Boris Johnson and Labour’s Keir Starmer will face off in today’s PMQs as rail strikes continue to cause chaos in Britain this week. As well as trade union pay dispute, on the agenda will be the Wakefield, Honiton and Tiverton by-elections. The sessions come as a damning new study claimed that Brexit will damage Britain’s competitiveness, hit productivity and dampen workers’ wages for the rest of the decade. The Resolution Foundation think tank’s report, in collaboration with the London School of Economics, said quitting the EU would make Britain “poorer” during the 2020s. The study said the immediate impact of Brexit was already clear, with a “depreciation-driven inflation spike” increasing the cost of living for households and cutting investment. Elsewhere, the government has today proposed a new Bill of Rights which will allow it to ignore interim rulings from a European court and could make it easier to deport foreign offenders.
Key Points
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Sajid Javed calls rail strikes ‘unjustified’
Health Secretary Sajid Javid has branded the railway workers’ strikes as “unjustified”. Speaking at a visit to St George’s Hospital on Wednesday, he said: “Well, I think, and I hope actually that the rail workers are quite unique in how they’ve responded to higher inflation because I think their strike is just just completely unjustified. “It is right that we look to modernise our rail services, it is right we take into account perhaps the longer term impacts of the pandemic with the changing patterns of the way people work. “I think people recognise also that during the pandemic, the Government put in billions of pounds, I think, some £16 billion of extra support for the rail industry. That’s something like £600 per family in the UK. But that can’t be continued. “We need to recognise this and make a changes and think this strike is unjustified and it’s hurting a lot of people, particularly people trying to get to hospital for their appointments and also you have NHS staff trying to get to the hospitals to help them.” Maryam Zakir-Hussain22 June 2022 11:43 1655893574
Health secretary says new Bill of Rights is about ‘delivering on our promise’
Sajid Javid said “it’s right that UK law is supreme” with a new Bill of Rights. The health secretary said: “I think that this bill that we’ve announced today is all about delivering on our promise, which is that UK courts should have supremacy when it comes to law for our country, our citizens. And that’s what this really is about at its heart and I think the most people would respect that. “I remember when I was home secretary how my attempts, for example, to remove your foreign national offenders from the UK that were murderers or convicted paedophiles, to remove them out of the country once they served their sentence were frustrated with the current approach and I think it’s right that UK law is supreme.” Maryam Zakir-Hussain22 June 2022 11:26 1655892674
Brexit: Ministers warned against trade deal with Gulf states over ‘appalling’ human rights record
Boris Johnson’s government has been warned against a post-Brexit free trade deal with a group Gulf states over the “appalling” record on human rights. Union chiefs and campaigners urged ministers to rethink its approach as talks on a deal between the UK and six Gulf nations kick off on Wednesday in Saudi Arabia. International trade secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan will meet representatives of the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) in Riyadh to begin negotiations with the bloc, writes Adam Forrest. Maryam Zakir-Hussain22 June 2022 11:11 1655891761
Sunak says Bank of England will act ‘forcefully’ to tackle inflation
Rishi Sunak said the government and the Bank of England were acting to combat rising inflation which hit a 40-year-high this morning. Asked if the Bank had lost control of inflation, which is meant to be kept at a target of 2%, the chancellor said: “I want people to be reassured that we have all the tools we need and the determination to reduce inflation and to bring it back down. “Firstly, the Bank of England will act forcefully to combat inflation. “Secondly, the Government will be responsible with borrowing and debt so we don’t make the situation worse and drive up people’s mortgage rates any more than they are going to go up. “Lastly, we are improving the productivity of our economy, improving the supply of energy we have and moving people off welfare and into work.” Maryam Zakir-Hussain22 June 2022 10:56 1655890808
Home Office top employee says nothing department loves more than a ‘good crisis’
Top Home Office civil servant Matthew Rycroft said there is nothing the department “loves better than a good crisis”. Asked about a point previously raised by the independent chief inspector of borders and immigration, David Neal, that there “always seems to be a crisis going on” in the Home Office, Mr Rycroft told the Commons Home Affairs Committee: “I absolutely recognise that.” He added: “You may recall when the home secretary and I set up a transformation programme for the Home Office, called One Home Office, one of the things that we were seeking to unlock was the sense in the department that we do go from crisis to crisis. “You know, there’s nothing that the Home Office loves better than a good crisis. And of course, responding well to crises is an important part of the functioning of a department of state. But there is a lot more to it than that. “And what I am seeking to do is to get us better at dealing with business as usual, and preventing things from becoming crises.” Maryam Zakir-Hussain22 June 2022 10:40 1655889974
Bus drivers to go on strike over pay dispute
Hundreds of bus drivers are to go on strike in a dispute over pay. Members of the Unite union employed by Stagecoach in Merseyside will walk out on June 30 and again on July 4. Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “Stagecoach is a highly profitable company – it can easily afford to pay its workers a decent wage but it is choosing not to. “Unite will always challenge employers who make excessive profits by exploiting and underpaying workers. Our members will receive Unite’s complete support until this dispute is resolved.” Unite regional officer Dave Roberts said: “Members of Unite are taking strike action as a last resort. Despite extensive negotiations, Stagecoach has refused to make an offer which meets members’ expectations. “Even at this late stage, strikes and the inevitable disruption they will cause can be avoided if Stagecoach makes a reasonable pay offer.” Maryam Zakir-Hussain22 June 2022 10:26 1655889134
Government had to ‘hold the line’ against RMT demands, deputy PM says
Dominic Raab said the government had to “hold the line” against the RMT’s demands for improved pay and conditions on the railways. The justice secretary said the strikes were “deeply regrettable” and reform was necessary on the railways. “We’ve, of course, got to reform the way the railways operate, given the new ways to working on the effect that has on commuter travel,” he told LBC Radio. “But there are also old practices, which frankly, are well out of date and unnecessary, which need to be reformed.” He added: “I think Network Rail are taking the right approach. We know that the cost of living challenge is there, we know that it affects workers across the board. “But the one thing that will keep inflation higher for longer and undermine pay packets for longer is if we have spiralling public sector pay increases beyond what is responsible. And that’s what’s at issue here. “It is precisely to protect the wages of those on the lowest incomes that we need to hold the line.” Maryam Zakir-Hussain22 June 2022 10:12 1655888234
Teacher union threatens strike action if government fails to offer ‘inflation plus’ pay rise
The country’s biggest education union will consult members on industrial action this autumn if the government fails to make an “inflation-plus” pay increase for teachers. In a letter to Nadhim Zahawi – seen by The Independent – the joint general secretaries of the National Education Union (NEU), warn they will not stand by “while you run both education and educators into the ground”. It comes amid the biggest industrial strike on the rail network for decades and the latest figures showing UK inflation hitting a fresh 40 year high, climbing 9.1 per cent in the 12 months to May — up from 9 per cent in April. Our political correspondent Ashley Cowburn reports: Maryam Zakir-Hussain22 June 2022 09:57 1655887309
Inflation: Raab defends restoring pensions triple lock
Deputy prime minister Dominic Raab defended restoring the pensions triple lock, which will see the benefit rise in line with inflation, at a time when the government is arguing against wages keeping pace with rising prices. He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “They (pensioners) are particularly vulnerable and they are disproportionately affected by the increase in energy costs which we know everyone is facing.” The Government had committed £37 billion to help people cope with rising costs, he said, but “at the same time we have got to stop making the problem worse by fuelling pay demands that will only see inflation stay higher for longer and that only hurts the poorest the worst”. Maryam Zakir-Hussain22 June 2022 09:41 1655886376
London mayor calls for free NHS care for all UK residents to help ‘prevent another Windrush scandal’
The Mayor of London has urged the government to make for the NHS access free for everyone living in the UK to prevent another Windrush scandal. As the nation observes Windrush Day, Sadiq Khan urged the government to end its hostile environment policy and curb NHS charging regulations for migrants, which impact undocumented Londoners as they struggle to prove their…
