Sir Keir Starmer has denied any ministers were involved in the collapse of the trial of alleged Chinese spies.

Christopher Cash, 30, a former parliamentary researcher, and teacher Christopher Berry, 33, were accused of spying for China, but weeks before their trial was due to begin, it was dropped.

Berry, of Witney, Oxfordshire, and Cash, of Whitechapel, east London denied the allegations.

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Sir Keir, his ministers and national security adviser Jonathan Powell have faced accusations they were involved in the trial being dropped.

The prime minister has maintained that because the last Conservative government had not designated China as a threat to national security, his government could not provide evidence to that effect, which the director of public prosecutions Stephen Parkinson said was required to meet the threshold for prosecution.

Mr Parkinson had blamed ministers for failing to provide the crucial evidence needed to proceed.

During a trade visit to India, the prime minister was asked whether any minister, or Mr Powell, were involved in the decision not to provide the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) with evidence that, at the time of the alleged offences, China represented a threat to national security.

He replied: “I can be absolutely clear no ministers were involved in any of the decisions since this government’s been in in relation to the evidence that’s put before the court on this issue.”

He did not mention Mr Powell specifically.

Read more:
Blame game over trial collapse. Who’s right? Who’s wrong?

Earlier this week, Mr Parkinson took the unusual step of sending MPs a letter to say the government had refused to label Beijing an enemy, which led to the case being dropped.

Sir Keir reiterated his line that the case could only rely on evidence from the period the pair were accused of spying, from 2021 to 2023, when the Conservatives were in government.

He said: “The evidence in this case was drawn up at the time and reflected the position as it was at the time,” the PM said in India.

“And that has remained the situation from start to finish.

“That is inevitably the case because in the United Kingdom, you can only try people on the basis of the situation as it was at the time.

“You can’t try people on the basis of the situation, as it now is or might be in the future, and therefore, the only evidence that a court would ever admit on this would be evidence of what the situation was at the time.

“It’s not a party political point. It’s a matter of law.”

Sir Keir’s assertion has been called into question by former top civil servants and legal experts.

Mark Elliott, professor of public law at the University of Cambridge, told Sky News there is no legal requirement for a country to be declared an enemy for someone to be tried for breaching the Official Secrets Act.

He said the current government was “cherry picking” what the previous government had said about China to claim they did not regard them as a threat to national security.

However, there are several examples of the Tory government saying China was a national security threat during the time Berry and Cash were accused of spying.

A new report has warned of a “clear decline in trust” in the Scottish government since devolution, with less than half of respondents saying it acts in the country’s best interests.

The Scottish Social Attitudes survey, published by the Scottish Centre for Social Research (ScotCen) on Thursday, found 47% of Scots trust the Scottish government to do what is right for Scotland.

The figure has decreased from 61% in 2019 and is down from 81% when devolution began in 1999.

The survey, 25 Years Of Devolution In Scotland: Public Attitudes And Reaction, also found 38% of respondents believe the government is good at listening to the public before making decisions, the lowest result since 2006.

The statistics on trust in the Scottish government are from research in 2023, with other data coming from 2024.

Satisfaction with the NHS has fallen to 22%, which ScotCen says is comparable with the rest of the UK.

This follows a 2023 finding in which 69% of people surveyed said they felt the standard of the health service had declined.

ScotCen said this represents the lowest level of satisfaction and the highest perception of a decline in standards since the time series began in 1999.

In 2024, around two in five adults in Scotland (41%) said they were living comfortably or doing alright financially, while around one in four (24%) reported they were really struggling.

Most of those north of the border continued to identify as Scottish, though the 74% saying in 2024 that it was at least one of their identities was a reduction from 84% who said so in 1999.

Despite trust in the Scottish government having reduced, support for independence is at 47%, up from 27% in 1999.

Read more:
Why next year’s Scottish elections could get messy

Paul Bradshaw, director of ScotCen, said: “These latest results show a clear decline in trust in the Scottish government, alongside continued concern about public services and the economy.

“While Scots remain strongly attached to their Scottish identity, our data suggest that confidence in political institutions is under pressure, a finding that will be important for policymakers and the public alike.”

In an extract from the report’s conclusion, co-authors Sophie Birtwistle and Sir John Curtice wrote: “So far as public opinion is concerned, devolution has not turned out in the way that either its advocates or its critics anticipated when the Scottish parliament first met on 1 July 1999.

“On the one hand, it has not resulted in any long-term marked decline in Scots’ willingness to acknowledge a British identity or in any marked divergence of attitudes and values between Scotland and England.

“On the other hand, far from persuading Scots of the merits of being part of the UK, the decision to put the independence question to voters in 2014 occasioned a marked long-term increase in support for leaving the UK.

“Yet, at the same time, although support for independence may now be higher, it is still a long way from looking like a ‘settled will’ in the way that, by 1999, the idea of Scotland having its own parliament appeared to be.”

Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes said the “fresh start of independence” would help to “raise living standards, grow the economy, and shape a fairer, more prosperous future”.

She added: “The data suggests that trust in the Scottish government is on a level with governments elsewhere, but we are determined to do more.

“Much of this data was collected up to two years ago.

“Since then, the Scottish government has made considerable progress to deliver on the people of Scotland’s priorities – including abolishing peak rail fares, confirming plans to deliver winter heating support for pensioners and taking action to improve our NHS, including investing record funding of £21.7bn for health and social care this year.”

As a possible ceasefire takes shape, Palestinians face the prospect of rebuilding their shattered enclave.

At least 67,194 people have been killed, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry, the majority of them (53%) women, children and elderly people.

The war has left 4,900 people with permanent disabilities, including amputations, and has orphaned 58,556 children.

Altogether, one in ten Palestinians has been killed or injured since the war began following Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel.

The attack killed 1,195 people, including 725 civilians, according to Israeli officials. The IDF says that a further 466 Israeli soldiers have been killed during the subsequent conflict in Gaza.

Swathes of Gaza have been reduced to rubble

More than 90% of Palestinians in Gaza have been displaced, many of them multiple times, following Israeli evacuation orders that now cover 85% of the Gaza Strip.

Few of them will have homes to return to, with aid groups estimating that 92% of homes have been destroyed.

“Despite our happiness, we cannot help but think of what is to come,” says Mohammad Al-Farra, in Khan Younis. “The areas we are going back to, or intending to return to, are uninhabitable.”

The destruction of Gaza is visible from space. The satellite images below show the city of Rafah, which has been almost totally razed over the past two years.

In just the first ten days of the war, 4% of buildings in Gaza were damaged or destroyed.

By May 2024 – seven months later – more than 50% of buildings had been damaged or destroyed. At the start of this month, it rose to 60% of buildings.

A joint report from the UN, EU and World Bank estimated that it would take years of rebuilding and more than $53 billion to repair the damage from the first year of war alone.

A surge in aid

Central to the promise of the ceasefire deal is that Israel will allow a surge of humanitarian aid to enter the Gaza Strip.

The widespread destruction of homes has left 1.5 million Palestinians in need of emergency shelter items.

Many of these people are living in crowded tent camps along Gaza’s coast. That includes Al Mawasi, a sandy strip of coastline and agricultural land that Israel has designated a “humanitarian zone”.

Aid agencies report that families are being charged rent of up to 600 shekels (£138) for tent space, and over $2,000 (£1,500) for tents.

Israel has forbidden the entry of construction equipment since the war began and has periodically blocked the import of tents and tent poles.

Restrictions on the entry of food aid have created a famine in Gaza City, and mass hunger throughout the rest of the territory.

Data from Israeli border officials shows that the amount of food entering Gaza has frequently been below the “bare minimum” that the UN’s famine-review agency says is necessary to meet basic needs.

As a result, the number of deaths from malnutrition has skyrocketed in recent months.

To date, Gaza’s health ministry says, 461 people have died from malnutrition, including 157 children.

“Will Netanyahu abide this time?”

As talks of a ceasefire progressed, the Israeli assault on Gaza City continued.

Footage shared on Tuesday, the two-year anniversary of the war, showed smoke rising over the city following an airstrike.

A video posted on Wednesday, verified by Sky News, showed an Israeli tank destroying a building in the city’s northern suburbs.

Uncertainty still remains over the future of Gaza, with neither Israel nor Hamas agreeing in full to the peace plan presented by US president Donald Trump. So far, only the first stage has been agreed.

A previous ceasefire, agreed in January, collapsed after Israel refused to progress to the agreement’s second stage. With that in mind, many in Gaza are cautious about their hopes for the future.

“Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time?,” asks Aya, a 31-year old displaced Palestinian in Deir al Balah.

“He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now.”

Additional reporting by Sam Doak, OSINT producer.

The Data and Forensics team is a multi-skilled unit dedicated to providing transparent journalism from Sky News. We gather, analyse and visualise data to tell data-driven stories. We combine traditional reporting skills with advanced analysis of satellite images, social media and other open source information. Through multimedia storytelling we aim to better explain the world while also showing how our journalism is done.