“Voters do not believe that the Conservative Party will cut taxes and nearly half would still vote Labour even if the economy did improve before the election, according to a new poll. Rishi Sunak has tried to quell unrest in the party by insisting that economic revival will narrow the polls. Last year he declared victory over one of his key leadership pledges, to halve inflation. It stands at 3.4 per cent, down from 11.1 per cent in October 2022. But a YouGov poll for The Times suggests that voters would be unlikely to reward the prime minister. In figures that will further trouble Tory MPs, 47 per cent say they would still vote Labour even with an improved economy compared with 26 per cent who would support the Conservatives.” – The Times
>Today:
>Yesterday:
“Britain can continue selling weapons to Israel lawfully despite the death toll in Gaza, the deputy prime minister has insisted, as pressure mounts on the government to publish its legal advice about the war. Oliver Dowden confirmed the government would continue to allow arms sales to Israel following the killing of seven aid workers, including three Britons, in a drone strike last week. However, he said it was it was “not appropriate” to publish the government’s legal advice on whether international law had been broken in Gaza. “It hasn’t been the case that we publish legal advice,” he told Times Radio… Dowden refused to say if ministers had received legal advice that Israel had broken international law…” – The Times
>Yesterday:
“The Government will not allow the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) to “stand in our way” and block policy allowing the deportation of asylum seekers to Rwanda, deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden has said. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak gave his strongest possible indication yet this week that he would back leaving the European Convention on Human Rights if it was necessary to implement his flagship immigration policy pivotal to stopping small boats crossing the English Channel. “The Prime Minister is absolutely determined to make sure that we deliver on that commitment to stop the boats,” Mr Dowden told Sky News’ Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips, echoing Mr Sunak’s criticism of the Strasbourg Court.” – The I
“Lord Cameron will warn that the US is risking the West’s security by holding up a new package of aid for Ukraine when he visits Washington DC next week. During a face-to-face meeting, the Foreign Secretary will urge Mike Johnson, the House of Representatives speaker, to stop his Republican colleagues from continuing to block the support. Earlier this year, the UK announced another £2.5 billion in aid to help Ukraine fight the Russian invasion, while the European Union has pledged a further €50 billion (£43 billion). But Joe Biden’s $95 billion (£75 billion) Bill, which includes security assistance to Ukraine, is being blocked by the US president’s Republican opponents in the House of Representatives, one half of the US Congress.” – The Daily Telegraph
“Faith schools will be able to exclude children who do not follow their religion from applying under plans being considered by the Government, it has been reported. Senior officials are said to be considering repealing the 50 per cent rule, which says religious schools must make half their places open to children of differing faiths. Will Tanner, Rishi Sunak’s deputy chief of staff, and James Nation, the deputy head of the Number 10 policy unit, are said to be involved in the consultation… It reported that Gillian Keegan, the Education Secretary, is also believed to be in favour of the repeal and is playing a significant role in the discussions. David Cameron…introduced the cap while in the coalition government with the Liberal Democrats.” – The Daily Telegraph
“The export potential of new equipment will become crucial in assessing whether to buy kit for Britain’s armed forces in a move aimed at fixing the country’s disastrous record in defence procurement, according to the minister in charge of the shake-up. James Cartlidge said overseas sales prospects would get greater weighting when the defence ministry assesses bids for new weapons and kit as part of a series of reforms that come into effect from Monday. The defence procurement minister said the move was designed to avoid the problems inherent in what he termed “exquisite procurement”, where extra capabilities are added during the development process resulting in delays and cost overruns.” – The Financial Times
“A football team that has not won a big trophy in decades, a prime minister with record low ratings, a Swiss-owned container ship, a US fighter jet and a large image of a smiling King. This is the unusual medley of images that the Conservative Party used in a campaign poster declaring Britain to be the second most powerful country in the world. The seemingly triumphalist montage made its way into the world last week. And it has already left it. The post was hastily deleted after being published on social media following a breach of protocol relating to its use of an image of the King, along with other criticisms. Buckingham Palace was aware of the post before its deletion, although it remains unclear whether a complaint was made to Conservative campaign headquarters.” – The Times
“A Tory MP has said that she was also targeted with a spear-phishing WhatsApp message and called William Wragg, the colleague at the heart of a honeytrap scandal, an idiot. Dame Andrea Jenkyns, 49, is the first woman and the third Conservative to say they received a message. She said Wragg’s decision to share other MPs’ phone numbers was “unforgivable”. The unknown fraudster used the aliases “Charlie” and “Abi” to lure MPs into sending explicit pictures. Messages from Charlie were sent from a number with a profile picture of a man in a white T-shirt having a meal with a woman in a floral dress. Wragg admitted to The Times last week that he had handed over colleagues’ contact details to Charlie.” – The Times
“A cross-party group of MPs is proposing to make abortion access a human right in England and Wales, putting forward legislation that would decriminalise abortion up to 24 weeks and introduce protections against access being stripped back. Proposals to modernise abortion law have been made in the form of amendments to the government’s criminal justice bill, which is due to be debated after parliament returns from its Easter recess later this month. The Commons speaker, Sir Lindsay Hoyle, will choose which ones are voted on. MPs are expected to be given a free vote. This latest proposal, tabled by MPs last week, seeks to protect the women who have abortions and the medical staff who provide them from prosecution.” – The Guardian
“Reform UK has ditched five candidates in the past week over racist, homophobic and obscene posts unearthed on social media, including one prospective MP who said that Africans had IQs “among the lowest in the world”. The party is neck and neck with the Conservatives in the north and Midlands, according to recent polling. Nigel Farage, the former Ukip leader, has hinted at a political comeback and the party was buoyed by the recent defection of Lee Anderson, the former Tory party vice-chairman. But in the past week alone five prospective parliamentary candidates, Jonathan Kay, Mick Greenhough, Pete Addis, Amodio Amato and Ian Harris, have been dropped because of social media posts.” – The Times
“A former British diplomat who described the October 7 Hamas terrorist attacks as “a single day of the boot being on the other foot” has been selected to run for George Galloway’s party in Blackburn, adding to fears of divisive electioneering in Labour-held areas with large Muslim populations. Galloway won the Rochdale by-election in February in a campaign dominated by the war in Gaza after Labour withdrew support for its candidate, Azhar Ali, over his comments about Israel. Constituencies in east London, Birmingham and Lancashire have been identified as target seats for the Workers Party, Galloway’s latest political movement. In Blackburn, the party has announced as its candidate Craig Murray…who was British ambassador to Uzbekistan…” – The Times
“The more fundamental truth is that self-evidently there are different kinds of elites, with different kinds of power in different contexts and institutions. It is reductive to the point of absurdity to pretend that power only resides among elected ministers, those in big business and the privately educated – and to suggest that politicians, for example, cannot legitimately refer to the power enjoyed by others… Since the radical expansion in the interpretation of human rights and administrative law, our legal frameworks have put far more power into the hands of judges than ever before… To deny this – to pretend that all the power in Britain resides in a kind of conservative caricature – is as silly as claiming the opposite.” – The Daily Telegraph
“Labour plans to digitise the NHS “red book” that parents use for their children’s medical records as part of a series of changes to the NHS app. Parents and the NHS would be able to see if children are behind on jabs or checkups through a new digital record, with automatic notifications to prompt them to book appointments under the party’s plans. The personal child health record, also known as the red book, has been handed out to new parents for the past 30 years. Previous health secretaries have hoped to digitise it during their tenure, including Jeremy Hunt and Matt Hancock, but it has yet to happen. Labour hopes its plans will help to boost MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccination rates, which have fallen in recent years…” – The Guardian
>Yesterday:
“A former SNP cabinet minister has accused Humza Yousaf’s government of botching the introduction of hate crime laws as a poll indicated they are supported by just one in five Scots. Jeane Freeman, who was health secretary when the controversial laws were passed three years ago, claimed the scale of the backlash had shocked ministers and criticised the government for not effectively explaining the scope of the legislation to the public. She said that excluding women from the laws, which offer new protections to males who identify as women and crossdressers, had been a blunder that exposed a lack of “political nouse”. Her stinging intervention came as it emerged that Police Scotland had been swamped with 8,000 hate crime complaints…” – The Daily Telegraph