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Labour Party

Sun
SIR Keir Starmer has been branded a hypocrite as a report reveals Labour held secret talks with Sue Gray.
The party and top civil servant discussed her becoming Sir Keir’s chief of staff months before the Government knew, the probe by watchdog Acoba will say this week.
A separate damning report by the Cabinet Office, also out this week, will say partygate inquistor Ms Gray breached impartiality rules and could have been sacked.
Acoba will give Ms Gray a six month ban — clearing the way for her to take up the Labour job in the autumn.
Some Tories want PM Rishi Sunak to force her to wait until after next year’s election.
A Tory said: “Damning information in the report will show Starmer’s a total hypocrite on standards — and not a man of his word.”
The report will reveal Ms Gray began talks with Labour last October — five months before she quit her job as Whitehall enforcer.
She had finished working on her Boris Johnson partygate probe.
But she was still a senior civil servant passing information to Parliament’s privileges committee investigating Downing Street lockdown breaches.
The Cabinet Office inquiry will find she “fell short” of civil ­service standards and was “in breach” of her contract.

Express
Sir Keir Starmer has insisted Sue Gray did nothing wrong, before meeting the top civil servant months before she quit her job
Sir Keir Starmer is alleged to have met Sue Gray about becoming his chief of staff months before the Government knew.
The Labour leader has been called a “hypocrite” over the move. A probe by watchdog Acoba says Sir Keir and the top civil servant met months before the discussions came to light.
Gray was in charge of running the Government’s partygate inquiry. But a damning report from the Cabinet office this week will reportedly say she breached impartiality rules and could be sacked.
Acoba will give Ms Gray a six month ban — clearing the way for her to take up the Labour job in the autumn, reports The Sun.

Sun
EX-LABOUR leader Ed Miliband looks set to be sidelined in a reshuffle next month after a series of humiliating U-turns on eco policies, insiders say.
Current party boss Sir Keir Starmer is secretly plotting to announce a revamp of his front bench in July and clip Ed’s wings, Labour sources believe.
Mr Miliband is expected to be kept on as shadow secretary of state for climate change and net zero.
But Sir Keir is considering making it clear he will not be deciding the party’s energy policy, amid a backlash over his plans.

Illegal migration Bill

Telegraph
The cost of housing asylum seekers in hotels and other temporary accommodation is on course to reach up to £11 billion a year as rising numbers of arrivals add to the growing backlog, according to a government analysis.
The official impact assessment of Suella Braverman’s Illegal Migration Bill is understood to warn that the cost for accommodating migrants could exceed £30 million per day – up from more than £6 million per day currently.
The figures, which are expected to be published this week, are likely to be seized on by the Home Secretary as evidence that the planned legislation will save taxpayers’ money, as ministers prepare for a major confrontation with Labour and the House of Lords to push the changes through Parliament.
The disclosure comes as the Government awaits a Court of Appeal judgment – expected this week – on the legality of its plans to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda as part of a fresh approach designed to deter new arrivals.

Green levy

Telegraph
Households will pay a £170-a-year green levy on energy bills in the coming days, with Rishi Sunak and Jeremy Hunt accused of “slyly” shifting costs back to consumers.
The Telegraph has learned that the two-year suspension of green levies announced last autumn is to end from the beginning of July, after just nine months.
The cost of the levies was shifted from consumer bills to be funded instead by the Government, following a year-long campaign by energy firms and MPs amid spiraling gas, electricity and food prices last year.
It will again be imposed on consumers, although there has been no formal announcement. Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg, who was business and energy secretary when the costs were taken away from consumers last year, said: “Green levies are part of the problem behind the UK’s particularly high electricity prices. They ought to be abolished but should fall on general taxation until that can happen. The ambition for net zero must not make us cold and poor.

Coal

Telegraph
Rishi Sunak has quietly scrapped the Government’s net zero pledge to pass a law banning coal power generation in Britain.
The Government no longer plans to legally outlaw coal from October 2024, a spokesman said, adding that legislation is “not necessary” because the owners of the country’s remaining coal power stations are set to close them before the deadline regardless.
Experts said that the change in position gives the Government wriggle room to fire up coal plants again in future should they be needed to prevent blackouts.
It is also likely to anger green campaigners, who have heavily criticised the use of coal plants to boost electricity supplies over the winter and this summer.
A government spokesman said: “The Government is committed to phasing out unabated coal generation by October 2024.

Scotland

Mail
Humza Yousaf’s flagship independence convention descended into farce yesterday after the SNP leader was heckled off stage by a furious party member during his speech.
As loud boos rang out around the hall – where there were hundreds of empty seats – the First Minister was embarrassingly forced to abandon his speech to try to reason with the heckler.
Theresa Mallett, 61, from Glenrothes, Fife, was initially jeered by SNP delegates for her interruption, prompting Mr Yousaf to plead for them to stop, adding: ‘Folks, let’s not boo.’
He then walked into the audience to speak to Ms Mallett, putting his hand on her shoulder in an attempt to comfort her.
The chaotic scenes came minutes into the SNP’s Convention for Independence in Dundee, billed as an ‘exciting event’ to ‘discuss our strategy for securing Scotland’s independence’.
However, just days before the £10-a-head event, conducted amid a muted atmosphere with 500 empty seats in the Caird Hall, the SNP was forced to appeal to people to buy tickets.

BBC News
Humza Yousaf has told a special SNP conference that greater support for Scottish independence must be built ahead of the next general election.
He said if the party won a majority of seats north of the border he would press the UK government for powers to hold a second referendum.
Scotland’s first minister added the only route to independence was through “lawful and democratic process”.
Both Labour and the Tories are opposed to further talks on another vote.
But Mr Yousaf told a convention in Dundee that his party would stand on the proposition that people could “vote SNP for an independent Scotland”.
He later told BBC Scotland: “We will put the simple proposition to the people in a general election because a referendum is being denied to us.
“If we win that general election we will then negotiate with the UK government of how we give it democratic effect.

ITV News
Scottish First Minister Humza Yousaf has said the next Westminster election should be used as a “manifesto for an independent Scotland”. Mr Yousaf told SNP members at the independence convention in Dundee that the manifesto should read as a “vote SNP for Scotland to become independent”. He said: “I am very clear, there is no route to independence except through the lawful and democratic process. Why? Because that is the way that we actually become independent. ”He added: “That election gives us the opportunity to break the log jam.
“I believe that in this election, the SNP should offer the people of Scotland a manifesto for an independent Scotland. “And I am proposing in that manifesto – page one, line one – a simple powerful statement to the people. It should say ‘vote for SNP for an independent Scotland’. “If the SNP win this election, then the people will have spoken. We will seek negotiations with the UK government on how we give democratic effect to Scotland becoming an independent nation.”

Social care

Telegraph
Nearly 100 care homes across the country are lying empty or have been repurposed, despite 37,000 people waiting for their care to begin, an investigation has found.
Some care homes are out of action because they have crumbled into disrepair or have been deemed unsafe, while other homes are being used for alternative purposes, such as to provide office space.
The Liberal Democrats submitted freedom of information requests to local authorities in England asking them to detail council-owned or operated care home buildings that are not currently being used to provide care services.
The investigation found that 94 care homes across 46 councils are not being used for their original purpose.
Thirty-seven of the unused care homes were found to be not fit for purpose, while 15 are lying empty.
Nineteen are currently being refurbished and another 15 are being used for other purposes, such as to provide office accommodation.

NHS

ITV News
The Prime Minister has said his NHS Long Term Workforce Plan will be the “biggest workforce training expansion” in the history of the health service.
Pointing to the country’s reliance on “attracting talented people from overseas rather than recruiting at home”, Rishi Sunak outlined the vision of his 15-year plan to “build the health workforce of the future”.
Writing in The Sunday Times, Mr Sunak said: “This week, in conjunction with the NHS, we’ll announce a series of new policies to transform the way we deliver healthcare.
“The NHS Long Term Workforce Plan will be the biggest workforce training expansion in the NHS’s history. It will ensure we train, retain, reform and make the most of our talented and experienced staff.
“It will be a 15-year plan to give the NHS certainty, because we recognise it takes time to train these staff, who are among the most highly skilled in our society.

Sun
THE NHS is too hooked on foreign doctors and nurses and will go on a British training blitz to staff our hospitals, Steve Barclay today declares.
Thousands more apprentice nurses and doctors will be taught to beef up the health service workforce. The cap on medical school places is set to be doubled from 7,500 in England to 15,000 so more brainy pupils can become doctors.
Ministers have also signed off just over £1billion more in training cash for the NHS to teach medics beyond the next election.
The radical shake-up is part of the long-awaited workforce plan, which is being announced by the Health Secretary and PM Rishi Sunak later this week.

BBC

Telegraph
The BBC has been accused of bowing to pressure from Sadiq Khan over its reporting of London’s Ultra Low Emission Zone (Ulez).
According to a leaked message, an editor at the BBC said that any stories on the controversial scheme had to be escalated to senior levels for sign-off because of an “outstanding complaint” from Mr Khan.
Under the Ulez scheme, vehicles that fail to meet emissions standards are required to pay £12.50 every day to travel within a restricted zone.
Mr Khan’s plan to expand it in August to cover all of London’s 32 boroughs has proved contentious and is likely to be a major dividing line in next May’s mayoral election.
A member of staff at the BBC has now leaked an email to Howard Cox, mayoral candidate for Reform UK and long-term leader of the campaign group FairFuelUK.
According to a report by The Daily Express, in an email sent to staff, Dan Fineman, senior news editor at BBC South East, said: “If any platforms are doing a story on Ulez charges in the South and South East we now need to do a mandatory referral to Jason Horton/Robert Thompson because of an outstanding complaint with the Mayor of London which is very live at the moment.”

Russia

Mail
Humiliated Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin is starting a life in exile in Belarus this morning after he sensationally abandoned his group’s march on Moscow at the 11th hour just 120 miles from the capital.
The mercenaries aborted their dramatic ‘armed mutiny’ against the Kremlin following crisis talks between Prigozhin and Belarus dictator Alexander Lukashenko.
Charges of rebellion have now been dropped against Prigozhin, with Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov also announcing that no Wagner mercenary will be prosecuted for the insurrection, which saw the group take the city of Rostov and march on the Russian capital in a whirlwind 24-hour advance.
The extraordinary episode has weakened Vladimir Putin’s position, according to experts, and all eyes will now be on the Russian supremo to see what he does next.

Sun
WAGNER coup leader Yevgeny Prigozhin fled to Belarus after striking a deal with Vladimir Putin to stand down his rebel forces just 120 miles from Moscow.
The mercenary boss left Russia as part of a deal to end his uprising with charges against him being dropped, the Kremlin announced.
Yesterday Putin faced the biggest challenge to his iron fist rule since he rose to power in the aftermath of the collapsed Soviet Union and took control of the Kremlin more than two decades ago.
Wagner boss Prigozhin vowed to “punish” Russia after he blamed the Kremlin for a deadly missile attack on one of his training camps in the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut.
The warlord – a former pal of Putin’s – led an armed rebellion with the stated aim to oust Russia’s military leaders as he turned on the top brass in Moscow.

Independent
Russia appears to have stepped back from the brink of a full-scale armed mutiny after the Wagner Group, one of the world’s most powerful private armies, halted a march on Moscow started by a vow for revenge.
While the immediate threat seems to have been averted, the unprecedented attack on the Russian military establishment marks the most serious challenge to President Vladimir Putin in the 23 years he has ruled with an iron fist – and the crisis is unlikely to just disappear just because the military convoy halted about 200km (125 miles) from the Russian capital.
Earlier in an extraordinary day, a visibly angry Mr Putin made an emergency address to the nation railing against the attempted coup and said the very existence of the Russian state was at stake.

Observer
Russia on Saturday appeared to have averted an immediate descent into civil war after mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin said he would order his Wagner fighters to end their march on Moscow and return to their bases in southern Russia.
At the end of an extraordinary day, during which a visibly angry Vladimir Putin had made an emergency television broadcast railing against the “deadly threat to our state”, Progozhin said that he wanted to avoid shedding Russian blood and would order his troops back to their bases instead.
“Now the moment has come when blood can be shed,” he said. “Therefore, realising all the responsibility for the fact that Russian blood will be shed from one side, we will turn our convoys around and go in the opposite direction to our field camps.”

Telegraph
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the Russian mercenary leader, turned his fighters back from a march on the Kremlin on Saturday after a truce was struck with Vladimir Putin.
Mutinous Wagner mercenaries marched to within 150 miles of Moscow in what the Russian president described as a treasonous “stab in the back” before they abruptly halted.
The stand-down came after Alexander Lukashenko, the dictator of Belarus, said he had brokered a last-minute truce to avoid a Russian civil war.
The key plank of the deal appeared to be the Kremlin dropping plans to abolish the Wagner military company.
“They were going to dismantle PMC Wagner. We came out on June 23 to the march of justice,” Prigozhin said in a voice message. “In a day, we walked to nearly 200 kilometres away from Moscow. In this time, we did not spill a single drop of blood of our fighters.

Mirror
Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin has left Russia for Belarus after President Vladimir Putin dropped charges against him.
The Kremlin has announced charges against him and his Wagner forces will be dropped by Russian authorities to avoid “bloodshed”.
Crowds have gathered tonight in Rostov-on-Don to say goodbye to Wagner troops as the mercenaries leave the city.
Prigozhin himself will move to Belarus under a deal brokered by the Belarusian president to end today’s armed mutiny against Russia’s military leadership, the Kremlinsaid.
The Wagner boss and his fighters will also be safe from prosecution under the agreement, it added.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Alexander Lukashenko had offered to mediate, with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s agreement, because he had known Prigozhin personally for around 20 years.

ITV News
The leader of the Wagner mercenary group has had criminal charges dropped after calling off a rebellion and ordering his troops to stop marching on Moscow, the Kremlin has said.
Yevgeny Prigozhin will also move to Belarus as part of a deal struck to diffuse tensions with the Russian military, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.
However, the saga raises many questions about what this means for the war in Ukraine and Vladimir Putin’s leadership, which after this saga now appears weaker than ever.
This has been one of the most damaging days of his 23 years as Russia’s president, given how close Wagner got to the capital with little resistance.

Childbirth

Mail
The NHS is to warn pregnant women that they shouldn’t use gas and air – because it’s harmful to the environment.
The health service has launched a crackdown on harmful greenhouse gas emissions from the most popular method of pain relief for women during labour.
The Scottish Government has written to all health boards with an NHS plan which suggests women should be encouraged not to use Entonox for the good of the planet.
It proposes expectant mothers play their part in ‘a collaborative mitigation approach’ to cutting the impact of Entonox.
It warns: ‘Future recommendations may require that education and training on the environmental impact of different analgesic techniques for labour should be made available to expectant mothers and care givers by antenatal services and delivery suite teams.’

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