General election: Rishi Sunak says reforming welfare is ‘moral mission’ as he pledges to cut rising costs of benefits
The Tories will put benefit reforms at the heart of their election campaign on Sunday as Rishi Sunak seeks to turn things around following a difficult week.
The party is promising to cut the cost of welfare to the tune of £12bn by the end of the next parliament through measures aimed at helping people back into work.
The plan includes a £700m investment in NHS mental health treatment to ensure 500,000 more people can access talking therapies by 2030.
It also includes previously announced measures, such as removing benefits for people not taking jobs after 12 months.
The number of working age people who are economically inactive has soared to record highs following the pandemic.
The trend is thought to be driven mainly by those who have taken early retirement and people with long-term health conditions waiting for treatment on the NHS.
But the Conservative Party has said the 40% increase of people out of work – from two million to 2.8 million since COVID – is unsustainable.
It claims the cost of providing benefits for working age people with health conditions could rise as high as £90bn by the end of the next parliament.
A recent study found people in their 20s are more likely to be off work with ill health than employees twice their age, with poor mental health driving the increase.
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April: What do Tories and Labour say about benefits?
The access to talking therapies is a 50% increase on the already planned expansion of 384,000 announced at the 2023 Autumn Statement.
As well this, the Tories say they will reform the disability benefits system and target it at those most in need, tightening the criteria for work capability assessments.
The plans also include passing on the responsibility for issuing sick notes from GPs to specialist work and health professionals.
The Conservatives also promise to toughen benefit sanction rules, speed up the rollout of universal credit, and clamp down on benefit fraudsters.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said: “Reforming welfare is a moral mission. Work is a source of dignity, purpose and hope and I want everyone to be able to overcome whatever barriers they might face to living independent, fulfilling lives.
“That’s why we have announced a significant increase in mental health provision, as well as changes to ensure those who can work, do work.”
The government put back to work welfare reforms at the heart of its autumn statement in November – with charities criticising them at the time for “demonising disabled people”.
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Mr Sunak has since doubled down on the pledge, recently calling for an end to “sick note culture” and saying he wants to shift the focus to “what people can do with the right support in place, rather than what they can’t do”.
The latest announcement comes after a difficult week that saw the prime minister embroiled in a row about his early exit from an international D-Day commemoration event.
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Labour, which is focusing Sunday’s campaign on prison overcrowding, criticised the “reheated pledges” from the Tories.
A spokesperson for Sir Keir Starmer’s party said: “This is the latest desperate announcement from Rishi Sunak, who has once again plucked numbers out of thin air in an attempt to disguise the fact that he has caused a spiralling benefits bill.
“These reheated pledges, old policies and vague promises will not get Britain healthy or benefits under control, and do nothing to solve the fact that £10bn of taxpayers’ money was lost to benefit fraud just last year.”
Politics
Shouts of ‘genocide’ in Commons as David Lammy denounces Israel’s ‘intolerable’ actions in Gaza
The foreign secretary has denounced Israel’s actions in Gaza as “intolerable” but stopped short of saying it had committed genocide.
MPs could be heard shouting “genocide” in the Commons chamber as David Lammy announced the government was suspending its trade negotiations with Israel and summoning Tzipi Hotovely, Israel’s ambassador to the UK, to the Foreign Office.
The UK has also sanctioned a number of individuals and groups in the West Bank which it says have been linked with acts of violence against Palestinians – including Daniella Weiss, a leading settler activist who was the subject of Louis Theroux’s recent documentary The Settlers.
Politics latest: Starmer says sorry for being ‘overly rude’ at PMQs
Israel immediately criticised the UK government actions as “regrettable” and said the free trade agreement talks, which ministers have now backed out of, were “not being advanced at all by the UK government”.
Oren Marmorstein, a spokesperson for the Israeli foreign affairs ministry, said: “If, due to anti-Israel obsession and domestic political considerations, the British government is willing to harm the British economy – that is its own prerogative.”
Mr Lammy’s intervention came in response to Israel ramping up its latest military offensive in Gaza and its decision to limit the amount of aid into the enclave.
Tom Fletcher, head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, accused Israel of “deliberately and unashamedly” imposing inhumane conditions on Palestinians by blocking aid from entering Gaza more than 10 weeks ago.
He also told the UN’s security council last week that it must “act now” to “prevent genocide” – a claim that Israel has vehemently denied.
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Aftermath of strike on Gaza school-turned-shelter
Speaking in the Commons, the foreign secretary said the threat of starvation was “hanging over hundreds of thousands of civilians” and that the 11-week blockade stopping humanitarian aid reaching Gaza was “indefensible and cruel”.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has agreed to allow a limited amount of aid into the besieged enclave in response to global concern at reports of famine.
Mr Lammy said Mr Netanyahu’s govenrment was “isolating Israel from its friends and partners around the world, undermining the interests of the Israeli people and damaging the image of the state of Israel in the eyes of the world”.
“We are now entering a dark new phase in this conflict,” Mr Lammy added.
“Netanyahu’s government is planning to drive Gazans from their homes into a corner of the strip to the south and permit them a fraction of the aid that they need.”
Referring to one of the far-right ministers in Mr Netanyahu’s government, he said Bezalel Smotrich “even spoke of Israeli forces cleansing Gaza, destroying what’s left of residents, Palestinians being relocated, he said, to third countries”.
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Surgeon compares Gaza to ‘killing fields’
MPs from across the house shouted “genocide” as Mr Lammy said: “We must call this what it is. It is extremism. It is dangerous. It is repellent. It is monstrous and I condemn it in the strongest possible terms.”
In the Commons, a number of Labour MPs urged the government to go further against Israel.
Yasmin Qureshi, the Labour MP for Bolton South and Walkden, said there needed to be a “full arms embargo” and said: “Can I ask the foreign secretary what additional steps he’s going to be taking in order to stave off this genocide?”
Another Labour MP told Sky News that while the statement was “better than previously…without a concrete timeline and a sanctioning of responsible ministers, it’s hard to know what tangible difference it will make.”
Read more:
British surgeon in Gaza says it is now ‘a slaughterhouse’
Gaza at mercy of what comes next – analysis
How Israel has escalated Gaza bombing campaign
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Israeli officials have said its plans to seize all of Gaza and hold it indefinitely. – which would move the civilian population southward – will help it achieve its aim of defeating Hamas.
Israel also believes the offensive will prevent Hamas from looting and distributing humanitarian aid, which it says strengthens the group’s rule in Gaza.
Mr Netanyahu has defended Israel’s actions in Gaza and reacted angrily to a joint statement penned by the leaders of the UK, France and Canada, in which they urged Israel to end its military offensive in Gaza and lift restrictions on humanitarian aid allowed into the enclave.
The Israeli prime minister said: “By asking Israel to end a defensive war for our survival before Hamas terrorists on our border are destroyed and by demanding a Palestinian state, the leaders in London, Ottawa and Paris are offering a huge prize for the genocidal attack on Israel on October 7 while inviting more such atrocities.
“No nation can be expected to accept anything less and Israel certainly won’t. This is a war of civilisation over barbarism. Israel will continue to defend itself by just means until total victory is achieved.”
US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Paul Atkins appeared before lawmakers in one of his first hearings since becoming chair of the financial regulator, addressing questions about his plans for the cryptocurrency industry.
In a May 20 hearing discussing oversight of the SEC, Atkins reiterated his pledge to make regulating digital assets a “key priority” while chair. In response to questions from North Carolina Representative Chuck Edwards, the SEC chair did not directly answer how much of the regulator’s funds were used to support the crypto task force headed by Commissioner Hester Peirce, and said its findings were “still under development.”
“We should be having something here in the next few months with proposed steps forward,” said Atkins in response to the task force’s first report.
The SEC chair’s appearance at the oversight hearing was one of his first since being sworn into office in April. Nominated by Donald Trump, Atkins, also a former commissioner, was seen by many lawmakers and those in the digital asset industry as someone who could radically change the SEC’s approach to crypto.
Looking to Congress for help with regulatory clarity
Atkins’ remarks came less than 24 hours after US Senators voted to move forward on consideration of a bill to regulate stablecoins, the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for US Stablecoins Act, or GENIUS Act. The bill is one of many related to aspects of digital assets that could affect how the SEC regulates the industry alongside agencies like the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).
“Whatever happens in Congress […] that will help undergird what we do,” said Atkins.
Related: Paul Atkins: ‘Crypto markets have been languishing in SEC limbo’
Since being sworn into office in April, the SEC chair has given opening remarks and overseen the commission’s roundtable events on digital assets. The next event, scheduled for June 9, will have SEC commissioners and industry leaders discuss issues related to decentralized finance.
Magazine: SEC’s U-turn on crypto leaves key questions unanswered
Politics
Suspension of trade talks a political signal that Israeli leadership is increasingly isolated
The UK has suspended trade talks with Israel, in protest at what David Lammy called the “intolerable” conditions in Gaza, which he said would leave the population at risk of starvation.
This is, the foreign office confirms, a UK first, in suspending trade talks for a political or humanitarian reason. The Israeli ambassador in London, Tzipi Hotovely, will be summoned to the Foreign Office to deliver the message.
Politics live: PM apologises for being ‘overly rude’ at PMQs
This suspension, with immediate effect, is a political signal that the Israeli leadership is increasingly isolated even among its allies; and intended to ratchet up the pressure to let aid in.
It comes with a step change in the UK’s language on the humanitarian situation.
Keir Starmer on Monday night, in his joint statement with French President Emmanuel Macron and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, said there would be “concrete steps” if food and medicine continued to be held up at borders; and this is one of the levers available.
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Doctors in Gaza plead for help
David Lammy, announcing the move and targeted sanctions against West Bank settlers linked to violence, called it a “dark phase” in the conflict and said: “[Benjamin] Netanyahu’s actions have made this necessary.”
Trade talks were launched under Rishi Sunak’s government, and a 2030 Roadmap was agreed for boosting trade.
Gaza live: UK halts trade talks with Israel
But although the Labour government committed to continuing with it, the last round of talks was held more than a year ago.
Israel has, the UN say, not allowed trucks in for 11 weeks, after saying Hamas steal the aid intended for civilians. Some trucks entered on Tuesday, but aid agencies say it is nowhere near enough.
With the collapse of the latest talks between the two sides in Qatar last week, the ceasefire the UK is calling for looks far off.
Using economic measures to force the aid issue is likely to be a signal to other allies, including the European Union, to take similar steps.
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