“Britain is not ready to defend itself from attack, a major report has warned. Following a year-long inquiry, the Commons defence committee said Labour was moving at a “glacial” pace in the face of renewed threats from Russia and China. It claimed Britain was failing to meet its Nato Article 3 defence obligations to “maintain and develop individual and collective capacity to resist armed attack”. It also warned the country had “next to nothing” when it came to integrated air and missile defences and “lacks a plan for defending the homeland and overseas territories”. Warning MPs they could not bury their “heads in the sand”, Labour’s Tan Dhesi, the committee’s chairman, said: “We have repeatedly heard concerns about the UK’s ability to defend itself from attack. Government must be willing to grasp the nettle and prioritise homeland defence and resilience.” The findings followed an 11-month inquiry by the committee, which included visits to Nato sites across Europe and evidence from defence experts and military chiefs. In July, Luke Pollard, the then Armed Forces minister, told the committee: “I think we have been very clear that we are not satisfied with Article 3 in the UK. But, equally, I think that is a position that every European Nato member state is clear on as well.” The review comes months after Sir Keir Starmer unveiled the Strategic Defence Review (SDR), his flagship plan to transform the country’s Armed Forces, and his pledge to ramp up defence spending to 3.5 per cent of GDP. But MPs expressed “deep concern” at delays to the Home Defence Programme, promised in the SDR. The report found cross-government working on homeland defence and resilience was also “nowhere near where it needs to be”. During the inquiry, Prof Peter Roberts, a leading military expert and fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, also told MPs the public needed to know just how at risk they were due to Britain’s lack of missile defence, which the UK has “next to nothing of”.” – Daily Telegraph
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> Today:
“The UK is facing bankruptcy if Labour increases taxes without cutting welfare spending, Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has warned. The Tory leader accused Chancellor Rachel Reeves of plotting a “stealth tax bombshell” in next week’s Budget to fund increased welfare payments because of her failure to cut the benefits bill. She added: “If she comes back for more taxes without having serious cuts in public spending, especially on welfare, then she is going to ruin our economy.” Labour said Badenoch’s plans would mean a return to austerity and cuts for schools, hospitals and police. Reeves is widely expected to scrap the two-child benefit cap, which means low-income families do not receive further benefits when they have a third or subsequent child, to tackle child poverty. She is also expected to freeze income tax thresholds to plug a gap in her spending plans, which would mean people would be dragged into paying more tax as wages rise. Badenoch said her party would oppose this “every single step of the way”. In a speech setting out her party’s plans for the economy, she claimed the government’s U-turn on welfare reforms and the expected scrapping of the two-child benefit cap will leave the chancellor needing to find an extra £8.5bn. “If Labour do scrap the two-child benefit cap, the future Conservative government would bring it back,” she told reporters after her speech. “The cap makes sure people on benefits have to make the same decisions about having children as everyone else. This is fairness.” Badenoch repeated her call for Reeves to be sacked if she broke her promise made after last year’s Budget not to come back for more taxes, telling reporters: “If she puts up tax she should get the axe.” The Tory leader argued that cutting spending was the Christian thing to do, because not doing so would “leave debts for the next generation”.” – BBC News
Comment:
> Today:
> Yesterday:
“The threat of spying in Parliament has increased since the collapse of the China spy trial, the Commons Speaker has warned. On Tuesday, MI5 issued a warning that MPs, peers and their staff had been targeted by “headhunters” on LinkedIn working with Beijing’s ministry of state security (MSS) to “cultivate” spies for China. In the rare “espionage alert”, the Security Service said two purported recruitment consultants, Amanda Qiu and Shirly Shen, had been “used by the MSS to target UK individuals and other foreign nationals”. The disclosure comes weeks after the collapse of a high-profile spying case in which Christopher Cash, a former parliamentary staff member, was accused of collecting sensitive information and passing it to the upper echelons of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Mr Cash and Christopher Berry, an Oxfordshire academic he allegedly worked with, have denied wrongdoing. The case collapsed after Government officials refused to describe China as a “enemy” in court. The Labour Government, which is seeking to deepen ties with China, was then engulfed in a row over who was to blame for the collapse, with some accusing the party of deliberately sabotaging the case. Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Speaker, told The Telegraph: “I’m still very angry that two people got away with spying on the House. One of them embedded themselves within an MP’s office, and then walked away scot-free. I think people are more vigilant because of it. They have realised that the threat has not gone away, and if anything it has increased. The ante has been upped.” Telegraph analysis of their online networks shows Ms Qiu and Ms Shen had access to civil servants at the Treasury, the Ministry of Defence and the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, and to former Conservative special advisers, senior political party officials and aides in both the House of Commons and House of Lords. Dan Jarvis, the security minister, told MPs that the Government would launch “protective security campaigns” that would “help all those who work in politics to help recognise, resist and report suspicious state-threat activity”.” – Daily Telegraph
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“Children born in the UK to refugee parents will face deportation under Shabana Mahmood’s asylum crackdown, the Home Office has confirmed. Officials said children would be required to leave the country with their parents if their refugee status was revoked. The decision is to ensure there are not “perverse incentives” for refugees to have children in the UK “on the basis that they can stay”, a source said. Lord Dubs, who came to Britain as a child after fleeing the Nazis, accused the home secretary of using “children as a weapon” to make the country less attractive for refugees. The Labour peer described the asylum reforms as “a shabby thing” which would not reduce migration and said he was “depressed” about the proposals… Mahmood faced anger from senior Labour figures over her asylum reforms on Tuesday. Dubs told the BBC’s Today programme: “I find it upsetting that we’ve got to adopt such a hard line. What we need is a bit of compassion in our politics and I think that some of the measures were going in the wrong direction, they won’t help. The hard line approach will not, in fact, deter people from coming here — at least on the basis of people I spoke to in Calais.” He joined a revolt against the proposals, which includes more than two dozen Labour MPs. Cat Eccles, the Labour MP for Stourbridge, accused ministers of trying to “appease the electorate” with “dog whistles”.” – The Times
Comment:
> Yesterday: