During the Q&A after her speech Kemi Badenoch would not commit to reversing the rise in employers’ national insurance in the budget.Asked if she would give such a commitment, Badenoch said that, if a tax increase is not raising money, the Tories would reverse it.“One of the things that we’re going to have to do is rewire everything,” she said.But she said she would not “comment on every bit of micro-policy” now.However, she did say the fact so many firms are complaining about the tax, and saying that it will make employing people on low wages unaffordable, meant that the government should “look again” at the plan.

And that would be something the Tories would look at when they started work on their policy platform, she said,UPDATE: Badenoch said:Where we can see that a change that has been brought in in the budget,,,will not raise any money, we will change that.

What I’m not going to do is comment on every bit of micro-policy.There will be different budgets, there will be new things that occur, the system may change.What I am starting with is principles, we believe that employer’s national insurance, while necessary to help us fund public services, is a tax on jobs.The fact that so many organisations – especially those that have people who are on the lowest wages – are saying that this is becoming unaffordable means that we should look again, and that’s one of the first things that we’re going to be doing when we start our policy platform.Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, has refused commit to reversing the rise in employers’ national insurance in the budget.

(See 2.13pm.) Responding to her comment at a CBI conference, Labour said this meant the Tories were now implicitly accepting the need for the tax increases announced by the government.(See 3.06pm.

)Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, has told the CBI that she is ruling out a further rise to overall public spending and that “public services now need to live within the envelope that we’ve set”.(See 4.46pm.)Rupert Soames, the CBI chair, has accused the government of treating employers as a “cash cow” in last month’s budget, and urged ministers to water down plans for workers’ rights.Steve Reed, the environment secretary, has said the UK’s flood defences are in the “worst condition on record” and promised the new Labour government has committed £2.

4bn to upgrade them,There is more coverage on our Storm Bert live blog,Keir Starmer is under renewed pressure over electoral reform after dozens of newly elected Labour MPs signed up to a parliamentary group calling for the UK to move to a proportional voting system,Scottish Labour will force a vote designed to re-design the Scottish government’s winter fuel payments, despite them being cut because of a decision by the UK government, PA Media reports,PA says:Within weeks of taking office, chancellor Rachel Reeves set off a political firestorm by announcing the winter fuel payment would be means-tested, cutting spending and ultimately scuppering the Scottish government’s plan to offer its own universal counterpart.

But last week, Scottish Labour announced it would bring in re-designed payments, which would lower the bar for those who would receive them if it won the 2026 Holyrood election,And today the party announced it would seek to bring the payments back by forcing a vote in Holyrood during stage three of the social security (amendment) (Scotland) bill,Amendments submitted by the party would require ministers to make regulations that would make all pensioners eligible for winter heating assistance, while also allowing for any payments made to be recovered if the recipient’s household income exceeds an amount set by ministers,Currently, winter heating assistance – as described in the Social Security (Scotland) Act 2018 which the current bill is designed to amend – is “assistance (which may or may not take the form of money) given by the Scottish ministers under section 24 to an individual to meet, or help towards meeting, the individual’s heating costs during the winter months”,The amendments would appear to make changes to the devolved benefit the Scottish government pushed back until next year after the chancellor’s announcement.

Commenting on the move, the Scottish government’s social justice secretary, Shirley-Anne Somerville, said:This is hypocrisy on stilts from Labour.After betraying millions of pensioners by taking away their winter fuel payment, they now expect people to believe that they can be trusted to stand up for pensioners.Hamish Falconer, a Foreign Office minister, has said that if Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli PM, were to visit the UK, a court would ultimately decide if he should be arrested because of the international criminal court warrant against him over alleged war crimes in Gaza.Falconer was responding to an urgent question from Priti Patel, the shadow foreign secretary, who has strongly criticised the ICC’s decision.(See 1.

13pm,)Explaining what would happen, Falconer said:In line with this government’s stated commitment to the rule of law, we respect the independence of the ICC,We will comply with our international obligations,There is a domestic legal process through our independent courts that determines whether or not to endorse an arrest warrant by the ICC, in accordance with the ICC Act of 2001,This process has never been tested because the UK has never been visited by an ICC indictee, if there were to be such a visit to the UK, there would be a court process and due process would be followed in relation to those issues.

There is no moral equivalence between Israel, a democracy, and Hamas and Lebanese Hezbollah, two terrorist organisations.This government has been clear, Israel has a right to defend itself in accordance with international law, that right is not under question, and the court’s approval of the warrants last week do not change that.Patel said the ICC “appears to be drawing a moral equivalence between Israel’s war of self-defence and Hamas terrorism” and she said the only beneficiaries of the decision were Hamas.But Falconer urged her to respect the ICC.He said:Diplomacy will continue, regardless of the process of the ICC, but I had understood it to be the common position of this house that the international rule of law is an important commitment.

The international criminal court is an important, the primary body, in enforcing these norms and the issues on jurisdiction and complementarity were heard by the pre-trial chamber, its three judges have issued their findings, and I think we should respect those.Q: What are your grounds for optimism?Reeves says she is hugely optimistic for Britain.The country has got so much going for it, she says.Government has to play a part.But businesses have to play a part too, she says.

Government has to provide stability.And she says it has to remove the barriers that are in the way of growth.As chancellor, Reeves says she has to get the whole of government thinking about how it can remove barriers holding up investment.And that’s the end of the Q&A.Reeves says public services now need to live within the envelope set.

She says departmental spending limits for beyond 2026 will be set out in the next phase of the spending review,She goes on:But what I am really sure about … [is] that public services now need to live within the envelope that we’ve set,We will not be coming back to top up those budgets,UPDATE: Reeves said:We’ll be publishing the second phase of the spending review in spring next year,But what I am really clear about, and I’ve said it already a couple of times today, [is] that public services now need to live within the envelope that we’ve set.

We will not be coming back to top up those budgets.We have set the envelope for public spending, and it’s through reform and through economic growth that we need to be able to properly fund our public services and to improve living standards for ordinary families.Q: [From ITV’s Joel Hills] A CBI survey says half of businesses might have to let people go as a result of the budget.Will you reconsider any of the measures?Reeves says she has made her decisions.She is determined to put the public finances back on a firm footing.

Overall, the budget is good for jobs and good for growth, she says.Reeves is now taking media questions.Q: [From the Telegraph] Businesses are disappointed with the budget.Haven’t you betrayed them.And are you ruling out any more big tax rises on businesses?Reeves says she faced a massive hole in the public finances.

In the last parliament people saw what happened when government did not address that.She won’t be that sort of chancellor, she says.She goes on:Public services now need to live within their means, because I’m really clear, I’m not coming back with more borrowing or more taxes …At this budget, we did wipe the slate team to put public finances and public services on footing, and as a result, we won’t have to do a budget like this ever again.And indeed, unlike the last government, I will only be doing one budget a year, so that this government can focus on what our number one priority is, and that’s growing the economy.Reeves says she had to “wipe the slate clean” with the budget.

But she says she will not need to deliver another budget with tax rises like that again,You can be confident we’re not going to have to come back again and do another budget like this,So you can be confident about the tax rates we’ve set for this parliament, and public services now, these are within the means that we’ve set,Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, tells the CBI that “everybody knows that that inheritance [at the time of the budget] was pretty dire in terms of the back hole in the public finances”,In line with the advance briefing, she says her critics have not been able to come up with alternative proposals.

Q: How will people know if your plans are working?Reeves says she will be judged on whether the economy grows,And that will only happen if investment starts to happen, she says,I want you to judge this government on our number one mission, which is to bring growth back to the UK economy,We can’t do that overnight … But over this parliament, we going to return investment, we’re going to return growth to the economy, because, in the end, that’s the only way to ensure that Britain is competitive and to ensure that we pull our weight in the world to improve living standards for working people,At the CBI conference Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, has just started taking part in a Q&A.

There is a live feed here.People who stay in Wales overnight, including children, are set to be charged a visitor levy under a scheme that could raise up to £33m a year to be ploughed back into tourism and culture, Steven Morris reports.The Welsh government’s news release about the visitor accommodation (register and levy) etc.(Wales) bill is here.Commenting on the plan, Mark Drakeford, the finance secretary in the Welsh government, said:We know tourism makes an important contribution to the Welsh economy and to Welsh life.

We want to ensure its long-term sustainability,That’s why we believe it is fair visitors contribute towards local facilities, helping to fund infrastructure and services integral to their experience,Visitor levies are common around the world – benefiting local communities, tourists and businesses – and we want the same for Wales,Money raised through a levy would be retained by local authorities and reinvested back into their local areas to support local, sustainable tourism,It’s a small contribution that could make a big difference.

The government has been criticised for the quality of the reports it has produced assessing the likely consequences of its employment rights bill.A series of impact assessments (IAs) were published last month.But the regulatory policy committee (RPC), a body set up to scrutinise the quality of impact assessments, has published a report saying the work by the government for this is “not fit for purpose”.It says:The RPC has assessed eight of the 23 individual IAs as ‘not fit for purpose’ and six of these are in the ‘highest impact’ measure category in the summary IA.The overall assessment for the bill IA is therefore ‘not fit for purpose’.

Given the number and reach of the measures, it would be proportionate to undertake labour market and broader macroeconomic analysis, to understand the overall impact on employment, wages and output, and particularly, the pass-through of employer costs to employees.Commenting on the report, Andrew Griffith, the shadow business secretary, said:Labour’s impact assessment for their radical trade union charter has been rated ‘not fit for purpose’ by the government’s own regulator.But businesses up and down the country knew this already.Just like the national insurance Jobs’ Tax, this bill is the second wave of an attack on job creators.Keir Starmer is paying tribute to Prescott now.

He says Prescott was the longest-serving deputy PM ever and “a politician for working people through and through”.In many respects, Prescott was ahead of his time, Starmer says.He championed causes like tackling climate change, fighting regional inequality, supporting the minimum wage, improving public transport, and building council houses.Prescott was “a skilled negotiator, sometimes with immense and perhaps surprising sensitivity”, Starmer says.He says Prescott had a talent for bringing people together who had different points of view.

He was someone who was not in politics for himself, Starmer says,And he was someone who was a team player who would support a position in public, even if he had opposed it in private before the collective decision was taken,UPDATE: Starmer said:Make no mistake, [Prescott] did things his own way, and forged his own path, and in doing so, he brought about some of the greatest transformation this country has ever seen, the linchpin of New Labour, because beneath the pugnacious exterior, John was a skilled negotiator, sometimes with immense and perhaps surprising sensitivity,He had an incredible skill, which was the ability to bring people together from different starting points, whether that was his work on climate negotiations, or closer at home in his own party, to stand together in a better place,And that sums up another thing that the public, I think, sensed about John