‘If someone had pulled the trigger’: MPs rue lack of challenger to oust Starmer

The most dangerous moment of Keir Starmer’s premiership came just after lunchtime on Wednesday, when mutiny was the talk of the Commons tea room.Anger is widespread across Labour – but it was at its most palpable among the party’s new MPs, as the Conservatives used a humble address to force the disclosure of the vetting documents and communications linked to Peter Mandelson, disgraced by his close association with Jeffrey Epstein.“At about 2pm yesterday, if someone had pulled the trigger, we would have moved,” one 2024 intake MP said on Thursday. “No one dared. I think that says a lot

Former Tory head of London council appointed Reform leader in Wales

Dan Thomas, a former Conservative leader of Barnet council, has been announced by Nigel Farage as Reform UK’s leader in Wales, three months before Senedd elections in which the hard-right party could win the most seats in the country.Farage received a standing ovation before he introduced Thomas at a sold-out rally at the International Convention Centre Wales, near Newport, on Thursday morning. Journalists were jeered and booed during the media conference.Thomas led Barnet council between 2019 and 2022, when the north London council was seized by Labour, and defected to Farage’s Reform party last summer. He stood down in December as a councillor for Finchley Church End – long synonymous with Margaret Thatcher – to move back to his south Wales valleys home town, Blackwood

Minister defends long delays to UK military spending plan

A government minister has defended long delays to a military spending plan that are also stalling the UK’s next-generation Tempest fighter jet programme, but refused to say when it will be complete.The defence investment plan (DIP), originally expected last autumn, has faced repeated postponements amid warnings that the military faces a £28bn funding gap over the next four years.Luke Pollard, the minister for defence readiness and industry, told the Guardian the plan is “a bigger task than many people outside defence realise”.It will mean “fundamentally changing the shape of our armed forces, so pivoting, in particular, towards more autonomy”, he said, while also stressing the need to refill military stockpiles sent to Ukraine in recent years. “It is not a simple matter of just replacing tank A with tank B

Mandelson sought Epstein’s help in hunt for lucrative roles at Glencore and BP

Peter Mandelson began seeking advice from the convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein on how to land “highly paid” senior roles with companies including BP and Glencore within days of Labour’s 2010 electoral defeat, emails show.A flurry of messages, sent in the weeks and months following the collapse of the New Labour project, reveal how Epstein mentored Mandelson as the former cabinet minister touted himself for lucrative jobs at global businesses.The emails. released by the US justice department among 3m pages of files on Epstein, lay bare the money-spinning opportunities available to departing ministers.In particular, they reveal Mandelson’s dogged pursuit of a job with the global mining firm Glencore, which became known as the “billionaire factory” thanks to the huge rewards on offer to senior staff from its $60bn stock market float in 2011

Nigel Farage’s two-day trip to Davos cost more than £50,000, documents reveal

Nigel Farage’s two-day trip to Davos cost more than £50,000 after he was given two guest passes by an Iranian-born billionaire, documents show.The Reform UK leader officially declared his attendance at the conference on the register of MPs’ interests, after giving speeches at the Switzerland summit in which he pledged to “put the global elites on notice”.Despite previously having dismissed the World Economic Forum as a jaunt for “globalists”, Farage also accepted £1,100 of luxury hotel accommodation from the conference organisers.The Guardian revealed last month that Farage had his trip to Davos paid for by Sasan Ghandehari, which the Reform UK leader refused to confirm at the time. He was registered at the forum under the banner of HP Trust, which is the family office of Ghandehari and describes itself as having a portfolio value in excess of $10bn (£7

Nigel Farage made ‘non-apology’, says school contemporary who accused him of racism

Nigel Farage has been accused of making a “non-apology” by a school contemporary who accused him of racist and antisemitic behaviour, after saying he was “sorry” if he had “genuinely” hurt anyone.For the first time since the row broke after a Guardian investigation, the Reform UK party leader appeared to indicate some remorse for the impact of his alleged behaviour while at Dulwich college, a private school in south London.“I think there are two people who said they were hurt, and if they genuinely were, then that’s a pity, and I’m sorry,” Farage said in an interview with the BBC. “But never, ever did I intend to hurt anybody. Never have