Who is Al Carns? Former Marine and Labour minister with sights on leadership

A former special forces colonel, government minister Al Carns was this week on manouevres warning that the UK needs to be preparing for war with Russia.“The shadow of war is knocking on Europe’s door once more. That’s the reality. We’ve got to be prepared to deter it,” he said, in comments that go beyond previous warnings by his boss, the defence secretary, John Healey.“Collectively, everybody – what is their role if we get caught in an existential crisis, and what do they need to be aware they need to do and what they can’t do, and how do we mobilise the nation to support a military endeavour?”It was stark language from the 45-year-old Scottish-born MP, who has had an exceptionally swift rise to his role of armed forces minister

Starmer to pick new US ambassador as relations with Trump tested

Keir Starmer is poised to choose a new ambassador to Washington from a shortlist of three as relations with the US are tested over Ukraine and Donald Trump’s attacks on European leaders.The prime minister held interviews with three finalists for the role this week, the Guardian has learned, with Downing Street preparing to make an appointment before the end of the year.The trio of candidates seen by Starmer were Varun Chandra, his business adviser who has helped negotiate a series of deals with the Trump administration, Christian Turner, a diplomat due to become ambassador to the UN, and Nigel Casey, the British ambassador to Russia.Whoever is chosen will be taking up the role at a critical stage in US-UK relations, with insiders warning of rising tensions over Ukraine and the White House’s pugnacious national security strategy.Chandra, a former managing partner at the corporate intelligence firm Hakluyt, has played a central role in negotiating bilateral deals with the US on trade, tech and pharmaceuticals and is seen as the frontrunner

Infighting, broken promises and insisting on the national anthem: what seven months of Reform UK in charge actually looks like

Nigel Farage’s party is gunning for power – so what is it like in the places where they’ve already got it? We embedded with Lancashire county council to find out what happens when rhetoric meets reality22 May 2025: a new dawn for Lancashire. Outside Preston’s grand old county hall, 53 brand new Reform UK councillors in turquoise ties – and one petite woman with an enormous turquoise hair bow – are hot-footing it past a gaggle of protesters for their first full council meeting. Most keep their heads down and get into the building as quickly as possible. But Joel Tetlow, a first-time politician who has made a few unfortunate headlines before even taking his seat, is intrigued. He stands in the doorway, vaping, as a demonstrator bellows: “Reform is a far right party and Nigel Farage is a racist and a fascist!”Tetlow – late 40s with a full head of vertiginous hair, wearing a powder-blue three-piece suit – insists he isn’t bothered

Government’s process behind tackling violence against women ‘worse than under the Tories’

Leading organisations have criticised the development of the government’s flagship violence against women and girls strategy, calling the process chaotic, haphazard and “worse than under the Tories”.Ministers are gearing up for a policy announcement blitz before the publication of the long-awaited plan next week.Important voices in the violence against women and girls (VAWG) sector have privately accused ministers of sidelining first-hand expertise and expressed concern that the strategy will not be sufficiently radical to achieve the government’s flagship manifesto promise to halve the rate of VAWG in the UK in a decade.Initially expected in spring, the VAWG strategy was delayed until summer and then autumn.On Friday it emerged that schoolboys would be the target of the strategy, which the BBC reported would be built around the pillars of preventing radicalisation of young men, stopping abusers and supporting victims

Reform UK claims it has overtaken Labour as Britain’s largest party

Reform UK says it is now the largest political party in Britain and has overtaken Labour, which has reportedly seen its membership fall below 250,000.Nigel Farage’s party says it has more than 268,000 members on the live tracker displayed on its website.Farage said: “As we have suspected for some time, Reform has overtaken Labour to become the largest political party in British politics – a huge milestone on our journey to win the next election. The age of two-party politics is dead.”Meanwhile, the Times reported that, according to internal figures, the Labour party’s paid-up membership had fallen below 250,000

‘There’s been a Badenoch bounce’: is the Tory leader finally cutting through?

At a Conservative donors event last week, Kemi Badenoch was asked for a selfie by the former Spice Girl Geri Horner. The Tory leader was, her allies say, a little bemused. But they were clear about what the approach meant: cut-through.Badenoch’s leadership got off to a poor start. Still reeling from the Tories’ worst general election defeat, she took over a diminished and disheartened party, which was languishing in the polls and facing an existential threat in the form of Nigel Farage’s Reform UK