The lobby of Westminster journalists has been cajoled by the government into reporting Labour plans to align with the EU single market via secondary legislation and without votes in parliament. Using so-called ‘Henry VIII powers’…
The substantive news was announced by Reeves at her Mais lecture and fleshed out by the FT three weeks ago, which said “the bill would allow Britain to adopt EU regulations to clear the way for an EU-UK food and agriculture trade deal… it would also pave the way for ministers to transfer other EU laws on to the UK statute book in future… government officials say Britain will seek ‘carve outs’ from some elements of EU rules and that MPs will have some kind of ‘oversight mechanism.'” The breathless reporting from papers rushing to get their ‘exclusives’ out tells you how much the lobby is a poodle to No10…
Readouts fired from the top of government last night caused the entire herd of Lobby hacks to type up exactly what they’re told on the phone. The government wants to have a fight over the EU reset right now… it wants to have it known that it is forcing single market alignment through because it thinks that will make it popular…
The Guardian reported the same thing as the FT – three weeks later – and claimed an ‘exclusive.’ Every other outlet followed suit. A No10 SpAd telling you something on the blower that’s already public does not a scoop make…
Some hacks have realised their mistake. Pippa Crerar posted on X today after the Guardian made a song and dance of its fake exclusive: “Keir Starmer confirms our stories in recent weeks that government wants power to sign up to EU single market rules *without* normal parliamentary vote.” Embarrassing…
The day after Starmer U-turned and refused to blame Trump for the war Rachel Reeves told the Mirror:
“Obviously no sensible person is a supporter of the Iranian regime, but to start a conflict without being clear what the objectives are and not being clear about how you are going to get out of it, I do think that is a folly and it is one that is affecting families here in the UK but also families in the US and around the world.”