UK politics: Send children’s legal rights to extra support will be protected, says education secretary – as it happened

Trott also asked Phillipson to confirm that no child would lose extra support they are currently getting through an EHCP as a result of the reforms to Send provision the government is planning to announce in the autumn.In response Phillipson said:This government will make sure that all of our children get the best start in life, including children with Send, and that is why, through the school white paper later on this year, we will ensure that all of our children, including those with Send, get better outcomes than they have at the moment.But many opposition MPs continued to press her on this, and Phillipson subsequently gave slightly firmer assurances – but without saying that EHCPs will survive in their current form.In response to Robbie Moore (Con), who asked for an assurance that children in mainstream education would not lose the “precious legal protections” they get through an ECHC, Phillipson replied:Isn’t it fascinating how many members opposite suddenly have a keen interest in support for children with Send.And he blithely says “whatever the challenges” of the Send system

Reform UK to introduce less stringent ‘common sense’ vetting system for candidates

Reform UK has told its members it is introducing a less stringent “common sense” vetting system for would-be candidates after complaints the previous checks were too strict, despite a recent series of controversies linked to the party.In a message sent to members and also posted by a regional party branch, Nigel Farage’s party said the updated vetting was “more proportionate than before and designed to strike the right balance between party reputation, individual freedom of expression and public confidence”.This new system would be seen as “a blank slate”, said the message to members, seen by the Guardian, adding: “If you have previously failed vetting, you are strongly encouraged to reapply under the new standards.”Under the earlier regime, touted by Farage as the most rigorous vetting system by any major party, “in some cases our standards and communication fell short of the mark”, the message said, adding: “We’ve listened, reflected and acted.”A message posted to Facebook by Reform’s East Thanet branch in Kent indicated one reason for the change was a need to generate enough candidates

Tony Blair thinktank worked with project developing ‘Trump Riviera’ Gaza plan

Tony Blair’s thinktank worked with a project developing a postwar Gaza plan that included the creation of a “Trump Riviera” and a manufacturing zone named after Elon Musk.The project, led by Israeli business people and using financial models developed by the US consulting firm Boston Consulting Group (BCG), was developed against the backdrop of Donald Trump’s vision of taking over the Palestinian territory and transforming it into a resort.While the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change (TBI) said it was not involved in the authorship of the plan, two staff took part in calls as the project evolved.The staff also took part in a message group used for the project, along with figures from BCG and the Israeli business people, while a TBI document titled “Gaza Economic Blueprint” was shared within it, the Financial Times reported.The report prompted an angry reaction from the institute, which Blair set up after he left Downing Street

‘We need real change, not fiddling at the edges’: voters on Labour’s first year

For Aiden Robertson, a 35-year-old consultant from Burnley, Labour’s first year back in government can only be summed up as “incredibly disappointing”.The year had been marked, he felt, by “dreadful communication, a lack of clear purpose, zero vision”, while Labour had been “pandering to Reform voters who will never back them”.“This just feels like continuity Tories. As a man who has voted Labour at every single election since 2010, this is the first time where I now feel I can no longer support them.”Robertson was among hundreds of people who shared their verdict of Keir Starmer’s first year in No 10 with the Guardian

Lord Lipsey obituary

David Lipsey, who has died aged 77, was a significant and influential Labour party adviser, a political journalist and then a member of the House of Lords for 25 years. Early in his professional life he recognised that despite a passionate interest in politics and public affairs, he had no wish to become an MP. He was thus that rare creature who wanted to improve the lives of others without being necessarily bothered about advancing his own career.He became nevertheless one of the best connected Labour figures of his generation, and gravitated from being a speechwriter in Whitehall and Downing Street – where he wrote the party’s manifesto for the 1979 general election – to a hugely successful career in old Fleet Street, before then being appointed to the Lords, as one of “Tony’s cronies”, by Blair in 1999. Like his first mentor, the former foreign secretary, Anthony Crosland, he was a radical egalitarian, and always tried to put what he believed to be the best thing to do above any ideological consideration

This is a party I’m looking forward to | Brief letters

A new party focused on poverty, inequality and “a foreign policy based on peace rather than war” (Report, 3 July). Oh Jeremy Corbyn, sign me up now. If you build it, we will come.David HeleyBrighton, East Sussex When I did a politics course back in the 1970s, the lecturer told us that a large majority was just as difficult, and often more so, to handle than a small one (Welfare climbdown lets genie out of the bottle, and no one knows what happens next, 2 July). How right he was