UK politics live: Badenoch warns of Tory leadership ‘stitch-up’ as Labour MP quits with attack on Starmer

Rosie Duffield slates ‘sleaze, nepotism and apparent avarice’ around prime minister

Keir Starmer refuses to apologise to pensioners over winter fuel payment cuts

Kemi Badenoch has warned that Tory members will be “very angry” if MPs take part in a “stitch-up” to lend votes to other candidates to keep her out of the top two in the leadership contest.

Allies of Ms Badenoch claim she is the victim of a “dirty tricks” campaign, with Robert Jenrick in effect lending votes to James Cleverly, which the former has strongly denied.

Asked whether she believed Mr Jenrick was taking this approach, she told The Times: “I think that may be happening. But what else is happening is that there is tactical voting. We’re also operating in an environment where people have friends — people who they’ve worked with, people they owe favours to.”

Meanwhile, the Labour Party was shocked as Rosie Duffield quit as one of its MPs, launching an attack on Sir Keir Starmer’s “cruel and unnecessary policies” and the freebies row.

Ms Duffield, who will sit as an independent, slated Sir Keir’s acceptance of more than £100,000 of clothes, glasses and accommodation from Labour peer Waheed Alli.

In her resignation letter, she wrote: “The sleaze, nepotism and apparent avarice are off the scale.”

Key Points

• Kemi Badenoch warns Tory members will be ‘very angry’ if stitch-up occurs
• Boris Johnson considered ‘nuts’ plan to raid Dutch warehouse over vaccines row
• Boris Johnson said he paid the partygate fine because ‘he had a lot on'
• Former PM realised he had Covid when he couldn’t finish the cheese in the fridge
• Johnson claims the partygate scandal was ‘feeblest event in the history of human festivity’

[28 September 2024 21:00 · Holly Evans]

Watch: Who will be the next leader of the Conservatives?

[28 September 2024 20:00 · Archie Mitchell]

What to expect from Tory conference

The 2024 Conservative Party Conference will be a drastically different affair from last year’s gathering in Manchester, when Rishi Sunak’s government was in its dying days.

Back then, ministers announced a slew of eye-catching policies that would reshape the future of the country in a desperate last few roles of the dice - Alex Chalk promising to offshore prisoners, Jeremy Hunt planning to slash the number of civil servants and Rishi Sunak scrapping HS2.

This year, Mr Sunak is a lame duck Tory leader and all eyes will be far from the diminished former prime minister. Instead it will be a four-day battle for the future leadership of the party, with the four remaining contenders thrashing it out to try to win over Tory members.

James Cleverly, Kemi Badenoch, Robert Jenrick and Tom Tugendhat will be put to the test in a series of hustings and speeches, as well as taking part in intense lobbying and networking behind the scenes in Birmingham with MPs and the party rank and file.

On offer elsewhere will be former Tory MPs, ousted by the public in July’s general election, setting out where they think the party went wrong and what it needs to do next.

High profile names expected to appear are ex-PM Liz Truss, former business secretary Jacob Rees-Mogg and incoming Spectator Editor Michael Gove.

The Independent will be bringing the latest updates and analysis from the conference.

[28 September 2024 19:49 · Jane Dalton]

Why Duffield has long clashed with Labour leadership

Rosie Duffield is a long-time critic of some of the Labour Party’s policies and its leadership.

She has attacked Sir Keir Starmer’s decision to retain the two-child benefit cap, branding it “heinous”.

And as a staunch defender of women’s rights and women’s spaces, Ms Duffield has repeatedly criticised Labour’s leadership over what she sees as its lack of support for women in trans issues.

Last year, she accused male party colleagues of trying to drown her out during a Commons debate when she spoke against gender reforms proposed in Edinburgh.

She said she felt “cold-shouldered by the Labour Party” and compared her membership to being in an abusive relationship.

And she said it was “dystopian” that Sir Keir had been reluctant to say whether a woman could have a penis.

She opted not to attend the Labour Party conference in 2021 after receiving threats and being branded transphobic, which she denies.

And when she said only women have a cervix, Sir Keir disagreed.

The Canterbury MP urged Sir Keir to maintain support for biological females to feel protected in prisons and domestic violence refuges, but said she was not confident the policy would be upheld.

She condemned the decision to apparently let a Labour aide keep his job after being found to have groped an intern 20 years his junior.

[28 September 2024 19:08 · Jane Dalton]

‘Lack of political instincts have come crashing down’: Rosie Duffield resignation letter in full

[28 September 2024 19:00 · Holly Evans]

University tuition fees ‘could hit £10,500 a year’ under new government plans

University tuition fees will rise with inflation, hitting £10,500 in the next five years, it has been reported.

The government is drawing up plans which will see university tuition fees, which have been frozen since 2017, rise by 13.5 per cent over the next five years according to The Times.

The fees will rise with inflation, however, ministers will reportedly introduce maintenance loans of £3,500, which were abolished under the Conservative government.

Read the full article here:

[28 September 2024 18:16 · Jane Dalton]

Rosie Duffield quits Labour with damning attack on Starmer

Rosie Duffield has quit as a Labour MP, attacking leader Sir Keir Starmer’s “cruel and unnecessary policies” such as means-testing the winter fuel payment, and the freebie row engulfing the party:

[28 September 2024 18:00 · Holly Evans]

James Cleverly says no taxpayer should pay over half their earnings

James Cleverly has said that no taxpayer should have to hand over more than half their earnings to the state, and warned against Labour’s tax-raising plans which could see people leave the UK.

The shadow home secretary is one of the four final contenders for the Tory leadership, is set to lay out his vision for the party during their annual conference in Birmingham this week. In an article with The Telegraph, he said the party had to restore its reputation for tax-cutting and deregulation.

“Instead of putting people off we should be attracting them, with a low, fair, and simple tax rate. We should send the signal that Britain is open for work, not that you work for Britain.

“Ensuring that no one pays more than half of any pound that they earn to the government should be a common Conservative aspiration.”

[28 September 2024 17:00 · Holly Evans]

Tory Party conference: John Rentoul answers your questions

With a leadership contest looming and the Conservatives facing tough decisions on the party’s strategy, join John Rentoul, The Independent’s chief political commentator, for a live Q&A.

If you have a question on the Conservative Party conference, submit it now here, or join live at 4pm on Monday 30 September for the “Ask Me Anything” event.

For more information, read this article:

[28 September 2024 16:00 · Holly Evans]

Is this the moment that Rachel Reeves put ‘what works’ before dogma?

This could be the moment that the Labour government started to find its feet. Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, is “ready to water down” her tax raid on non-doms because the Treasury fears that it may “fail to raise any money”, the Financial Times reported on Thursday.

The timing of this realisation is interesting, the day after the end of the Labour conference at which the news might have been greeted with howls of “betrayal” from the marginalised, but still vocal, usual suspects.

But what is important about this U-turn is that it means the cold light of realism has been allowed to penetrate the pie-in-the-sky slogans of Labour’s pre-election economics.

Read the full article here now:

[28 September 2024 15:35 · Holly Evans]

Revealed: Starmer’s ‘three pillar’ blueprint to rebuild EU ties with youth mobility a negotiating chip

Sir Keir Starmer is still open to agreeing a deal with the EU on free movement for young people – but does not want to give away his negotiating hand too early as he prepares to head to Brussels next week.

The Independent understands that the Labour government has a “three pillar” blueprint to reset the relationship with the EU in painstaking talks.

The main talks will be headed by European affairs minister Nick Thomas-Symonds, who is based in the Cabinet Office and has been handed some of the most complex and sensitive tasks in the Starmer government.

Read the full article here: