Minister rejects claim that recognition of Palestine state could breach international law
A minister has denied claims that Sir Keir Starmer could risk breaching international law with his pledge to recognise Palestine as a state.
Nearly 40 members of the House of Lords, including prominent UK lawyers, made the claims in a letter to Attorney General Lord Hermer yesterday.
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The letter, first reported by The Times, argues that Sir Keir’s promise to recognise Palestine in September – unless Israel takes “substantive steps” to end the situation in Gaza – may breach international law as the territory may not meet the criteria for statehood under the Montevideo Convention, a treaty signed in 1933.
But speaking to Wilfred Frost on Sky News Breakfast, small business minister Gareth Thomas said he did not believe the move, which has been condemned by Israel, would breach international law because the UK has not signed the Montevideo Convention.
He pointed out that 140 countries have already recognised Palestine as a state.
Mr Thomas said: “I respect the views of those lawyers, but in the end, recognition of a state is a political judgement.
“And we’ve been very clear that our judgement is that the Palestinians have an inalienable right to statehood; that now is the right time to say publicly that we will recognise the state of [Palestine] unless Israel agrees to end the appalling violence that we’re seeing in Gaza at the moment, and commits to a two state solution.”
He added: “And the ceasefire that can enable the huge amounts of aid we need to get aid and to feed the people of Gaza and commits to no annexation of land in the West Bank. Otherwise, we will recognise, at the UN General Assembly in September.”
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Canada to recognise Palestinian state in September
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What does recognising a Palestinian state mean?
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday followed in the footsteps of the UK and France, saying his country would also recognise Palestine as a state pending certain conditions – including that the Palestinian Authority commits to fundamentally reforming its governance, and holds general elections in 2026 in which Hamas can play no part.
But in their letter to Lord Hermer, 38 peers said Palestine “does not meet the international law criteria for recognition of a state, namely, defined territory, a permanent population, an effective government and the capacity to enter into relations with other states”.
They said there was no certainty over the borders of Palestine and no single government, while also pointing out that Hamas and Fatah are enemies.
Lord Hermer has previously insisted that a commitment to international law “goes absolutely to the heart” of the government’s approach to foreign policy.
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What do Israelis think of UK’s plan to recognise Palestine?
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Among the respected lawyers who have signed the letter are Lord Pannick – who represented the previous government at the Supreme Court over its Rwanda scheme – as well as KCs Lord Verdirame and Lord Faulks.
Some of Parliament’s most prominent Jewish voices, including crossbench peer Baroness Deech, Labour’s Lord Winston and the Conservatives’ Baroness Altmann, have also put their name to the letter.
Israel has condemned the UK’s decision, with the foreign ministry arguing it “constitutes a reward for Hamas and harms efforts to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza and a framework for the release of hostages”.
The crypto market could soon see some much-needed relief after the US Senate reached an agreement on a three-part budget deal to end the government shutdown, Politico reports.
Pending legislation to fund the US government has more than enough support to pass the 60-vote threshold, Politico reported on Sunday, citing two people familiar with the matter.
It was Republican Senate Majority Leader John Thune’s 15th attempt to win Democratic support for a House-approved bill, putting the record 40-day government shutdown within reach of being lifted.
An official vote is still needed to finalize the agreement.
Ongoing uncertainty over when the US government would reopen has been a key factor holding back Bitcoin (BTC) and the broader crypto market from mounting a rebound.
Bitcoin initially rallied to a new high of $126,080 six days into the government shutdown on Oct. 6, but has since fallen over 17% to $104,370, CoinGecko data shows.
Bitcoin’s fall over the past month saw it drop by double-digit percentage points on Oct. 10 after US President Donald Trump’s announcement of 100% tariffs on China sent shockwaves throughout the markets.
Bitcoin rallied 266% after last government shutdown lifted
The last US government shutdown occurred between late December 2018 and late January the following year in Trump’s first term.
After it ended on Jan. 25, 2019, Bitcoin rose over 265% from $3,550 to $13,000 over the next five months.
Prediction markets back shutdown to end this week
Bettors on prediction market Polymarket are backing that the government shutdown will be lifted on Thursday, with the market showing a 54% chance it will happen between Tuesday and Friday.
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Those odds were just 27% a day ago.
Odds on competitor platform Kalshi are similar, estimating the government shutdown will end on Friday, 44 days into the shutdown.
It comes as Trump announced on Sunday that most Americans will receive a $2,000 dividend from tariff revenue.
Approximately 85% of adults will be eligible, excluding high-income earners, he said.
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Politics
Downfall of BBC leaders greeted with undisguised glee by many on the right of British politics
Amid serious concerns over the editorial mistakes made by the BBC, the downfall of its leaders has been greeted with undisguised glee by many on the right of British politics.
Former prime minister Liz Truss was quick off the mark to retweet gloating posts from Donald Trump and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt with clapping emojis.
Ms Truss argued not just for the abolition of the licence fee, but for the end of nationalised broadcasting altogether.
Her former cabinet colleague Suella Braverman has also called for the licence fee to be scrapped.
It’s an idea long advocated by Nadine Dorries during her time as culture secretary. The recent Reform convert is particularly pessimistic about the BBC’s future – telling me she believes its “core bias” has worsened in recent years.
“I’m afraid the resignation of Tim Davie will change nothing,” she said. “Under this Labour government overseeing the new appointment… it will probably get worse.”
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Why ‘Teflon Tim’ resigned from BBC
All three politicians were close allies of Boris Johnson, who has been instrumental this week in piling the pressure on the BBC.
He dramatically threatened in the Daily Mail to boycott the licence fee until Tim Davie explained what happened with the Trump Panorama documentary – or resigned.
The official Conservative Party line is slightly more restrained.
Shadow culture secretary Nigel Huddleston told Sky News “we want them to be successful” – but he and his boss Kemi Badenoch are calling for wide-ranging editorial reforms to end what they describe as “institutional bias”.
Their list calls for changes to BBC Arabic, its coverage of the US and Middle East, and “basic matters of biology”, by which they mean its stories on trans issues.
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‘Catastrophic failure’ at BBC
The irony of demanding editorial changes from a supposedly independent organisation dealing with allegations of bias has been lost in the furore.
Similarly, Nigel Farage is calling for the government to appoint a new director-general from the private sector who has “a record of coming in and turning companies and cultures around”.
As part of its editorial independence, the appointment of the BBC’s next editor-in-chief is meant to be entirely down to its own independent board – and out of the hands of ministers.
The government’s own response to the scandal has therefore been relatively muted. In a statement, Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy thanked Mr Davie for his long service to public service broadcasting – and paid tribute to the BBC as “one of our most important national institutions”.
Tim Davie and Deborah Turness. Pics: PA
Before the news of the resignations broke, she had been expressing her “complete confidence” in how the BBC’s leadership were dealing with the “serious allegations” described in the leaked memo from Michael Prescott, a former external adviser to the corporation’s editorial standards committee.
The departure of Mr Davie and the CEO of BBC News Deborah Turness just hours later seemed to be something of a shock.
A more detailed government response is sure to come when parliament returns from recess tomorrow.
The Culture Media and Sport Committee of MPs – which has played an active role in the scandal by writing to the BBC chairman and demanding answers – is due to receive its response today, which is expected to include an apology for the Panorama edits.
Its chair Dame Caroline Dinenage described Mr Davie’s resignation as “regrettable” but said that “restoring trust in the corporation must come first”.
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Analysis: ‘Teflon Tim’ has come unstuck
The past controversies faced by Davie
Read their resignation letters in full
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Ex-Panorama staffer: ‘Worst crime imaginable’
So far, the only British political leader prepared to mount an outspoken defence of the BBC is Sir Ed Davey.
The Liberal Democrat argues that seeing the White House take credit for Mr Davie’s downfall – and attacking the BBC – “should worry us all”.
He’s called on the PM and all British political leaders to stand united in “telling Trump to keep his hands off it”.
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What did the BBC do to anger Trump?
Given the diplomatic contortions Sir Keir Starmer has gone through to develop close relations with the current president, this seems entirely unlikely.
But for a prime minister already juggling an overflowing in-tray of problems, controversy over the national broadcaster as the government prepares to enter negotiations about renewing its charter for the next decade is another political tripwire in waiting.
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Starmer avoided political heat at home during Brazil climate conference – but he returns to a prisons crisis
Sir Keir Starmer’s been on the other side of the world for most of the week – at the COP30 climate summit in Brazil, his 40th foreign trip in 16 months.
Back home, his government’s credibility has continued its painful unravelling.
Five days on from David Lammy’s disastrous stand-in performance at PMQS, the justice secretary’s ministerial colleagues are still struggling to explain why he repeatedly failed to answer questions on whether another migrant criminal had been released from prison by mistake.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer at the Remembrance Sunday service at the Cenotaph in London. Pic: PA
Yes, Conservative MP James Cartlidge got the question wrong, as Brahim Kaddour-Cherif was an illegal migrant, not an asylum seeker.
But Mr Cartlidge argued that because the deputy prime minister failed to divulge the information he did have, he failed to act with full transparency and should be investigated by the PM’s ethics advisor for a possible breach of the ministerial code.
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy has been defending Mr Lammy’s response.
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Lammy not sharing facts is ‘shocking’
She told Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips she doesn’t accept that he was being evasive, insisting Mr Lammy had been carefully weighing his words to ensure that “when we do speak about matters of such significance to the public… we do so with care and make sure the full facts are presented”.
At that time, rather extraordinarily, we’re told the justice secretary did not have the full facts of the case, even though the Metropolitan Police had been informed the day before (six days after Kaddour-Cherif was accidentally freed).
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The combination of wrongly-freed prisoners and illegal migrants is a conjunction of two of the most toxic issues in British politics – the overflowing prison system and the dysfunctional asylum system.
Both are vast, chaotic problems the government is struggling to get a grip on, as the Conservatives also found, to their cost.
But ministers’ ongoing failure to bring both issues under control has only been highlighted by Mr Lammy’s sloppy handling of the situation.
Football regulator donations row
Ms Nandy has herself been at the heart of another government controversy this week – over the appointment of the new football regulator, David Kogan.
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‘I didn’t want to mislead MPs on prisoner release’
An independent investigation found she “unknowingly” breached the code on public appointments by failing to declare that Mr Kogan had previously donated £2,900 to her Labour leadership campaign – and also criticised her department for not highlighting his status as a Labour donor who had previously given £33,410 to the party.
The culture secretary has apologised and explained she had been unaware of the donations.
She also pointed out that Mr Kogan was a candidate originally put forward by the Conservatives. But again, it’s messy.
It’s yet another story which chips away at the government’s promises to clear up politics and act with full transparency and accountability.
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Political fallout analysed
Budget blues?
The ultimate breach of trust looks set to come with the budget on 26 November, however.
In an extraordinary early morning speech this week, Chancellor Rachel Reeves signalled that she’s likely to raise taxes in two and a half weeks – and thus breach the core promise of the Labour Party manifesto.
The rationale for her dire warnings on Tuesday was to start explaining why she will probably have to do so – getting in her excuses early about the languishing state of the economy as a result of Brexit, Donald Trump’s tariffs and her inheritance from the Conservatives.
The Tories claim Ms Reeves could sort out the finances by cutting welfare spending – something ministers dramatically failed to do when their efforts at reform were scuttled by angry backbenchers.
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Governments breach their manifesto commitments all the time.
But if the chancellor goes ahead and puts up income tax, as expected (even if that’s offset, for some, by a corresponding cut to national insurance), it will be a shock – and the first such increase in 50 years.
The new deputy leader of the party, Lucy Powell, pointedly warned the government this week about the risks of breaching trust in politics by breaking manifesto promises.
Lisa Nandy didn’t shoot her comments down when Sir Trevor asked for her response, arguing instead that while “we take our promises very, very seriously”, they [Labour] “were also elected on a promise to change this country”, with a particular focus on fixing the NHS.
The impossibility of doing both – protecting taxes while also increasing government spending in such a challenging economic climate – highlights the folly of making such restrictive promises.
But voters are not in a forgiving mood.
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