Brexit

Express
JOE BIDEN has been slapped with a “gargantuan stack of red tape” by Britain to show how damaging the current Northern Ireland Protocol is to trade, a news report has claimed.
Conor Burns, the PM’s representative, has handed over a bundle of regulatory forms to show officials the negative impact it is having on businesses, it has been reported. Mr Burns said the bundle of regulatory forms was helping him explain to officials in Washington the impact on businesses and consumers and why Britain wants changes.
The bundle follows a series of warnings from the US against overriding elements of the Protocol unilaterally.
Last week, Nancy Pelosi, the Democrat House Speaker, claimed that doing so could damage the Good Friday Agreement, and the UK’s chances of a free trade deal with the US.
The Protocol created an Irish Sea border between Britain and Northern Ireland, avoiding a hard border in Ireland, the Democratic Unionist Party claims the effect has been to drive up the cost of living, and it has refused to enter into power-sharing in Stormont with Sinn Fein following elections earlier this month.
Mr Burns told US officials the British Government wants a negotiated settlement with the EU over the Protocol, but would “do the right thing for our country”.

Pounds and ounces

Telegraph
Boris Johnson will pave the way for the return of pounds and ounces in British shops this week, in a “common sense” move heralded by Tory MPs as taking advantage of freedoms delivered by Brexit.
On Friday, the Government will publish proposals to repeal EU-derived law requiring metric units to be used for all trade, with only limited exceptions.
At the same time, ministers will issue guidance to firms on restoring the use of the crown symbol on pint glasses, after it was replaced by the CE marking to help the UK conform with EU rules.
A government source said: “We Brits measure our walks in miles and our beer and milk by the pint. And nobody knows what a 4.5kg baby looks like, but we all know a 10-pounder is a whopper.
“It’s time we held our heads high about our long history of traditional measures.
“And what better way to celebrate Her Majesty’s Platinum Jubilee than restoring the crown emblem back onto the side of pint glasses so that we can toast her health and service to this country.”

BBC News
The government will launch a review on when and where imperial measurements can be used, to coincide with the Queen’s Jubilee weekend.
At the moment, traders must use metric measurements when selling packaged or loose goods – but they can use imperial measurements alongside them.
The review, which had already been signalled, will begin on Friday.
Labour MP Angela Eagle said it was a “pathetic” attempt to “weaponise nostalgia”.
In September, the government said it would review rules on imperial measures as part of broader plans to reshape UK law after Brexit.
A legal requirement to use metric measurements when selling packaged or loose goods was first introduced by the EU in 2000.
The law states that imperial measurements can be displayed as well as metric ones – but cannot be more prominent.
In 2001, the rules became the focus of debate in the UK following the prosecution of the “metric martyrs” – a group of market traders convicted of selling goods using only imperial measures – although have not been rigorously enforced since.

Boris

Mail
Boris Johnson‘s Cabinet allies have accused supporters of former Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt of mounting a secret pub plot to oust the Prime Minister.
They suspect MPs who attended a dinner at an upmarket bar in West London called The Surprise last week were scheming to trigger a Tory leadership challenge.
The event, held the night before Sue Gray’s report into Partygate was published, was hosted by Devon MP Mel Stride, a former campaign chief for Michael Gove who is seen by the Johnson camp as a rebel ringleader.
Also in attendance was long-serving Ludlow MP Philip Dunne, a key ally of Mr Hunt.
Of the 16 MPs known to have been there and who voted in the 2019 leadership election, just three backed Mr Johnson.
Five backed Mr Hunt, who is widely expected to mount a leadership bid if a contest is called, while six supported Mr Gove, who is not expected to enter another contest.

Guardian
Boris Johnson has plunged the Conservative party into an acute identity crisis as a result of Partygate and U-turns over tax policy, senior Tories warned last night, as more MPs called for him to resign as prime minister.
Former Tory leader Iain Duncan-Smith told the Observer his party had been left with an “enormous identity problem” because it had raised taxes instead of cutting them under Johnson and the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, undermining a core Tory message that had helped win it successive general elections.
Doubts about Johnson’s ability to survive as prime minister, and fears that the Tories are now on a terminal electoral slide, grew as party grandee Sir Bob Neill said the combination of collapsing trust in the prime minister, coupled with a lack of clarity over what the Conservatives stood for, had created a “toxic mix” in the minds of voters. Neill called on Friday for Johnson to go.
Yesterday two more MPs – former health minister Steve Brine and Anne Marie Morris – said they had also lost confidence in Johnson, taking the total who have gone public to 24.

ITV News
Labour will push for a vote on Boris Johnson’s decision to ‘water down’ rules for ministers after it was made clear they would not automatically lose their jobs if they breach the Ministerial Code.
Sir Keir Starmer and his team plan to use an opposition day debate, when Parliament returns from its week-long break to mark the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, to encourage Conservative MPs to vote and rebel against Mr Johnson’s changes.
It is traditional for ministers to resign or face the sack if they are found to have breached the code.
But a government policy statement said on Friday that this was a “disproportionate” expectation in the case of “minor” violations of the code.
Instead, the code has been updated, giving the prime minister the option of ordering a lesser sanction such as “some form of public apology, remedial action or removal of ministerial salary for a period.”

Evening Standard
Boris Johnson’s government was hit with a fresh blow on Friday as a fifth new MP called on him to resign after the Sue Gray report.
Sir Bob Neill, MP for Bromley and Chislehurst, urged the Prime Minister to stand down on Friday afternoon.
He said he had sent a letter of no confidence in the PM to Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the 1922 Committee of backbench Tory MPs.
In recent days, Wimbledon MP Stephen Hammond, David Simmonds, MP for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner, Billericay MP John Baron, and York MP Julian Sturdy have issued statements calling on Mr Johnson to quit after the Gray report on Wednesday into the partygate scandal.
Sir Bob, chairman of the Commons justice committee, said: “My years as a lawyer have taught me not to come to conclusions without the fullest possible evidence.

Express
MICHAEL Gove has given a full-throttle defence of Boris Johnson as the best person to lead the country as the Prime Minister’s foes plot to push him from power.
The Levelling Up Secretary insisted there is “no one in Government who has his energy, his determination, his vision”. The PM is under attack from Tories from different wings of the party who believe he needs to go in the wake of public anger about lockdown rule-breaking in Downing St.
But Mr Gove told the Sunday Express: “I’m absolutely confident that Boris can and should win the next election and I want him to lead us into it and I want him to be Prime Minister for as long as possible.”

Petrol

Telegraph
Boris Johnson is declaring war on petrol stations that fail to pass on the Government’s fuel duty cut, pledging to name and shame those that refuse to drop their prices.
Three government sources said the Prime Minister had expressed fury that the 5p-a-litre cut to fuel duty announced in March was failing to materialise at many pumps.
On Mr Johnson’s orders, Department for Transport officials have been tasked with drawing up proposals to “expose” those failing to pass on the cut. Grant Shapps, the Transport Secretary, has suggested a government-run “forecourt watch” or “pump watch” scheme to name and shame offending firms.

Post

Mail
Royal Mail is paving the way to its first full-scale Sunday parcel delivery service as it enters a fierce battle with rivals.
Bosses have drawn up a ‘road map’ that could build its Sunday proposition tenfold in an effort to put the 506-year-old business at the forefront of weekend online shopping.
The group has hailed the plan a ‘revolution’ similar to the end of Sunday trading restrictions for shops in the 1990s. It would also mark an end to the frustration of waiting days for parcels to arrive until after the weekend.
The strategy is part of chief executive Simon Thompson’s plan to transform the business and take market share from competitors such as Amazon, DPD and Hermes, which is now known as Evri.
Internet purchases surged during the pandemic. B u t demand has been on the wane with the end of lockdown restrictions. Royal Mail has also faced decades of dwindling letter volumes as more mail is sent digitally.

Police

Guardian
Neil Basu has said he will be demanding an explanation from the government about why he was overlooked to be the next leader of the National Crime Agency (NCA).
The Met assistant commissioner, 53, said he would not be reapplying to be director-general after the application process was reopened.
Basu, the former head of UK counter-terrorism policing, told the Sunday Times: “I am disappointed in the way the process has concluded and will not be applying again. I will be seeking an explanation from the Home Office.”
The Guardian reported on Thursday that an expert panel assessed that Basu, the favourite for the job, and Graeme Biggar, the NCA’s acting director-general, were sufficiently qualified to be appointed to the role.
Both were told by Matthew Rycroft, the permanent secretary at the Home Office, they would not be picked. Instead, the process to find a candidate would be restarted and they could reapply.
Neither applicant is understood to have been given a reason.
One Whitehall source confirmed claims that the selection process was stopped because Downing Street intervened and favoured Bernard Hogan-Howe, the former commissioner of the Met and a vocal supporter of Boris Johnson, for the NCA role.

Times
Police chiefs are at war over a race to lead the National Crime Agency, which has become embroiled in cronyism claims.
Neil Basu, the country’s most senior non-white officer, has demanded an explanation from the government about why he was overlooked for the role of director-general at the agency after he was one of the final two candidates.
Basu broke his silence to say he was “disappointed” to miss out on the £223,000-a-year job a week after The Sunday Times revealed Boris Johnson wanted to shoehorn in his supporter Lord Hogan-Howe, the former Scotland Yard chief who oversaw the disastrous VIP child sex abuse inquiry.

Customs

Express
PORTS across Britain have introduced “customs clearance fees” in an attempt to recoup lost revenues.
The move at border control posts is a consequence of delays to phytosanitary procedures. Ports in London, Tilbury, Southampton and Teesport are now charging customers news fees that range from £17 to £25 per entry. A source speaking to news outlet Loadstar about the new fees said: “In reality, it is a bulls**t money-making exercise, as there are no examinations, it’s probably aimed at recovering port development costs.”
The news comes after the BBC is at the centre of a Brexit row after making a screeching U-turn over hiring a presenter who had slammed the UK’s exit from the EU and Boris Johnson in tweets.

Rail strike

Guardian
The railway has long been quietly gearing up for what is being headlined as the biggest industrial battle in a generation. Now, with the weapon of a national strike ballot primed, the RMT rail union has to decide whether to pull the trigger.
Its national executive committee will discuss next steps in the coming days, after 40,000 members across Network Rail and 15 train operating companies voted overwhelmingly for action. For now, it is officially inviting more talks with train operating companies – a slightly perplexing stance for some in the industry, who said the RMT had jumped the gun before pay discussions had begun.
Nonetheless, many expect the first in what is likely to be a series of 24-hour stoppages to be called for late June. At an estimated daily cost of £30m, that will prove, as transport secretary Grant Shapps warned, damaging to an industry very much in recovery mode, but not necessarily a full-blown logistical crisis for the country, as some have suggested.

Russia

Express
VLADIMIR Putin is coming under pressure from Russians to end his bloody war in Ukraine with a politician demanding the Kremlin “immediately withdraw” its troops.
Leonid Vasyukevich, a communist lawmaker from the Khabarovsky Krai in the far east of Siberia urged Putin to end the conflict in Ukraine. He said: “During a military operation, people become disabled. These are young people who could be of great use to our country.” The local deputy added: “We demand an immediate withdrawal of the Russian troops.”
His appeal was backed by lawmaker Leonid Vasyukevich, who warned: “If our country does not halt the military operation then there will be even more orphans in our country.” Their remarks followed the surprising condemnation of the war by Boris Bondarev, a career diplomat posted to the Russian mission to the UN in Geneva, on Wednesday. Through a letter in which he wrote he was “ashamed” of his country and called the invasion a “disaster”, he became the highest-level Russian diplomat to denounce Moscow’s assaults.

Star
Russian despot Vladimir Putin may already be dead, British intelligence chiefs believe.
Senior MI6 bosses say the Russian president has been seriously ill and that if he had died, his cronies would hush it up to keep power for as long as possible.
A source told the Daily Star Sunday that Putin’s recent media appearances had very probably been pre-recorded.
A body double may also have been used at public events, like the Moscow Victory Day Parade earlier this month.
One intelligence source said: “Putin is very ill and when he dies his death will be kept secret for weeks, if not months.
“There is also the possibility that he is already dead. It’s impossible to know. It is believed that Putin has employed body doubles in the past when he has been unwell and the Kremlin could be doing so now.

Sun
OFFICIALS in Ukraine believe they will identify more than 100,000 cases of war crimes by Russian forces — with some of the horrific stories told for the first time today.
Ukraine’s chief prosecutor Iryna Venediktova says her team is already investigating nearly 14,000 cases.
But the true number committed by Vladimir Putin’s troops is expected to top 100,000 based on estimations from what has come to light in the first three months of the bloody conflict, says a source in her office.
Prosecutors there are already building war crimes cases but expect the process to last months owing to the scale of the horrors that are being uncovered already.

Guardian
Ukraine is in a race against time to save the eastern Donbas region as relentless Russian artillery and air strikes threaten to turn the tide of the war, and support for Kyiv’s continued defiance among some west European allies appears to be slipping.
Ukrainian officials say they urgently need advanced US-made mobile multiple launch rocket systems (MLRS) to halt Russian advances in Luhansk and Donetsk. The rockets would be capable of striking Russian firing positions, military bases, air strips and supply lines at a range of up to 300km (185 miles).
“We are in great need of weapons that will make it possible to engage the enemy over a long distance,” Ukraine’s commander-in-chief, General Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, said. “The price of delay is measured by the lives of people who have protected the world from [Russian] fascism.”

Sun
HORROR footage allegedly shows Russia is using killer flesh-melting thermite bombs that can burn through flesh down to the bone.
The terrifying video appears to show the night sky lit up by a chilling rain of sparkling, burning thermite, a killer chemical mixture.
The thermite was reportedly being fired by Russian Grad launchers using 9M22S incendiary rockets.
The clip, shared by various respected journalists in Ukraine, appears to have been filmed by a soldier in the National Guard unit in Donbas.
Journalist Euan MacDonald shared the footage and said in the caption: “Ukraine’s troops are facing some of the most savage, barbarous weapons ever devised.

Mirror
Footage captures Russia today testing its new 6,670 mph Zircon – or Tsirkon – missile which can hit targets some 600 miles away.
Vladimir Putin, 69, has poured money into developing new nuclear-cable missiles which – he claims – are “unstoppable” by Western air defences.
Deliveries of the Zircon are due within weeks in Russia, which fired the missile from the Admiral Gorshkov frigate in the Barents Sea and hit a target at a range of 625 miles in the White Sea.
A statement from the Russian defence ministry said: “According to objective control data, the Zircon hypersonic cruise missile successfully hit a sea target located at a distance of about 1,000 km.
“The flight of the hypersonic missile corresponded to the specified parameters.”

Metro
Russia has successfully carried out a test-fire of a hypersonic Zircon cruise missile, the defence ministry has said.
Dramatic footage of the test, which took place today, shows the weapon being blasted into the air from the Admiral Gorshkov frigate in the Barents Sea.
The missile, which is capable of travelling at speeds of 6,670 mph reportedly struck its intended target in the White Sea some 625 miles away.
In a statement, the Russian defence ministry said: ‘According to objective control data, the Zircon hypersonic cruise missile successfully hit a sea target located at a distance of about 1,000 km.

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