The papers’ front pages.

Brexit

Telegraph
Sir Keir Starmer will hand the vote to millions of EU citizens if Labour wins the next general election, the Telegraph can reveal.
Under manifesto plans for the biggest expansion of the franchise in almost a century, Sir Keir will launch a “package of proposals” including votes for settled migrants and 16 and 17-year-olds.
The move could force the Conservatives out of London altogether and unseat Boris Johnson if he stands again for Parliament in 2029.
However, the Labour leader faces accusations of trying to “rig the outcome” of a future election and “laying the groundwork for a referendum to rejoin the EU”.
Under the proposals, migrants who live permanently in the UK and pay tax will be able to vote in general elections for the first time.
It is expected to affect around 3.4 million EU nationals in Britain, who have already fulfilled those requirements to achieve “settled status”. A further 2.6 million have already been granted “pre-settled” status and could be given voting rights in the future.
Labour would also expand the franchise to include 1.4 million 16 and 17-year-olds, increasing the size of the electorate by more than eight per cent in total.
Prof Sir John Curtice, the polling expert, said that migrants and young people were more likely to be Labour supporters.
Home Office data show migrants with settled status are heavily concentrated in large cities and the south of England.

Mail
Sir Keir Starmer was accused of trying to ‘gerrymander’ UK general elections over plans to hand millions of EU residents a vote in choosing British governments.
The Labour leader faced accusations of a new bid to roll back Brexit after reports said he planned to include the proposal in his party’s next manifesto.
It would potentially be coupled with votes for settled migrants as well as for 16 and 17-year-olds.
Last night, there were suggestions as many as four million EU nationals who lived in the UK and paid tax here could get a new right to vote in general elections.
It comes after Sir Keir, bidding to be Labour leader in January 2020, branded the treatment of EU residents after the Brexit referendum as ‘shameful’.
Sir Keir, who had previously called for a second Brexit referendum, said: ‘The Government should give all EU nationals living in the UK full voting rights in future elections.’
He added: ‘They are our neighbours and friends and families.’
Yesterday, a Labour Party spokesman told the Sunday Telegraph that Sir Keir ‘fundamentally believes that if you work hard and contribute to this country…………….it is fair and right that you should also have a say in decisions being made for your community.’
But amid claims that migrants and younger voters would favour Labour, Tory MP and ex-Brexit Minister David Jones accused him of a ‘patent attempt to gerrymander the voting system in the UK, which should be rejected by all reasonable politicians.’
He added: ‘Even when we were in the EU, EU nationals here couldn’t vote in general elections in this country.
‘It makes no logical sense at all now that we have left.
‘But then Starmer has spent the last seven years trying to water down Brexit.’

Telegraph
The post-pandemic downturn in British exports to the EU cannot be blamed on Brexit, a report has suggested.
The Centre for Brexit Policy said it was a “myth” that Britain’s departure from the bloc was mostly to blame for the shortfall in exports, pointing instead to a “combination of global factors” and the “distinctive pattern of UK exports”.
A report from the think-tank looked at why UK exports have recovered more slowly than other G7 countries since the Covid-19 pandemic.
It said that because of the distorting effects of the pandemic and the impact of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine it is difficult to ascertain the “underlying drivers”.
But the report claimed that more than 80 per cent of the UK’s current shortfall in exports is in sectors that “cannot in any meaningful way be ascribed” to Brexit.
It said a heavy reliance on overseas sales of cars and aircraft components along with cutbacks in North Sea oil and gas production are the main reasons for the underperformance against international competitors.
Phil Radford, a trade analyst who wrote the report, said: “The UK’s particular mix of exports explains why UK trade was bound to underperform G7 countries in 2021 and 2022.

Observer
Rishi Sunak was losing control of an increasingly anarchic Tory party on Saturday as former cabinet ministers openly criticised the direction of policy under his leadership and dozens of backbench MPs plotted a new rebellion over Brexit.
Amid recriminations over the heavy Conservative losses in recent council elections, and with pro-Brexit MPs incensed that Sunak’s government is dropping plans to shred more than 4,000 EU laws within months, discipline was at risk of completely disintegrating on the right of the party.
Speaking at the inaugural conference of the pro-Boris Johnson Conservative Democratic Organisation (CDO) in Bournemouth on Saturday, former home secretary Priti Patel suggested the party’s high command under Sunak was responsible for the losses.
In a clear swipe at those now in charge, she said some senior figures at Westminster had “done a better job at damaging our party” over the past year than Labour. She also criticised MPs for removing Johnson, saying they had overseen the “ousting of our most electorally successful prime minister since Margaret Thatcher”.
In comments reminiscent of the disastrous Liz Truss leadership, she also backed a tax-cutting agenda, despite the perilous state of public finances and stubbornly high inflation. “The public will not vote Conservative because they want high taxes, high spending and high borrowing,” she said. “They vote Conservative because they expect us to keep taxes down.”
Nadine Dorries, the former culture secretary and one of Johnson’s biggest backers, told the conference that the party had undergone an “astonishing political tumble” since Johnson secured an 80-strong majority in 2019 and was “going backwards”.

Illegal migrants

Mail
Ruthless gangs that send illegal migrants to Britain on small boats from France have praised the Archbishop of Canterbury for his attack on the Government’s flagship Bill on immigration.
The gangs, based at the migrant camp in Dunkirk – the biggest in northern France – told The Mail on Sunday that what Justin Welby said was ‘good’ as it meant more ‘people will be able to go to England and not be sent to Rwanda‘.
Gang members said they would wait to see if the Government’s plan to send illegal migrants to central Africa will now be stopped. Archbishop Welby attacked the Illegal Migration Bill in the House of Lords on Wednesday, calling it ‘morally unacceptable and politically impractical’, adding that it risked causing ‘great damage’ to Britain’s interests and reputation at home and abroad.
He was criticised in the UK for being ‘out of touch’, but was lauded by people smugglers in Dunkirk.
Aziz, 23, tried to take five friends to Dover on a dinghy last week, but was stopped by French police who cut up his inflatable boat.
The Iraqi, who claims to have two brothers in London, is planning another attempt. He added: ‘What this man said was good. Nobody wants to go to Rwanda. I will kill to not go to Rwanda.’
Adam, 33, a Turkish Kurd and suspected gang member who runs a food stall in the camp, said: ‘What this priest said is good. People in Rwanda are leaving for Europe.’

BBC News
Protestors have held a rally against plans to house 500 migrants on a barge off the Dorset coast.
About 100 demonstrators marched to Portland Port, where the government-commissioned vessel is expected to arrive in June.
The Home Office said the barge would “offer better value for the British taxpayer than expensive hotels”.
However the protest organisers, campaign group Stand Up To Racism, said the government plans were “inhumane”.
The group’s joint chair, Lynne Hubbard, said refugees had “suffered enough”.
She said: “We would see it as a prison barge designed for 222 people [and] 500 humans are going to be put on that barge. It’s inhumane.
“The government should do what it did around Ukrainians. We know there are many, many people who would be happy to host a refugee.”
Her co-chair Grafton Straker agreed with Ms Hubbard and said the migrants should be treated with more respect.
Dorchester resident Julie Croley said people in the area were “scared” of the new arrivals.
She said the government had allowed “166,000 people to arrive in this country and put them wherever they think they can slot them into and not care what the local people think”.
The barge – Bibby Stockholm – is contracted to be berthed at Portland for 18 months initially.
The Home Office said it was trying to manage pressures on the asylum system in a cost-effective way.

Sun
RECORD numbers of foreign criminals are still in the UK after failed bids to deport them, figures reveal.
At the end of last year 11,769, including killers and sex offenders, were here after completing jail terms.
That is an increase of 89 per cent on five years earlier.
Foreign convicts should be returned to their home country at the end of their sentences.
But when arrangements cannot be made, or deportation is challenged, the criminal can be released into the community.
During the Tory leadership campaign, Rishi Sunak vowed: “I will double the number of foreign offenders we deport.”
But the Home Office statistics also show the number here for at least five years after jail has reached a record 3,708.
In one case, 50 due to be deported to Jamaica won a reprieve after an emergency Court of Appeal ruling.
Several of the men went on to commit serious offences here.

Independent
Rishi Sunak will urge world leaders to tackle illegal migration as he embarks on a round of international diplomacy this week.
Days after the Archbishop of Canterbury condemned his plan to deport anyone who arrives on a small boat across the Channel to Rwanda, the prime minister will use meetings at the Council of Europe summit in Reykjavik to discuss the importance of strengthening the bloc’s borders, Downing Street has announced.
He will stress “collective” efforts are necessary to tackle illegal migration as well as the threat posed by Russia in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine.
“Many of the challenges we are dealing with, from inflation to migration, must be solved by working closely with our international partners,” he said.
The visit will come days before Mr Sunak heads to Japan for a bilateral meeting in Tokyo and a G7 gathering in Hiroshima.
Mr Sunak’s appeal for international cooperation on illegal migration comes as he faces increasing pressure domestically over his attempts to stop people coming to the UK on small boats.

Lord Frost

Telegraph
Lord Frost has launched his bid to become an MP as he was placed on the Conservative Party’s candidates list for the next general election.
The Tory peer, 58, who served as a Brexit minister in Boris Johnson’s Cabinet while in the House of Lords, is in contention for a safe Conservative seat.
If successful, he would be required to give up his seat in the Lords in exchange for a place in the Commons – the first person to do so since a rule change to allow such a move in 2014.
Lord Frost, who is from Derby, has not yet been selected for a specific constituency but could plump for Mid Derbyshire. The current MP is fellow Tory Pauline Latham, who is standing down at the next election and holds a majority of more than 15,000.
Lord Frost rose to fame as the UK’s chief Brexit negotiator in 2019, and led the talks that resulted in Mr Johnson’s revised Brexit withdrawal agreement.
Following the deal, he led Britain into trade deal negotiations with the EU, before being nominated for a peerage and serving as a Cabinet minister.
During a dispute with the EU over Northern Ireland, Mr Johnson described his friend as the “greatest Frost since the Great Frost of 1709”.

WFH

Mail
Labour plans to give people the legal right to work from home as part of its election manifesto, as well as making it easier for workers to strike.
The policy to make flexible working the default option is featured in an extensive list of proposals being formally weighed up, which has been leaked.
The key line proposes: ‘Make flexible working the default from day one for all workers, except where it is not reasonably feasible.’
It comes at a time when there are escalating fears that Britain’s poor productivity is having a negative impact on economic recovery.
The position was first set out by the party in July 2021, when Angela Rayner, Labour‘s Deputy Leader, said it was ‘not just about working from home’ but also broader flexible working rights.
Other examples included flexible hours, staggered hours, compressed hours, annualised hours, and flexibility around school runs and other family and caring responsibilities.
This sharply contrasts with the Conservative Party’s stance, with prime ministers trying to lure people back into the office after the Coronavirus pandemic.
Increasing the likelihood of people working from home could jeopardise the push to improve the UK’s productivity, which trails behind some of the other major economies and is seen as vital for securing improved growth in the long term.

Local elections

Mail
‘I even got to let my hair down a little bit,’ says Rishi Sunak, beaming about how much he and his wife Akshata enjoyed last weekend’s Coronation concert.
‘It was like a date night – we haven’t been to a concert in years. Akshata got me dancing.’
Celebratory jigs are not commonplace in a Tory Party still reeling from the loss of more than 1,000 seats in the local elections, which led Sir Keir Starmer to boast that he was heading for Downing Street.
But as he sits down with The Mail on Sunday on his 43rd birthday, Mr Sunak exudes confidence and bonhomie – joking about how he had been ‘outed’ that day as a fan of ‘bonkbuster’ author Jilly Cooper and looking forward to manning the barbecue at his Chequers country retreat this weekend.
While he was flipping the burgers in Buckinghamshire, acolytes of Boris Johnson were gathering 100 miles away in Bournemouth under the umbrella of the new grassroots Conservative Democratic Organisation – with former Home Secretary Priti Patel using the platform to warn that Mr Sunak risked presiding over the ‘managed decline’ of the Tory party.
MPs on the Right of the party have been dismayed in particular by the scaling back of the post-Brexit ‘bonfire’ of EU laws; former Cabinet Minister Jacob Rees-Mogg – another Bournemouth rebel – reacted by likening Mr Sunak to the Borgias, the Italian dynasty notorious for their corruption and immorality.
With barely 18 months until the General Election, Mr Sunak has gambled his political fate on five policy pledges – halving inflation, growing the economy, reducing the national debt, cutting NHS waiting lists and stopping migrant boats – knowing that Labour will seize on any failures without mercy.
Mr Sunak, who says he is ‘straining every sinew’ to meet the pledges, highlights in particular his determination to tackle the flood of migrants crossing on small boats – despite criticism by Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, who said the plan to send the migrants on to Rwanda was ‘morally unacceptable’.
A giant barge, designed to hold 500 migrants, arrived in Falmouth, Cornwall, last week, and the Prime Minister says that more are on the way.

ITV News
The former home secretary Priti Patel used a speech to a new Conservative grass-roots movement to blame the party’s leadership for last week’s big losses in local elections.
She was speaking at the launch of the new Conservative Democratic Organisation, a pro-Boris Johnson group that wants to give more power to grassroots party members.
The Tory party has not covered itself in “glory” and has seen the ousting of Boris Johnson, the “most electorally successful prime minister” since Margaret Thatcher, she said.“We haven’t covered ourselves in glory, and in fact some parts of Westminster and colleagues have done a better job at damaging our party than the opposition,” she said.
“Even the left-wing campaign groups, the civil service that you know, we all struggle with day in, day out.“
And even I’m afraid some of those in the media that want to distort and make life difficult for us.“
We have seen, as discussed today, the ousting of a democratically elected, in fact our most electorally successful prime minister since Margaret Thatcher.” She paid tribute to Mr Johnson, describing him as the “man that got Brexit done” and as the person who delivered on the “people’s priority”.

Finance

Express
Financial experts have said that the UK economy is “stuck in limbo” after it emerged that economic growth stalled due to strike disruptions.
Economic growth has stalled due to major strike disruption, figures show.
Gross domestic product rose by 0.1 per cent between January and March, the Office for National Statistics said.
But there was a 0.3 per cent fall in March, driven by the cost-of-living crisis and walkouts.
The ONS said growth during the whole quarter was impacted by industrial action.
Nurses, junior doctors, train workers, ambulance staff, civil servants and teachers are among those who have walked out over pay in recent months.
And it comes amid more strikes by rail workers, which will hit tonight’s Eurovision Song Contest in Liverpool.
Financial expert Jonathan Moyes, head of investment research at the Wealth Club, said: “It was another weak month of data. The UK appears to be stuck in limbo. This is the third broadly flat quarter for GDP in a row.
“While it suggests the country is performing far better than most expected last year, it remains a challenge to reconcile how the economy can escape a recession after such a steep rise in interest rates.
“Nonetheless, while strike action continued to affect the data – particularly for services – manufacturing and construction are pockets of strength.”
Passengers faced travel chaos again yesterday due to a strike by train drivers, with disruption continuing today amid an escalation of long-running disputes over pay.
Aslef members at 15 train operators walked out. And workers in the RMT will strike today as thousands of fans make their way to the M&S Bank Arena in Liverpool for Eurovision.

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