found in the government’s favour. Asylum and immigration decisions are made in the home secretary’s name, but the vast majority are delegated to officials, working from detailed guidance set out by the government according to its policies and the law.Civil servants and lawyers can choose to alert Ms Patel to cases that are particularly sensitive or high-profile, but sources say it is unusual for ministers to intervene themselves. The home secretary is entitled to override legal advice and order cases to proceed even if it is considered likely that the Home Office will lose in court. More