The long-awaited report into Russia’s influence on UK politics could soon be cleared for publication, after Downing Street confirmed MPs will vote on Monday to re-establish a key intelligence committee. A No 10 spokesman said the committee would be encouraged to publish “as soon as possible”.
At the same time, Boris Johnson has nominated Chris Grayling to lead the influential intelligence and security committee, which has not sat for a number of months. Recently, Mr Grayling’s disastrous privatisation of probation services was entirely undone and the service renationalised.
It came as Rishi Sunak defended his £30bn mini-Budget plan but admitted the UK was “entering one of the most severe recessions this country has ever seen”. Economists have warned Britain could face decades of tax rises to repair its battered public finances, with borrowing set to soar.
The chancellor admitted that “we can’t sustainably live like this ... and over the medium term we can and we will return our public finances to a sustainable position”.
He also said there would be “significant” unemployment as a result of Covid-19.
On the economic front, Oliver Dowden announced on Thursday evening that gyms could reopen from 25 July, subject to conditions, while outdoor arts performances would be able to resume from 11 July. Recreational sports, once teams publish approved guidance, can also restart from 11 July, the culture secretary said.
Meanwhile, Brexit talks broke up a day early due to, as Michel Barnier put it, “significant divergences” between Britain and the EU. Negotiations will continue later in the month. Mr Barnier warned EU countries to expect disruption at the end of the year, with a no-deal scenario looming.
Scroll down to see how we covered the day’s events live.
Good morning and welcome to The Independent’s live coverage of events at Westminster and beyond.
Mini-Budget offers ‘no hope or support’ for self-employed, unions warn
The cost of dealing with the coronavirus crisis has risen to a staggering £190bn, according to the Treasury’s latest figures – after Rishi Sunak revealed a further £30bn worth of measures. It’s fair to say reaction to the chancellor’s pledges has been mixed. A mixed grill, if you will.
The offer giving diners 50 per cent off when eating out in August (up to £10 a head) makes all of today’s front pages, but Labour said it was distraction from the lack of substantial support. “We were promised a ‘New Deal’, but what we got was a ‘Meal Deal’.”
The VAT cut and £1,000 bonus for every employee firms keep on when the furlough scheme ends were largely welcomed. But the CBI said more grants and rates relief were “urgently” needed to keep companies afloat, while the unions and Federation of Small Businesses said the self-employed had been “overlooked”.
Mike Clancy, general secretary of the Prospect union, said the chancellor had “failed to acknowledge that there are some sectors that need extra support so they can retain viable jobs until they can reopen”.
He added: “The chancellor started his statement saying that ‘nobody will be left without hope’, but there was nothing in his new package for the millions of forgotten freelancers and others who have been left with no hope and no support for months.”
Chancellor’s mini-budget offers ‘no hope or support’ for self employed, unions warn
‘There were millions of forgotten freelancers and others across the country hanging on the chancellor’s every word today, but once again the government has let them down’Brexit border plans could be challenged by WTO, minister warns
Boris Johnson’s Brexit border plans may be vulnerable to international legal challenge and will help smugglers, the trade secretary has warned in a leaked cabinet letter.
Liz Truss wrote to chancellor Rishi Sunak and Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove saying she had “key areas of concerns” about the prime minister’s plans for Northern Ireland.
In the letter, obtained by the Business Insider website, the international trade secretary says the UK would “be vulnerable to WTO challenge” over the plan.
Downing Street did not deny the letter’s veracity but a spokesman said “we do not comment on leaks.”
Rachel Reeves, Labour’s shadow Cabinet Office minister, said: “This email confirms fears that several ministers have been making things up as they go with a lack of awareness of the real world consequences of border policies they’ve had four years to develop.”
Trade Secretary says Boris Johnson’s Brexit border plans vulnerable to smugglers and WTO challenge
Leaked letter shows Liz Truss has concerns about government’s approachSir Mark Sedwill gets £250,000 ‘compensation’ package
Boris Johnson has authorised a payment of almost £250,000 “compensation” to Sir Mark Sedwill after he stepped down as cabinet secretary in mysterious circumstances.
In a personal minute published on Wednesday the PM said the UK civil service human resources department and legal advisors had been consulted about the £248,189 payment, which was “likely to be in the form of a pension contribution”.
It follows Sir Mark appearance at the national security committee, where he offered a warning to his successor, saying senior civil servants are now “fair game” for anonymous briefings in the press. “It is a regrettable feature of modern politics, I’m afraid,” he told MPs.
More details here:
Boris Johnson orders quarter of a million pounds 'compensation' to top civil servant after mysterious resignation
Sir Mark Sedwill is stepping down from his role amid rumours that he has been forced out by Dominic CummingsThousands of EU nationals ‘barred from government support’
Thousands of EU nationals have been barred from accessing government support over the past year, and the figure is likely to have increased “dramatically” in recent months amid the coronavirus crisis, according to research.
A report by the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) think tank found large numbers of EU migrants applying for universal credit were rejected because of the government’s “flawed” habitual residence test (HRT) – which requires claimants to prove they have a settled home in the UK.
An analysis of Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) figures by the think tank showed around 45,000 universal credit claims were closed because of HRT failures in the last 12 months of available data. This accounted for about 10 per cent of all those who took the test, around half of whom are estimated to be EU citizens.
The report states the number of claims will likely have increased “dramatically” due to Covid-19.
Our social affairs correspondent May Bulman has all the details:
Thousands of EU nationals 'barred from government support during pandemic'
‘Considerable flaws’ in universal credit system causing ‘unnecessary hardship’ for EU claimants due to challenges providing correct documentation, finds IPPR think tankGovernment has set aside £10bn for test and trace
The government has allocated £10bn of public money for spending on the much-criticised test and trace system for England, Treasury documents have revealed.
The sum, much of it going on contracts with private firms like Serco and G4S, amounts to more than 100 times Public Health England’s £90m annual budget for infectious diseases and was described as “extraordinary” by a member of the Independent SAGE group of scientists.
Labour demanded a full break-down of the test and trace budget to ensure that the money is being spent in “the most effective way to limit the spread of Covid-19”.
Government has set aside £10bn for test and trace system for England
Labour demands full breakdown of spending, much of which is going to commercial contractorsTaxi drivers could be part of testing expansion, suggests top Tory MP
Ahead of the publication of weekly test and trace data, former health secretary Jeremy Hunt has suggested taxi drivers and people arriving at airports as well as NHS staff could be subject to mass testing in efforts to identify asymptomatic people and their contacts.
Hunt, now chair of the health and social care committee, said certain groups within the population, as well as people in particular parts of the country, could be tested to try to better track Covid-19 infections.
Speaking during an online conversation with Royal Society of Medicine president Professor Sir Simon Wessely on Wednesday, he said: “I think looking at healthcare staff, looking at taxi drivers is another group, airport arrivals is another group.
“I think we need to think about mass testing amongst groups of the population as well as parts of the country like Leicester and so on, as our best way of finding out where the asymptomatics are and feeding them into the system so that their contacts can be isolated.”
Chancellor taking ‘computer says no’ approach to support scheme, says Labour
Labour’s shadow chancellor Anneliese Dodds said Rishi Sunak has given “a lot of excuses” for not expanding economic recovery schemes to support more people.
She told BBC Breakfast: “Two things need to change, first of all we shouldn’t still be having this ‘computer says no’ response from the chancellor.
“Whenever these matters have been raised he said there is a need for speed when the different systems were set up, the furlough scheme and the self-employed scheme, that you can’t possibly include everyone at the beginning and he repeated that again yesterday.
“I’ve said to him and Labour said back to him that these systems have been created now, there is more scope in the system to be fitting them to people’s circumstances.”
She added: “It’s a complicated area but it’s not beyond the wit of man to sort out solutions to this.”
Dodds told the Today programme said the government is taking a “one-size fits all” approach in its incentive scheme to persuade employers to keep on furloughed staff beyond October.
Dodds continued: “The big issue for the chancellor is he’s assuming, it seems, that as people come out of those sectors that they will rapidly be able to be re-employed.”
UK entering ‘very significant recession’, admits Sunak
Chancellor Rishi Sunak has said jobs are at risk unless economic activity returns to normal.
He told Sky News: “We won’t know the exact shape of that recovery for a little while - how will people respond to the new freedoms of being able to go out and about again … But unless activity returns to normal, those jobs are at risk of going which is why we acted in the way that we did.”
Sunak admitted he was “anxious” about the state of the economy, and that the UK was “entering into a very significant recession”.
Asked if everyone who has been furloughed will go back to work, Rishi Sunak said: “No. I’ve been very clear that we are not going to be able to protect every single job and it would be wrong of me to pretend otherwise.”
Sunak defends ‘broad offer’ to firms to keep on furloughed staff
Chancellor Rishi Sunak told BBC Breakfast he could not place a figure on an “acceptable” number of job losses.
He said: “Very clearly, every person who loses their job is a tragedy. That’s why I acted yesterday with a comprehensive plan to protect and support as many jobs as possible.
“If you’re asking me ‘can I protect every single job’ of course the answer is no. ‘Is unemployment going to rise, are people going to lose their jobs?’ Yes, and the scale of this is significant.
“We are entering one of the most severe recessions this country has ever seen. That is of course going to have a significant impact on unemployment and on job losses.”
Sunak was asked about why the job retention bonus had not been more targeted and said: “I actually think it will make a significant difference, it is something that people were actually interested in calling for.
“Given the income distribution of those on furlough, we know that £1,000 can be a significant reward and incentive to employers to successfully bring staff back and continuously employ them. I think actually having a broad offer to all those 9 million people is the right thing to do.”
He added: “I would make the same decisions again and I’m sure if we had a more targeted approach in this instance you’d probably have me on this show saying ‘Well, why are these people excluded?’”
‘I can only apologise’: Sunak says sorry to freelancers
Yet more from Rishi Sunak as he continues his round of morning interviews. The chancellor csaid more than a million businesses had benefited from government financial support during the crisis – but apologised to those who had not been reached.
He told Times Radio: “Over a million businesses have benefited, for example from the furlough scheme a million businesses have accessed some of our loans, almost a million businesses have got access to cash grants or business rates holidays.
“So clearly the scale of what we’re doing is reaching a lot of people. Is it going to reach absolutely every single person and every single company in exactly the way they would like? I’m sure not and I can only apologise for that.”
He also apologised to freelancers who feel left behind by the support schemes. “Does everyone feel that they’ve been helped in the way that they would like to have been? Of course not and I can only apologise for that.”
Truss said ‘staged’ approach could be challenged by WTO
More now on the letter Liz Truss wrote to chancellor Rishi Sunak and Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove expressing her “key areas of concerns” on the government’s Brexit border plans.
In the email, first published by Business Insider, the international trade secretary warned the UK would “be vulnerable to WTO challenge” over its “staged” approach to border policy – because it would temporarily give the EU preferential treatment in the absence of a trade deal.
Gove backtracked last month over plans to immediately introduce full border checks when the transition ends on 31 December and instead said Britain would “phase” in the changes over six months.
But Truss was said to have asked for “assurances” that the UK will deliver full border controls at ports by July next year and that plans are in place from January “to mitigate the risk of goods being circumvented from ports implementing full controls”.
Truss also reportedly warned of angering unionists in Northern Ireland by delivering the “high-risk” dual tariff system on all imports to the nation on 1 January. “This is very concerning as this may call into question NI’s place in the UK customs territory,” she said, according to the report.
Former Labour communications chief Alastair Campbell is among those amazed by the uncertainty which still remains. “These charlatans are destroying one of the greatest countries in the world, and they’re not even clear why,” he tweeted.
Cummings ‘will tour highly-classified national security sites’
Boris Johnson's top aide Dominic Cummings is reportedly set to head out on a tour of highly-classified national security sites as part of his plan to shake up the British military, according to a new report.
Correspondence obtained by Australian media outlets The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age shows Cummings has requested visits to five sites – including facilities that specialise in defence intelligence.
So what might he be hoping to achieve? Our associate editor Sean O’Grady has taken a closer look.
Why is Dominic Cummings visiting British military and security facilities?
It would be nice if Mr Cummings would tell the public what he thinks he’s playing at, writes Sean O’GradyHigher taxes on the way, says IFS expert
The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) director Paul Johnson warned that a “reckoning, in the form of higher taxes” would have to come eventually to repair the battered public finances.
He questioned whether the billions of extra spending announced by Rishi Sunak would offer value for money but acknowledged that measures needed to be taken now in the face of a recession that was the “deepest in our history”.
At a presentation of the think tank’s findings on the mini-Budget, he said that normally they would be asking “what can be afforded” but “today the question is better posed as what is needed and what can be delivered”.
There was also the issue of whether the extra funding would offer the benefits claimed.
“Even in a crisis we shouldn't ignore the basics,” he said. “A lot, probably a majority, of the job retention bonus money will go in respect of jobs that would have been, indeed already have been, returned from furlough anyway.”
Stay the hell away, Europeans tell British tourists
The latest YouGov survey from Europe makes for interesting reading. It shows 61 per cent of people in Spain want British tourists to stay at home, while a majority of people in Germany and France fell the same way.
YouGov also asked British citizens what they thought of tourists coming to the UK. People are most wary of visits from Americans (76 per cent opposed) and Chinese visitors (72 per cent opposed).
Report claiming Huawei targeted UK elite ‘totally without evidence’ top official tells MPs
Some of the top executives of Huawei UK are answering MPs questions at the science and technology committee this morning.
They have been asked about allegations the company has targeted members of the British elite for support. It follows claims made in a new dossier – reportedly compiled with the help of former MI6 spy Christopher Steele – that the firm tried to persuade high-profile figures in the UK to act as “useful idiots”.
“We have not seen the report – we’ve seen press coverage of the report. We refute the content of what we have seen,” said Jeremy Thompson, vice president of Huawei UK.
Victor Zhang, chief representative of Huawei UK said the claims were “totally without evidence. We reserve the right to take any legal actions … once we see the full story”.
John Lewis to close eight stores, putting 1,300 jobs at risk
More bad economic news. John Lewis has announced it is to permanently close eight UK stores, putting 1,300 jobs at risk, as sales failed to rebound after the coronavirus lockdown.
It follows a warning from the head of Burger King UK that up to 1,600 jobs could be lost as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. The chief executive suggested the company may have to permanently close up to 10 per cent of its British outlets.
John Lewis to close eight stores, putting 1,300 jobs at risk
The department store chain said it will shut two department stores in Birmingham and Watford, four smaller shops in Croydon, Newbury, Swindon and Tamworth, as well as outlets at Heathrow Airport and St Pancras station in LondonAnger after Sunak serves food without wearing mask
There’s been plenty of responses to Rishi Sunak’s trip to a central London branch of Wagamama, in which he served customers without wearing a mask.
One tweeted: “What the hell is Rishi Sunak doing clowning around in a restaurant without a mask?”
Stefan Simanowitz, media manager at Amnesty International tweeted: “Rishi chatting while holding plate of food. Thousands of saliva gobbets would have landed on the food.”
More reaction here:
First-time house buyers could now be ‘worse off’, says IFS
First-time house buyers will be left “worse off” by the chancellor’s decision to scrap stamp duty for most purchases, the Institute of Fiscal Studies has suggested.
The IFS warned that house prices will rise as some of the tax break is captured by sellers – which will punish first-time buyers.
“This is a group that might actually be made worse off by the policy,” said Helen Miller, the IFS’s deputy director.
She said “across the whole market, it’s more likely that prices will rise and therefore first time buyers could be left keeping less of the discount”.
More on IFS analysis of the mini-Budget here:
First time buyers will be left 'worse off' by Rishi Sunak's stamp duty axe, think-tank warns
Institute for Fiscal Studies also questions £10-a-head ‘eat out to help out’ restaurant discount - arguing social distancing, not demand, is the problemEU open to Scotland joining but '’very reluctant’ to let UK return, expert says
Kirsty Hughes, former director of Scottish Centre on Europe Relations, has said predicted the EU would have “complete openness” to Scotland joining the bloc if they voted for independence in a legally binding referendum.
“On the Scottish side I think there is complete openness if Scotland was to vote Yes in a constitutionally and legally valid referendum. There is complete openness to welcoming another small, northern European country into the European Union,” she said.
Hughes is less certain there’s a way back for the UK.
“I think the EU would be very reluctant in the near future to welcome a penitent UK back. It would have to be more than penitent, it would have to be one that had clearly worked through all its political, democratic, constitutional problems and come out the other side of that.”
