Andy Burnham will attend UN general assembly where he is expected to try to drum up more support for Ukraine Andy Burnham is expected to meet Donald Trump for the first time in person at the UN general assembly next week in New York. Last month the Guardian reported British officials had stepped up their preparations for a face to face meeting between Burnham and Trump after the prime minister said he hoped to attend the assembly of world leaders. Continue reading...

TUC conference rings with praise for new No 10 team, but battles loom over workers’ rights and north sea drilling Louise Haigh, the UK first secretary, got a standing ovation from trade union members in Brighton this week, as she acknowledged what she called “the necessity to be bolder in this second chance that we’ve been allowed”. Haigh was the stand-in at the annual TUC congress for Andy Burnham, absent because of his father’s death. Continue reading...

Move would mean some input on companies’ spending and holding bosses to account over bills and sewage discharges Mayors and other local politicians could be given powers to oversee water companies under plans being considered by the UK government to bring utilities under greater public control. Local leaders would have the power to direct some parts of water companies’ spending and hold bosses to account over bills and sewage discharges as part of the proposals. Continue reading...

It’s not just that Nigel Farage claimed his movement abhorred the super-rich. It’s also the obscenity of individuals seeking so much sway over who runs the country As £72m in donations makes its way to Reform UK’s bank accounts, consider what Nigel Farage said on the eve of Britain’s vote to leave the European Union a decade ago. “This referendum is the people versus the establishment,” he declared. “It is the vested interest, it’s the rich, it’s the big business.” Just two years ago, Farage assailed “an unholy alliance of big business, big banks and big government”. He is also the same man who, when he debated with the then Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, in 2014, claimed to “represent the mercantile, trading, entrepreneurial end of society”, while his opponent “represents big banks, big government and big business”. Continue reading...

In an interview about the donations, he said they are compliant with the law ‘today’ Andy Burnham has cancelled engagements today and tomorrow following the death of his father Roy, who was suffering from Alzheimer’s, the Press Association reports. Burnham has spoken about his father’s illness which meant that he did not know his son had become prime minister. [We] will continue bringing forward further reforms to strengthen confidence in our democracy. Following on from the previous minister for democracy’s letter to you of 10 July 2026, we wanted to reiterate the government’s concerns, shared by many members of the public and parliamentarians, about the rise in the volume and concentration of money in UK politics. We have to limit the way financial power can end up dominating political power, to get to a politics that works for all people in all places. We believe spending limits on parties and candidates are too high, and ought to be reduced. Continue reading...

Los líderes nacionalistas de Gales, Escocia e Irlanda del Norte este lunes en Cardif.

Prime minister had been due to speak at the TUC conference in Brighton UK politics live – latest updates Andy Burnham has cancelled his engagements for Monday and Tuesday after his father, Roy, died. Among other plans, the prime minister had been due to speak to the TUC conference in Brighton on Tuesday. Continue reading...

A recent consultation on corporate reporting prizes the interests of shareholders over society. It’s a step in the wrong direction The question of what corporations are for is deeply political. In a 1970 article for the New York Times, Milton Friedman argued that the “social responsibility of business is to increase its profits”. The idea that CEOs should worry about providing good jobs was “pure and unadulterated socialism”, he wrote. Friedman and his fellow neoliberals saw companies as vehicles for enforcing their politics. Their ideas endured: UK bosses are now paid 130 times more than average workers. Despite Andy Burnham’s pledge to end neoliberalism, a 12-week consultation recently launched by his government risks entrenching it. The consultation was first announced as part of the Starmer government’s crusade against “red tape”. The average annual report for some businesses now runs to 98,000 words, and no doubt there are areas that could be simplified. But the consultation proposes removing vital information and presumes that company reports primarily serve shareholders, rather than other stakeholders. Both are steps in the wrong direction. Continue reading...

“I’m sure I’ll be called into that potential disaster,” Trump says in reference to dispute between Argentina and UK over the Malvinas. Leer más

This week’s move suggests that, even in the age of Trump, Britain will once again have an ‘ethical dimension’ to its foreign policy. That’s good for the world Almost 30 years ago, the Labour titan Robin Cook announced his arrival at the Foreign Office by laying out what would become described as an “ethical foreign policy” . The UK, he said, “must support the demands of other peoples for the democratic rights on which we insist for ourselves”. Human rights would be “at the heart of our foreign policy”. In the 25 years since Cook was demoted, Britain has had a further 14 foreign secretaries – including seven in the past six years – few of whom can claim to have placed progressive ideals at the heart of their actions. Ed Miliband’s speech on Tuesday outlining the UK’s decision to impose economic sanctions on Israeli settlements in the West Bank – and unveiling the international coalition he has built to support it – suggests that Cook may finally have a successor. Steve Bloomfield is the former international editor of the Observer and a previous winner of the Orwell prize Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here . Continue reading...

Milei administration launches legal action against firms linked to the Sea Lion project as the government widens its sanctions drive; Sixty companies and individuals linked to hydrocarbon activity around disputed islands targeted. Leer más