News

Nigel Farage has said Reform activists depicting female cabinet ministers as cows to be slaughtered is “probably not very funny”.The Reform UK leader responded to a report by The Independent about an image that emerged from a Reform local election stunt depicting Angela Rayner, Rachel Reeves and Bridget Phillipson as cows heading to the abattoir.He said: “All sorts of appalling things get said and done by people fighting in elections at a local and national level.“We get it done to us, and if one or two of our people do it to them, maybe, if it’s funny, it probably isn’t very funny.” More

Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner has quashed rumours that she is vying to become leader of the Labour Party, saying she has “no desire” to take on the role.It follows speculation about a potential leadership challenge after the leak of a memo outlining apparent tax rise plans, alongside media briefings suggesting she could be demoted.In an interview with Trevor Phillips on Sunday (25 May), the deputy leader said she is “honoured” to hold her current role and is not interested in becoming leader. Asked whether she could rule out ever becoming leader, she replied: “Never.”Rayner also indicated that an inquiry is “underway” into how the memo addressed to Chancellor Rachel Reeves was leaked. More

A Rachel Reeves interview was stopped mid-air due to a technical glitch that resulted in her voice sounding extremely high pitched.Discussing recent inflation data from the Office of National Statistics in a squeaky voice, the Chancellor was cut short mid-sentence by Sky News.Presenter Wilfred Frost had to apologise for the technical blunder: “I think we’ve got a problem there with the sound, again,” he explained.Inflation rose to 3.5 per cent last month – the largest month-on-month rise in two and a half years. More

Sir Keir Starmer has backed the courts over Lucy Connolly’s prison sentence, stating that he is “against incitement of violence to other people”.The wife of a former Tory councillor was sentenced to 31 months in prison for inciting racial hatred online in the aftermath of the Southport attack last year.Speaking during Prime Minister’s Questions on Wednesday (21 May), Sir Keir said that whilst he is “strongly in favour of free speech”, he is staunchly opposed to any incitement of violence against individuals, when asked about Connolly’s case by Independent MP Rupert Lowe.Connolly’s Court of Appeal application against her jail term was dismissed yesterday by three judges at the Royal Courts of Justice. More

Sir Keir Starmer made a jab at Nigel Farage during Prime Minister’s Questions on Wednesday (21 May), stating that the Reform UK leader, who is currently holidaying in France, was “first through the e-gates”.Mr Farage missed a parliamentary debate on a Brexit reset yesterday, where the prime minister presented his new UK-EU deal, with access to e-gates being a crucial part of the agreement.Speaking to Reform UK MP Lee Anderson in the House of Commons, Sir Keir said it was “very good” to see him standing in for the Clacton MP.Sir Keir’s joke on e-gates was met with cheers from the Commons, and he followed the jab with the pun: “Nice work if you can get it.” More

Sir Lindsey Hoyle lashed out at unruly MPs during Prime Minister’s Questions on Wednesday (21 May), asking them to behave or leave the Commons.During a heated debate on Labour’s winter fuel payment cuts, where Sir Keir Starmer announced a U-turn on the controversial policy, the Speaker stood up to tell a group of disruptive whips he “expects better from them”.“The boys at the back, I’ve got my eye on you”, he said, which prompted further jeers.Calling for “order” in the House of Commons, Sir Lindsay addressed the rowdy MPs and asked “which one wants to leave first?” before pointing to one particularly loud offender as the “first volunteer”. More

Sir Keir Starmer has described the “level of suffering” in Gaza as “utterly intolerable”.The prime minister told the House of Commons on Tuesday (20 May): “We’re horrified by the escalation from Israel. We repeat our demand for a ceasefire as the only way to free the hostages.“We repeat our opposition to settlements in the West Bank, and we repeat our demand to massively scale-up humanitarian assistance into Gaza.”Sir Keir united with his French and Canadian counterparts to issue a stark warning to Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to halt his “egregious” actions in Gaza. More