A Labour Party in Tory clothing? Why Starmer’s backbenchers are deeply uncomfortable

Published

19 hours ago

March 17, 2025

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Since taking office nine months ago Sir Keir Starmer has weathered party rows about winter fuel payments, the two child benefit cap, WASPI women, airport expansion and cuts to international aid.

All of these decisions have been justified in the name of balancing the books – filling that notorious £22bn black hole, sticking to the fiscal rules, and in the pursuit of growth as the government’s number one priority.

But welfare reform feels like a far more existential row.

Health Secretary Wes Streeting argued on Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips that the current system is “unsustainable”.

Ministers have been making the point for weeks that the health benefits bill for working-age people has ballooned by £20bn since the pandemic and is set to grow by another £18bn over the next five years, to £70bn.

But the detail of where those cuts could fall is proving highly divisive.

One proposal reportedly under consideration has been to freeze personal independence payments (PIPs) next year, rather than uprating them in line with inflation.

Charities have warned this would be a catastrophic real-terms cut to 3.6 million people.

Concerned left-wing backbenchers are calling on the government to tax the rich, not take from the most vulnerable.

The Sunday Times and Observer have now reported that Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall has dropped the idea in response to the backlash.

Wes Streeting denied reports of a cabinet row over the plan, insisting the final package of measures hasn’t yet been published and he and his cabinet colleagues haven’t seen it.

Not the final version perhaps – but given all backbench Labour MPs who were summoned to meetings with the Number 10 policy teams for briefings this week, that response is perhaps more than a little disingenuous.

In his interview with Sir Trevor Phillips, he went on to make the broader case for PIP reform – highlighting the thousand people who sign up to the benefit every day and arguing that the system needs to be “sustainable”, to “deliver for those that need it most” and “provide the right kind of support for the different types of need that exist”.

To me this signals the government are preparing to unveil a tighter set of PIP eligibility criteria, with a refocus on supporting those with the greatest needs.

Changes to incapacity benefit to better incentivise working – for those who can – are also clearly on the cards.

The health secretary has been hitting out at the “overdiagnosis” of mental health conditions, arguing that “going out to work is better for your mental and physical health, than being spent and being stuck at home”, and promising benefit reforms that will help support people back to work rather than “trapped in the benefits system”.

Turning Tory?

Starmer said this week the current welfare system couldn’t be defended on economic or moral grounds.

The Conservatives don’t disagree.

Before the election, they proposed £12bn in cuts to the welfare bill, with a focus on getting people on long-term sickness back to work.

This morning, shadow education secretary Laura Trott claimed Labour denied that welfare cuts were needed during the election campaign and had wasted time in failing to include benefits reform in the King’s Speech.

“They’re coming to this chaotically, too late and without a plan,” she said.

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Notwithstanding the obvious critique that the Tories had 14 years to get a grip on the situation – what’s most striking here is that, yet again, the Labour government seems to be borrowing Conservative clothes.

When challenged by Sir Trevor this morning, Streeting denied they were turning Tory – claiming the case for welfare reform and supporting people into work is a Labour argument.

But, from increasing defence spending and cutting the aid budget to scrapping NHS England, there’s a definite pattern emerging.

If you didn’t know a Labour administration was in charge, you might have assumed these were the policies of a Conservative government.

It’s a strategy which makes many of his own backbenchers deeply uncomfortable.

But it’s doing a good job of neutering the Tory opposition.

Politics

LIBRA memecoin orchestrators named as defendants in US class-action suit

Published

2 hours ago

March 18, 2025

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LIBRA memecoin orchestrators named as defendants in US class-action suit

The Libra token scandal is set to be reviewed by the Supreme Court of New York after a newly filed class-action lawsuit accused its creators of misleading investors and siphoning over $100 million from one-sided liquidity pools.

Burwick Law filed the suit on behalf of its clients against Kelsier Ventures, KIP Protocol and Meteora on March 17 for launching the Libra (LIBRA) token in a “deceptive, manipulative and fundamentally unfair” manner. The token was then promoted by Argentine President Javier Milei on X as an economic initiative to stimulate private-sector funding in the country.

The law firm slammed the two crypto infrastructure and launchpad firms behind LIBRA — KIP and Meteora — claiming that they used a “predatory” one-sided liquidity pool to artificially inflate the memecoin’s price, allowing insiders to profit while “everyday buyers bore the losses.”

Within hours, the insiders “rapidly siphoned approximately $107 million from the liquidity pools,” causing a 94% crash in LIBRA’s market value, Burwick Law said in a March 17 filing shared on X.

President Milei was mentioned in the lawsuit but wasn’t named a defendant.

Burwick accused the defendants of leveraging Milei’s influence to aggressively promote the token, deliberately creating a false sense of legitimacy and misleading investors about its economic potential.

Approximately 85% of LIBRA’s tokens were withheld at launch and the “predatory infrastructure techniques” allegedly used by the defendants weren’t disclosed to investors, Burwick said.

“These tactics, combined with omissions about the true liquidity structures, deprived investors of material information.”

Burwick is seeking compensatory and punitive damages, the disgorgement of “unjustly obtained” profits and injunctive relief to prevent further fraudulent token offerings.

Data from blockchain research firm Nansen found that of the 15,430 largest Libra wallets it examined, over 86% of those sold at a loss, combining for $251 million in losses.

Only 2,101 profitable wallets were able to take home a combined $180 million in profit, Nansen noted in a Feb. 19 report.

The venture capital firm behind the LIBRA token, Kelsier Ventures, and its CEO, Hayden Davis, were apparently two of the biggest winners from the token launch. They claim to have netted around $100 million.

Davis, who is now facing a potential Interpol red notice following an Argentine lawyer’s request, said on Feb. 17 that he didn’t directly own the tokens and wouldn’t sell them.

Meanwhile, Milei has distanced himself from the memecoin, arguing he didn’t “promote” the LIBRA token — as fraud lawsuits filed against him have alleged — and instead merely “spread the word” about it.

Argentina’s opposition party called for Milei’s impeachment but has had limited success thus far.

Magazine: Meet lawyer Max Burwick — ‘The ambulance chaser of crypto’

Politics

Paul Atkins closes in on SEC chair role amid setbacks: Report

Published

4 hours ago

March 18, 2025

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Paul Atkins closes in on SEC chair role amid setbacks: Report

Paul Atkins could move one step closer to becoming the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s new crypto-friendly chair, with a Senate committee hearing reportedly in the works for March 27.

President Donald Trump nominated Atkins to lead the SEC on Dec. 4, but his marriage into a billionaire family has reportedly caused headaches with financial disclosures — delaying his potential start date.

While it isn’t clear whether the White House has produced those papers to the Senate, Senate Banking, House and Urban Affairs Chair Tim Scott is reportedly eyeing a March 27 hearing to review Atkins’ standing, Semafor’s Eleanor Mueller said in a March 17 X post.

“No clarity yet on whether the committee has Atkins’ paperwork in hand, but either way, this is the most momentum we’ve seen so far.”

Atkins would, however, need to be voted in by the Senate at a later date.

Mueller also said the Senate banking committee is also planning to hold a bipartisan meeting on Atkins’ nomination on March 21.

It follows an earlier March 3 Semafor report, where Mueller said financial disclosures had held Atkins back from scheduling a Senate hearing to review his standing.

His wife’s family is tied to TAMKO Building Products LLC — a manufacturer of residential roofing shingles that reportedly turned over $1.2 billion in revenue in 2023, Forbes said on Dec. 14, 2024.

“It’s a lot to go through,” one former Senate Banking Committee staffer reportedly told Mueller on March 3.

“But he got named so early on, so I think that’s why people are starting to be like, ‘What the hell’s taking so long?’”

Atkins previously served as an SEC commissioner between 2002 and 2008 and worked as a corporate lawyer at Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP in New York before that. He is expected to regulate the crypto arena with a more collaborative approach than former SEC Chair Gary Gensler.

It’s been almost four months since Atkins was chosen by Trump to lead the SEC on Dec. 4, and over two months since Trump was inaugurated on Jan. 20.

A late start for an SEC chair wouldn’t be too unusual, however.

The two most recent SEC chairs, Gary Gensler and Jay Clayton, started on April 17, 2021, and May 4, 2017 — months after presidential transitions occurred in those years.

Meanwhile, Mark Uyeda has been serving as the SEC’s acting chair since Gensler left on Jan. 20.

Since then, the Uyeda-led SEC has established a Crypto Task Force led by SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce and canceled a controversial rule that asked financial firms holding crypto to record them as liabilities on their balance sheets.

The SEC has dropped several investigations and lawsuits that the Gensler-led commission filed against the likes of Coinbase, Consensys, Robinhood, Gemini, Uniswap and OpenSea over the last month.

The SEC is also looking to abandon a rule requiring crypto firms to register as exchanges and may even axe the Biden administration’s proposed crypto custody rules, Uyeda said on March 17.

Magazine: SEC’s U-turn on crypto leaves key questions unanswered

Politics

SEC could axe proposed Biden-era crypto custody rule, says acting chief

Published

5 hours ago

March 18, 2025

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SEC could axe proposed Biden-era crypto custody rule, says acting chief

The US Securities and Exchange Commission could change or scrap a rule proposed under the Biden administration that would tighten crypto custody standards for investment advisers, according to the agency’s acting chair, Mark Uyeda.

In prepared remarks to an investment industry conference in San Diego on March 17, Uyeda said the rule proposed in February 2023 had seen commenters express “significant concern” over its “broad scope.”

“Given such concern, there may be significant challenges to proceeding with the original proposal. As such, I have asked the SEC staff to work closely with the crypto task force to consider appropriate alternatives, including its withdrawal,” Uyeda said.

The rule was floated under the Biden administration during Gary Gensler’s tenure leading the regulator. It aimed to expand custody rules for investment advisers to any and all assets held for a client, including crypto, and upped the requirements to protect them.

This meant that investment advisers would have to custody their clients’ crypto with a qualified custodian. Gensler said at the time that investment advisers “cannot rely on” crypto platforms as qualified custodians due to how they operate.

The proposal caused friction with Uyeda and Commissioner Hester Peirce, along with industry advocacy bodies who claimed the rule was unlawful and dangerous.

“How could an adviser seeking to comply with this rule possibly invest client funds in crypto assets after reading this release?” Uyeda remarked at the time. He did, however, support the proposal despite disagreeing “with a number of provisions.”

Peirce, who was the sole commissioner of the five to vote against the rule, said at the time that the proposed rule “would expand the reach of the custody requirements to crypto assets while likely shrinking the ranks of qualified crypto custodians.”

Uyeda’s latest remarks come days after he said on March 10 that he had asked SEC staff “for options on abandoning” part of a proposal pushing for some crypto firms to register with the regulator as exchanges.

The Trump-era SEC has also killed a rule that asked financial firms holding crypto to record them as liabilities on their balance sheets, called SAB 121.

In December, President Donald Trump picked former SEC Commissioner Paul Atkins to take over from Uyeda to chair the agency. This is now a step closer, with a Senate hearing reportedly slated for March 27.

Magazine: SEC’s U-turn on crypto leaves key questions unanswered