Political news

• Tory chief whip Julian Smith under fire in pairing row

  19-07-2018 22:57 via bbc.co.uk
  Julian Smith faces pressure after an MP was told to break a pact and take part in a key Brexit vote.
  
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• Why Conservatives are fighting each other

  19-07-2018 22:33 via bbc.co.uk
  The government is heading towards the summer break, wracked by infighting among Tory MPs.
  
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• Jo Swinson pairing row: Conservatives admit chief whip asked MPs to break arrangements

  19-07-2018 21:58
  Julian Smith made error in asking Tory MP to vote despite pact with Lib Dem, say party sourcesThe Conservatives have been forced to admit that their chief whip asked MPs to breach Commons voting conventions in knife-edge Brexit votes on Tuesday, as opposition parties demanded he quit and queried the accuracy of the prime minister’s account of events. Related: The cheating of Jo Swinson has exposed the UK parliament’s rotten coreContinue reading...
  
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• Ben Jennings on Dominic Raab in Brussels – cartoon

  19-07-2018 21:20
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• Windrush scandal: Compensation could be capped under proposed scheme

  19-07-2018 21:15 via bbc.co.uk
  The Home Office announces a consultation on its plans to compensate victims of the Windrush scandal.
  
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• Pressure mounts on Tory chief whip over ‘pairing’ row

  19-07-2018 21:04 via ft.com
  Labour urges sacking of Julian Smith after handling of key Brexit vote
  
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• Esther McVey admits ongoing problems with universal credit

  19-07-2018 20:23
  Changes in pipeline as DWP is accused of failing to respond promptly or take expert advice The welfare secretary Esther McVey has admitted there are continuing problems with the much-criticised universal credit system and signalled that further changes are in the pipeline.She also said Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) ministers and officials needed to listen more carefully to claimants, campaigners and frontline workers when they reported problems and complaints.Continue reading...
  
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• Cyber watchdog warns on Huawei security risks to critical UK networks

  19-07-2018 20:06 via ft.com
  More work needed to manage Chinese group’s presence, says report
  
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• Europe steps up preparations for no-deal Brexit

  19-07-2018 19:52 via ft.com
  Brussels points to doomsday notes highlighting likely ‘serious disruption’
  
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• Enter Dominic Raab, a veritable chip off the old Brexit block | John Crace

  19-07-2018 19:28
  The new Brexit secretary is showing every sign of being as clueless as his predecessorThere is no sincerer form of flattery. It had been expected that the appointment of Dominic Raab to replace David Davis as Brexit secretary might raise the average IQ of the department by a few dozen points. After all, even appointing my dog – one of the dimmer creatures on this planet – would have been an improvement. But these hopes have been quickly dashed. Either there is something about the Bre
  
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• Raab promises to inject ‘renewed energy’ into Brexit talks

  19-07-2018 19:15 via ft.com
  EU side raises pressure on London over deadlocked Irish border issue
  
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• Raab promises to inject ‘renewed energy’ in Brexit talks

  19-07-2018 19:15 via ft.com
  EU side raises pressure on London over deadlocked Irish border issue
  
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• New Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab vows to 'intensify' talks

  19-07-2018 19:06 via bbc.co.uk
  Dominic Raab meets the EU's chief negotiator, as the IMF warns Ireland will be hit hard by a no deal Brexit.
  
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• DUP MP Ian Paisley says rule breach a personal embarrassment

  19-07-2018 18:59 via bbc.co.uk
  The DUP MP choked with emotion at times as he told MPs he had made a "genuine mistake".
  
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• Barnier welcomes Raab by stressing urgency of Irish border deadline

  19-07-2018 18:58
  As EU negotiator meets Brexit secretary in Brussels, Raab calls for more ‘vim’ in talksThe EU’s chief negotiator, Michel Barnier, has welcomed Dominic Raab to Brussels with a thinly veiled critique of Theresa May’s Chequers plan and a 13-week deadline in which to solve the problem of the Irish border.Appearing with Barnier for the first time in the Belgian capital, the new Brexit secretary, clutching a copy of the UK’s recently published Brexit white paper, called f
  
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• Timber scandal: Natural Resources Wales chair quits

  19-07-2018 18:54 via bbc.co.uk
  Diane McCrea goes after auditor queries Natural Resources Wales accounts for third year in a row.
  
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• Theresa May signed off five-figure bonus for chief Brexit adviser

  19-07-2018 18:54
  PM approved bonus of £15,000 to £20,000 for Oliver Robbins – a key adviser behind her softer Brexit strategyTheresa May signed off a bonus of up to £20,000 for her chief Brexit adviser, Oliver Robbins, while he was working as permanent secretary of the Department for Exiting the European Union last year, Number 10 confirmed.The department’s annual report says that Robbins was paid a bonus of £15,000 to £20,000 for his work on top of an annual salary of a
  
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• Blair: PM's Brexit 'doesn't honour public mandate'

  19-07-2018 18:45 via bbc.co.uk
  Former Prime Minister Tony Blair says Theresa May's approach to Brexit "doesn’t honour what most people who voted for Brexit think".
  
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• No-one charged in 9 out of 10 crimes - Home Office

  19-07-2018 18:25 via bbc.co.uk
  Only 9% of crimes end with suspects being charged or summonsed, Home Office figures suggest.
  
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• Don’t worry, a no-deal Brexit won’t be allowed to happen | Simon Jenkins

  19-07-2018 17:48
  Even if Britain does leave the EU on WTO rules next March, life will still go on largely as normalNow they are talking car crashes. From Brussels comes Project Fear Mk II, a “preparedness” guide for Europe if there is no deal on Brexit. It is Brussels-speak for a terrorism red alert. It covers such things as passports, air traffic control, financial transfers, military bases, data protection, medicines licensing and all the border clutter we have spent half a century removing. Unlike
  
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• New MPs' code 'risks cover-up claims'

  19-07-2018 17:42 via bbc.co.uk
  A senior MP warns that making all investigations into MPs anonymous risk damaging transparency.
  
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• Raab promises to ‘heat up’ Brexit talks in Brussels

  19-07-2018 17:29 via ft.com
  Davis replacement in meetings with Barnier for first time
  
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• Andrew Bridgen wants no confidence vote on Theresa May

  19-07-2018 17:23 via bbc.co.uk
  A Conservative MP calling for a confidence vote in Theresa May's leadership speaks of the party whips "blackmailing" MPs.
  
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• The Irish ‘backstop’ offers a key to unlocking the Brexit impasse

  19-07-2018 16:10 via ft.com
  Some European flexible thinking is needed for a compromise and to avert a crisis
  
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• Boris' Brexit dream is over - it's time to wake up

  19-07-2018 15:51
  
  The truth behind Boris Johnson's notion that the "Brexit dream is dying"
  
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• Parents set to lose right to veto sex education at age 15

  19-07-2018 15:43 via bbc.co.uk
  Pupils should be able to request sex education against their parents' wishes, the government says.
  
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• Profile: Ian Paisley

  19-07-2018 14:41 via bbc.co.uk
  The career of the son of the DUP's founder has been one of controversy and electoral success.
  
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• Nostalgia and the promise of Brexit

  19-07-2018 13:59 via ft.com
  Leavers dispute British imperial past has shaped their mental picture of world
  
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• UK police force using data to assess risk and predict crime

  19-07-2018 13:43 via ft.com
  Somerset and Avon police has more than 40 apps searching through records
  
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• UK police force uses data to assess risk and predict crime

  19-07-2018 13:43 via ft.com
  Avon and Somerset police has more than 40 apps searching through records
  
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• How police force uses data to assess risk and predict crime

  19-07-2018 13:43 via ft.com
  Avon and Somerset has more than 40 apps searching through records
  
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• Labour draws up plans for government in case of snap election

  19-07-2018 13:00
  Party preparing about 35 pieces of legislation to be ready to go should it win powerLabour is privately ramping up preparations for government, holding an away day on Monday where shadow cabinet members will present plans for a leftwing populist legislative programme so the party is ready for a snap general election.The event in London will lay out plans for draft Queen’s speech of up to 35 bills and a budget intended to focus on living standards and workers’ rights. Continue reading
  
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• A proposal for the centre-left: stop dreaming of a new party and think about how you'll work with Corbyn

  19-07-2018 12:12
  
  Jeremy Corbyn's Labour is divided and divisive, but a new centre-left party is not a solution
  
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• Police record 16% rise in knife offences

  19-07-2018 11:23 via ft.com
  Data provides fresh evidence of rise in serious violent crime in England and Wales
  
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• At-a-glance

  19-07-2018 09:56 via bbc.co.uk
  A guide to the four possible scenarios for the UK's future relationship with the European Union.
  
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• Brexit: Watchdog warns of need to issue driving permits

  19-07-2018 09:23 via bbc.co.uk
  Millions of permits will be needed if the UK and EU do not recognise each other's driving licences.
  
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• NI pro-remain parties release Brexit concern statement

  19-07-2018 09:22 via bbc.co.uk
  It comes as the prime minister is due to arrive in Northern Ireland to visit the border.
  
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• Sunflowers and Santa Claus: Guardian writers and readers on how their first memory changed them

  19-07-2018 07:00
  Our earliest memory can shape our lives, but new research suggests that many are false. Here, writers and readers reflect on their earliest recollections
  It starts as a dreamy state of dizzying vertigo, and then I rattle, headfirst, down the wooden stairs. Falling down the white-painted (I think), definitely uncarpeted stairs of our first house is my first memory, and I must have been around two. But is it real? A new study suggests not, and if you can remember lying in your pram/taking your fir
  
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• The week the Brexiters lost control of Brexit

  19-07-2018 06:00 via ft.com
  Tory hardliners fail to grasp that the EU would set the terms of a no-deal rupture
  
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• Brexit pressure mounts over Northern Ireland border

  19-07-2018 06:00 via ft.com
  Raab and Barnier to meet amid rising alarm in Brussels over avoiding a hard frontier
  
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• UK trials unmanned systems to supply troops on the front line

  19-07-2018 05:00 via ft.com
  Drones and other kit to be tested on Salisbury Plain by British army
  
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• Lord Patten: 'I've never seen so much animosity in Conservatives'

  19-07-2018 01:55 via bbc.co.uk
  Former Conservative chairman Lord Patten on the party's toxic atmosphere - and Boris Johnson.
  
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• May hangs on as Johnson condemns Brexit plan in speech

  19-07-2018 01:39
  Ex-minister hits out at fellow Brexiters but backbenchers rally after Commons onslaught Boris Johnson has used a stinging resignation speech to tell MPs it is “not too late to save Brexit”, but stopped short of a leadership challenge against Theresa May.The former foreign secretary, who resigned from the cabinet last week over May’s Chequers negotiating strategy, said the government had allowed a “fog of uncertainty” to descend since May’s Lancaster House spee
  
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• Publishers warn of Brexit threat to record exports

  19-07-2018 01:00 via bbc.co.uk
  The UK's publishing industry says leaving the EU could damage its record-breaking export business.
  
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• Military personnel based in Scotland compensated for tax rises

  19-07-2018 01:00 via bbc.co.uk
  The UK government will compensate soldiers facing higher income tax bills because they are based in Scotland.
  
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