Afternoon summary
Thousands of nurses have been on strike in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and an ambulance strike in England and Wales is set to go ahead tomorrow after Steve Barclay, the health secretary, concluded talks with trade union without opening new talks on pay. (See 5pm.)
Rishi Sunak has restated his determination to bring inflation under control in evidence to the Commons liaison committee. (See 3.54pm.) Earlier, in an interview with the Daily Mail, he warned that the strikes could go on for months. (See 8.41am.)
Updated
Public account committee chair tells minister not to delay release of PPE Medro papers ordered by MPs
Meg Hillier, the chair of the Commons public accounts committee, has told the government that it would be unacceptable for it to try to postpone the release of papers relating to the award of PPE contracts to PPE Medpro, a firm linked to the Tory peer Michelle Mone.
Two weeks ago the Commons passed a “humble address” motion obliging the government to release papers relating to the contracts to the Commons public accounts committee, which scrutinises public spending.
In a letter to the committeee, sent yesterday, Will Quince, a health minister, said the government might not release the documents to the committee until an investigation into the company by the National Crime Agency is complete. The investigation has been ongoing since May 2021.
In her reply sent today, Hillier said delaying until the NCA inquiry was over would be unacceptable. She said the committee was used to dealing with information submitted on a confidential basis and she told Quince she expected the government to release the information in the new year.
Updated
Christina McAnea, the Unison general secretary, told reporters after her meeting with Steve Barclay about tomorrow’s strike that she thinks the health secretary has no leeway to negotiate on pay. She said:
[Barclay] was concerned about the strike, sympathetic to ambulance and other health workers but has no room for manoeuvre apparently, so I don’t know where we go with this.
I’m a negotiator and my view is you go in prepared to make some concessions, you go in prepared to talk about the parameters within which you can make decisions.
But we’re not being given any room for manoeuvre on this and therefore their position is fixed and we have no option but to take strike option and consider strike action in January …
There was nothing about pay. He was very clear about that and I was very clear that without that there’s nothing we can do about the strike.
Ambulance strike set to go ahead tomorrow after Steve Barclay concludes talks with unions without discussing pay
Thousands of ambulance workers and paramedics are preparing to strike tomorrow after talks between the government and unions failed to address the issue of pay, PA Media reports. PA says:
Steve Barclay, the health secretary, met union representatives on Tuesday afternoon but discussions around pay were off the table as the government sought reassurances over strike cover.
Thousands of nurses are on strike in England, Wales and Northern Ireland on Tuesday while ambulance staff will walk out in England and Wales on Wednesday.
Unison’s strike is running from noon until midnight on Wednesday while the GMB action runs from midnight tonight to midnight on Wednesday, and Unite’s from midnight tonight to midday on Wednesday.
After the meeting with unions, Barclay tweeted: “I hugely value the work of our NHS staff & it’s disappointing some union members are going ahead with further strike action - my door remains open to further talks. Unions have called for industrial action to cause maximum disruption & inevitably this will have an impact.
Here are Barclay’s tweets.
I hugely value the work of our NHS staff & it’s disappointing some union members are going ahead with further strike action - my door remains open to further talks.
— Steve Barclay (@SteveBarclay) December 20, 2022
Unions have called for industrial action to cause maximum disruption & inevitably this will have an impact (1/3)
My priority remains patient safety. We have contingency plans in place & I have met with ambulance union reps today @unisontheunion, @unitetheunion, @GMB_union & @AACE_org urging them to honour their commitment to provide responses to life-threatening emergency calls. (2/3)
— Steve Barclay (@SteveBarclay) December 20, 2022
People should come forward for emergency care & attend appointments unless contacted.
— Steve Barclay (@SteveBarclay) December 20, 2022
Ultimately union demands are unaffordable during these challenging times but as I’ve said before, I’m open to engaging with unions on how to make the NHS a better place to work. (3/3)
After the talks, Onay Kasab from Unite, said:
I went in full of hope, unfortunately I’ve come out very, very disappointed, because all the secretary of state wanted to talk about is what’s been done already, the discussions at a local level to make sure that emergencies are covered tomorrow.
The government have got to engage on pay because these strikes will escalate otherwise, that is the reality.
Our members are absolutely determined to win not just the pay battle but to win the battle to save the NHS.
Q: The original defence review did not mention Taiwan. Will it be mentioned in the integrated review refresh?
Sunak says he is not going to write the IR here.
Sir Bernard Jenkin thanks Sunak for his time. And they’re finished.
Sunak says he is 'hopeful' of being able to appoint new ethics adviser soon
Q: When will you appoint a new ethics adviser?
Sunak says he is “hopeful” about being about to appoint someone soon. He says it is important to get the right person for the job.
Sunak says the UK is something of an outlier in the large number of people who stop studing maths after 16. He says he would like to address this.
Q: Do you agree that allowing only some universities to take international students would be a non-starter?
Sunak says that is not something he has spoken about. He says he wants to ensure the brightest and the best can come to the UK. And he says he wants people who come to the UK to contribute.
Updated
Robin Walker (Con) goes next.
Q: Will the Northern Ireland institutions be back up and running in time for the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday agreement?
Sunak says he has not put a deadline on it. He says he does not think that would be helpful.
Q: There is no clarity as to what will happen to environmental law under the legislation to review all EU retained law. How long will Defra have to review this law?
Sunak says the government committed to not weakening environmental protections with the bill. It wants to ensure legislation is tailored for this country.
Over 140 bits of retained EU law in the Defra space have been repealed, he says.
He says the dashboard for retained EU law will be updated in the new year.
Sir Bernard Jenkin goes next.
Q: Is it true officials cannot draft replacement legislation until the bill is on the statute book, as I have been told. Can they start now?
Sunak says he will consider this.
Updated
Sir Bob Neill (Con) is asking the questions now.
Q: How does the plan to get rid of 3,000 EU laws by the end of next year increase certainty for business?
Sunak says he wants to review this law. But he says there are provisions in the bill that would determine the timetable.
There are areas where the UK will want to take advantage of the new flexibilities, he says.
We should do it quickly.
Q: Quickly or thoroughly?
Quickly and thoroughly, says Sunak.
Q: In 2019 we made no suggestion we would leave the European convention on human rights, did we?
Sunak says most European countries reject most asylum claims for Albania. So he thinks the UK should be able to do that too.
Updated
Cash has finally got to the thrust of his question. Will Sunak agree to meet him to discuss this? Does he agree executives must be liable?
Cash ends by asking for a “clear understanding” that Sunak agrees with him.
Sunak says the online safety bill is world-leading. He says senior managers will face criminal sanctions under the bill. The home secretary will engage with colleagues, he says.
Q: But will you meet with us? The criminal sanctions in the bill are too indirect.
Sunak says the culture secretary will pick this up.
Sir Bernard Jenkin jokes about how a meeting with Bill Cash would be “something to look forward to” in the new year.
Sunak swerves that one again, and says it will be one for the culture secretary.
Updated
Sir Bill Cash (Con) says the statute book is still full of EU law, even though we have left. This applies to the online safety bill too, he says.
He is making a short speech rather than asking a question.
Not even a short speech …
Updated
Q: Will the new asylum law contain provisions allowing the UK to derogate from the European convention on human rights?
Sunak says he will not speculate on that.
Q: A consent motion from the Scottish parliament would be required for you to repeal the Human Rights Act. Will you respect the vote of the Scottish parliament if it blocks repeal of the Human Rights Act?
Sunak says he will work with the Scottish parliament and work constructively.
Q: But if the Scottish parliament blocks repeal, will you respect that?
Sunak says you would expect the two parliaments not to agree on everything. But he wants to work constructively with Edinburgh, he says.
Updated
Sunak refuses to say whether his asylum plans might require UK to leave European convention on human rights
Joanna Cherry (SNP) says Suella Braverman has said before she wants the UK to leave the European convention on human rights. Is that your position?
Sunak says he will legislate to allow the UK to remove asylum seekers.
Q: Will that require the UK to leave the convention?
Sunak says he does not want to speculate on that.
Q: Dominic Raab said leaving the convention was not off the table.
Sunak says he is confident he can deliver on his plans.
Here is my colleague Peter Walker’s take on these answers.
Under questioning from Joanna Cherry, Rishi Sunak is *very* keen to not say whether he wants the UK to leave the ECHR over asylum claims. It's presumably because he knows many of his MPs want it to happen, but that it's not really feasible, and so he's a bit stuck.
— Peter Walker (@peterwalker99) December 20, 2022
The committee is now moving on to the final section, on the state of the union. (See 2.56pm.)
Pete Wishart (SNP) says there have now been six polls in a row showing a majority for an independence vote. How will you respond?
Sunak says he wants to ensure the government keeps delivering for Scotland.
Q: Do you realise how hollow that sounds? We think Scotland should decide its future. You are not going to tell me, are you, you have no plans for Scotland’s constitutional future?
Sunak says the government will continue to deliver on the Smith commission plans. Good progress is being made on that.
Q: Do we have to wait until you decide the time is right for another referendum?
Sunak says he wants to focus on things that will make a difference to people’s lives.
Q: The more you delay, the more support for independence will go up? At some point you will have to address this.
Sunak says he wants to focus on things that make a difference to the lives of people in Scotland.
Q: You were given a fixed-penalty notice during Partygate. Do you think we have been unnecessarily hard on your predecessor Boris Johnson.
Sunak says he has not got anything further to say on Partygate.
But he disputes Wishart’s claim he has nothing to offer the people of Scotland. He says he made a point of speaking to the first minister on his first day in office.
Updated
Sunak offers 'personal message' to NHS workers going on strike
Sir Bernard Jenkin asks about the NHS strikes.
Sunak says the pay review bodies took into account the likely impact of inflation.
He says he wants the NHS to focus on cutting the backlogs.
He says the government has a clear commitment to funding the NHS well.
Q: What would be your personal message to NHS workers who are going on strike?
Sunak says he has always been grateful to NHS workers for what they do. He says it is important for government to get a grip on inflation.
UPDATE: Sunak said:
I’ve acknowledged it is difficult, it’s difficult for everybody, because inflation is where it is. And the best way to help them and help everyone else in the country is for us to get a grip and reduce inflation as quickly as possible.
And we need to make sure that the decisions that we make can bring about that outcome. Because if we get it wrong and we’re still dealing with high inflation in a year’s time, that’s not going to help anybody.
I don’t want to see that, I want to see things get back to normal, and that’s why having an independent pay process is an important part of us making those decisions and getting them correct.
Updated
McKinnell says the number of children living in poverty is going up, not down. She says 75% of children growing up in poverty grow up in a house where someone is working.
Sunak says there are over one million fewer people in absolute poverty than there were in 2010. He says that includes 200,000 fewer children.
(Absolute poverty is a poverty as measured by reference to household income figure from 2010. Unlike relative poverty, the benchmark does not go up every year as inflation rises. Over time, the number of people living in absolute poverty almost always falls.)
Catherine McKinnell (Lab) says, in a tight labour market, it would make sense to make childcare more affordable.
Sunak says the UK is quite in international league tables for female participation in the labour force.
He says he does not think childcare is the reason why people are leaving the labour market. Mostly it is people over 50, he says.
Sunak says he would like to cut demand for food banks by time of next election
Stephen Timms (Lab) goes next.
Q: You said during the Tory leadership contest you would like to end the need for food banks. Is that realistic?
Sunak says he would like to think it is.
Q: When might that happen?
Sunak refuses to say.
Q: Do you think demand for food banks will have reduced by the time of the next electon?
Sunak says he hopes so. He hopes to get the economy growing.
He says they need a better understanding of useage. He says food banks are being included in a DWP survey, and that might provide better data.
Q: The local housing allowance is frozen at 2020 levels. That means, when rent goes up, people have to use other benefits. Disabled people with electric equipment have higher costs. And some people are losing the warm homes allowance. Are you doing anything about these issues?
Sunak says housing spending has gone up, there is a special payment for the disabled, and the warm homes discount is better targeted.
We’ve done global issues, and now the committee is onto the economic issues section.
Harriett Baldwin (Con) asks what he most regrets about his time as chancellor.
Sunak says he rightly warned people that inflation might go up. He tried to put the finances on a sustainable track. At the time some people thought he was worrying too much about rising interest rates.
As for an issue he may have missed, he says he did not realise what a problem they would have with economic inactivity.
Q: The cost of living payments create a big disincentive to earn more because people could lose £900 if their salary goes beyond a certain level. Our committee recommended a tiered system in a report.
Sunak says various mitigations are possible.
Q: Can you confirm that you will not go ahead with the increase in fuel duty assumed in the accounts?
Sunak says he will leave tax decisions for the chancellor. When he was chancellor, he preferred it when the PM did not comment on tax.
UPDATE: My colleague Peter Walker sums this up well.
Asked to name his biggest regret during his time as chancellor, Rishi Sunak says it was being unfairly criticised for being right about fiscal policy when others were wrong. OK.
— Peter Walker (@peterwalker99) December 20, 2022
Updated
Philip Dunne (Con) goes next.
Sunak says he will be looking at the net zero strategy over the Christmas holidays.
Q: The Cop15 biodiversity summit has just finished. How will you deliver on those targets?
Sunak pays tribute to Thérèse Coffey and Zac Goldsmith for their work there. He says an environmental improvement plan will be published early next yaer.
Sir Bernard Jenkin says some lawyers say he can deliver his policy within the European convention on human rights. Others say he cannot. Which view does Sunak take?
Sunak says he is confident he will be able to pass legislation that achieves what he wants. He does not address Jenkin’s question.
Sunak won't say how many asylum seekers he expects to be send to Rwanda by end of next year
Johnson says she worries there are “fairy tale” figures in Sunak’s plans for asylum.
Q: What evidence have you used when deciding you can eliminate the backlog?
Sunak says some modelling suggests the Home Office can triple its processing times.
Q: What is the target for the number of people who will be send to Rwanda by the end of 2023?
Sunak says he does not know if there will be further legal challenges.
Q: The Rwandan government says it expects 200 people to arrive.
Sunak says he will not comment on commercial figures.
Q: Was the permanent secretary right to say there was no evidence of value for money?
Sunak say it is part of his small boats strategy.
Updated
Diana Johnson (Lab) says the asylum backlog had been allowed to grow since 2013. She says Sunak told MPs that the backlog would be abolished by next year. What backlog?
Sunak says the backlog up to 28 June. He says that amounts to around 92,000 cases.
Q: So you are not abolishing the backlog?
Sunak says it would be one of the most significant reductions seen.
Q: How many small boats do you expect to come to the UK in 2023?
Sunak says he would not put a number on it.
Q: The Home Office were planning for 60,000 people to come this year?
Sunak says there will be a planning assumption, but he does not know what that is.
Q: What will the backlog be at the end of next year?
That depends on arrivals, says Sunak.
Clive Betts (Lab) says many Ukrainian refugees in the UK are homeless. Is that acceptable?
Sunak starts by paying tribute to families who have hosted Ukrainian refugees.
Recently the thank you payments were extended, and made more generous.
He says £150m has gone to councils to allow them to mitigate homelessness.
Q: Lord Harrington, the former minister for refugees, said payments should be doubled (from £350 to £700). But they only went up to £500, for families after a year of hosting so someone. Can’t you be more generous?
Sunak says there is also help for councils.
Q: But support for councils has been cut?
Sunak says some costs were frontloaded. And it is also a matter of what can be afforded.
Q: What has happened to the lessons learnt document on Ukraine?
Sunak says munitions are being replenished. The issue is less money than supply chain capacity, he says.
He says the UK wants to give Ukraine what they need. The priorities are air defence, armoured vehicles and artillery ammunition.
On China, Sunak says his governmnet has blocked China taking an increased stake in Newport Wafer Fab. China has been excluded from the Sizewell C nuclear project. It has been excluded from surveillance technology on government property. And the UK has organised with other countries a UN resolution on Xinjiang.
Updated
Sunak says he is 'increasingly concerned' about Iran's conduct
On Iran, Sunak says he is “increasingly concerned about Iran’s behaviour”. He expects to spend an increasing amount of time on this.
Whilst Russia and Ukraine remain our number one foreign policy challenge as we go into the new year.
I am increasingly concerned about Iran’s behaviour, the treatment of their citizens, what they’re doing in the region which is destabilising, and indeed the nuclear programme.
So I think it is something we will need to spend an increasing amount of time on as we go forward.
Updated
Sunak dismisses suggestion audit of Ukraine war means his support for Zelenskiy is weakening
Alicia Kearns (Con) goes first.
Q: Will you commit to supporting Ukraine? There was concern about your audit of the war.
Rishi Sunak says he would not read too much into the reports about the audit. Look at the support for Ukraine he has shown. Of course he will continue to back Ukraine, he says.
UPDATE: Sunak said:
I wouldn’t necessarily read too much into the press reports. Look at my actions …
Of course, we will continue to support Ukraine, I think what all of us would want to see is Ukraine successfully repel Russian aggression.
And it’s important that we maintain support, but also evolve the support for the conditions that we’re seeing on the ground at the battlefield. And that’s what I’m keen to do.
Updated
Sir Bernard Jenkin starts by telling Rishi Sunak that if his answers go on too long, he will extend the time of the hearing. It is due to last for 90 minutes.
Rishi Sunak gives evidence to Commons liaison committee
Rishi Sunak is about to give evidence to the liaison committee, the Commons body made up of the chairs of all the select committees.
Sir Bernard Jenkin (Con) chairs the committee.
According to the committee, there will be three main sections in the hearing. Here are the subjects, and the names of the MPs who will be asking questions under each heading.
Global Issues (including the war in Ukraine, migration and COP27)
Clive Betts MP, Levelling Up, Housing and Communities
Philip Dunne MP, Environmental Audit
Dame Diana Johnson MP, Home Affairs
Alicia Kearns MP, Foreign Affairs
UK’s place in the World / the state of the union
Sir Bill Cash MP, European Scrutiny
Joanna Cherry MP, Joint Committee on Human Rights
Robin Walker MP, Education
Pete Wishart MP, Scottish Affairs
Economic issues (including the autumn statement and subsequent effects on the cost of living)
Harriett Baldwin MP, Treasury
Steve Brine MP, Health and Social Care
Sir Robert Neill MP, Justice
Sir Stephen Timms MP, Work and Pensions
There will also be questions on cross-departmental matters, asked by Catherine McKinnell MP, chair of the petitions committee
Ben Wallace, the defence secretary, made a statement to MPs giving an update on the war in Ukraine. He said that one of his aims was to expose the links between Russia and Iran. He told MPs:
Iran has become one of Russia top military backers. In return for having supplied more than 300 kamikaze drones, Russia now intends to provide Iran with advanced military components, undermining both Middle East and international security. We must expose that deal. In fact I have just now.
As my colleague Dan Sabbagh reports, Wallace provided details on the Russian losses.
Ben Wallace, UK def sec, lists Russian mil losses in Ukraine:
— Dan Sabbagh (@dansabbagh) December 20, 2022
- Over 100k soldiers dead, injured or deserted
- 4,500 armoured vehicles destroyed
- 140 helicopters, fixed wing aircraft lost
- "Rumours of Gen Gerasimov's dismissal persist"
And he said a Newsnight report from the weekend, saying that Rishi Sunak has ordered an audit of the war, did not mean his determination to back Ukraine was weakening.
Wallace on the Sunak's Ukraine audit - understandable PM "would seek an update on Ukraine" and "want to take a stock check of where we are". Adds that the process "in no way weakens or undermine his resolve to support Ukraine, this year and next year and onwards"
— Dan Sabbagh (@dansabbagh) December 20, 2022
Metropolitan police launch inquiry into complaint about Tory MP telling activist to 'go back to Bahrain'
Scotland Yard has launched an investigation after Tory MP Bob Stewart told an activist to “go back to Bahrain” during a confrontation. The Metropolitan police said in a statement:
On Sunday, December 18 police received an online report from a man alleging he had been verbally racially abused.
The allegation relates to an incident in Cleveland Row, SW1A on Wednesday, December 14.
Officers from Westminster CID are investigating.
Activists gathered outside the Scottish parliament building demanding MSPs protect the “core principals” of Scotland’s new gender law ahead of a debate this afternoon on proposed reforms, PA Media reports.
The gender recognition reform (Scotland) bill is expected to pass this week following a debate on Tuesday, which could take as long as nine hours, and a vote on Wednesday.
The controversial bill would make it easier for trans people to obtain a gender recognition certificate (GRC) by removing the requirement for a diagnosis of gender dysphoria.
It will also lower the minimum age for applicants from 18 to 16 and drop the time required for an applicant to live in their acquired gender from two years to three months - six for people aged 16 and 17 - though with a subsequent, three-month reflection period.
The marathon debate on Tuesday will look at more than 150 proposed amendments to the new law.
Trans-rights activists united outside Holyrood on Tuesday urging MSPs to “protect the bill” through the amendment phase.
Three ambulance trusts declare critical incidents
At least three ambulance services have declared critical incidents as NHS services around the country face “unprecedented” pressure, PA Media reports. PA says:
North East Ambulance Service [see 9.53am], South East Coast Ambulance Service and the East of England Ambulance Service have all moved to the status as staff work to respond to calls.
The former operates across Northumberland, Tyne and Wear, County Durham, Darlington and Teesside; South East Coast Ambulance Service covers Brighton & Hove, East Sussex, West Sussex, Kent, Surrey and North East Hampshire; while the latter works in Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire, Essex, Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire.
North East Ambulance Service said it declared a critical incident on Monday afternoon as a result of “significant delays for more than 200 patients waiting for an ambulance, together with a reduction in ambulance crew availability to respond because of delays in handing over patients at the region’s hospitals”.
Declaring a critical incident allows trusts to take measures to protect patients most in need. In some cases people are asked not to ring 999 unless it is a life-threatening emergency.
Updated
Jeremy Hunt has insisted the government will not engage in renewed pay negotiations with striking NHS staff.
The chancellor told the Commons the government had to stick to the recommendations of the NHS pay review body, which in the summer outlined proposals for a £1,400 rise for most NHS staff this year. Speaking during Treasury questions, he said:
I think the best way to resolve the situation is to respect that process.
When you have a cost of living crisis, as we have at the moment, I think the best way to resolve this is an independent process. It is an independent process. When I was health secretary, they often made rulings that were not comfortable.
The government has insisted on sticking to the recommendation, which is worth about 4% on average for nurses. Hunt said the NHS was still able to recruit new nurses, saying there were 32,000 more nurses now than at the start of the parliament.
However, the Royal College of Nursing trade union is pushing for a bigger pay rise and has questioned the independence of the pay review body. The government’s preferred measure of inflation is currently 10.7%.
The chancellor also confirmed he was preparing an extension in financial support for businesses with high energy bills, which would be announced “early in the New Year”.
Will Quince, the health minister, did not give examples of what he meant when he said this morning that people should avoid “risky activity” while the ambulance strike is on. (See 9.49am.) But, as the BBC reports, he subsequently cited contact sports, unnecessary car journeys or running on icy roads as they sort of things people might avoid.
Health leaders send letter to PM saying they cannot guarantee patient safety while ambulance strike is on
Health leaders have written to the prime minister saying that they cannot guarantee patient safety when the ambulance workers’ strike takes place tomorrow.
The letter has been sent by the NHS Confederation and NHS Providers, two organisations that represent trusts and other NHS bodies, and Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, told the World at One it had been send as a “last resort”. He said:
We never want to alarm people. But we have reached the stage where our leaders feel it’s necessary to say that they cannot guarantee patients will be able to avoid risks as these strikes unfold.
Taylor said his members were particularly concerned about the impact of the ambulance strike. But they were worried about further strikes too. He went on:
And so what we’re saying to the government, and to the trade unions, is that as health service leaders we need to be clear with the public that … we cannot guarantee patient safety, we cannot avoid risks in the context of this industrial action …
We need to make it clear that we are entering into a very dangerous time. This is why we are upping even more our call to the government and the trade unions to try to find a way of resolving this dispute.
Asked about the government’s refusal to reopen talks on pay, Taylor said that if that continued to be the case, the strikes would carry on. He went on:
If industrial action takes place, then there will be risk, there will be harm to patients. And it is simply our responsibility to make that absolutely clear to the public to the politicians and to the trade unions.
Taylor also claimed that, although category one calls (involving a life-threatening emergency) to ambulances would receive a response when the strike was on, it had not been guaranteed that category two calls (involving serious conditions like a stroke or chest pains), would always get a response. But he accepted that these issues were being negotiated locally.
In her statement earlier Sharon Graham, the Unite general secretary, said the unions had agreed that category one and category two calls would be covered. “That has been agreed at a host of local NHS trusts,” she said.
Updated
Jerry Hague, a solicitor, has stepped down as Labour’s candidate for Bolsover at the next election after it emerged that he was fined 12 years ago for misconduct over the way his firm deducted money from compensation paid to miners, the BBC reports. Bolsover used to be a mining constituency and it was represented by Labour’s Dennis Skinner until he was defeated by a Conservative, Mark Fletcher, in 2019. Hague said it was an honour to be selected as a candidate, but that he had decided to stand down in the best interests of the Labour party.
Updated
Sharon Graham, the Unite general secretary, has accused Rishi Sunak of ignoring his responsibilities to negotiate an end to the health strikes. In a statement before the ambulance strike tomorrow, she said:
In all my 25 years of negotiating deals with employers, I have never seen such an abdication of responsibility as that by the prime minister, Rishi Sunak, today. It is well beyond time for him to intervene and break the deadlock in the NHS dispute.
The general secretaries of all the unions involved are prepared to negotiate but the PM needs to come to the table now. It’s time to stop hiding behind the discredited NHS pay review body. He needs to name the time and place. If need be Downing Street on Christmas morning – a new deal and the dispute could be nearing resolution before it’s time for Christmas lunch.
Updated
Two-thirds of Britons support nurses' strike, poll suggests
YouGov has released new polling suggesting that two-thirds of Britons support the strike by nurses. Support for striking ambulance staff is almost as high.
The RMT rail strike is the dispute that has most public opposition (49%), but even here opinion is broadly mixed. Some 43% of people support the RMT action.
The survey also suggests that a majority of people blame the government for the health strikes.
The poll is based on a survey of 1,758 adults between 16 and 19 December.
Updated
Rishi Sunak would be spending Christmas in his constituency in Richmond, Yorkshire, No 10 said. And between Christmas and new year he will be dividing his time between Yorkshire and No 10. The PM’s spokesperson said Sunak would not be taking a formal holiday over that period and for most of that time he would be working.
Updated
At the Downing Street lobby briefing the PM’s spokesperson also flatly refused to give examples of the sort of “risky” activity that the health minister Will Quince said people should avoid while the ambulance strike is on. (See 9.49am.) The spokesperson told journalists:
The public, as we saw through Covid, can be trusted to use their common sense.
Cabinet discusses plans for king's coronation as health strikes continue
You might have thought that today’s nurses’ strike, and tomorrow’s strike by ambulance staff would have been discussed at cabinet this morning. But you would have been wrong. At the Downing Street lobby briefing this morning, the PM’s spokesperson said that, after Rishi Sunak updated colleagues on his attendance at the Joint Expeditionary Force summit in Lithuania yesterday, the main topic of discussion was planning for the king’s coronation next year.
Oliver Dowden, the chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster (and an arch-royalist – it is said that he adores this aspect of the job) helped to lead the discussion. He said the coronation would be “a moment of constitutional significance which will allow us to showcase the very best of the United Kingdom”.
Asked why the health strikes were not discussed, the spokesperson said that cabinet ministers discussed them at a meeting of the Cobra emergency committee yesterday, and that further Cobra meetings might take place.
Updated
Tory MP Andrew Bridgen loses appeal against five-day Commons suspension, as panel says he was lucky to get off so lightly
The Conservative MP Andrew Bridgen has failed in his appeal against a report saying he should be suspended from the Commons for five days for breaking the rules on declaring interests and banning paid advocacy.
Last month the Commons standards committee said that Bridgen broke the MPs’ code of conduct after he approached ministers and officials on behalf of a forestry company that had given him a donation, a visit to Ghana and the offer of an advisory contract.
It said that Bridgen should be suspended for two days for breaking the rules on advocacy and interests, and a further three days for putting undue pressure on the parliamentary commissioner for standards during the course of the inquiry.
Bridgen appealed to the independent expert panel against the finding that he broke the rule, and the severity of the proposed punishment. The panel rejected his arguments on both grounds, and told him, in effect, he was lucky to be getting off so lightly. It said in its report:
[Bridgen] essentially does no more than assert that the sanctions recommended by the committee were excessive. We disagree. Indeed, in our view the sanctions for breach of the rule against paid advocacy and for the email letter could properly and fairly have been more severe.
Updated
Here is a Guardian video of nurses in Birmingham explaining why they are on strike today.
The Liberal Democrats say Steve Barclay, the health secretary, should resign if tomorrow’s ambulance strike goes ahead. Daisy Cooper, the Lib Dem deputy leader and health spokesperson, said:
Steve Barclay must get round the table and resolve these strikes now.
A health secretary that can’t keep ambulances running during a winter crisis is not fit for office and must resign.
James Morris, a Conservative, asked Rachel Harrison to clarify what GMB members were asking for in their NHS pay dispute.
Harrison said they wanted a pay rise above inflation, plus a plan to restore a decade’s worth of lost earnings.
But she also said that if the government made a new offer, the GMB would take that to its members.
“We’re not making a demand,” she said. “We’re saying, make us an offer.”
Updated
Rachel Harrison from the GMB tells the health committee that “life and limb” cover will be provided during the ambulance strike. “The last thing that our members want to do is put patients in harm’s way,” she says.
Prof Julian Redhead, national clinical director for urgent and emergency care at NHS England, tells the committee that emergency cover will continue while the ambulance strike is on. There will be ambulances available for the “sickest and most vulnerable patients”, which in general means category one and category two calls, he says. He says people should not be discouraged from calling 999.
Pay review body process needs to be reformed, GMB official tells MPs
At the Commons health committee they are now talking about the pay dispute with the government.
Rachel Harrison, national secretary of the GMB union, says her union has a meeting with Steve Barclay, the health secretary, today. But it is about emergency cover, not pay. If the government does not reopen talks on pay, tomorrow’s strike will go ahead, she says.
She says some people working in the NHS are now being paid less than the national living wage.
She also calls for “true reform” of the pay review body process. She says the recommendations should not be conditioned by departmental budgets that have already been set.
And she says the panel should be genuinely independent, and free to make recommendations taking into account factors like the cost of living and the impact on the workforce.
She also says in some years in the past the Department of Health has engaged in direct pay talks with unions, instead of just leaving it to the pay review body.
Updated
At the committee Daren Mochrie, the chair of the Association of Ambulance Chief Executives, said that he did not think the situation would improve in the coming months. In response to a question from Lucy Allan (Con), Mochrie said: “I cannot see how in the next few weeks and months ahead the situation will improve.”
Updated
Back at the Commons health committee the Conservative MP Lucy Allan said that 44,000 hours had been lost in a single month at West Midlands ambulance service while ambulances waited outside hospitals.
And Dr John Martin, president of the College of Paramedics, said NHS England figures published in December showed that 4,232 hours were lost in one day because of ambulances waiting outside hospitals. He went on:
That equates to 176 ambulances. That is our members who are really struggling because they can spend the whole of their shift at a hospital waiting to hand over a patient. Everybody is frustrated, including ED [emergency department] doctors.
The frustration is they are worn out, they are tired, they want to get back to being good paramedics.
Updated
Aslef announces strike by train drivers on Thursday 5 January
Aslef, the train drivers’ union, has announced that it will hold another strike on Thursday 5 January.
The strike will affect 15 rail companies: Avanti West Coast; Chiltern Railways; CrossCountry; East Midlands Railway; Great Western Railway; Greater Anglia; GTR Great Northern Thameslink; London North Eastern Railway; Northern Trains; Southeastern; Southern/Gatwick Express; South Western Railway (depot drivers only); SWR Island Line; TransPennine Express; and West Midlands Trains.
Mick Whelan, the Aslef general secretary, said:
We don’t want to go on strike but the companies have pushed us into this place. They have not offered our members at these companies a penny – and these are people who have not had an increase since April 2019.
That means they expect train drivers at these companies to take a real-terms pay cut – to work just as hard for considerably less – when inflation is running at north of 14%.
The train companies say their hands have been tied by the government. While the government – which does not employ us – says it’s up to the companies to negotiate with us. We are always happy to negotiate – we never refuse to sit down at the table and talk – but these companies have offered us nothing. And that is unacceptable.
Rachel Harrison, national secretary of the GMB union, told the Commons health committee that ambulance staff have the highest level of sickness in the NHS becauze of the “terrible conditions” they are working in. She said:
There’s the highest sickness levels amongst all categories of workers in the NHS in the ambulance service and that is because of the terrible conditions they’re being expected to work in.
And this isn’t just the frontline paramedics, technicians, emergency care assistants. This is the call centre - people who are having to deal with this influx of calls and screaming families and friends who are frustrated.
And the massive increase in mental health calls that they’re having to deal with because there are no, or there have been significantly reduce access to community and mental health services.
So the whole impact across the workforce is massive and our members are pleading on the government to do something about this now.
In his interview on the Today programme this morning Will Quince, the health minister, admitted that even on non-strike days people with chest pains, or a suspected stroke, were having to wait around 47-48 minutes for an ambulance.
Asked if lives were at risk, not from the strikes but from the general state of the NHS, he replied:
It’s actually not the ambulance services themselves, it’s issues with emergency departments, largely bed occupancy rates … That’s exactly why we’re putting in the extra half a billion pounds.
Updated
Ambulance delays having 'devastating impact' on staff because they cannot look after patients properly, MPs told
Rachel Harrison, national secretary of the GMB union, told the Commons health committee that ambulances delays are having a “devastating impact” on staff.
The delays are primarily caused by the shortage of beds in hospitals, and they mean that ambulance staff often have to wait for long periods before they can unload a patient into hospital and head out for the next calls. And the shortage of hospital beds is often attributed to the difficulty they have in finding care support for the patients they are ready to discharge.
Harrison said that her union had been warning about this problem for years, and that it was a major factor behind the decision by her members to go on strike. Asked about the delays, she said:
It’s absolutely having a devastating impact on our members – frustration, stress, burnout, exhaustion, low morale, mental health.
Our members are tired of going to work every day and in some cases spending the whole of their shift sat on an ambulance outside an A&E department with the same patient. We’ve had examples where our members have clocked off at the end of one shift to return the following day to the same patient being on that ambulance with the crew they’d left them the night before.
Our members went into this profession to become healthcare professionals, to help the public and provide patient safety. They feel they are being physically prevented from being able to carry out their jobs today. And that is because of this knock on impact over delays and waiting times, and the fact that patients can’t be safely discharged into hospitals.
And when they eventually get to a job that they can see on the monitor that somebody’s been waiting hours and hours for this call, they don’t know what situation they’re walking into. They don’t know if that individual will still be alive. They have friends and families that are screaming at them as if it is their fault. And these are the very individuals that are not to blame for this situation.
So our members have taken the steps that they’ve taken, the vote for action, and this is one of the central parts as to why. They are doing this because we have been raising these issues for years and we have been ignored.
Updated
In his interviews this morning Will Quince, the health minister, said that the military personnel who are helping out when ambulance staff are on strike tomorrow will not be allowed to turn on blue lights when driving ambulances, or drive them through red lights. “They will be there to drive ambulances in a support capacity for individual trusts,” he said.
At the health committee hearing Dr John Martin, president of the College of Paramedics, told MPs that ambulance staff are now having to deal with “a sicker population who are calling us more often” than they were in the past. But, despite that, ambulance staff were seeing fewer patients per shift, he said, because of the delays getting people into hospital because of delayed discharges.
In the Commons the health committee has just started a hearing focusing on ambulance delays and strikes. There is a live feed at the top of the page.
There are four witnesses giving evidence: Prof Julian Redhead, national clinical director for urgent and emergency care at NHS England; Daren Mochrie, chair of the Association of Ambulance Chief Executives; Rachel Harrison, national secretary of the GMB union; and Dr John Martin, president of the College of Paramedics.
More than 60 cross-party MPs have written to the Sun’s editor, Victoria Newton, to demand an apology and “action taken” against Jeremy Clarkson for a column where he said the Duchess of Sussex should be paraded through the streets naked, my colleague Jessica Elgot reports.
The North East Ambulance Service, which covers Northumberland, Durham, Teesside and Tyne and Wear, has declared a critical incident as it struggles to cope with demand.
The incident was declared on Monday as “a result significant delays for more than 200 patients waiting for an ambulance,” the service said. There was also “a reduction in ambulance crew availability to respond because of delays in handing over patients at the region’s hospitals”.
Stephen Segasby, the service’s chief operating officer, said:
Our service is under unprecedented pressure.
Declaring a critical incident means we can focus our resources on those patients most in need and communicates the pressures we are under to our health system partners who can provide support.
We are asking the public to call us only in a life-threatening emergency. For all other patients, we are urging them to use www.111.nhs.uk, speak to their GP or pharmacist.
The declaration comes as NEAS also braces itself for strike action. Service bosses have urged the public to “use the service wisely” during the strikes on 21 and 28 December.
Health minister tells public to avoid 'risky activity' when ambulance staff are on strike tomorrow
Will Quince, the health minister, has been giving interviews this morning. He told BBC Breakfast that, because cover will be limited when ambulance staff go on strike in England and Wales tomorrow, people should avoid “risky” activities. He said:
Where people are planning any risky activity, I would strongly encourage them not to do so because there will be disruption on the day.
Quince did not give examples of what might count as risky behaviour.
RCN chief Pat Cullen says nurses will escalate strike in January if government does not offer better pay deal
Pat Cullen, general secretary of the Royal College of Nursing, has been giving interviews this morning, as well as joining RCN members on a picket line in Newcastle.
Cullen said that, if the government did not resolve the dispute, the RCN would escalate its strike action in January. She said:
If this government keeps giving our nursing staff the cold shoulder as they have to date then, it’s really unfortunate that, come January, we will see more hospitals being involved and striking and that means more nursing staff involved.
She urged the prime minister to “do the decent thing” and to open talks on a revised pay offer. She told PA Media:
I want to say to the prime minister this morning, please step in now and do the decent thing on behalf of every patient and member of the public of this country.
But please do the decent thing also for nursing staff - get round the table and start to talk to me on their behalf.
That’s the only respectful and decent thing to do, and let’s bring these strikes to a conclusion.
She refused to say whether the offer of an extra one-off payment might help to settle the strike. Steve Barclay, the health secretary, reportedly wanted to offer nurses a one-off lump sum, but was overruled by No 10. Asked if nurses would accept this, Cullen said nurses did not want “quick fixes”. They needed an in-depth review of the value of their work, she said. But she added: “That’s for us to discuss in a room, not on the airwaves.”
Too late to improve pay offers, says Sunak, as nurses strike again
Good morning. Nurses in England, Wales and Northern Ireland are on strike again today. And health chiefs are even more worried about the impact of another dispute tomorrow, when ambulance staff in England and Wales take industrial action.
Rishi Sunak is chairing cabinet this morning, and at 3pm he will take questions from the Commons liaison committee, probably for around 90 minutes. It will probably be the most extensive Q&A he has undergone since he became prime minister.
But if anyone expects him to open the door to an early resolution of the health service strikes, they are likely to be disappointed. Sunak gave an interview to the Daily Mail’s Jason Groves yesterday in which he warned the public to be ready for the long haul. Here are the key lines.
Sunak said the current round of strikes could go on for months. Asked if Britain could face months of strikes, Sunak replied:
Yeah. Look, I’m going to keep making the same arguments I’ve been making.
The government is acting fairly and reasonably and will always continue to do so. I’m going to do what I think is right for the long-term interests of the country: combating inflation.
The government is doing everything it can to be responsible and put in place contingency measures to support people, but ultimately I will continue to urge the unions to call off the strike because that’s what is causing disruption to people’s lives, that is what is having an impact on their health.
He implied it was too late to improve the pay offer for the 2022-23 financial year. Groves reports:
[Sunak] flatly rejected reports that he was preparing a climbdown in his trial of strength with union leaders. The PM said it was too late to improve on pay offers in a financial year that was ‘basically finished’.
But Sunak implied that unions might get a more generous pay offer for 2023-24 if they called off strikes now. “Offering an olive branch to workers, [Sunak] hinted that next year’s pay round could be more generous if union members behaved responsibly now,” Groves reports. He goes on:
Mr Sunak said it was too late in the financial year to unpick the settlement – and suggested the unions should focus on making the case for an improved pay deal next year. ‘We do need to think about what’s the right approach for next year,’ he said. ‘Of course that’s a conversation we will have with the unions, with the pay review bodies, as we think about the right pay settlements.’
Here is the agenda for the day.
9.30am: Rishi Sunak chairs cabinet.
10am: NHS England, the Association of Ambulance Chief Executives, the GMB and the College of Paramedics give evidence to the Commons health committee about the ambulance strikes.
11.30am: Downing Street holds its lobby briefing.
11.30am: Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor, takes questions in the Commons.
After 12.30pm: MPs hold a debate on the forthcoming adjournment, which allows them to raise any topic they want.
3pm: Sunak takes questions from the Commons liaison committee.
I’ll try to monitor the comments below the line (BTL) but it is impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer questions, and if they are of general interest I will post the question and reply above the line (ATL), although I can’t promise to do this for everyone.
If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter. I’m on @AndrewSparrow.
Alternatively, you can email me at andrew.sparrow@theguardian.com.
Updated
