Meanwhile a petition to parliament calling on Jeremy Hunt to resume meaningful contract negotiations with the BMA has passed 5,000 signatories, and that number is rising quickly.
When it reaches 10,000 the government must respond to the petition; should it reach 100,000 signatories, it will be considered for debate in parliament.
The petition says: “J. Hunt is to impose a new contract. As incoming junior doctors, with GMC registration, starting work as an FY1 in August 2016 and junior doctors working within the NHS we will refuse to sign the imposed contract and will continue strike action on behalf of the medical profession and greater public.”
Updated
Outside the Department of Health headquarters, Glenys Arlidge, a junior doctor in a London A&E department, said Jeremy Hunt denigrated the medical profession, did not understand the way hospitals operated or were structured or the vital role that others such as paramedics played in delivering emergency care in the UK.
“He should understand fully how things work - then he might be in a position to improve things. If that were the case he would have far more support from the profession.”
She said Hunt had shown himself unwilling or unable to admit he didn’t properly understand junior doctors’ needs and as a result had put patients at risk. “That’s absolutely unforgivable. Patients should not be the ones to come to harm.”
Arlidge said she and her husband - also a junior doctor - who have a one-year-old son, often only had one weekend day a month when both were not working.
Updated
Heledd Vaterlaws, a junior doctor who qualified in Wales and has worked in a GP surgery in London for the past six years, was one of about 200 to 300 junior doctors and supporters gathered outside the Department of Health headquarters on Whitehall on Thursday night.
The crowd chanted slogans including “Jeremy Hunt has got to go” and “we won’t give up the fight”.
She said: “We all know that the fight is going to go on - we’re not going to give up now. The more Jeremy Hunt lies and spins this the more we are going to fight.”
Vaterlaws said she and her colleagues were being forced to choose between their own health and wellbeing and that of their patients. She added that the idea that junior doctors would win pay rises under the new contract was wrong and stressed that, contrary to media reports, junior doctors were not paid overtime.
A true seven-day NHS was not realistic given existing staff levels, Vaterlaws said. Patients did not want to spend their Saturdays seeing their GP about minor complaints.
Updated
What happens next?
Denis Campbell, health policy editor, writes:
After two months of talks during December and January there are no more negotiations planned.
NHS trusts in England will start imposing the new contract from the start of August, initially on the new cohort of medical graduates starting work in the NHS for the first time then. It is expected to take a year to get all 45,000 juniors onto the contract.
The BMA responded to Hunt’s announcement by pledging to continue its fight against the contract. But it is so far given no details as to what that might involve and it is unclear what they can do.
They might seek to undertake further industrial action -- and possibly even stage an all-out strike. But while some members of the BMA’s junior doctors committee back that option, others, and the BMA’s leadership, believe that refusing to work in areas of emergency care, such as A&E and maternity services, could lead to patients being harmed or even killed, which would have disastrous consequences for doctors’ currently very high standing with the public.
The BMA is seeking legal advice as to whether the ballot result it got in November -- 98% backed strike action -- remains a legal basis for further walkouts or withdrawals of labour. If it is not, then they may have to stage a second ballot to give them a fresh mandate to strike.
Jack Dover, 24, a medical student at Manchester university, said his whole career would be affected by today’s decision.
“I’ve been going at this for 4 and a half years now and I’ve got 18 months left to go,” he says.
“My generation is the generation that has already been shafted by fees and now we’re coming out of university with all this debt and we’re being shafted by crappy working conditions as well.”
Dover is in the last year of medical students in England and Wales to have £3,500 fees instead of having to pay £9,000 per year.
“Because the contract is only for England, it’s really made me consider whether I want to go to one of their her parts of the UK. I wanted to stay in Manchester because I love it here,” he says.
“I’ve got a choice between uprooting my whole life or working under a contract that means I will make mistakes because I’ll be so tired.”
Updated
Has Jeremy Hunt won?
Denis Campbell, health policy editor, writes:
Yes -- and no. The health secretary has got his way in that from August the 45,000 junior doctors in the NHS in England will start working under a contract that is, on key issues, very close to the one he first threatened to impose back in September. Usefully for him it is also a contract that, by forcing junior doctors to work on Saturdays more often, lets him claim that he has taken a major step forward to delivering the seven-day NHS promised in the Conservatives’ general election manifestio last year.
It does that because it extends “plain time” -- the hours in the week for which junior doctors are paid at their basic rate -- in two key ways. First, it will now be extended from 7pm to 9pm between Monday and Friday. Secondly, and most importantly, given the significance of Saturday working for both sides, for the first time Saturdays between 7am and 5pm will now count as “plain time” for the first time. That will help hospital chief executives roster more junior doctors to work then without it increasing their running costs significantly and thus help bring about a seven-day NHS for which ministers have produced no extra money.
But has Hunt convinced the public that his proposals are right?
Definitely not. Separate opinion polls this week, by Ipsos Mori and YouGov, found that those who back the junior doctors outnumber those who don’t by two to one. Imposing the contract is unlikely to reduce that strong public support for trainee medics.
More practically, Hunt’s move could also have serious consequences for the NHS in both the short and long-term. The main risk is that even more newly-qualified doctors will decide not to continue their career in protest at a contract they regard as unfair. The numbers choosing not to stay in the NHS and start specialist medical training has gone down for the last four years in a row. Many of the medical royal colleges -- bodies which represent different groups of doctors professionally -- have voiced serious unease about the prospect of that happening and thus worsening existing, sometimes serious, shortages of medical personnel.
And a seventh.
Now 7 NHS chiefs - Sir Andrew Cash from @SheffieldHosp says he does not support imposition. He does support Dalton's deal #juniorcontract
— Shaun Lintern (@ShaunLintern) February 11, 2016
And a sixth. Miles Scott, chief executive of St George’s Hospital Trust in south London, says he too does not support imposition.
To be clear, I supported the contract offer but not imposition.
— Miles Scott (@StGeorgesCEO) February 11, 2016
Health Service Journal’s Shaun Lintern has uncovered another two NHS chief executives whose names are on a letter purporting to support the imposition of the contract, but who now say they do not support that measure.
That’s five - a quarter - of the original 20, which now includes David Sloman, chief executive of the Royal Free London NHS Trust, and David Loughton of Royal Wolverhampton Trust.
Full statement from David Sloman: pic.twitter.com/RiQJ9XGX8T
— Shaun Lintern (@ShaunLintern) February 11, 2016
Breaking: David Loughton of Royal Wolverhampton Trust clarifies he "does not support imposition" of #juniorcontract
— Shaun Lintern (@ShaunLintern) February 11, 2016
That's five out of 20
Updated
Afternoon summary
- Ministers have decided to impose a new contract on NHS junior doctors after the British Medical Association rejected a “best and final” offer to settle the bitter dispute, Jeremy Hunt has told MPs.
- He accused the union of being inflexible on an issue that was vital to delivering the government’s manifesto pledge to introduce a seven-day NHS by 2020.
- Junior doctors reacted angrily to the announcement, with some saying they planned to quit the NHS in protest. Although Hunt claimed that many hospital bosses and NHS organisations backed his move, the wider medical profession has greeted the announcement with alarm.
- The BMA said it would fight the imposition.
Junior doctors cannot and will not accept a contract that is bad for the future of patient care, the profession and the NHS as a whole.
- Google has insisted that it pays a “fair” amount of tax in the UK as senior executives from the internet giant and from HMRC were grilled by the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee over a £130 million settlement over back taxes from the last 10 years.
- Google’s Matt Brittin insisted that the company in fact paid corporation tax at 20% on its activities in the UK like anyone else. The figure was the largest tax settlement following audit ever paid by Google outside the US, he said.
- Hillier told Brittin he was “living on another planet” and demanded four times to be told what Mr Brittin was personally paid, but he responded: “I don’t have the figure but I will happily provide it.”
You don’t know what you get paid? ... Out there, taxpayers, our constituents, are very angry, they live in a different world clearly to the world you live in, if you can’t even tell us what you are paid.
- HMRC chief executive Lin Homer denied that large companies like Google were given preferential treatment, telling the committee: “It is exactly the same system we apply to everyone.”
- The government has hinted it may look again at proposals to cut taxpayer funding for opposition parties, known as Short Money, by 19% and then freezing them in cash terms until 2020.
-
Shadow Commons leader Chris Bryant warned ministers against reducing this support at a time when they have hired more special advisers than ever before at an increased cost of 2.5 million a year.
What’s the word for this behaviour? Is it shabby, tawdry or just downright cynical?”
- Cabinet minister John Penrose denied he had said the Government would be launching proposals - instead noting it would be further consultations.
-
The home secretary has yet to make a conclusive case for giving spying agencies new snooping powers to track the web browsing histories of all British citizens, a key committee of peers and MPs has concluded.
The fact that we have made 86 recommendations shows that we think that part of the bill is flawed and needs to be looked at in greater detail. There is a lot of room for improvement.
- Shadow foreign minister Hilary Benn has laid out the security case for remaining in the EU, saying Russian president Vladimir Putin would see Brexit as a sign of “weakness”.
- The UK still has “issues” with the proposed EU reform package, Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond said after European Council president Donald Tusk issued revised proposals to member states in response to concerns raised by other members.
- The new draft text being discussed in Brussels includes changes which would effectively limit the use of a proposed “emergency brake” on migrant workers in the UK and makes clear child benefit curbs will not be extended to old-age pensions.
Labour’s Andy Burnham and Keir Starmer have written to Theresa May this afternoon over the new concerns raised by a key joint committee about the snooper’s charter.
It is our view that the Government must now take time to reconsider the draft Bill, taking into account the conclusions and recommendations in the three detailed reports, and return to Parliament with a significantly revised and improved Bill.
A significant revision does not seem likely, though a new version will be published soon, according to the BBC’s political correspondent Eleanor Garnier.
PM's spokesman: revised Investigatory Powers Bill will be published "in coming weeks" & reiterates legislation to be in force by end 2016
— Eleanor Garnier (@BBCEleanorG) February 11, 2016
Updated
The Guardian’s Scotland editor Severin Carroll reported earlier this week that he understood the junior contract would not be imposed north of the border. Wales has also said it will not impose the contract.
We’ve just had that confirmed from Scottish health secretary Shona Robison, and this effectively breaks a long standing convention that NHS doctors contracts are agreed and implemented at UK level.
It is extremely disappointing that the UK Government has announced the imposition of a contract that the BMA clearly feels is not right for junior doctors.
I want to reassure junior doctors working in the NHS in Scotland that this Government will not impose any new contract on our workforce.
We take a very different approach to our relations with NHS staff and are determined to continue our longstanding positive relationship - working with staff to improve and shape services for the future.
Junior doctors are an extremely valued part of Scotland’s NHS and that is why we will continue to service the existing contract for junior doctors until such time that we feel it is right to move towards negotiations.
BMA Scotland continue to be an important partner of ours and if we did decide to move towards a new contract, it would only ever be on the basis of an agreed and negotiated settlement.
We believe that working with our junior doctors and other NHS staff is ultimately in the best interests of patients.
Dr Chris Sheridan, chair of the BMA’s Scottish junior doctor committee, called the outcome in England “hugely disappointing” but welcomed the clarification by the Scottish health secretary which he called “reassuring to my colleagues here in Scotland.”
Updated
Perhaps the most surprising political news of the day comes from the Green party, who announce the brother of US presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders has been appointed as their new health spokesperson.
Sanders has often been compared to Labour’s Jeremy Corbyn, an old-school socialist who caught the imagination of young, left-wing voters.
But Larry Sanders said his brother is actually closest to the Green party in terms of his beliefs.
Larry Sanders, who stood for the Greens in the May 2015 General Election, said he will campaign for further investment in the NHS as part of his new role.
“2016 should be another good year for the Green Party, but we’re not in the public’s eye as much as we should be,” he said. “We’re the only party that is consistently speaking out against NHS privatisation and we know that the public will support us on this issue.”
I’ve been speaking to Dr Dagan Lonsdale, the junior doctor who confronted Jeremy Hunt at the Millbank studios.
The pair have clashed before, during an interview for BBC Radio 4’s Today programme last year. Lonsdale, who said he believes that was the last time the health secretary had taken part in a live exchange with a junior doctor, took exception then to Hunt’s suggestion that doctors did not understand what was being offered to them, saying it’s “a bad idea to tell doctors they are being misled by their union because they’re well and able to make an assessment themselves.”
Lonsdale, who had been interviewed in the TV studios himself before Hunt arrived, said the health secretary had promised to meet him again.
I’m sure he doesn’t mean it, but I’ll be trying to take up up on it. He did say we can ‘meet later’. He doesn’t want to sit down with an intelligent, informed professional who knows the facts.
Mr Hunt has always said his door is open for us to talk, but today he slammed it shut in my face.
Hi @Jeremy_Hunt, today you said you didn't have time to talk to me but you would in future. Please name the time and place and I'll be there
— Dagan Lonsdale (@DaganLonsdale) February 11, 2016
The specialist registrar said he had particularly been angered by Hunt’s statement on weekend death rates.
“He mentioned eight separate studies, but they are all based on the same data set, and two of them were by the same person. It is completely untrue that they are separate and independent studies,” he said.
Lonsdale said he and his wife will now have to sit down and work out if they can continue in their professions.
We have to contemplate if we can work in a system that stretches doctors in such a way that patients are put at risk and where were will be unable to give the right amount of time to family life for our son. I think if even 1% of the NHS workforce leaves because of this contract, the NHS will be in dire straits.
There are already gaps in rotas. The only option if you want a fully seven-day NHS service without any more investment is to stretch services thinner or make doctors work more hours and we all know tired doctors make mistakes.
Updated
Labour MP Liz Kendall is on the BBC’s This Week after Question Time tonight. She’s taken affront to the suggestion by the BBC Twitter feed that she might have only received 4% of the vote in the Labour leadership election.
Four POINT FIVE https://t.co/j1iuVP6Bup
— Liz Kendall (@leicesterliz) February 11, 2016
Natalie Bennett, leader of the Green party, called the imposition of the contract “a new low” in the treatment of public sector workers.
“It’s playing with fire. With a global shortage of health workers, the potential for medical staff to leave the English NHS - if only to go to Wales, Scotland and possibly much further afield - is clear,” she said.
Speaking to junior doctors as I offered the Green Party’s support on picket lines, I found most know at least one colleague who’s already moved to Australia, Canada and other countries, and many are considering leaving themselves.
Some revelations after meticulous digging by Health Service Journal’s Shaun Lintern, who is contacting all 20 of the hospital chief executives listed as supporting the contract’s imposition in a letter by Sir David Dalton. Three have now said they do not support forcing the contract on doctors.
Claire Murdoch, head of central and north west London NHS foundation trust, also said she did not support imposition, though she thought the contract offer was fair and reasonable.
Statement from @ClaireCNWL to HSJ...pretty clear she should never have been on that list #juniorcontract pic.twitter.com/NXmK4AOXvt
— Shaun Lintern (@ShaunLintern) February 11, 2016
Andrew Foster, chief executive of Wrightington, Wigan & Leigh NHS, said similar.
@cpeedell I have not supported contract imposition. I have supported the view that the offer made is reasonable.
— Andrew Foster (@andrewkfoster) February 11, 2016
This was the tweet earlier from Professor Stephen Foster, claiming he too did not support imposition.
@HSJEditor not supporting imposition. Supporting fact that David came up with a better offer than the one on the table.
— Prof Dr Stephen Dunn (@Stephen_P_Dunn) February 11, 2016
The bitterness of the dispute between Hunt and junior doctors is likely to have a marked effect on the government’s dealings with their superiors, as it prepares to negotiate a new consultant contract.
Professor John Schofield, president of the Hospital Consultants and Specialists Association which is the union for senior doctors said it showed a lack of respects for the entire medical profession.
It will steel consultants and other senior specialist grades... in their dealings with government over the impending new consultant contract.
We fear that senior doctors, who are the government’s next target, will increasingly vote with their feet alongside their juniors rather than wait around to be used as target practice by politicians in whom they have now totally lost faith.
(NB: Hope this should answer this question from BTL)
Updated
Corbyn: 'What is keeping this dispute going is the Secretary of State'
Jeremy Corbyn has called Hunt’s decision to impose a contract on junior doctors “provocative and damaging” and said he expected to see further strike action.
He refuted Hunt’s repeated view that the BMA had been unwilling to negotiate and said the imposition showed the health secretary had “a lack of confidence in his own arguments.”
What is now keeping this dispute going are the actions of the Secretary of State himself.
More strikes now look likely. If that happens, it will be clear that the blame lies with the government, not the doctors. Even at this late stage, I appeal to Jeremy Hunt to go back and negotiate with the BMA.
This government is reckless with our NHS and is now prepared to put patient care at risk in the service of its self-defeating austerity programme.
While I’ve been focussed on junior doctor contract, my colleague Rowena Mason has been following the row over party funding we touched on earlier.
Ministers have hinted they could be prepared to back down on plans to slash opposition party funding, known as Short money, amid signs some Conservatives could revolt over the cuts.
Here’s her report:
John Penrose, a Cabinet Office minister, said a new consultation about the move would start shortly, after Labour called an urgent question in the House of Commons to condemn the government’s “shabby” handling of the plans.
Some Tories feared the cuts of 19% to state funding for opposition parties would set a bad precedent and contravene the principle that such moves are done on a cross-party basis.
The move comes on top of the government’s trade union bill that is expected to cut Labour’s funding from the unions by as much as £8m, as members will be forced to opt into subscriptions rather than being automatically affiliated with the choice of opting out.
This is the story in full:
Updated
The pop star James Blunt has this interesting offer to make, if the title is indeed his to bestow.
I'm officially handing over my Cockney Rhyming title to @Jeremy_Hunt
— James Blunt (@JamesBlunt) February 11, 2016
Updated
This picture is captioned as “Jeremy Hunt with a man in medical scrubs”.
That man is Dr Dagan Lonsdale, a specialist registrar in intensive care medicine, based at St George’s hospital in south London, and one of the most vocal critics of the junior contract.
He followed Hunt into the studio, to berate him about his decision.
You’ve got no evidence whatsoever Mr Hunt that these changes will have a positive effect. You are taking a massive gamble with people in the NHS. I don’t know why you won’t address that point.
Health secretary @Jeremy_Hunt was confronted by #JuniorDoctor @DaganLonsdale on his way to the Sky studio https://t.co/g84PkPNiEY
— Sky News (@SkyNews) February 11, 2016
Some breaking news now, the chancellor George Osborne’s psychiatrist brother Adam Osborne is struck off the medical register after a tribunal rules he had a relationship with a vulnerable patient.
My colleague Josh Halliday has been at the hearing.
Dr Adam Osborne "showed a blatant disregard for the fundamental tenets of the medical profession," medical tribunal rules
— Josh Halliday (@JoshHalliday) February 11, 2016
Updated
Are you a junior doctor who opposes this decision? How does it make you feel? What would you say to the health secretary?
We’re looking for your stories. Here’s where you can tell us about how it will affect you.
Heidi Alexander, the shadow health secretary, has been speaking to Sky News.
She said Jeremy Hunt is presenting the junior contract as if it were the key to unlocking more consistent care over seven days.
“The truth is the need to change a huge number of things,” she said, pointing to consultant cover, and the number of nurses on wards relative to admissions.
Alexander also argued that patients are likely to be sicker if they access care at weekends, particularly those who cannot be admitted to hospices to receive palliative care.
It’s a really complicated issue and the health secretary is in real danger of over simplifying this and conflating the junior doctor contract with his manifesto commitment to a seven-day service.
She said she would be happy for any of her relatives to receive weekend care at any NHS hospitals. “It is something that as a country we should be proud of. My concerns is that as the years go by is that we could see that quality of care deteriorate,” she said.
The Guardian’s home affairs editor Alan Travis has now published his full report of the sharp criticism of the so-called ‘snoopers’ charter’ by a key committee of peers and MPs.
The home secretary has yet to make a conclusive case for giving spying agencies new snooping powers to track the web browsing histories of all British citizens, a key committee of peers and MPs has concluded.
The third critical report from a parliamentary committee in three weeks increases the pressure on Theresa May to rewrite substantial parts of her so-called snooper’s charter introduced after Edward Snowden’s disclosures of mass surveillance.
The final report of the pre-legislative scrutiny committee on the investigatory powers bill makes 86 detailed recommendations to ensure the new legal framework covering intrusive spying powers is workable, can be understood by those affected and includes proper safeguards.
The committee’s recommendations include:
• Strengthening of the judicial commissioners’ role; that they are appointed and dismissed by the lord chief justice, not the prime minister, initiate their own investigations, and refer directly to the investigatory powers tribunal. But the committee says the current proposed judicial role on “double lock” authorisation of intrusive surveillance warrants is sufficiently flexible.
• Stronger safeguards for the protection of legally and journalistically privileged material to be written on the face of the bill.
• On encryption, it welcomes the home secretary’s reassurance that the bill will not create “back doors” to encrypted services such as WhatsApp but wants clarification written into the bill. It stops short of endorsing tech industry concerns about encryption.
• The publication alongside the bill of a full justification for so-called “bulk collection powers” – mass harvesting of personal communications data – which the home secretary has yet to provide.
• Parliamentary review of the operation of the powers under the bill, five years after it is brought into force.
Here’s the full report:
I’m getting more reaction through from many different health bodies, which are highly critical of Hunt’s vow to impose the contract on doctors.
-
Jon Skewes, director for communications, policy and employment relations at the Royal College of Midwives said it was further proof that the Government is failing to listen to the concerns of NHS frontline staff.
Both junior doctors and midwives already provide seven day services, day and night, 365 days a year.
Imposing a contract on junior doctors in this manner is likely to damage morale further and is an attack on all NHS staff.
- Dr Maureen Baker, chairwoman of the Royal College of GPs, said the imposition will will inevitably damage morale across the NHS - and may damage patient care.
We would ask whether the Government has carried out a structured and robust risk assessment, along with measures to evaluate the impact of their decision on patient safety.
The last few months have been incredibly tough for junior doctors, and have led to the lowest morale across our profession in a generation.
Imposing a contract, in its current form, is asking junior doctors - the future of our NHS - to work under conditions in which they neither feel valued nor able to deliver safe patient care.
The imposition of the contract will undoubtedly impair our efforts to recruit thousands of additional doctors into the NHS over the coming years in order to keep the health service sustainable - as many medical students are seeing this turmoil, not liking what they see, and turning away from medicine in the UK altogether.
-
Danny Mortimer, chief executive of NHS Employers, did not criticise the imposition but said he was “saddened and hugely frustrated that an agreed deal has not been reached with the BMA.”
The NHS needs certainty on this contract and a continuation of a dispute would be harmful to patients, and the NHS.
Over the last four years significant progress has been made to address concerns around safe working. I believe the new offer is fair and safe for doctors, and patients.
Updated
Around 500 people have said they will join an emergency protest tonight outside the Department of Health at 5pm, against the imposition of the contract.
The government have decided to *try* to impose this contract on junior doctors. Let’s show them what they can do with it. #junioraction #juniorcontract
Much has been made over how junior doctors have been moving in droves to Australia and New Zealand over working conditions and morale in the NHS. But they may not need to go as far as that.
Any junior doctors in England should know they will not have the contract imposed if they cross the border, the Welsh health minister Mark Drakeford has said in a statement released just now.
We have no plans to impose a new junior doctors’ contract.
Wales has a strong tradition of working in partnership with our staff and their representatives.
Wales will continue to offer attractive working arrangements and a positive training experience, based on the existing new deal arrangements.
Junior doctors from any part of the UK interested in working in Wales will find fair working conditions and a very warm welcome here.
Updated
My colleague Rajeev Syal has posted his first take on the tense exchanges between MPs and Google executives and HMRC earlier at the public accounts committee today, including the moment that Google’s Matt Brittin said he did not know his own salary.
In the early stages of a grilling over Google’s tax affairs, the internet company’s European boss was asked to tell MPs what he was paid – but said he could not disclose the figure because he didn’t know how much he earned.
Matt Brittin was appearing before the public accounts committee in the aftermath of a row about £130m in back taxes it agreed to pay in a deal that caused a public outcry, despite being described as a victory by George Osborne. At the beginning of the session, Brittin, the president of Google Europe, declined to respond to a request to say how much he was paid, saying: “I’ll happily disclose that if it’s a relative matter for the committee.”
The committee chair, Meg Hillier, demanded to know it, but Brittin said he did not have the figure. “You don’t know what you get paid, Mr Brittin?” she said to laughter in the room.
She continued: “Out there, our constituents are very angry, they live in a different world clearly to the world you live in, if you can’t even tell us what you are paid.
“It seems a bit of a PR disaster if you didn’t have the nous to realise in the same week that taxpayers were filing their tax returns, and sweating over a little bit of bank interest and getting it in on time, and you announce this as a good deal.
Here’s the rest of the report:
Junior doctors have been tweeting me with their analysis of Hunt’s comments in the House of Commons earlier.
@jessicaelgot we cannot seek to "boost basic pay" rotas are rotas can't choose to work out of hours or not #juniorcontract
— Tom Oates (@toates_19) February 11, 2016
@jessicaelgot People will remember this day at the ballot box #juniorcontract
— Cllr Dr Hitchin (@stephen_hitchin) February 11, 2016
@jessicaelgot govt has 1 major bargaining chip in #juniorcontract - they are monopoly providers of postgraduate medical training [1/2]
— Arnab Ghosh (@arnabarnabarnab) February 11, 2016
@jessicaelgot most have worked incredibly hard for junior training posts – no way to progress in career unless we accept their contract[2/2]
— Arnab Ghosh (@arnabarnabarnab) February 11, 2016
@jessicaelgot thanks! I'm leaving for a research post in April and do not plan to return to NHS after. I'm about 1 year away from consultant
— DrSKarrar (@karrar_sarah) February 11, 2016
. @jessicaelgot Heartbroken that Govt imposing contract.Juniors will vote with their feet: England's loss is Scotland,Wales&Australia's gain
— Heather Ryan (@DrHFRyan) February 11, 2016
Updated
Jeremy Hunt finds support from the Telegraph’s Asa Bennett, who has little sympathy for the BMA. Here’s an extract.
This Saturday pay offer was far from unjust for junior doctors, who can already count themselves lucky for getting any premium for working that day. The same can’t be said for firefighters, police officers, air ambulance pilots, retail assistants or restaurant staff – all of whom work Saturdays on their standard rate of pay. Most care home nurses and managers work Saturdays at their normal rate too. As a union, the BMA is of course meant to have its members’ best interests at heart, but digging in over issues like this shows how out of touch it is, seemingly unaware of how others work in the public and private sector.
BMA reaction: 'a flawed contract'
The full text of the BMA’s press release can be found here. Another snippet:
Junior doctors already work around the clock, seven days a week and they do so under their existing contract. If the government want more seven-day services then, quite simply, it needs more doctors, nurses and diagnostic staff, and the extra investment needed to deliver it. Rather than addressing these issues, the health secretary is ploughing ahead with proposals that are fundamentally unfair.
Updated
Here is the Guardian’s story on Hunt’s decision, which contains reaction from the BMA.
Dr Johann Malawana, chair of the BMA’s junior doctors committee, said: “The decision to impose a contract is a sign of total failure on the government’s part. Instead of working with the BMA to reach an agreement that is in the best interests of patients, junior doctors and the NHS as a whole the government has walked away, rejecting a fair and affordable offer put forward by the BMA. Instead it wants to impose a flawed contract on a generation of junior doctors who have lost all trust in the health secretary,.”
Imposition could prompt a generation of “alienated” junior doctors to choose not to continue their careers in the NHS, Malawana added.
“This is clearly a political fight for the government rather than an attempt to come to a reasonable solution for all junior doctors,” he said. “The government’s shambolic handling of this process from start to finish has totally alienated a generation of junior doctors – the hospital doctors and GPs of the future, and there is a real risk that some will vote with their feet.”
Jeremy Hunt has been on Sky News defending the new contract. While feelings are running high in the middle of an industrial dispute, he argues, once the dust settles people will realise in a few years’ time that it was the obvious thing to do. He rejects the argument that the contract is unsafe as it will mean a reduction in maximum hours worked in a week and fewer consecutive night shifts.
Lunchtime summary - Jeremy Hunt imposes contract on junior doctors
- A new contract will be imposed on junior doctors after negotiations with the British Medical Association (BMA) failed, Jeremy Hunt has said.
- The health secretary announced that talks to settle the dispute with junior doctors had failed and that a new contract would be imposed from August 1, setting the scene for renewed confrontation and the possibility of further strikes.
- Hunt said the process had created “considerable dismay” among junior doctors but he felt that, given time, the contract would be accepted as a good thing.
- The health secretary said those working one in four or more Saturdays will receive a pay premium of 30%. It does represent a reduction in current rates, because hospitals must be able to afford additional weekend rostering, he said.
- The government will also give doctors a basic pay rise of 13.5%.
- Hunt paid tribute to the government’s chief negotiator, Sir David Dalton , who he said had reached agreement on 90% of issues. But Dalton and NHS England’s chief executive, Simon Stevens, had asked him to end the uncertainty, and Hunt said he has decided to do that.
- Hunt said the negotiating process had uncovered some “wider and more deep-seated issues relating to junior doctors’ morale” and announced a government review to address wider concerns from doctors.
- Shadow health secretary Heidi Alexander said the imposition of the contract “could amount to the biggest gamble with patient safety this House has ever seen” and said it was an admission of failure.
Hunt has finished taking questions on his statement. Here’s some of the latest reaction on Twitter to the news he will impose the contract.
Hard to believe Hunt was brought in to calm things down in the NHS after the warfare triggered by Andrew Lansley and his reforms #savethenhs
— Diane Abbott MP (@HackneyAbbott) February 11, 2016
Glad to hear that Prof Sue Bailey chair @AoMRC has agreed to lead a wider review of long standing issues affecting junior doctors' morale
— Sarah Wollaston MP (@sarahwollaston) February 11, 2016
If current and earlier docs offer both "cost neutral", there is something very wrong with way @Jeremy_Hunt & Health Dept do their sums!
— Robert Peston (@Peston) February 11, 2016
Jeremy Hunt should be forced onto Question Time this evening so he can't hide away this evening after forcing his Junior Doctor contract.
— GP Doctor (@TheGPDoctor) February 11, 2016
Many MPs are bringing up the effects of imposition of the contract on morale and recruitment.
Hunt says he believes “the biggest threat to morale is when doctors are not able to deliver the care they came into the profession to deliver.”
That’s what we’re trying to put right. In the end, the government have to decide what is right for patients and services as well as right for doctors.
Updated
Jack Dromey, Labour MP, asks if Hunt is proud that he has alienated junior doctors, and patronised them by saying they did not understand what was on offer.
Hunt says Dromey “can do a lot better than that” but insists the BMA would not meet the government without pre-conditions until December this year, when they had already balloted for industrial action.
Here’s the full statement from Labour’s shadow health secretary Heidi Alexander to Jeremy Hunt a few minutes ago.
This whole dispute could have been handled so differently.
The Health Secretary’s failure to listen to junior doctors, his deeply dubious misrepresentation of research about care at weekends and his desire to make these contract negotiations into a symbolic fight for delivery of seven-day day services has led to a situation which has been unprecedented in my lifetime.
Everyone, including the BMA, agrees with the need to reform the current contract. But hardly anyone thinks the need to do that is so urgent that it justifies imposition, and all the chaos that will bring.
One of the hospital chief executives who the Secretary of State claims is supporting him has tweeted this morning: “I have supported the view that the offer made is reasonable… I have not supported contract imposition”.
Can the Health Secretary not see that imposing a new contract which doesn’t enjoy the confidence of junior doctors will destroy morale which is already at rock bottom?
Does he not realise that this decision could lead to a protracted period of industrial action which will be distressing for everyone – patients, doctors, everyone who works in or depends upon the NHS?
A poll earlier this week found that nearly 90 per cent of junior doctors are prepared to leave the NHS if a contract is imposed. The Health Secretary needs to stop behaving like a recruiting agent for Australian hospitals and start acting like the Secretary of State for our NHS.
The Health Secretary has been keen to present a new junior doctor contract as the key which unlocks the delivery of 7 day services. This is a massive oversimplification and he knows it. Whilst research shows a higher mortality rate amongst patients admitted to hospital at the weekend, there is absolutely no evidence which shows a lack of junior doctors specifically causes this.
What we heard from the Secretary of State today could amount to the biggest gamble with patient safety this House has ever seen. He has failed to win the trust of the very people who keep our hospitals running and he has failed to convince the public of his grounds for change.
Imposing a contract is a sign of failure. It’s about time the Secretary of State realised that.
Updated
MP Bernard Jenkin says he has such sadness that junior doctors were caught up in a dehabilitating and damaging dispute. He asks Hunt to speak directly with them and calls the BMA relationship “destructive.”
Hunt reiterates he believes there was no reason to have this dispute, and a seven-day NHS was something that was desired by every single doctors who “chose a career in medicine with the highest ethical motives.”
He says he will continue to engage with doctors directly.
Updated
Here’s some of the first reactions from junior doctors, students and others to Hunt’s confirmation that he will be imposing the contract.
Hunt announces Junior contract to be imposed. He has failed Patients, the NHS & this country. There'll be no certainly, only uncertainty now
— Roshana Mehdian (@RoshanaMN) February 11, 2016
We seem to be living in a dictatorship not a democracy #juniorcontract @Jeremy_Hunt
— Steve Corry-Bass (@SteJCB) February 11, 2016
@Jeremy_Hunt you're a liar. A complete liar. Thank you for making me feel like the last 6 years of uni have been for nothing #Juniordoctors
— Yossari-asmin (@yasminleighw) February 11, 2016
I'm devastated for my F2 daughter who is going to Oz in August and my son who graduates as a Dr this year #notsafenotfair #juniordoctors
— Fiona Collins (@DrFionaC) February 11, 2016
Labour MP Barry Gardiner says it is logical to assume the problem he is trying to solve will get worse as fewer doctors join the NHS.
Hunt says there are 10,600 more than five years ago.
There have been a lot of smoke and mirrors about what the contract proposal is.
I hope all trainees and medical students look at the proposal that independent experts believe fair and reasonable and we will continue to recruit more doctors into the NHS.
Updated
Hunt is challenge on his statistics on weekend death rates by the SNP’s Philippa Whitford, who is a doctor, who points out studies show that nurses are more important to mortality.
Hunt calls her comments “immensely more constructive” than Labour’s, but says the contract will be looked back on as a major step forward for a seven-day NHS.
Conservative MP Dr Sarah Wollaston, a former GP, said the BMA should welcome the inquiry into morale announced today and asks that both sides move forward in a positive way and “take the temperature down”.
.@Jeremy_Hunt: "hope we can go forward in a positive spirit". That's just laughable as he's IMPOSING a #juniorcontract. #juniordoctorexodus
— Kitty Mohan (@DrKittyMohan) February 11, 2016
Updated
Here’s a list of the NHS chief executives backing the imposition of the contract.
A list of NHS chief execs backing the position set out in Sir David Dalton's letter to Jeremy Hunt #juniorcontract pic.twitter.com/y2RjJ9x1iN
— Shaun Lintern (@ShaunLintern) February 11, 2016
But the consensus is already crumbling, as Heidi Alexander points out, one of the chief executives listed says he has not agree that the contract should be imposed, only that doctors should accept the deal
@cpeedell I have not supported contract imposition. I have supported the view that the offer made is reasonable.
— Andrew Foster (@andrewkfoster) February 11, 2016
Updated
Heidi Alexander, the shadow health secretary, says the imposition of the contract will “destroy morale” among junior doctors and says Hunt’s statistics on weekend death rates are “deeply dubious”.
She cites the number of doctors moving to Australia to work, saying the UK should not train doctors to export them to the Southern hemisphere.
This could be the biggest gamble with patient safety this house has ever seen. Imposing a contract is a sign of failure and it is about time the Secretary of State realised that.
Hunt announces review into 'morale' of junior doctors
Hunt said the process has “uncovered deep seated concerns about morale, well-being and quality of life” and he cites separation from spouse and families on placements and inadequate support from seniors.
He has asked Dame Sue Bailey, president of the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges, to lead a review into measures outside the contract that will improve morale.
Updated
Hunt says the government’s “door remained open” for three years and said the departments showed a willingness to negotiate time and again.
But he said it was imperative both sides demonstrated flexibility and compromise. “The BMA proved ultimately unwilling to do that.”
He refers to eight studies on weekend death rates, and said that six pointed to inadequate staffing levels.
Hunt said he is confident that the new contract is “one that in time can commend the confidence of workforce and employers.”
Hunt says those working one in four or more Saturdays will receive a pay premium of 30%. It does represent a reduction in current rates, because hospitals must be able to afford additional weekend restoring.
The government will also give doctors a basic pay rise of 13.5%.
Hunt will impose contract on junior doctors
Hunt pays tribute to the chief negotiator, Sir David Dalton, who he said has reached agreement on 90% of issues.
But Sir David and NHS England’s chief executive, Simon Stevens had asked him to end the uncertainty, and Hunt said he has decided to do that today.
Updated
Jeremy Hunt in the House of Commons
I’m switching now to cover Jeremy Hunt’s statement on the junior doctors’ contract in the House of Commons, he’s expected to impose the contract on the doctors this summer.
Labour MP Caroline Flint asks why HMRC hasn’t applied any penalties to Google for non-payment of tax over the last five years.
It is very difficult to argue they have taken insufficient care, even if they have come to the wrong conclusion in their accounting, Harra said.
Flint says that the lawyers and tax experts of Google have “out- manoeuvred” HMRC and says there is “considerable public anger”.
Updated
Lin Homer is going back to the letter sent last night to the committee. The letter contained taxpayer-confidential information, she said, which they needed Google permission to make public. She insists the information was intended to be aired in the committee.
The SNP’s Deirdre Brock said the committee does not need the exact numbers. What they need to know is, is every business treated the same, even small shops in her constituencies?
It is exactly the same process, Brock said, though admits the average length of an investigation is 22 months so “this was a long one”.
Jim Harra, HMRC’s Director General for Business Tax says he does not have a figure for how much the six-year investigation into Google has cost the taxpayer.
Obviously, us conducting a six year audit is a very expensive and resource intensive process which, obviously, I wish we didn’t have to do.
They do not usually take six years. It is a new area of the economy. [For companies like Google] their scale and business model and ways their customers behave change all the time. we can’t just look at one year and extrapolate that to other year.
It was long, resource-intensive and pain-staking.
Updated
Up next is HMRC’s turn to be probed over the tax arrangment with Google, and corporate tax deals more generally.
In front of the committee is Dame Lin Homer, chief executive and permanent secretary, Jim Harra, director general of business tax and Edward Troup, tax assurance commissioner.
Hillier reveals that the committee received a letter yesterday offering some confidential background information about the HMRC and Google deal.
Homer admits that letter was co-ordinated with Google, offering to share more information about the deal with the PAC.
Hillier said the approach was disappointing.
We want answers about this in public, so taxpayers hear the answers too. Last minute, confidential information does not help that. We want to talk openly and honestly.
I don’t need to remind you that you are public servants. I was disappointed with that approach.
Updated
Here’s some reaction from the Twitter-sphere about the Google executives in front of the PAC.
"If you are so keen on this tax reform, why don't you lead by example" #googletax
— Tom Phillips (@tomphil91) February 11, 2016
Bonkers of Google to pretend that *its* tax complexity is a function of tax rules. It's a function of Google's choices.
— Jo Maugham QC (@JolyonMaugham) February 11, 2016
What we have discovered PAC/Google: 10 year deal - taxes £112m, interest £18m, Google says it's "fair", UK tax structure stays the same
— Kamal Ahmed (@bbckamal) February 11, 2016
David Mowat on PAC asks Google if their employees are proud of them not paying more tax. Ridiculous idealistic nonsense
— Patrick Kidd (@patrick_kidd) February 11, 2016
PAC concludes questioning Google
Hillier concludes by calling on the company to be more transparent.
Why don’t you lead by example to provide more information to the general public and to other countries?
If you want your staff to be proud, if you want to do good in the world, then why can’t you tell the ordinary British taxpayer how your settlement was reached?
Hutchinson said no company has ever provided as much detail on a tax settlement as Google, but he cannot say more because it is commercially sensitive.
Back at the PAC, Richard Bacon MP is still pressing the Google executives on the exact pre-tax profit of Google of which 19% tax was paid.
I’m trying to express myself clearly. You paid tax at 19%, which must be 19% of something. You have said several times that you pay it at 19%.
You answer that by saying that is spread over 5 years. I can’t understand why you don’t know that. I don’t understand why you don’t have that figures now. I’m very surprised you don’t know it.
While I’ve been focussed on the Google evidence at the select committee, Chris Bryant, the shadow leader of the house, has been asking an urgent question on short money in the House of Commons, relating to the funding of political parties.
He called George’s Osborne’s plans to cut the funding of state grants to opposition political parties by 19% as “shabby”.
Bryant said Commons Leader Chris Grayling had failed to turn up for three meetings yesterday on the issue.
Why, frankly, isn’t the Leader of the House doing his proper job and standing at the despatch box today?
What’s the word for this behaviour? Is it shabby, tawdry or just downright cynical?
Here’s the report from the Press Association of the exchange between Bryant and Cabinet Office Minister John Penrose.
Replying to an urgent question from Labour, Cabinet Office Minister John Penrose told MPs a consultation will start “shortly”.
Opening his remarks, Mr Bryant quoted previous Conservative comments objecting to opposition parties being under-resourced at a time when spending has increased on taxpayer-funded special advisers.
He said: “In opposition the Prime Minister said he would cut the number and cost of special advisers, yet in Government he has appointed 27 more special advisers than ever before and the cost has gone up to the taxpayer by 2.5 million a year.
“There’s a word for that Mr Speaker but it’s not parliamentary.”
“In opposition, the Conservatives banked 46 million a year in short money but in Government they want to cut short money by 20% for the Opposition.
“There’s a word for that Mr Speaker but it’s not parliamentary.
“How can it be right for the Government to cut the policy development grant for political parties by 19% when it’s not cutting the amount of money spent on special advisers of its own?
“Surely history has taught us that an overweening executive is always a mistake.
“Surely if a party in Government needs financial support in addition to the civil service then it’s in the national interest that all the opposition parties should be properly resourced as well.”
Mr Byrant said the Government has been briefing journalists that its proposals will be published on Friday - when Parliament is in recess.
Updated
Hutchinson says Google is paying what they think is a “reasonable” amount of tax - 19%. Mowat said if that is the case, why do they book sales in Ireland, channel business through the Netherlands and Bermuda?
If we did have our UK office selling directly to UK customers, that would be a change in our structure, but would not change that the tax rules require you pay tax in the UK relating to the value of the profits generated in the UK?
Is Tom Hutchinson from @Google honestly saying they'd pay the SAME tax in the UK if they had a permanent establishment here? Really?? #pac
— Alexi Mostrous (@AlexiMostrous) February 11, 2016
Tory MP David Mowat concedes Google has paid “probably the right amount of tax” given its exceptionally complex tax structures.
But he says it is not the correct moral course.
You use Ireland, Holland, Bermuda. Doesn’t it bother you some of your employees might bail out over that?
Updated
Hutchinson said it was not a negotiated tax settlement.
There was not a number that was thrown out by HMRC and we negotiated it down. That is not the way the process worked.
Bacon said the row is ruining the reputation of the internet giant.
This is staining your reputations. You have chosen to take very complex routes. You can’t like the fact that lots of people hate you because of this. Why don’t you face up to that?
Brittin said they cannot pay more than the government demands of them.
We have reached the end of a lengthy independent process. At the end of the process, the HMRC told us exactly the right amount to pay and we are paying it. We have just finished an intensive review with tax specialists where they decided this is the right amount to pay.
We believe we are [paying the right amount] because this is what we are asked to pay.
An extraordinary response to a question from Tory MP Richard Bacon.
Can you tell me the number on which you paid tax at 20%?
Brittin said he does not have the profit numbers in front of him. Hutchinson said he also does not have the exact numbers of how much tax was paid in the UK. Bacon himself uses a calculator to work out the profits on activities in the UK - around £230m.
Why did it take you take six years - as long as the second world war - to explain your activities adequately to HMRC? Are you saying it’s HMRC’s fault for being so slow. Either you’re bad at explaining or they are very thick at understanding.
Brittin said HMRC interviewed people at Google “from top-to-bottom” to try to understand the way the business operates.
It’s incredible that it takes six years to explain what the internet is, Bacon said.
Tom Hutchinson has repeatedly insisted the company’s tax arrangements in Bermuda have no impact on the tax paid in the UK.
Jolyon Maugham QC, a barrister specialising in tax, says this cannot possibly be the case.
Bermuda *does* have an impact on tax paid in the UK. Without the Bermuda tax haven Google would have no incentive to avoid UK taxes.
— Jo Maugham QC (@JolyonMaugham) February 11, 2016
There is robust laughter in the room as Brittin attempts to suggest that Ireland is a good base for Google because of the numbers of languages spoken by staff.
“Not for tax reasons?” Mowat says. Brittin admits favourable tax arrangements were one of the reasons, as well as lower property prices and good internet connections across the Atlantic.
Updated
Conservative MP David Mowat mockingly said it is “laudable” that Google says it wants a simpler tax system, but says the company cannot blame the UK for having a complex system because its company has a complex structure.
It wasn’t us who decided to say all our sales were booked in Dublin. It wasn’t us that decided that the ways you were going to choose to operate by using ‘the double Irish’.
You tell us you want a transparent system. Yet you use the double Irish, you use the Dutch Sandwich, you use Bermuda.
Your argument is everyone else does it so we do.
Tom Hutchinson, Google’s head of tax, is adamant that it is the tax system, not the company, which is to blame for the current row.
He’s clearly not exactly enjoying his time in front of the committee.
I would love to see the system be more simple so we won’t have to come to meetings like this and explain it, but we need the governments to work together and develop an overall worldwide system.
Updated
Tax came up from 'time-to-time' in meetings with ministers, Google admits
Flint draws attention to more than 20 meetings which Google had with ministers over the past five years and asks if the tax question “ever came up”.
Brittin says there has been no political involvement in the deal with HMRC. Flint and Hillier says that is not the question. Brittin says they have never sought a meeting with government over tax deals. Again, Flint said, that is not the question.
I’m sure, given the scrutiny, we’ve had that the tax issue will have come up from time to time. You’d be surprised if you didn’t given the scrutiny.
Google and government had informal chats about their tax arrangements. Wonder what was said?
— Ciaran Jenkins (@C4Ciaran) February 11, 2016
Updated
Caroline Flint is speaking now. She asks about the remaining £112m paid in tax, because the other £18m was interest, and asks if any fines were paid. Hutchinson says not.
Flint asks if Google thinks it is a fair settlement. Hutchinson says he thinks it is, after an extensive audit. “It was higher than we paid on returns,” he said.
“So, why weren’t you paying it in the tax years during that six-year period?” Flint said.
It’s a good question, Hutchinson admitted, to some murmurings in the room.
Flint says the public will be incredulous.
The public tuning into this will be asking themselves, how can a massive company like Google, with all the expertise that it hires, how can HMRC not, in real time, tackle the problems of how you pay your tax?
Updated
'We have never paid a larger settlement than the one we just agreed to'
Brittin said the reports were just statements by politicians in those countries, “politicians who would like to see tax paid in proportion to sales”, rather than actual deals.
Hutchinson goes further, and says the British tax settlement is the highest ever paid.
Those are articles that are not based on facts. I can say, we have never paid, as part of an audit outside the US, we have never paid a larger settlement than the one we just agreed to.
Updated
Tom Hutchinson, Google’s head of tax, repeats Brittin’s point that profits Google makes from UK customers are related to the value created outside the UK, the technology of the Google search engine.
Look at the value of the substance of the values for services in the UK, what would you pay a third party? That’s what we did doing our tax returns, HMRC came back and argued that should be a higher amount, that’s what we ended up paying.
Jackson asks him whether it is true that Google have had “involved” discussions with Italy and France over their tax affairs, which Hutchinson refuses to comment on. It has been reported the web giant is set to pay the French government more than three times what it has paid HMRC.
Updated
Stewart Jackson, Conservative MP, called Google’s press release about how it had agreed to pay £130m in back taxes “a dead cat strategy”,
“You knew that would put pressure on the Treasure and HMRC,” he said.
Stewart Jackson accuses Google of using tax press release as a "dead cat". Dead cats have definitely jumped the shark.
— Robert Hutton (@RobDotHutton) February 11, 2016
He also calls the article Brittin wrote in the Telegraph, on reformation of international tax, as Google posing as “a disinterested observer”.
You have made a choice to avoid tax, and you have set up structures specifically to do so. I think there’s an element here of we are doing the UK taxpayer a favour by paying tax.
Quite frankly, if i hadn’t disclosed between 2005 to 2015 all the circumstances of my income I would be in trouble with HMRC. Why are you different?
Brittin said the audit was a way for HMRC was to understand “the nature of internet business”.
He says the heart of the matter for income tax is place where “value is created.”
Most of the value is created by the search, which is developed and built in the US, some is created by the marketing but most by the search. There are 20,000 engineers in the US, and 1,000 in the UK.
The rules require you to pay your tax based on the economic value creation.
Updated
Google’s Brittin says he wants to clarify the most recent tax bill that attracted the negative attention.
He says that of the £130 million it paid in back taxes, £18 million was interest and the rest is tax.
Brittin is asked the cost of Google’s new base in Kings Cross, which he says has cost around £1bn. He insists that despite the size and cost of the building, the global operation’s headquarters are still based in Ireland.
“Frankly you are taxing already my patience and the patience of the hard-working taxpayer out there,” Hillier says.
Updated
Google/
Meg Hillier MP is quizzing Matt Brittin, current President of EMEA Business & Operations for Google, and the exchange is already pretty testy.
We are here for taxpayers in Britain, do you hear the anger and the frustration out there, with these huge figures?
The £130 million figure was “the conclusion of a six-year rigorous, independent tax audit in which we are paying tax at 20% like every other UK company”, Brittin said. “We are paying tax at 20% on the activities in the UK.”
Hillier asks Brittin what he gets paid, after asking him to confirm chief executive of Google Sundar Picha, has been paid £138m.
He says he will “disclose that if it’s relevant to the committee”.
Hillier asks him to state it publicly, and Brittin says he must check the figures.
“You don’t know what you get paid?” she asks, incredulous. MPs burst out laughing.
Updated
Google’s evidence to the public accounts committee is due to start in the next few minutes, with the executives taking their seats now in Portcullis House.
The BBC’s Norman Smith has the letter from the government’s chief negotiator, Sir David Dalton, which is the clincher for Hunt’s statement later, where he is expected to impose a new contract on junior doctors from August 1.
Everyone’s first preference has always been for a negotiated outcome. Unfortunately this no longer seems possible.
I therefore advise the government to do whatever it deems necessary to end uncertainty for the service [the NHS] and to make sure that the new contract is in place which is as close as possible to the final position put forward to the BMA yesterday.
Govt chief negotiator David Dalton letter to Jeremy Hunt #juniordoctors pic.twitter.com/WwheF5fjwX
— norman smith (@BBCNormanS) February 11, 2016
Updated
The government’s so-called snoopers’ charter needs “significant amendments and further work,” according to a joint parliamentary committee.
The committee were particularly critical of the proposal that internet browsing records of all citizens be stored, which it called intrusive, and said the threat to privacy outweighed the value of the data to security services.
Scrutiny committee on snoopers charter say much stronger powers and independence needed for judicial oversight commissioners
— Alan Travis (@alantravis40) February 11, 2016
Lord Murphy, who is chairing the committee looking at the Draft Investigatory Powers Bill, said more clarification is needed before Parliament can be assured the full implications of the bill have been thought through.
The committee has made 86 recommendations, including more safeguards for internet and phone data collection.
Earlier this week, the Intelligence and Security Committee also warned that the draft bill did not have sufficient civil liberties safeguards.
Updated
Here’s some background to Hunt’s statement later.
- A deadline to accept the government’s “final” deal passed over Wednesday night.
- The government’s chief negotiator, Sir David Dalton, earlier warned this would mean talks had reached “the end of the road”.
- Dalton is understood to have told Hunt he sees no prospect of a negotiated settlement to the long-running dispute unless the doctors’ union agrees to give ground on Saturday working.
- Hunt wants junior doctors – all doctors below the level of consultant – to accept working on Saturdays as part of a new normal working week, but Dalton claims the BMA has refused to even countenance the possibility.
Junior doctors and other medics are already expressing fury at the news that the contract may be imposed.
I'll be calling my lawyer https://t.co/anKn0FKh7U
— Roshana Mehdian (@RoshanaMN) February 10, 2016
Sad to hear #jyniordoctors contract will be imposed. Hope this won't make recruitment of #juniordoctors a nughtmare and increase locum spend
— Dr Umesh Prabhu (@DrUmeshPrabhu) February 11, 2016
Updated
An interesting line here from the Huffington Post’s Paul Waugh in his morning briefing email.
Will Hunt really impose jun doc contract, or is this one last bit of blinkmanship? WaughZone:https://t.co/Y6iuSAOJS6 pic.twitter.com/jLCGOziZ1E
— Paul Waugh (@paulwaugh) February 11, 2016
Jeremy Hunt to deliver statement on junior doctors' contract
Health secretary Jeremy Hunt will make a statement to the Commons on the junior doctors’ contract, after yesterday’s strike action with the BMA.
This could very well turn out to be an announcement that the government will impose the contract on doctors this summer because negotiations have failed with the BMA. If Hunt does impose the contract, the doctors may then decide to pursue legal avenues.
He’s expected to address MPs around noon, after an urgent question by Chris Bryant on Short Money, so I’ll cover that statement as it happens after the first hour or so of Google’s appearance at the select committee.
Updated
Putin would back Brexit, says Hilary Benn
Hillary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary is speaking now at Chatham House on “the internationalist case for Europe”.
Benn campaigned against British membership at the time of the last public vote in 1975, and his father Tony Benn was and still an oft-quoted proponent of Brexit.
Times have changed, Benn said, and he now believes British interests are best protected by being part of the EU.
I have changed my view on Europe since 1975. I have been on a journey, not least because Britain has been on a journey too.
We live in a changing world and if you look at the future challenges we face I believe the case for Europe is stronger now than ever.
We have not lost our identity. The fact that we are not a member of the Euro nor part of Schengen shows that we can defend our national interest.
Benn put national security at the heart of his speech on the benefits of remaining in the union, a subject David Cameron has also been focused in recent days.
Let’s be clear. President Putin would shed no tears if Britain left the European Union.
He would see Brexit as a sign of our weakness and of the weakness of European solidarity at the very moment when we need to maintain our collective strength.
We need stronger international cooperation, not weaker. At this moment in this century, it would be an extraordinary folly to turn our back on this vitally important international alliance if we wish to help shape world events.
Hilary Benn hits the EU security button "Putin would see Brexit as a sign of our weakness and of the weakness of European solidarity".
— Patrick Wintour (@patrickwintour) February 11, 2016
There was also a not-so-veiled dig at the ‘Out’ campaigns messaging that getting Britain out of Europe is a patriotic duty.
There is nothing patriotic about diminishing the United Kingdom’s ability to make its voice heard by other nations.
Narrow nationalism is not the same as patriotism.
And stumbling out of Europe and pulling up the drawbridge would only serve to harm our position and influence in the world.
Hilary Benn pretty confident of a win. "I believe the British people will vote to stay in the EU."
— Emily Ashton (@elashton) February 11, 2016
Up at 10am, here are the Google and HMRC representatives up in front of public accounts committee chair Meg Hillier and MPs.
Matt Brittin, president, Google Europe, Middle East and Africa
A former management consultant and commercial director at Trinity Mirror, he has been at Google since 2007. Once told by Margaret Hodge that his company was “devious, calculated and unethical”.
Tom Hutchinson, vice president, Google Inc.
Travelling to London from Silicon Valley, he has previously told Bloomberg: “We have an obligation to our shareholders to set up a tax-efficient structure.”
Dame Lin Homer, chief executive and permanent secretary, HMRC
The outgoing chief executive has clashed previously with the public accounts committee over Google’s affairs, told three years ago her tax inspectors had not been tough enough with the tech giant.
Other representatives from HMRC:
Jim Harra, director general business tax
Edward Troup, tax assurance commissioner
My colleague Simon Bowers has written an in-depth look at the questions Google and HMRC will need to answer today -
Google’s effective global tax rate was 17% last year, yet the tax rates in its two largest markets – the US and the UK – were 35% and 20%. Why is Google not paying its fair share?
Is it fair for Google to use its lobbying and investment muscle to put pressure on politicians?
Why do ‘expert’ sales staff in Ireland earn less than half that of marketing support staff in the UK?
Google faces grilling at public accounts committee
Good morning, I’m standing in for Andrew Sparrow on the live blog today, where the focus will be on Google’s evidence at the influential public accounts committee on corporate tax deals; we’ll also hear from HMRC.
I’ll also be monitoring the latest from Brussels as EU leaders are given the most recent draft of the reform deal being sought by David Cameron to persuade voters to remain in the EU. Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary, has also pledged his support for the In campaign this morning, despite campaigning against British membership at the last public vote in 1975.
Elsewhere, the public administration select committee has said the Government’s English Votes for English Laws (EVEL) system is too complex, and suggested the “hostility” with which the arrangements were viewed by parties other than the Tories suggested they could end up as a “short term experiment”
And in a BBC charter review report published today by the Culture, Media and Sport Committee chaired by Jesse Norman, MPs criticised the BBC’s so-called “luvvies letter” signed by celebrities defending the corporation.
Here’s the agenda for today:
08.30 Hilary Benn’s speech and Q&A on Europe at Chatham House
10.00 Google and HM Revenue and Customs give evidence to the Commons Public Accounts Committee on corporate tax deals.
10.00 Nick Clegg appears to give evidence at the union and party funding committee
12.00 Nicola Sturgeon appears at Scottish First Minister’s Questions
17.45 The Prime Minister hosts a business ambassadors roundtable and reception at 10 Downing Street
In the Commons today
- Energy and Climate Change Questions
- A statement on the future business of the House
- A debate on the police handling of the Poppi Worthington case
Select committee reports
- The publication of the second report from the communities and local government committee on the right to buy
- The publication of the fifth report from the public administration and constitutional affairs committee on English votes for EnglishlLaws
- The publications of the Commons’ culture, media and sport committee’s report into the BBC charter review
I’ll also post breaking political news as it happens, as well as curating some of the best analysis and reaction from the rest of the web, with a summary at lunchtime and in the afternoon.
I’ll try to monitor comments below the line and answer questions when I can, but it may be quicker to get me on Twitter.
You can follow me or contact me there on @jessicaelgot.
We do not here much from Senior doctors about any of this, any ideas why not.