Nigel Farage defends allowing US chlorinated chicken into UK as part of trade deal

Nigel Farage has defended allowing labelled chlorinated chicken from the US into the UK as part of a trade deal, as a poll suggested his Reform UK party could be on course to take the highest number of seats at a general election.Speaking before the local elections in England on 1 May, Farage said British consumers already ate chicken from places such as Thailand reared in poor conditions, and accepted chlorine-washed lettuce.He told the Sunday Times: “If you have a look at the chicken we are currently importing from Thailand, you look at the conditions they’ve been reared in, and that every single bag of pre-made salad in every single supermarket has been chlorinated … once those basics have been accepted I’ll have a debate with you.”Asked how he would prevent British chicken farmers being undercut by cheap producers from the US, he said: “I want to promote British farming as being a high-end product. I think the growth of farmers’ markets, they are a much more discerning audience that wants to know where their meat comes from

Two-party politics is dying in Britain. Voters want more than just Labour and Tories | Robert Ford

A byelection in a normally safe Labour seat was Keir Starmer’s first big electoral test as Labour leader. A similar scenario now provides his first test as prime minister. The loss of Hartlepool to Boris Johnson’s Conservatives in 2021 provoked the biggest crisis of Starmer’s time as opposition leader, forcing sweeping changes in personnel and approach. The loss of Runcorn and Helsby to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK could be similarly bruising. Labour ought to start as favourites, having won this socially mixed marginal corner of Cheshire by a massive margin less than a year ago

Tories and Reform use the steel crisis to knock clean energy. They’re wrong: it will secure all our futures| Ed Miliband

The world feels more uncertain and unpredictable just now than at any time in my political lifetime. For Britain – in our values, our approach and our consistency – we owe it to today’s and future generations to be the port in the storm. Nowhere is that more true than on energy and climate. The decisions we take today will shape not just the years ahead but the generations ahead.That is why it is so important that Keir Starmer set out more than three years ago his mission for Britain to become a clean energy superpower

Cutting business ties with China would be ‘foolish’, Reeves says amid reports of US pressure

Rachel Reeves has dismissed the idea of economically disengaging from China, amid concerns the US may put pressure on the UK to limit its deals with Beijing.The chancellor, who will discuss a trade deal with the US on a trip to Washington next week, said it would be “very foolish” for Britain to have less involvement with Xi Jinping’s administration.The Wall Street Journal reported this week that US officials would attempt to use trade deals and tariff discussions to economically isolate China.Keir Starmer spoke to Donald Trump on Friday about the “ongoing and productive discussions” over a trade deal. It was the first conversation between the British prime minister and the US president since the imposition of 10% tariffs by Washington

Labour MPs urge Starmer to ‘get out there’ with Trump-style media strategy

Senior Labour figures are urging Keir Starmer to take a leaf out of Donald Trump’s book and make more frequent media appearances in an attempt to dominate the political agenda as the US president does.MPs told the Guardian they want the prime minister to act more like Trump, who has upended political convention by televising large parts of his cabinet, holding long bilateral meetings on camera and calling in to live television shows.The strategy is very different from that employed by the prime minister, who has said he wants politics to intrude less in people’s lives, and sometimes goes several days without doing a public appearance.Some in his party believe that Starmer’s safety-first approach to media is ill-suited to modern politics, where the news agenda moves rapidly and traditional outlets have less power than ever.One minister said: “Trump and [the vice-president] JD Vance have shown the advantage of getting out there and not worrying about making mistakes

‘We need to get back to British’: concern over immigration in Doncaster before local elections

“You can’t fix the system with the same hands that broke it,” Richie Vallance shouted through a megaphone from his mobility scooter. “Let’s make Doncaster Doncaster again,” he yelled at passersby in the city centre, who mostly politely ignored him.Vallance is standing as an independent candidate for mayor in the local elections on 1 May, when all 55 seats on the city’s council will also be up for grabs. The small South Yorkshire city is a key battleground that will be a test of Labour’s resilience in the face of rising public support for Reform UK.Nigel Farage’s party is surging ahead in the polls and in Doncaster there is a good chance it will wrestle control from Labour, which has been in power for nearly 50 years