UK Politics

The assisted dying bill returns to the House of Commons on Friday where every MP will get the chance to speak and vote on amendments.The bill has undergone significant changes since it succeeded in an initial vote in the Commons in November, as more than 150 amendments were made at the bill’s committee stage.The High Court approval has been dropped and replaced by multidisciplinary “Assisted Dying Review Panels”, while the implementation period has been doubled to four years for an assisted dying service to be implemented, if the bill passes into law.Mentally competent adults with a life expectancy of six months or less – who have a settled wish to die that has been approved by two doctors and a panel with a senior legal figure, psychiatrist and social worker – would be able to do so under the proposed legislation for England and Wales.The Royal College of Psychiatrists (RCPsych) has said it cannot support the bill in its current form, highlighting “serious concerns” about the number of psychiatrists needed to meet the demands of the bill and the safeguarding of people with mental illness.However, Kim Leadbeater has said it is now “safer, fairer and more workable” after undergoing weeks of scrutiny by a committee. It has been suggested that the changes to the High Court safeguard might sway MPs to vote against the bill.In October 2024, Labour MP Ms Leadbeater introduced her new law to legalise assisted dying for some terminally ill adults in England and Wales.Ahead of its initial publication, Ms Leadbeater insisted her private member’s bill would offer the “safest choice” for mentally competent adults at the end of their lives.She said the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill would make it illegal for someone to persuade a person through dishonesty, coercion or pressure to declare they wanted to end their life or to induce someone to self-administer drugs to die. Anyone found guilty of doing so would face a maximum prison sentence of 14 years.Labour MP Kim Leadbeater, centre, previously joining Dignity in Dying campaigners in Parliament Square outside the Houses of Parliament More

Keir Starmer is set to agree a youth mobility scheme in alignment with the European Union despite his controversial clampdown on migration, a senior government source has confirmed with The Independent.The prime minister’s announcement this week to “significantly” reduce legal migration was apparently designed to “allow room” for the potential scheme as part of his post-Brexit reset of relations with the bloc, The Independent has been told. The speech on Monday sparked alarm with claims it echoed Enoch Powell’s infamous “rivers of blood” speech in 1968 that whipped up a frenzy of anti-immigration hatred across the UK. It is understood the mobility scheme could be similar to the one available between the UK and Australia, allowing people aged between 18 and 30 to travel and work freely between countries for two years. It is still not clear though when the scheme might begin.The much-discussed Brexit reset deal is also set to bring about much closer cooperation on European defence, with the UK set to play a much more advanced role. The source revealed the PM’s next target will be a trade deal with the Gulf states in a bid to unlock billions in funding for economic growth in the UK.Starmer and EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen meeting in Downing Street More

The UK looks increasingly likely to agree to a post-Brexit youth mobility scheme with the European Union at a major UK-EU summit on Monday. Such an agreement would be a major step towards resetting Boris Johnson’s damaging Brexit deal, and has been pushed by European officials for months.The move, which is being demanded by European countries and commissioners in Brussels, would help to create much closer ties with the bloc and begin to repair the shattered relationship left by the previous Tory government.Here, The Independent looks at how such a scheme would work in practice, who would be eligible to take part and whether or not there is support for it in Britain.What would be the key features of a youth mobility scheme? An agreement of this nature would allow young people in the UK and the EU to move and work freely between countries for a limited period of time. It is likely to include 18- to 30-year-olds, potentially extending to those under 35 as well. It is thought that they would be able to live and work abroad for up to two years. However, there is some suggestion that figures in the government are pushing for this period to be reduced to just one year instead. Do similar schemes exist already? Britain already has similar agreements with 13 countries, including Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, Iceland, Uruguay, Hong Kong and Taiwan.The scheme is currently available for those aged 18 to 30 or 18 to 35, depending on where they are from, and allows them to live and work in the UK for up to two years. In order to qualify for the scheme, individuals must have £2,530 in savings to show they are able to support themselves while living in Britain. Would the British public back the scheme? There is widespread support for such an agreement, with a YouGov survey of almost 15,000 people indicating that two-thirds (66 per cent) backed the scheme, compared to just one in five (18 per cent) who are opposed.In Nigel Farage’s Clacton-on-Sea constituency, which voted overwhelmingly in favour of leaving the EU in 2016, more than twice as many people were in favour (57 per cent) than against (25 per cent) the idea of a mobility scheme.Would it drive up net migration?Supporters of the agreement insist it wouldn’t drive up net migration, arguing that young people in the UK would be keen to move abroad, in the same way that young people in the EU would be keen to come here. Meanwhile, the time-limited nature of the scheme means they wouldn’t be able to permanently settle abroad. There is also speculation that there would be a cap on numbers – or a “one-in-one-out” policy – to ensure that those coming to the UK remain balanced with the number of people leaving. However, without that cap, critics argue Britain would end up taking more young people than it loses. Meanwhile, others argue that a youth mobility scheme would be a return to freedom of movement enjoyed by travellers when the UK was part of the EU by the back door.Sir Keir’s “red lines” for the negotiations with Brussels include no return to freedom of movement between countries. But it is understood that the government considers a limited youth mobility scheme would not break that promise because of the time limit. More

Sir Keir Starmer has been mocked by Nigel Farage for “learning a great deal” from Reform UK on immigration, as the PM faces growing backlash from his MPs over the government’s rhetoric. It came after the prime minister’s claim that the UK risks becoming an “island of strangers” as a result of migration was compared to inflammatory language used by Enoch Powell in his “rivers of blood” speech.The 1968 speech whipped up a frenzy of anti-immigration hatred across the UK after it imagined a future where the white population in Britain “found themselves made strangers in their own country”.Reform UK leader Nigel Farage speaking during Prime Minister’s Questions (House of Commons/PA) More

Former Reform UK MP Rupert Lowe has branded Nigel Farage a “coward and a viper” after an inquiry into allegations he made “verbal threats” against the party’s chair was dropped. The Crown Prosecution Service said it would not charge Rupert Lowe after reviewing the evidence handed over by the party. The Great Yarmouth MP was suspended from Mr Farage’s party this year amid a civil war and allegations about his conduct, which he denies.Responding to the news he would face no action, Mr Lowe said he was ashamed to have represented the party and launched an extraordinary attack on its leader.“Nigel Farage must never be prime minister,” he said in a statement.“I am ashamed to have shared a parliamentary platform with them. Ashamed to have trusted them. Ashamed to have called them friends. Farage is no leader – he is a coward and a viper. I feel deeply embarrassed that I ever thought he was the man to lead,” Mr Lowe added. Rupert Lowe consistently denied the allegations More

A newly elected Reform UK councillor was sacked from his previous job as a police officer after reporting illness before travelling to Spain to sell a luxury sports car.Andrew Hamilton-Gray shaded victory over Labour on 2 May, receiving nearly 40 per cent of the vote to win a seat in Loughborough at the Leicestershire County Council elections in a glorious night for Nigel Farage’s party.But it has since emerged he was sacked as a Leicestershire Police officer after he called in sick hours before taking a ferry to Spain.He was dismissed from the force in January 2024 for breaching professional standards on “honesty and integrity, discreditable conduct, orders and instructions, and duties and responsibilities”.A flyer encouraging people to vote for Mr Hamilton-Gray in Loughborough More

NatWest faces 100 million cyber attacks attempting to breach its defences every month, MSPs have been told, as experts set out the “staggering” scale of digital crime.The bank also blocks around a third of emails coming into its system, Holyrood’s Criminal Justice Committee heard.Police and cyber crime agencies are increasingly dealing with fraudsters operating online, with gold scams and romance fraud becoming particularly prominent.The trend increased sharply during the pandemic – in 2020 Police Scotland recorded 7,710 cyber crimes, but in 2024 that increased to 18,280.Chris Ulliott, head of cybersecurity at NatWest, told the committee on Wednesday: “We analyse every single email coming into our estate, looking for malicious content.“About a third of the emails, millions a month, we actually block because they are believed to be the start of an attack against our staff.“If I look outside our network at the attacks that are probing our estate, we’re averaging about 100 million attacks per month just trying to break past the defences we have in the organisation”.He said this has led to a cybersecurity team with hundreds of staff and a budget of millions.Mr Ulliott said there is growing concern about fraudsters using artificial intelligence (AI) to make their approaches to people seem more credible.The technology could even be used to alter a fraudster’s appearance in a real-time online call to look like an “elderly British gent” to gain trust with a victim.Mr Ulliott said Scattered Spider, the group which may have been behind the recent attack on Marks & Spencer, is likely a loose international group in their teens and 20s who are sharing ideas on online forums.SNP MSP Rona Mackay said the numbers revealed by the NatWest official were “absolutely staggering”.Police Scotland Assistant Chief Constable Stuart Houston said law enforcement agencies around the world are collaborating to try and catch cyber criminals, with the FBI sharing intelligence on fraud and ransomware groups.Adam Stachura from the charity Age Scotland said many elderly people are not confident users of online technology.He said the impact of cyber crime can be devastating for the elderly, saying: “It can create financial destitution – that hit to confidence and self-worth.”David Keenan, chief information officer at Arnold Clark, discussed the serious cyber attack which crippled the car company’s network at the end of 2022.He said recovery was a months-long effort and the attack came despite the company having 12 staff dedicated to cybersecurity.The SNP’s Ben Macpherson said cyber crime is “the criminal justice issue of our time”.He said cyber criminals had even impersonated himself in order to contact constituents in Edinburgh Northern and Leith. More

Canada was “not impressed” by the King’s invitation to Donald Trump for an unprecedented second state visit to the UK, the country’s prime minister has said.Freshly elected leader Mark Carney said February’s invitation jarred with Canadians because it was delivered physically by Keir Starmer during an Oval Office press conference while Trump was challenging Canada’s sovereignty and suggesting America’s northern neighbour should become the 51st state of the US. The former British colony is also a key member of the Commonwealth and regards King Charles as its head of state.“I think, to be frank, they [Canadians] weren’t impressed by that gesture… given the circumstance,” Mr Carney told Sky News. “It was at a time when we were being quite clear about the issues around sovereignty.” Mr Carney, a former Bank of England governor, ran his election campaign on standing up to Mr Trump’s tariff plans and threats to make Canada a state of the US. He has reiterated to Trump that Canada will “never ever” become part of the US. A wave of anti-Trump sentiment in Canada in the wake of the US president’s comments about a takeover helped Mr Carney secure an unexpected victory. His party, the Liberals, won 168 seats out of 343 in Canada’s House of Commons. Sir Keir personally delivered the invitation during his White House visit in February More