Developers met ministers dozens of times over planning bill while ecologists were shut out

The scale of lobbying of ministers by developers on Labour’s landmark planning changes, which seek to rip up environmental rules to boost growth, can be exposed as campaigners make last-ditch attempts to secure protections for nature.The government published its planning and infrastructure bill in March. Before and after the bill’s publication the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, and housing minister Matthew Pennycook have met dozens of developers in numerous meetings. The body representing professional ecologists, meanwhile, has not met one minister despite requests to do so.The government’s planning bill will reach its final stages before it is given royal assent in the coming days, after months of tussling between ministers, nature groups and ecologists

Plant importers say border delays in Kent could drive up prices and stop deliveries from EU

Importers of plants say long delays and damage to shipments at a Kent border control post risk driving up prices and could lead to transport companies stopping deliveries across the Channel.Traders have reported long waits in recent weeks at the government’s Sevington facility off the M20 near Ashford, which was built to check goods of plant and animal origin arriving from the EU. One importer said delays were adding £200 of costs to each load.There are also warnings that trees and shrubs are repeatedly being damaged when unloaded and reloaded on to lorries during the inspection process.Since Brexit, deliveries of animal and plant products between Britain and the EU have required paperwork and been subject to stringent inspections at the border as a part of sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) controls

Cutting aid for disease fund would be moral failure, Labour MPs tell Starmer

A group of seven Labour MPs who served as ministers under Keir Starmer have written to the prime minister warning that an expected cut to UK funding for aid to combat preventable diseases would be both a “moral failure” and a strategic disaster.With ministers and officials expected to decide the UK’s contribution to the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria within days, the letter renews pressure on Starmer to pull back from an expected 20% cut.Dozens of other Labour MPs have already expressed alarm at the idea of the UK slashing its contribution to the Global Fund, especially as this would be announced on the sidelines of next month’s G20 summit in South Africa, which Starmer is attending.There is wider concern about Starmer’s apparent reluctance to involve the UK in development projects, with his government deciding on the eve of the Cop30 climate summit to not contribute to a fund for the world’s remaining tropical forests.Aid groups have said that if the UK contribution to the Global Fund for 2027-29 is cut from £1bn to £800m, as has been discussed by senior government officials, it would badly hamper the work of one of the most cost-effective aid programmes of modern times, and could cause up to 340,000 avoidable deaths

A rats to riches story: Larry the Downing Street cat finds place in TV spotlight

He’s on his sixth prime minister, has watched presidents and princes walk through the black door of No 10, and will soon become the longest continuous resident of Downing Street since Pitt the Younger.The landscape of British politics has changed a lot in the past 15 years, but Larry the cat has remained a reassuring constant. Now his enduring popularity – the like of which some of his temporary owners would kill for – is to feature in a new Channel 4 documentary series presented by David Baddiel, ‘David Baddiel: Cat Man’, exploring Britain’s love of cats. For Larry’s fans, the spotlight has been a long time coming.“Larry’s totally the guy to meet in No 10,” one Westminster source said, adding that – as police officers stationed outside the entry of No 10 who regularly open the door for him will attest – he “has the run of the house”

Remaining four ‘rebel’ Labour MPs have whip restored

Four Labour MPs who lost the party whip in July for being “persistent rebels” have had the sanction removed, the last of a series of penalised backbenchers to be allowed back into the fold.Neil Duncan-Jordan, Chris Hinchliff, Brian Leishman and Rachael Maskell spoke to the party’s chief whip, Jonathan Reynolds, and were allowed to hold the whip again after a review of how they had behaved since the suspension, it is understood.The decision to strip the four of the whip came as a surprise and dismayed a number of their colleagues, who saw it as a heavy-handed attempt by Keir Starmer’s Downing Street operation to impose discipline following a humiliating government climbdown on welfare reform the month before.All four MPs had been openly critical of several government policies. Maskell, the York Central MP, and Duncan-Jordan, who represents Poole, had spearheaded opposition to the cut to the winter fuel allowance and welfare reforms

Boris Johnson trying to undermine BBC leadership, insiders fear after leak

Boris Johnson and figures linked to him are engaging in an effort to undermine the BBC’s leadership, insiders fear, after the leaking of a memo criticising its reporting of Donald Trump, trans rights and Gaza.Tim Davie, the BBC’s director general, and other senior editorial staff are under pressure after the criticisms made in the document by Michael Prescott, a former independent external adviser to its editorial guidelines and standards committee (EGSC).Parliament’s culture, media and sport committee has demanded to know the BBC’s response to the memo, setting Monday as a deadline. The BBC’s board is compiling its response.However, insiders believe the leaking of the memo to the Daily Telegraph and the criticisms that have followed from Johnson are part of a concerted attempt to undermine the organisation, which is heading into crucial talks with the government over the renewal of its charter