Afternoon summary
Keir Starmer has also been attending the Nato summit in The Hague, which Jakub Krupa is covering on his Europe live blog (still going strong).
People who voted Labour in 2024 but who now say they would not support the party are disproportionately working class, or leave-supporting, or female, according to researach published by YouGov. In his YouGov write-up, Dylan Difford says:
Compared to those 2024 Labour voters who’ve stuck with the party over the last year, Labour defectors are less likely to have been educated to degree level (41% vs 51%), more likely to be classed as living in working class households (41% vs 28%) and are more likely to have voted to leave the EU (24% vs 13%).
While just 41% of those who are still supporting Labour are women, 57% of those who’ve abandoned the party are.
But there are key differences between the different groups of Labour defectors. Those who’ve switched to the Greens are the youngest, with 70% being under the age of 50, while losses to Reform UK are noticeably older than average, with less than half (46%) having reached their half-century milestone.
SNP welcomes analysis showing Scotland's child poverty record much better than England's since MSPs passed landmark bill
The SNP has welcomed a Big Issue report saying since the Scottish Parliament passed its own Child Poverty Act in 2017 Scotland’s record on this issue has been much better than England’s. The Big Issue says:
According to [the Big Issue analysis] of child poverty data, Scotland has seen a 12% drop in relative child poverty since 2018, while England and Wales has seen a 15% rise – a 27-percentage point gap in progress. Where 21,000 Scottish children saw their poverty lifted, 320,000 more English and Welsh children have fallen into poverty.
The Scottish government’s landmark act, which received royal assent in December 2017, sparked a significant divergence in child poverty levels between the home nations. Before 2018, Scotland had seen similar rises in relative child poverty to England and Wales. Child poverty in Scotland rose by 19% between 2015 and 2018, only marginally slower than England and Wales at 23%.
The act included setting ambitious statutory targets for the Scottish government to reduce relative child poverty to 10% of Scottish children by 2030. While experts say Holyrood still faces considerable challenges in meeting this target, it has enshrined tackling child poverty as a top policy priority for subsequent Scottish governments.
In a statement issued by the SNP, Collette Stevenson MSP said:
The SNP government in Scotland has taken a radically different approach to tackling child poverty, and that approach is working.
While the Labour party implements cuts and maintains the disgraceful two-child cap, this SNP government is transforming lives with the Scottish child payment and lifting 20,000 children out of poverty by scrapping Labour’s two-child cap.
Updated
Chagos Islands deal 'not perfect', but UK's control of Diego Garcia would be at 'greater risk' without it, peers say
The House of Lords international agreements committee has published a report backing the government’s deal with Mauritius handing over sovereignty of the Chagos Islands. It says:
Like all treaties, the agreement reflects a compromise between the views of the two parties. It is not perfect. The cost to the UK taxpayer is high. The agreement does not guarantee that Chagossians can return to the islands. There are some uncertainties around the future of the marine protected area. There is no guarantee of an extension to the agreement after the initial 99-year period and questions have been raised about the enforceability of the right of first refusal.
Nevertheless, it is clear that if the agreement is not ratified, and if a future government attempted to go on resisting international pressure to transfer sovereignty over the Chagos Archipelago, Mauritius is likely to resume its campaign through international courts with a view to obtaining a legally binding judgment on sovereignty against the UK. We heard that there are ways in which Mauritius could bring that issue before an international court. We also heard that any international court looking at this issue would be unlikely to find in favour of the UK. In that circumstance, the future of the base on Diego Garcia would be at greater risk.
The committee is chaired by Lord Goldsmith, the former Labour attorney general.
TUC general secretary Paul Nowak calls for welfare bill to be paused
Paul Nowak, general secretary of the TUC, has added his name to those saying the government should pause the welfare bill. He posted these on social media this morning.
The Tories left behind a toxic economic & social legacy.
Everyone agrees our welfare system needs to work better, partic when it comes to support to get people into decent jobs. But changes that could push disabled people & their families into poverty are not the answer. 1/2..
In light of the the broad-based support for the reasoned amendment, the govt should pause and rethink their welfare reforms.
Let’s get this right - rather than rush through reform - & build a welfare system that’s fit for purpose.
Justice secretary Shabana Mahmood says rules being changed to speed up deportation of foreign prisoners
Shabana Mahmood, the justice secretary, is changing the rules to allow foreign prisoners to become eligible for deportation more quickly, the Ministry of Justice has announced. In a news release it says:
Changes to the Early Removal Scheme will mean prisoners with no right to be in the country will face deportation 30% into their prison term rather than the current 50%.
Combined with upcoming sentencing reforms, this could see many serving fixed-term sentences eligible for deportation after serving 10 percent, down from 20 or 25 percent currently.
The MoJ says foreigners make up around 12% of the prison population and that this move will free up around 500 prison places a year.
How serious is the Labour revolt over welfare bill? What commentators are saying
Here is more comment on the welfare bill crisis facing Keir Starmer.
From Andrew Marr’s cover article in the New Statesman
Something serious has gone wrong in relations between Downing Street and the Labour Party in parliament. Welfare reform is essential and yet the Liz Kendall bill may even be lost – such is the scale of the unhappiness on the Labour benches. On 19 June, Richard Burgon, on the left of the party, compared it to the winter fuel payment error but on a much larger scale. He told me the government just hadn’t made enough concessions: the bill, despite desperate pleading by Labour MPs, “confirms our worst fears that it’s going to be… plunging hundreds of thousands of more disabled people into poverty”. MPs who voted for it would find, back in their constituencies, that it was “hanging round their necks like a millstone”. New Statesman readers know very well the counter-argument about the huge number of people moving on to sickness benefits, and the vast cost of that. But plenty of MPs who are not Burgon’s natural bedfellows agree with him.
There comes a point when joining a rebellion is the safer thing to do, both for holding your seat and aligning with a majority of your colleagues; 1 July, when the welfare reform bill vote is scheduled, may be that moment.
From Tom Belger at LabourList
Some 59 of the 108 first signatories of the reasoned amendment opposing welfare cuts are new Labour MPs. Weren’t the newbies in the class of ’24 supposed to be ultra-loyal “Starmtroopers”?
A year ago, the idea so many of the new intake would be publicly rebelling on such a high-profile issue within the new government’s first year would have felt laughable …
The leadership seems to have underestimated the fact that for 2024 intake MPs of virtually all factions and none, “one of their most common reasons for getting involved in the Labour Party was opposition to Conservative austerity and welfare cuts,” as the BBC’s Henry Zeffman noted in February.
As one Labour insider wryly noted to LabourList this week: “Whoever ‘hand-picked’ this new intake is probably going to have a tough quarterly assessment.”
From Stephen Bush’s Inside Politics column in the Financial Times
The underlying problem for Labour is that the policy is bad. The cuts run contrary to the logic of the government’s broader reforms to welfare, to the extent that they have any policy logic to them. That is one reason why the attempts to contain the rebellion are not working — ministers have been deployed to win round rebels. But, as one rebel put it to me, the problem is “they don’t really have anything to say”.
The average Labour rebel is pretty close to public opinion on this issue — they agree with the big picture aim of what the government is trying to do and concur that our welfare system needs reform, but they look at the arbitrary changes that the government is making and they say: “What on Earth does this have to do with reform?”
The introduction of universal credit was a reform because it changed how the benefits system operated …
But this proposed change by the Labour government, where Pip will continue to be assessed and operated in the same way as before but under a new series of conditions, is not a “reform”. It’s just a way to save money.
From Kevin Schofield at Huffpost UK
Attempts by Cabinet ministers to persuade the rebels to back down have so far failed.
A senior government source said: “The rebels are dug in.
“There are two options, neither good – pull the vote or make major changes to the bill.
“Both will leave major questions about Keir’s authority and the financial costs.”
A Labour source said pulling the vote or making further concessions was “the most likely scenario”.
But he added: “I wouldn’t entirely rule out pushing through. The rebels should walk through the lobbies with the Tories to maintain the Tory welfare system that is spiralling out of control and keeping people locked out of work.”
Hundreds of people come to parliament for mass lobby to explain to MPs case for trans rights
Peter Walker is a senior Guardian political correspondent.
Many hundreds of transgender people and supporters are arriving in parliament for a mass “lobby”, a slightly old-fashioned and very direct tactic in which people arrive on the estate and demand to speak to their MPs about a subject.
Wednesday’s lobby, which the organisers predict will involve around 1,400 members of the public speaking to 130 MPs, is billed as a chance for trans people to directly describe how they see the supreme court ruling on gender, and the way it has thus far been interpreted by the official equalities watchdog, as affecting their everyday lives.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has faced criticism over what some term an overly literal response to the court decision that “woman” in the Equality Act refers only to a biological woman in setting out how organisations should respond.
Its interim advice set out among other things that transgender people should not be allowed to use toilets of the gender they live as, and that in some cases they also cannot use toilets of their birth sex.
Normally such lobbies take place in the central lobby between the Commons and Lords, but due to the size of Wednesday’s event it was moved to Westminster Hall, with desks set up for people to say which MP they wanted to see, and a PA system for parliamentary staff to announce MPs’ arrivals.
Jess O’Thomson from Trans+ Solidarity Alliance, which has led the lobby, said:
It’s not a protest in the traditional sense. People are coming into parliament to speak to their MPs about trans rights because right now, things are really, really scary for trans people. The EHRC guidance, which looks set to become law, would effectively impose a trans bathroom ban in this country. It would make us an international outlier in terms of our approach to trans people’s human rights.
Some MPs who have been contacted by transgender constituents have previously raised worries such as people who have lived as their identified gender for decades and fear being forced to declare their status to co-workers or others. O’Thompson said one transgender woman in her 70s taking part on Wednesday was worried about being no longer able to attend her women’s gardening club.
One of the MPs waiting in Westminster Hall to see constituents, the Lib Dem Roz Savage, organised a debate in May about the repercussions of the court ruling. She said:
I have to say it was eye opening. I think most people just aren’t aware of the daily challenges faced by members of the trans community. I really just want to see everybody treated with the respect and the dignity that they deserve.
On the EHRC guidance she said:
It’s very hard to see how it could work on a practical level. I think you only have to imagine a few scenarios to see how impractical it is, and would probably actually cause more consternation than the opposite, than the way things were before.
So I think just on a common sense level, as well as a moral and ethical and humanitarian level, this really has to be looked at again.
Updated
At his press conference Keir Starmer said the vote on the welfare bill would go ahead, but did not specify in his answer that it would go ahead on Tuesday next week, as planned. (See 1.51pm.)
Sometimes an omission like that can be significant. But Geri Scott from the Times says in this case it wasn’t.
Keir Starmer committed again to a vote on welfare in his press conference at NATO but didn’t specifically say on Tuesday - some instantly taking this as a sign it may be pushed back but I’m told this isn’t the case and would be “over-reading” his answer. Vote currently still on.
Starmer claims welfare reform is 'progressive' cause, and Labour best party to carry it out
Q: In London your spokesperson said there was a moral argument for welfare reform. Does that mean opponents of reform are immoral?
Starmer said that Labour was the best party to reform welfare.
The argument I would make is that it is a Labour government that should reform welfare.
If the welfare system isn’t working for those that need it, and is not, it’s a Labour government that should make it work for the future.
Just as it was a Labour government that created the welfare system, it falls to this Labour government to make sure we’ve got a welfare system that’s sustainable for the future to come.
We created the health service, and now we have to ensure that it’s fit for the future. Same with welfare.
That is a progressive argument, that is a Labour argument, and it’s the right argument to make.
Q: The national security strategy published yesterday said Britons should prepare for war on home soil. Should people be thinking seriously about cold war-style prepartions?
Starmer said it was mistake to think the UK does not face threats at home. Cyber attacks are happening on a daily basis, he said. Russia and Iran were carrying out cyber attacks against the UK on a regular basis, he said.
Q: Do you think President Trump wants to get tough on Russia now over Ukraine?
Starmer said at the Nato summit there was a view that Russia needs to be pushed harder.
I think it’s fair to say the mood of pretty well all participants in the session in Nato that we’ve just had in the moment summit was, on the one hand, of positivity and resolve and purpose in relation to the commitment we’ve made … but at the same time recognising that we need to now push harder on Ukraine. And I think that reflects the mood in the room, and that it’s time for Putin to come to the table.
That’s been the subject not only of the discussions at the summit, but actually of many of the discussions over dinner last night and in the margins.
Starmer did not explicitly discuss Trump’s views on this.
Starmer suggests welfare bill revolt just 'noises off' as he rejects claim row shows he is bad at politics
Q: Why have you failed to read the mood of Labour MPs on welfare reform. Is that because you have no political nous, as critics claim?
Starmer says Labour MPs are “pretty united” in agreeing that welfare reform is needed.
The question is how. The bill will modernise welfare, and make it fairer and more efficient, he says. That is what the goverment was elected to do, he says.
He goes on:
If I may say so, many people predicted before the election that we couldn’t read the room, we hadn’t got the politics right, and we wouldn’t win an election after 2019 because we lost so badly.
That was the constant charge of me at press conferences like this, and we got a landslide victory.
So I’m comfortable with reading the room and delivering the change the country needs.
We’ve got a strong Labour government with a huge majority to deliver on our manifesto commitments. And that’s the work that we did over many years to win the election. Now we start the work over many years to change the country. Having changed the party, we now change the country.
And is it tough going? Are there plenty of people and noises off? Yes, of course, there always are, there always have been, there always will be.
But the important thing is to focus on the change that we want to bring about.
Starmer has always been sensitive to the charge that he has poor political instincts. It was a claim often made when he was in opposition, and it still surfaces now, despite his landslide election win. In fact, just today the New Statesman has been promoting a cover essay by Andrew Marr making this claim. This is from Will Lloyd, the magazine’s deputy editor.
🚨 In our @NewStatesman cover story this week by @AndrewMarr9 “natural supporters of Starmer” begin to wonder if the PM is a politician or some sort of overgrown civil servant https://t.co/S4UfEzC97l pic.twitter.com/GE5z8OJzl7
— Will Lloyd (@Will___lloyd) June 25, 2025
But Starmer’s answer implied the internal Labour row about welfare was little more than “noises off”. If that is what he meant, that would be a mistake, because the rebellion is much more serious about that. Perhaps he was wound up by the aggressive question (from a Mail reporter), which could have prompted him to say more than he intended.
UPDATE: ITV News has a video clip of Starmer’s answer.
'Is it tough going? Are there plenty of noises off? Yes, of course - there always are'
— ITVPolitics (@ITVNewsPolitics) June 25, 2025
The PM insists Labour is a 'united front' on the proposed welfare reforms, despite over 120 backbenchers backing a move to block the plans
Starmer says he's 'comfortable reading the room' pic.twitter.com/WOglajo1os
Updated
Starmer claims he does view Trump as reliable ally
Q: President Trump gave you hardly any notice of his attack on Iran and then he expressed doubts about Nato’s article 5. Is he really a reliable ally?
Yes, says Starmer. He says the UK works very closely with the US.
Starmer says he is 'very confident' he will lead Labour into next election despite party opposition to welfare plans
Q: Your plans to increase defence spending go into the next decade. How confident are you that you will be around in the next parliament to implement these plans? And are you confidend you will lead Labour into the next election?
Starmer says he is “very confident”. He says when he was elected he said there would have to be a decade of renewal. He says it is important to “lead from the front”.
Q: Are you willing to compromise on welfare reform?
Starmer again says welfare needs reform. The government was elected to reform the system, and that is what it will do, he says.
Starmer again says government will go ahead with vote on welfare bill
Starmer is now taking questions.
Q: There is no condemnation of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in the Nato communique. Is that to appease Donald Trump?
Starmer says Nato’s position on Ukraine has not changed. It is time for Putin to come to the table.
Q: On welfare reform, if yo cannot government your party, how can you govern the country.
Starmer says welfare needs reform, and he again confirms the vote will go ahead on Tuesday.
On the question of welfare reform, we’re committed to reforming our welfare system. It doesn’t work. It traps people, and it has to be reformed, and it also has to ensure that we’ve got a welfare system that is fit for the future. And that is why there will be a vote.
Starmer is making his opening statement.
He confirms the announcement about the government buying jets to carry nuclear weapons.
Keir Starmer holds press conference at Nato summit
Keir Starmer is holding a press conference at the Nato summit.
There is a live feed here.
PMQs – snap verdict
At PMQs Angela Rayner defended the welfare cuts bill and said that the vote on it would go ahead, as planned, on Tuesday next week, despite growing speculation that minister will have to postpone. While it would be unfair to describe these comments as worthless, they were also about as devoid of significance as any political discourse can be. That is because Rayner was just delivering “the line”.
PMQs gets interesting when politicians go beyond the line, or it starts to shift. But Rayner was defending the bill with a script that is very familiar, and would not have been out of place being deployed by a loyal backbencher in the 6.50 slot on the Today programme. She certainly did not put in passionate, compelling defence of the bill. But there was nothing in what she said that implied she wants to see it fail. Maybe she does (most Labour MPs with her politics seem to think that way), and maybe Mel Stride was right to say she was defending a policy she did not personally support. But if that is the case, Rayner covered it up quite successfully.
And Rayner saying the vote will go ahead does not mean it will. But it does not mean it won’t either. It just means that, at this point, No 10 has not decided to pull the debate. It is a binary issue, and in situations like this the government always has to keep saying it is sticking to the plan until the moment comes to announced that it isn’t. Just ask Michael Gove. In December 2018 he told the Today programme that a vote on Theresa May’s Brexit bill was “definitely, 100% going to happen” – only for the vote to be abandoned a few hours later.
Perhaps the most interesting thing we learned in relation to the welfare bill was that Labour MPs opposed to it did not want to have that argument out at PMQs. Debbie Abrahams is the second signatory in the reasoned amendment, and as chair of the work and pensions committee this is her specialist subject. She had a question, but she asked about something else. As did Rebecca Long-Bailey, Rayner’s former flatmate and runner-up in the leadership contest won by Keir Starmer. She has signed the reasoned amendment, but did not bring it up at PMQs.
Rayner, in her exchanges with Stride and elsewhere during PMQs, seemed over-reliant on the ‘You Tories were rubbish’ response to any complaints about the government’s record. But that did not seem to matter much because Stride’s attack lines were predicatable and vulnerable to a fairly obvious comeback. Adam Bienkov from Byline Times summed it up quite well like this.
Conservative Shadow Chancellor Mel Stride, whose party raised taxes to record levels and presided over a surge in welfare costs, accuses the government of planning to raise taxes and increase welfare costs #pmqs
Updated
Jeremy Corbyn, the former Labour leader, asked the final question. He said the UK should not be selling F-35 parts to Israel given that those jets were used to attack Gaza. And he asked if Rayner would back his bill for a public inquiry into the UK’s complicity with Israeli war crimes.
Rayner said Israel’s recent actions in Gaza were “appalling”. But she said it was for international courts to determine when genocide has taken place, not governments.
Rayner says the Palestine Action attack at Brize Norton was “disgraceful”. But she says the attempt by Reform UK to blame the female officer commanding the base was “even more disgraceful”. They should have been blaming the criminals, not “an accomplished woman who has served her country”, Raynerr says.
Neil O’Brien (Con) says local people are opposed to the plan to expand the boundaires of Leicester’s local authority.
Rayner says what local people did not want was the last government.
Kanishka Narayan (Lab) accuses Reform UK of proritising the interests of millionaires with its latest policy, the Britannia card.
Rayner says Nigel Farage is demanding “billions more in unfunded tax cuts for the very richest” while voting against better sick pay for low earners.
Oliver Dowden, who used to respond to questions from Rayner when he was deputy PM, says it is nice to be asking her a question again. He asks what the government is doing to stop houses being transformed into houses of multiple occupation.
Rayner says councils have powers to deal with these applications.
Rayner says Kemi Badenoch said recently she was getting better week by week. She jokes that Badenoch has achieved that over the last two weeks by getting Chris Philp and Mel Stride to replace her. But she has not chosen Robert Jenrick, Rayner says.
Cameron Thomas (Lib Dem) asks about the nuclear test veterans. He asks if Rayner will attend a meeting to discuss appropriate compensation.
Rayner says the veterans minister will attend a meetting on this.
Earlier the Labour MP Rebecca Long-Bailey also asked about this issue, saying the veterans deserved “answers, justice and an apology”. She cited last night’s Newsnight report on this issue
James MacCleary (Lib Dem) asks what the government is doing to address the staffing problem in nurseries.
Rayner says the government is investing in the sector.
Natasha Irons (Lab) asks about youth centres, and the closure of a provision in Croydon. Youth centres should get statutory protection, she says.
Rayner says the last government was to blame. This government is making different choices, she says.
Gavin Robinson, the DUP leader, asks Rayner to condemn the recent disorder in Northern Ireland. Does Rayner agree the Windsor framework is stopping the government legislation for border controls on a UK-wide basis.
Rayner says the Windsor framework addressed longstanding issues. The government is appealing issues relating to immigration law. It wants immigration law to imply on a UK-wide basis, she says.
Robinson was referring to this case.
Debbie Abrahams (Lab) asks if the government will fix the affordable housing crisis.
Rayner says Abrahams is right to raise this issue.
Daisy Cooper, the deputy Lib Dem leader, says her party is opposed to the welfare bill. The government may have to push it through with Tory support, she claims.
She asks for an assurance that these reforms will not be implemented, if the bill passes, until the review of the carers’ allowance scandal has concluded.
Rayner defends the bill, but does not address the question.
Cooper says the government has reportedly agreed that President Trump’s state visit will take place in September. Will the government leverage that visit to get assurances for Ukraine?
Rayner says the government is really pleased Trump is coming for a second state visit.
Joe Morris (Lab) asks about a school in his Hexham community that has had to close because of crumbling concrete.
Rayner says this was one of the problems left by the last government.
Stride asks if Rayner is embarrassed to be defending policies she does not support.
Rayner says it is embarrassing that the Tories turn up every week and do not apologise for their record.
Stride says the IFS is predicting the biggest increase in council tax in history. Does the government think it is not paid by working people.
Rayner says council tax went up every year under the Tories. She says Tory members of the Local Government Association wanted the cap on council tax increases lifted.
Rayner refuses to rule out tax rises in autumn budget
Stride says economists thinks taxes will rise in the autumn budget, even though Rachel Reeves said she would not be putting up taxes again. Can Rayner repeat that?
Rayner says the Tories have no plan, and no credibility.
She does not rule out tax rises.
Stride says the Tories will support the bill under certain conditions.
Rayner says the Tories are asking for no tax rises, but they put taxes up. And they want welfare spending cut, even though it went up when they were in power.
Rayner says vote on welfare bill will go ahead on Tuesday
Stride asks if Rayner can assure MPs the vote will go ahead on Tuesday.
Rayner replies: “We will go ahead on Tuesday.”
Updated
Mel Stride says many Labour MPs would like to see Angela Rayner standing in for Keir Starmer for good.
Why does she think MPs opposed to the welfare bill are wrong?
Rayner says the government will invest £1bn in support for people to get back into work. And it will end routine assessments for people judged incapable of every going back to work.
Mike Tapp (Lab) says the Tories gave up on law and order. Now they post “wannabe superhero videos” highlighting the problems they created. Does the deputy PM agree they should “hang their heads in shame for failing to protect our streets”.
The Speaker, Lindsay Hoyle, says that was not about government policy, so there is no need for Rayner to reply.
Angela Rayner starts by saying the UK is working with allies to de-escalate tensions in the Middle East. The government wants to prevent Iran getting a nuclear weapon, she says.
She says the situation in Gaza is of “gravest concern”. She says the remaining hostages must be released, and aid must be delivered at more volume.
Green party condemns government plan to expand deterrent by buying fighter jets capable of carrying US nuclear bombs
After PMQs there will be an urgent question, tabled by the Tories, on the government announcement about buying American F-35A jets capable of delivering US tactical warheads that are likely to be stored on British soil.
Commenting on the plans, the Green party MP Ellie Chowns said:
UK fighter jets carrying Donald Trump’s nuclear bombs—is this anyone’s vision of security? Nuclear weapons do not make the world safer; they heighten the risk of escalation and mistrust. As a founding signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the UK should be leading efforts to reduce and eliminate nuclear arsenals. Normalising the idea of ‘substrategic’ or battlefield nukes is incredibly dangerous, undermining decades of arms-control progress and increasing the likelihood of miscalculation.
Angela Rayner faces Mel Stride at PMQs
PMQs is starting soon. Angela Rayner, the deputy PM, is standing in for Keir Starmer, who is at the Nato summit.
Mel Stride, the shadow chancellor, is deputising for Kemi Badenoch.
Here is the list of MPs down to ask a question.
Treasury minister sidesteps question about impact abandoning welfare bill would have on government spending plans
Darren Jones, chief secretary to the Treasury, sidestepped a question this morning about the impact that abandoning the UC and Pip bill would have on government spending.
At the Treasury committee he was asked by Harriett Baldwin, the Tory chair, what choices the government would have if the bill gets rejected. Jones replied:
The first thing to say is of course that the government policy has not changed and we’ll be progressing with our reforms to the welfare system …
If we are in a world where there are any changes to the AME [annually managed expenditure] forecast on the demand-led spending for welfare payments – again that’s something the OBR will forecast independently for us and will be factored into any considerations the chancellor has at the budget later in the year.
The bill is expected to eventually save the government about £5b a year.
According to a report in the Times this morning, Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, has been telling Labour MPs that failing to pass the bill will devastate government spending plans.
Badenoch says it would be 'pathetic' for Starmer to postpone vote on welfare bill
Kemi Badenoch has said it would be “pathetic” for Keir Starmer to postpone the vote on the UC and Pip bill. She posted this on social media, as a comment on the tweet from Kitty Donaldson. (See 11.22am.)
This is pathetic. Starmer must not pull this bill. We’ve offered to support him in the national interest if our reasonable conditions are met.
If he pulls the bill, it proves Labour isn’t serious about fiscal responsibility. If Labour backbenchers are too scared to deliver welfare changes that make only limited savings, how can they solve bigger problems like the national debt?
As explained earlier, Badenoch has not really offered to support the bill. (See 9.41am.) Arguably, she would look more principled, and cause more trouble for Starmer, if she did unequivocally support it. Although Conservative backing would theoretically make the bill more likely to pass, it would exacerbate the Labour split, because Labour MPs would be loth to vote with the Tories on welfare cuts.
Starmer fails to quell speculation that ministers will cancel Tuesday's vote on welfare bill given size of Labour revolt
Labour figures think it is increasingly likely that the government will pull Tuesday’s vote on the UC and Pip bill. This is from my colleague Jessica Elgot.
There is a view forming among ministers and PPS’ that the government will have to pull the welfare bill.
However, the message from the centre is very clear it will go ahead regardless of the opposition from MPs because the issue has to be forced.
And this is from the i’s Kitty Donaldson.
There is widespread speculation in Government that No 10 will pull the entire welfare bill before the end of Wednesday, sources told The i Paper
Keir Starmer’s comments this morning (see 9.41am) are not being viewed as a reliable guide to what will happen.
Updated
Timms tells MPs government must cut welfare spending urgently because Pip cost rising by almost £3bn per year
Timms told the work and pensions committee that the government had to cut welfare spending urgently.
Asked by Debbie Abrahams, the committee’s chair, why the government had not consulted on the key cuts in the bill, Timms replied:
Essentially because of the urgency of the changes needing to be made. So if we look at personal independence payment (Pip) – the year before the pandemic, in current prices, Pip cost the then government £12bn. Last year it cost the government £22bn and the cost of it went up by £3bn per year – or £2.8bn per year – last year alone.
And that is not a sustainable trajectory. So there was a need for urgency with the changes.
He said there has been a “much greater propensity to claim benefits, and that’s what’s driving that very, very steep increase in the GDP accounted for by health and disability benefits” in recent years.
Asked if he accepted the rising cost of living was also a factor behind the growing cost of the benefits bill, Timms said:
I think you are absolutely right. I am sure that the cost of living challenges are a very big factor in what’s happened. That people who may well have always been eligible but have not in the past claimed benefit, are now doing, and that’s what’s driven this very substantial increase.
But he repeated that the “current trajectory is not a sustainable one”, adding:
It’s not in the interests of people who depend on Pip for it to be on a financially unsustainable trajectory. We do need to deal with that.
Back at the work and pensions committee John Milne (Lib Dem) asked Stephen Timms, the welfare minister, why the government was confident that the proposed changes could lead to fewer people claiming Pip and health-related UC. He said that in the past, when some benefits have been cut, that has only led to claims for other, related benefits going up.
Timms accepted that this could happen. He said that when the last government got rid of the LCW (limited capability for work) health top-up for UC, many claimants, instead of going to standard UC, which paid less, claimed the LCWRA (limited capability for work-related activity) health top-up, which was worth even more.
He said the government has taken that into account this time, and wants to ensure that people who lose out don’t just move on to more generous benefits. He said it would focus on ensuring help is available to get people into work.
Starmer plays down concern about Trump's comment implying he is not fully committed to Nato's article 5
European leaders have never been 100% confident of Donald Trump’s commitment to Nato, and to its article 5 saying an attack on one member should be treated as an attack on all, even though under pressure he normally says he’s signed up. That is because he routinely changes his mind, because he has expressed hostility to Nato in the past, and because he more pro-Russian than any of his predecessors.
Trump triggered another burst of doubt when he declined to express firm support for article five when speaking to reporters on his flight to the Nato summit. Asked if he was committed to article 5, he replied:
Depends on your definition. There’s numerous definitions of article 5, you know that, right? But I’m committed to being their friends.
Jakub Krupa is covering the summit today on his Europe live blog. As he reports, Trump this morning said he was with the Europeans “all the way” when asked about this.
Asked about Trump’s “depends on your definition” comment, Keir Starmer played down concerns about the president’s commitment to Nato. Starmer told reporters:
Nato is as relevant and as important today as it’s ever been. We live in a very volatile world, and today is about the unity of Nato, showing that strength. We’re bigger than we were before, we’re stronger than we were before.
Asked if he would seek clarity from Trump over his commitment to article 5, Starmer said:
I think it’s very important that we stand here as allies, and we do stand here as allies, coming together, absolutely committed to the importance of Nato, particularly at this point in a very volatile world.
When John Healey, the defence secretary, was asked about Trump’s comment on Times Radio this morning, he said he and Starmer trusted Trump’s commitment to Nato and article 5 because they had heard him give that commitment to Starmer, in public, when they met in the White House earlier this year.
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Jobs not available for sick people facing benefit cuts, thinktank claims
Debbie Abrahams, the Labour chair of the work and pensions committee, cited research by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation welfare thinktank when she asked Stephen Timms about concerns that there were not enough jobs for disabled people. (See 9.59am.) She was referring a press release the JFR issued yesterday.
The JRF said:
For the first time, JRF combined the number of people who will be affected by the upcoming cuts to health-related universal credit (UC) with the number of people already required to look for work as a condition of claiming UC. We compared this to the number of available jobs in each local authority in Great Britain.
The analysis found that the parts of the country among the hardest hit by the cuts have fewer job opportunities.That means people on disability benefits who live in places with high numbers of those out of work will have the greatest challenge in finding a job, undermining the government’s wish to drive up employment amongst disabled people.
On average, there are 6.9 people claiming universal credit, including people claiming the health element or searching for work, for every available role.
The north-east has the fewest jobs available with 15.2 people for every post, followed by Wales (12.5) and Scotland (11.3). The south-east had the most jobs available with 2.9 people for every job.
The UC and Pip bill will make the standard rate of UC more generous. But it will cut the value of health-related UC, which is paid to people now working because they are ill, because it is worth double the standard rate, and ministers are worried that this incentives people to claim who might not need it.
Abby Jitendra, principal policy adviser at the JRF, said:
Cutting disabled people’s benefits won’t magically create suitable jobs, particularly in those parts of the country that have long had weaker jobs markets. It’s little wonder so many disabled people are fearful of the impact of the government’s cuts.
As MPs gear up to debate the government’s cuts, we urge the government to change course by protecting disabled people from the harm that these cuts will cause and offering a real plan to create good quality jobs across the country.
Timms claims he's 'looking forward' to debate on welfare cuts bill on Tuesday
At the work and pensions committee Stephen Timms was asked by the Tory MP Peter Bedford if the government still intended to go ahead with the second reading vote on the UC and Pip bill on Tuesday. It did, Timms said. “I’m looking forward to the debate.”
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Debbie Abrahams, the chair of the Commons work and pensions committee, is one of the leading Labour MPs who have signed the reasoned amendment that would kill of the UC and Pip bill in its present form.
At the committee she asked Stephen Timms if he was confident that enough jobs would be available for the people currently claiming sickness and disability benefits whom the government wants to get into employment.
In response, Timms stressed the fact that, under the governments plans, the cuts are due to be phased in gradually. People are only at risk of losing their Pip benefit when their claims are reassessed.
Stephen Timms, disability minister, gives evidence to MPs about UC and Pip bill
The work and pensions committee hearing with Stephen Timms, the social security and disabilities minister, has just started. There is a live feed here.
Starmer insists vote on welfare cuts bill will happen on Tuesday amid speculation Labour revolt will force delay
Good morning. MPs are due to vote on the universal credit (UC) and personal independent payments (Pip) bill next week, the legislation enacting the disability and sickness benefit cuts worth around £5bn. As Pippa Crerar and Aletha Adu report in our overnight story, Keir Starmer insisted yesterday that he was pressing ahead with the plans.
But this morning it seems all but certain that, if the government goes ahead with the vote without offering a colossal concession, it will lose. And, if governments know they are going to get defeated on flagship legislation, they normally pull the vote at the last minute.
Here are the key developments this morning.
The Labour rebellion is growing – even though some cabinet ministers spent yesterday trying to persuade rebel Labour MPs to back the bill. By last night, 123 Labour MPs had signed the amendment, up from 108, plus 11 MPs from opposition parties, all from Northern Ireland. You can read all their names on the order paper here. They are the MPs who have signed Meg Hillier’s amendment, listed under business for Tuesday 1 July.
Starmer has failed to quell speculation that the vote will be postponed. Despite what he said publicly yesterday, the BBC is reporting a source close to government thinking saying: “Once you take a breath, it is better to save some of the welfare package than lose all of it.” And the Times is reporting:
Privately, some close to the prime minister are preparing to delay next Tuesday’s vote in an attempt to buy time and find concessions to win enough of the rebels around. One minister described the mood in government as one of “panic”.
But Starmer has again confirmed the vote will go ahead. He told LBC:
There’ll be a vote on Tuesday, we’re going to make sure we reform the welfare system.
He said the welfare system had to change:
It traps people in a position where they can’t get into work. In fact, it’s counterproductive, it works against them getting into work. So we have to reform it, and that is a Labour argument, it’s a progressive argument.
John Healey, the defence secretary, refused to rule out the government making further concessions before the vote in an interview on the Today programme this morning.
Kemi Badenoch has in effect confirmed that the Tories will not support the bill. She implied the opposite in a statement she released last night, saying:
The government is in a mess, their MPs are in open rebellion. If Keir Starmer wants our support, he needs to meet three conditions that align with our core Conservative principles.
The first condition is that the welfare budget is too high, it needs to come down. This bill does not do that.
The second condition is that we need to get people back into work. Unemployment is rising, jobs are disappearing, and even the government’s own impact assessments say that the package in this bill will not get people back to work.
The third is that we want to see no new tax rises in the autumn. We can’t have new tax rises to pay for the increases in welfare and other government spending.
We are acting in the national interest to make the changes the country needs. And if Keir Starmer wants us to help him get this bill through, then he must commit to these three conditions at the dispatch box.
There is no chance of the government committing to no tax rises in the autumn, and so, while sounding supportive, this statement is anything but. The bill also fails Badenoch’s first condition, because it would not stop spending on disability benefits still rising (but by less than it would without the cuts). Ministers have made this point to Labour rebels in a bid to persuade them the bill is not as harsh as people suppose.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9.30am: Stephen Timms, minister for social security and disability, gives evidence to the Commons work and pensions committee about the proposed disability benefit cuts.
10am: Darren Jones, chief secretary to the Treasury, gives evidence to the Commons Treasury committee about the spending review.
Morning: Keir Starmer and other leaders arrive at the Nato summit in The Hague. Starmer is expected to hold a press conference in the afternoon, after the main meeting.
Noon: Angela Rayner, the deputy PM, takes PMQs.
Also, Wes Streeting, the health secretary, is giving a speech in Blackpool where he will say that England’s poorest areas will get billions in extra health funding under new government plans to tackle stark inequalities.
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