Connect with us

Published

on

Liberal Democrat deputy leader Daisy Cooper has revealed she was told she had four days to live but the NHS saved her.

Speaking to the party’s conference in Brighton, Ms Cooper also told for the first time how the Lib Dems were on the brink of extinction in 2020.

She said the NHS gave her life back, which is why the party is determined to turn the health service around.

Politics latest: PM in Italy to learn from ‘dramatic reductions’ in illegal migration

Ms Cooper, who has the autoimmune disease Crohn’s, said she was rushed to hospital 12 years ago and was told without major surgery she had only four days to live.

She weighed just seven stone, her eyesight was failing, her heart rate had plummeted, her arms were black and blue and she was fed through a feeding tube, the MP said.

“But it wasn’t the prospect of major surgery that upset me – it was what they said next,” she told the conference.

“‘Even if you survive Daisy, even if you recover, you will probably never be able to work again. Your Crohn’s disease is so aggressive, at most you’ll be able to maybe do one day a week but nothing too stressful.

“‘You’ll likely need surgery every five years or so. Here’s an information pack about the benefits you might be entitled to.'”

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

Ed Davey arrives at conference on jet ski

Ms Cooper, 42, said she lay in her bed and sobbed for “17 hours straight” as she felt her world had “fallen apart” and that she would never be able to campaign again.

She added: “Hopefully though, you can see that the story ends well!

“As is the case with so many millions of people, the NHS didn’t just save my life, the people who make the NHS what it is, gave me my life back.”

She said she often wonders what is happening to people who are suffering the same symptoms now and questioned if they can even get a GP appointment, or if they have to wait a long time for a scan or are stuck in a hospital corridor.

The Lib Dems are demanding the government increase funding for the NHS, including GP services, when the chancellor announces her autumn budget on 30 October.

But Sir Keir Starmer earlier this week said the NHS would not get any more funding without reforming as he laid out a 10-year plan to fix the health service.

Read more from Sky News:
Free schools meals should be given to all children in poverty

Tax the rich instead of struggling pensioners

Ed Davey helps replace a stile in Ditchling during the party's autumn conference at the Brighton Centre in Brighton.
Pic: PA
Image:
Sir Ed Davey helped build a stile near Brighton while at the party’s conference. Pic: PA

Ms Cooper also told the conference one of the first conversations she had with Lib Dem leader Sir Ed Davey after she became his deputy in 2020, was how the party was close to not existing.

“It was quite sobering,” she said.

“He said to me: ‘Daisy, we both know we’ve only got 11 MPs. But – when you add up our majorities – do you know how few votes stand between us and extinction? It’s 69,664. If we lose just half of those votes to the Tories, we will be wiped out’.”

That conversation has been in the back of her mind every day since, she said.

But she revealed she had not told “a single living soul” until now because they did not want anyone to know “we were in survival mode”, especially after boundary changes meant they notionally only had eight seats.

“Eight seats between us having a parliamentary party – or extinction,” she added.

“But here’s a new number for you: our MPs now represent seven million people! In parliament, I can’t even walk to the toilet without bumping into a Lib Dem MP!”

Continue Reading

Politics

China Merchants Bank tokenizes $3.8B fund on BNB Chain in Hong Kong

Published

on

By

China Merchants Bank tokenizes .8B fund on BNB Chain in Hong Kong

China Merchants Bank tokenizes .8B fund on BNB Chain in Hong Kong

CMBI’s tokenization initiative with BNB Chain builds on its previous work with Singapore-based DigiFT, which tokenized its fund on Solana in August.

Continue Reading

Politics

Chancellor admits tax rises and spending cuts considered for budget

Published

on

By

Chancellor admits tax rises and spending cuts considered for budget

Rachel Reeves has told Sky News she is looking at both tax rises and spending cuts in the budget, in her first interview since being briefed on the scale of the fiscal black hole she faces.

“Of course, we’re looking at tax and spending as well,” the chancellor said when asked how she would deal with the country’s economic challenges in her 26 November statement.

Politics Hub: Follow latest updates

Ms Reeves was shown the first draft of the Office for Budget Responsibility’s (OBR) report, revealing the size of the black hole she must fill next month, on Friday 3 October.

She has never previously publicly confirmed tax rises are on the cards in the budget, going out of her way to avoid mentioning tax in interviews two weeks ago.

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

Chancellor pledges not to raise VAT

Cabinet ministers had previously indicated they did not expect future spending cuts would be used to ensure the chancellor met her fiscal rules.

Ms Reeves also responded to questions about whether the economy was in a “doom loop” of annual tax rises to fill annual black holes. She appeared to concede she is trapped in such a loop.

Asked if she could promise she won’t allow the economy to get stuck in a doom loop cycle, Ms Reeves replied: “Nobody wants that cycle to end more than I do.”

She said that is why she is trying to grow the economy, and only when pushed a third time did she suggest she “would not use those (doom loop) words” because the UK had the strongest growing economy in the G7 in the first half of this year.

What’s facing Reeves?

Ms Reeves is expected to have to find up to £30bn at the budget to balance the books, after a U-turn on winter fuel and welfare reforms and a big productivity downgrade by the OBR, which means Britain is expected to earn less in future than previously predicted.

Yesterday, the IMF upgraded UK growth projections by 0.1 percentage points to 1.3% of GDP this year – but also trimmed its forecast by 0.1% next year, also putting it at 1.3%.

The UK growth prospects are 0.4 percentage points worse off than the IMF’s projects last autumn. The 1.3% GDP growth would be the second-fastest in the G7, behind the US.

Last night, the chancellor arrived in Washington for the annual IMF and World Bank conference.

Read more:
Jobs market continues to slow
Banks step up lobbying over threat of tax hikes

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

The big issues facing the UK economy

‘I won’t duck challenges’

In her Sky News interview, Ms Reeves said multiple challenges meant there was a fresh need to balance the books.

“I was really clear during the general election campaign – and we discussed this many times – that I would always make sure the numbers add up,” she said.

“Challenges are being thrown our way – whether that is the geopolitical uncertainties, the conflicts around the world, the increased tariffs and barriers to trade. And now this (OBR) review is looking at how productive our economy has been in the past and then projecting that forward.”

She was clear that relaxing the fiscal rules (the main one being that from 2029-30, the government’s day-to-day spending needs to rely on taxation alone, not borrowing) was not an option, making tax rises all but inevitable.

“I won’t duck those challenges,” she said.

“Of course, we’re looking at tax and spending as well, but the numbers will always add up with me as chancellor because we saw just three years ago what happens when a government, where the Conservatives, lost control of the public finances: inflation and interest rates went through the roof.”

Pic: PA
Image:
Pic: PA

Blame it on the B word?

Ms Reeves also lay responsibility for the scale of the black hole she’s facing at Brexit, along with austerity and the mini-budget.

This could risk a confrontation with the party’s own voters – one in five (19%) Leave voters backed Labour at the last election, playing a big role in assuring the party’s landslide victory.

The chancellor said: “Austerity, Brexit, and the ongoing impact of Liz Truss’s mini-budget, all of those things have weighed heavily on the UK economy.

“Already, people thought that the UK economy would be 4% smaller because of Brexit.

“Now, of course, we are undoing some of that damage by the deal that we did with the EU earlier this year on food and farming, goods moving between us and the continent, on energy and electricity trading, on an ambitious youth mobility scheme, but there is no doubting that the impact of Brexit is severe and long-lasting.”

Continue Reading

Politics

Crypto maturity demands systematic discipline over speculation

Published

on

By

Crypto maturity demands systematic discipline over speculation

Crypto maturity demands systematic discipline over speculation

Unlimited leverage and sentiment-driven valuations create cascading liquidations that wipe billions overnight. Crypto’s maturity demands systematic discipline.

Continue Reading

Trending