News Round-Up

• “Keir Starmer relaxes laws on illegal immigrants getting U.K. citizenship” – Keir Starmer has been accused of making Britain “the soft touch of Europe” after rolling back laws designed to make it nearly impossible for illegal migrants to become U.K. citizens, reports the Mail.
• “Britain voted Brexit to control immigration. This power has been wasted” – Brexit handed Britain control of immigration, but politicians have squandered it, says Guy Dampier in the Telegraph.
• “PM’s legal chief ‘helped’ Palestinians to sue arms dealers” – Keir Starmer’s Attorney General is said to have helped write a handbook on how Palestinian victims could sue arms dealers in the U.K., according to the Mail.
• “Tech firms still failing to delete videos seen by Southport killer” – A furious Yvette Cooper has slammed social media companies for failing to remove violent videos watched by killer Axel Rudakubana ahead of the Southport murders, reports the Mail.
• “U.K. will be first to make owning AI tools for child abuse illegal” – Yvette Cooper has announced that the U.K. will be the first country in the world to make it illegal to own AI tools designed to generate images of child sexual abuse, says the Mail.
• “U.K. could become an ‘Islamist nation with nuclear weapons’” – Suella Braverman has warned that Britain could “fall into the hands of Muslim fundamentalists” and become an “Islamist nation with nuclear weapons” like Iran, according to News18.
• “Keir Starmer urged to boost defence spending to more than 3% of GDP” – Keir Starmer has been privately urged to boost defence spending to more than 3% of GDP – far outstripping his 2.5% target, reports the Mail.
• “Starmer’s Brexit reset ‘risks dragging U.K. into Trump’s trade war’” – Senior Tories are warning Keir Starmer’s attempted Brexit ‘reset’ with the EU could put Britain at risk of being dragged into Trump’s trade war, according to the Mail.
• “It’s a miracle Reeves delivered her growth speech with a straight face” – As consumer confidence stalls, Labour is tearing our fragile public finances apart, writes Liam Halligan in the Telegraph.
• “Care providers set to descend on Westminster” – Nearly 3,000 care providers will rally at Westminster next month, blaming Labour’s policies for a £2 billion funding shortfall that’s pushing adult social care to the brink, says the Mail.
• “Blair branded Starmer an ‘out-of-touch human rights lawyer’” – A new book on the PM’s rise to power reveals the fears of his closest aides, according to the Mail.
• “Starmer used Shakespearean actress to help him get over ‘stage fright’” – Keir Starmer used a Shakespearean actress to help him get over stage fright as she admits he would “shut down” when he was out of his comfort zone, reports the Mail.
• “Keir Starmer’s Chief of Staff said he was an ‘HR manager not a leader’” – Keir Starmer’s current Chief of Staff has described the PM as an “HR manager not a leader” while claiming that Angela Rayner simply “manipulates people”, according to the Mail.
• “Angela Rayner launched tirade against ‘nonce’ Prince Andrew” – According to the new book about Starmer, Angela Rayner waged a private battle to stop “that nonce” Prince Andrew from ever standing in for his brother, reports the Mail.
• “Labour could lose more seats to Nigel Farage’s Reform Party” – A new mega-poll reveals that Labour could lose more seats to Reform U.K. than the Conservatives would, according to the Mail.
• “Farage vows to hold ‘biggest launch rally in British history’” – Nigel Farage has vowed to hold the “biggest ever” launch rally in British political history as he sets his sights on winning big at the local elections, reports LBC.
• “Scotland heading for largest pro-independence majority in history” – A Scottish Labour “implosion” means voters are set to return the largest pro-independence Holyrood majority in the history of devolution, says the Telegraph.
• “Britain to remain WFH capital of Europe thanks to Rayner’s workers’ rights plan” – Angela Rayner’s plan to make flexible working the “default for all” is set to cement Britain’s status as the working from home capital of Europe, reports the Telegraph.
• “Esther McVey MP publishes key COVID-19 vaccine minutes” – After the MHRA removed key COVID-19 vaccine minutes from their website after she quoted them in the House of Commons, Esther McVey has published them on her website so people can see what they were trying to hide.
• “Lucy Letby’s ‘final hope’ to prove she ‘was right all along’” – Lucy Letby’s lawyers say that new evidence to be unveiled this week is her final hope of proving she was right all along and is a victim of a miscarriage of justice, according to the Telegraph.
• “My research was misused to convict Lucy Letby – so I did my own inquiry” – Dr Shoo Lee, a neonatalist whose 30-year-old paper was pivotal in Letby’s trial, and an expert panel have re-examined the case and concluded the conviction isn’t safe, says the Times.
• “Huge blaze breaks out in U.K. village as wind turbine catches fire” – Fire crews have been tackling a blaze at a wind turbine in Cambridgeshire, reports the Express.
• “Inside the ISIS open-air prison camp – a ticking timebomb in Syria” – In the sprawling refugee camps scattered across northeastern Syria, there is a jihadist crisis waiting to happen, warns David Averre in the Mail.
• “Freed hostages receive emotional hugs from delighted families” – Three Israeli men who spent more than a year in Hamas captivity have been reunited with their families, reports the Mail.
• “If we buckle, other dictators will unleash war” – In the Mail, Iain Duncan Smith beats the drum for continued Western support of Ukraine against Russia.
• “Justin Trudeau hits back at Donald Trump in trade war” – Justin Trudeau has hit the U.S. with retaliatory tariffs after Trump imposed a steep tax on imports from the country’s North American neighbours, reports the Mail.
• “Canadian hockey fans boo U.S. national anthem after Donald Trump tariffs” – Canadian hockey fans booed ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ at a recent NHL game, hours after Trump hit Canada with tariffs, says the Mail.
• “Trump’s trade war isn’t as mad as it seems” – The Donald is right to challenge the prevailing anti-tariff orthodoxy, writes Tim Stanley in the Telegraph.
• “An update on a CBDC for the U.K.” – Together explains where we are with the Bank of England’s plans to develop a Central Bank Digital Currency.
• “Rip up diversity rules ‘that will only create jobs in HR’, bosses demand” – Financial chiefs are calling on the City regulator to tear up plans to impose diversity targets in the latest sign of a mounting business backlash against DEI, reports the Mail.
• “Most voters under 30 believe sex offenders should be castrated” – More than two-thirds of voters under 30 believe sex offenders should be castrated, in the latest indication of increasingly hardline views among Gen Z, says the Mail.
• “Stop using the word ‘passenger’, Network Rail tells staff” – Network Rail has instructed employees to stop using the word ‘passenger’ in a bid to make their services come across as less formal, reports the Mail.
• “Do not call fat people obese, ‘sensitivity’ guide tells NHS workers” – In the Telegraph, Tim Sigworth dissects the National Institute of Health and Care Excellence’s new guide to how to speak woke-ish, with a little help from Lord Young.
• “Treat pick-up artists like extremists, urge officials” – Home Office staff have explained how lotharios form part of the wider online subculture called the ‘manosphere’ that serves as a gateway to extremism, according to the Times.
• “Film about trans teen will be shown to pupils as young as 11” – A film showing the use of cross-sex hormones and chest binders among teenagers is to be made available in state schools across the country as part of LGBTQ+ History month, reports the Times.
• “SNP ministers consider ban on cats” – SNP Ministers are considering a ban on cats after a group set up to advise the Scottish Government suggested they were a danger to wildlife, says the Scottish Express.
• “European politicians call for social media censorship and attack X and Meta’s free speech policies as ‘threat to democracy’” – ADF International reports that politicians at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) have called for more censorship to tackle so-called “misinformation”, “disinformation” and “hate speech”.
• “Victoria Wood’s ‘Let’s Do It’ content warning for ‘offensive’ lyrics” – ITVX has slapped a content warning on one of Victoria Wood’s best-loved songs because its lyrics “may offend modern audiences”, reports the Mail.
• “Brilliant Budapest” – In the New Conservative, Dr. Roger Watson shares his impressions from a recent trip to Budapest, where, after five days of exploring, he couldn’t spot a single BLM poster or rainbow lanyard.
• “If guilty, he will resign” – On GB News, ex-Labour MP Stephen Pound says that if Sir Keir Starmer is found to have broken lockdown rules in 2020, as a new book suggests, he will do the decent thing and resign. Fat chance!

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