Labour lost white working-class voters to Greens in Gorton and Denton, party analysis finds

Labour lost significant numbers of white working-class voters to the Greens in Gorton and Denton, the party’s postmortem has concluded, after it came third in the Greater Manchester byelection last month.The Greens won the byelection, with Reform in second place.Labour’s deputy leader, Lucy Powell, told activists and members it was a warning the party could lose voters on its left flank who went far beyond the stereotype of progressive young professionals and those from Muslim communities.High numbers of voters broke for the Greens in the final hours before polling closed, the party’s analysis has found, with some conflicted until they reached the ballot box about which party was better placed to stop Reform.Powell was expected to present the findings to Labour’s national executive committee on Tuesday but told activists and members in a call over the weekend that people had repeatedly said they needed a “reason” to vote Labour

Reform UK suspends mayoral candidate over comments on Jewish group

Reform UK has suspended one of its key mayoral candidates after he described members of a Jewish neighbourhood watch group as “cosplayers” and likened them to “Islamists on horseback”.Chris Parry, who had remained the mayoral candidate for Hampshire despite a previous controversy in which he said David Lammy should “go home” to the Caribbean, made the latest comments on Monday about Shomrim, a volunteer group that safeguards communities including Orthodox Jewish families.The former rear admiral was condemned for comments made when he retweeted a post on X by Catherine Blaiklock, a co-founder of the Brexit party, hours after news emerged of an arson attack on ambulances run by a Jewish charity in London.“Can Christian’s [sic] in Britain set up their own police and patrol certain neighbourhoods?” said Blaiklock, who posted a picture of a number of Shomrim vehicles.Parry shared the post, adding: “Remember that these cosplayers have no more jurisdiction or legal authority than ordinary citizens

UK defence firms ‘bleeding cash’ as delayed spending plan leaves industry in ‘paralysis’

Defence manufacturers are going bust while others have been left in “paralysis” and “bleeding cash” as they wait for a long-delayed UK military spending plan for the next decade, MPs have heard.Industry groups said a more than six-month delay to the defence investment plan (DIP) had also left the UK behind Germany and the US in attracting cash from global investors.“The ecosystem is not in a great place, it’s what I would call paralysis,” said Samira Braund, the defence director of the ADS Group trade body, speaking to the defence select committee on Tuesday. “I don’t think that [the government] have put effective mitigation plans in place at all.”The DIP, originally expected last autumn, has been repeatedly postponed amid warnings that the military faces a £28bn funding gap over the next four years

Rachel Reeves rules out universal support on energy bills

Rachel Reeves has ruled out universal support to deal with any future rise in energy bills, saying any government help would be targeted, and criticised the support offered by Liz Truss’s government as unaffordable and irresponsible.The chancellor also said she would review the planned fuel duty rise in September, but did not commit to delaying or postponing it.She said contingency planning was taking place for an expected rise in energy bills but the focus was on longer-term measures to bring down bills for all, and targeted support for the poorest households.“The previous government pushed up borrowing, interest rates, inflation and mortgage costs with an unfunded, untargeted package of support under Liz Truss. That gave the support to the wealthiest of households,” Reeves said

Ed Davey accuses Reform UK and Tories of importing ‘Trump-style divisive politics’

Ed Davey has accused Reform UK and the Conservatives of importing “Trump-style divisive politics” as he launched the Liberal Democrats’ 7 May local elections campaign, promising the party would focus on “fixing things for your community”.He also raised concerns that energy bill support being considered by the UK government would not include people on middle incomes who he said were being “hammered” by price rises caused by the war on Iran.Davey’s party is hoping to build on its success last year when it beat the Conservatives into third place by winning more than 160 new seats, which were taken almost entirely at their expense.Lib Dem candidates are to focus on tested issues, including cleaning up local rivers polluted by sewage. The other two main planks of their platform for the 7 May election are on improving local health services and cutting energy bills

Exhibition to tell story of Punjabi princess and pioneering suffragette Sophia Duleep Singh

The extraordinary life of an exiled Punjabi princess, embraced by the British royal court and a goddaughter of Queen Victoria, but who would become a pioneering suffragette and challenge the very authority of the elite social circles in which she moved, is to be told in a new exhibition.Princess Sophia Duleep Singh was the daughter of Duleep Singh, the last Sikh maharajah of the Punjab. As a child he was forced to surrender his lands to the East India Company in 1849, and sign away the famous Koh-i-noor diamond, now a potent symbol of colonial exploitation and set in the crown of the late Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother.He came to England, where he struck up a close friendship with Queen Victoria, and later married the daughter of a German banker and an enslaved Ethiopian woman, with their children growing up at Elveden Hall in Suffolk as aristocrats.The powerful story of Sophia and the five women who shaped her life – her sisters Catherine and Bamba, her mother Bamba Muller, grandmother Jind Kaur and godmother Queen Victoria – is the subject of The Last Princesses of Punjab which opens at Kensington Palace on 26 March running until November

Starmer’s liaison committee jaunt was largely soporific – just as he’d wanted | John Crace

What a difference a week makes. At last week’s prime minister’s questions, Keir Starmer tried to persuade us he knew less than he did. His memory was so bad that he could barely remember who Peter Mandelson was, let alone why he had appointed him as ambassador to the US. Fast forward to Monday’s appearance before the liaison committee, the supergroup of select committee chairs, and Keir was desperate to convince us he knew more than he did. He had the inside track on Iran

Keir Starmer signals winter support for household bills amid energy price shock

Ministers are looking at providing support for household bills next winter, Keir Starmer said, as he suggested the energy price shock unleashed by the Iran conflict could continue for months to come.The prime minister indicated he would prefer to focus any taxpayer-funded help on the poorest households, rather than an expensive universal bailout, ahead of an emergency meeting on the economic fallout of the Middle East crisis.Addressing the Commons liaison committee on Monday, he said there would not necessarily be a “quick and early end” to the conflict, despite Donald Trump postponing US strikes on Iranian power plants.Starmer promised to look at “every lever that’s available” to help people cope with the cost of living impact, with ministers understood to be discussing contingency plans at the Cobra meeting, which will be attended by the governor of the Bank of England.“We’re looking across the board at what can be done, whether it’s cost of living or the support we need to put in

Starmer says he is ‘unapologetic’ about his focus on national interest when asked how he deals with ‘rude’ Trump – as it happened

Meg Hillier ended the liaison committee hearing by pointing out to Starmer that it must be challenging dealing with Donald Trump, who could be “quite rude” about the UK one day, and different the next day. It must be like dealing with different presidents, she said. She asked him if he had a message for the country about how he coped with this.Starmer replies:double quotation markYes, I’m utterly focused on what’s what’s in the best interests of our country, and I’m unapologetic about that.And notwithstanding the pressure that comes from elsewhere, I will remain laser-focused on what is in the British national interest