UK News

The government is struggling to cut the amount of foreign aid it spends on hotel bills for asylum seekers in the UK, the BBC has learnt. New figures released quietly by ministers in recent days show the Home Office plans to spend £2.2bn of overseas development assistance (ODA) this financial year – that is only marginally less than the £2.3bn ...

Scottish Labour has taken Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse from the SNP in a closely fought by-election. The party’s Davy Russell won with 8,559 votes, with a majority of 602 over the SNP. The vote followed the death of SNP MSP Christina McKelvie, who had represented the constituency since 2011. Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said his party had “proven the ...

  Zia Yusuf has resigned as the chairman of Reform UK, saying working to get the party elected was no longer “a good use of my time”. In a post on social media, Yusuf did not expand further on his reasons for stepping down. However, it comes after he said it was “dumb” for the party’s newest MP to call ...

King Charles III received a standing ovation from Canadian lawmakers on Tuesday as he opened a new session of parliament in Ottawa, saying, “all Canadians give themselves far more than any foreign power or any continent can ever take away.” The 76-year-old king is the first leader of the British monarchy invited to deliver the speech from the throne to ...

Britain will spend a record 3 billion pounds ($4 billion) to boost training opportunities, the government said yesterday, part of a broader strategy to train locals to fill gaps in the labour market and reduce reliance on foreign workers. The investment will “refocus the skills landscape towards young, domestic talent” by creating 120,000 new training opportunities in key sectors such ...

Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner has refused to confirm whether the government is planning to scrap the two-child benefit cap. On Sunday, the Observer reported that Sir Keir Starmer had privately backed abolishing the limit and requested the Treasury find the £3.5bn to do so. The policy prevents most families from claiming means-tested benefits for any third or additional children ...

  South Western Railway (SWR) has been renationalised, making it the first train company to transfer to public ownership under Labour. The first nationalised service, from Woking to Surbiton, departed on time at 05:36 on Sunday, though the ongoing journey to London Waterloo was on a rail replacement bus due to engineering work. The government called the move a “new ...

Reform UK has said it will fully reinstate winter fuel payments to pensioners and scrap the two-child benefit cap, if the party gets into government. The commitments – to be unveiled at a press conference next week – come after Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer faced pressure from Labour MPs to change his approach to both policies. By the time ...

Tina – an acronym, not a person – was very popular with the late Lady Thatcher. It was in 1980 that the then prime minister – introducing what were radical economic policies – first insisted “There Is No Alternative”. Although politically on the left, Chancellor Rachel Reeves has used similar rhetoric. She has claimed there is no alternative to last ...

Thousands of demonstrators gathered outside 10 Downing Street on Friday under the banner “Emergency Protest – Stop Arming Israel – Words Are Not Enough,” demanding the UK government halt arms exports to Israel and take concrete action in response to the humanitarian catastrophe unfolding in Gaza. The protest, coordinated by several pro-Palestinian groups including the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC), comes ...