Ross Kempsell is joined by Ameer Kotecha, who recently resigned as a diplomat in the Foreign Office, to discuss where British foreign policy is going wrong and why he left Whitehall. Find out what he really thinks of David Lammy and Yvette Cooper…
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During Reeves’ Treasury Committee appearance this morning in which the Chancellor said she supports releasing strategic oil reserves, she also said there is a ‘valid’ argument to be made that she shouldn’t have raised National Insurance:
“Yeah, we did make the decision to increase national insurance in my first Budget and that’s because we needed to properly fund public services including the NHS which got a £29 billion a year uplift and so I do recognise and it’s a valid argument to say that should not have happened but if that didn’t happen we wouldn’t have been able to put the money into the NHS and reduce waiting list and reducing waiting list in the NHS is also good for business because it means that more people are available for work and the workforce is is is healthier. Um, but I do recognize there are particular issues around youth unemployment.”
UK unemployment is now higher than Italy’s…
Extraordinary polling from Merlin Strategy. More than half of Labour voters and nearly two-thirds of Green voters would prefer to ‘reduce inequality’ (punish wealth) than make everyone better off. If the rich benefit, it’s no good. They’d rather the poor stay poor if the alternative is to give another penny to a millionaire...
Nigel Farage has claimed he wrote privately to Keir Starmer in September, offering to help the government strengthen ties with the Trump White House. In the New Statesman today he says he told Starmer:
“I know a lot of this administration, I am on text exchanges with cabinet members [and] if you need my help in any way at all, I will do it. I will do it under the radar. Nobody will ever know.”
They know now…
Of course, Starmer didn’t reply. The (former) Trump Whisperer preferred to go it alone…
Darren Jones has revealed just how shambolic the mangled Digital ID scheme is on Times Radio. Quelle surprise…
The ‘Chief Secretary to the PM’ said the OBR was wrong that it would cost £1.8 billion but would not say whether the projected figure was higher or lower and that it would depend on the final product is. The OBR’s figure would buy you about two more Type 45 destroyers…
He also does not know how it would work: “We haven’t consulted yet on what it is that we’re trying to build and how we’re going to build it.” It likely won’t be in place before the next election: “The minimum viable case will come in 2029 when the Prime Minister wants people to be able to digitally verify their rights to work.”
Interestingly Jones said if the in-person consultation thinks “this whole thing sounds horrible and we don’t want it” the government will “probably” ditch the policy. That’s because “this consultation is not a performative consultation. It’s a genuine one. That’s why we’re not just doing a kind of online consultation in the way that normal consultations might happen.” Full confirmation from a minister there that consultations are entirely fake…
Former leader of the SNP in Westminster Ian Blackford told Times Radio why he believes Nicola Sturgeon’s claim that she spent no time in the kitchen and therefore didn’t see any of her husband’s purchases:
“She doesn’t have a passion for cooking.”