Sir Keir Starmer has outlined six targets for his government to meet by the next general election in his “plan for change” – including 1.5 million new homes and slashing NHS waiting lists to levels not seen for a decade.
Thursday 5 December 2024 17:11, UK
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Darren Millar, member of the Senedd (MS), has been elected the new leader of the Welsh Conservatives.
He takes the role after Andrew RT Davies resigned after just narrowly winning a vote of confidence.
Mr Millar, who has represented Clwyd West in the Senedd since 2007, has been elected unopposed after no other Welsh Conservative members put themselves forward.
Announcing his election in a tweet, the Welsh Conservatives said: “It’s now time for our party to unite and take the fight to our political opponents as we prepare for the Welsh parliament elections in 2026.”
A Welsh Labour spokesperson was, as expected, rather dismissive of Mr Millar, saying he is “a new face”, but he represents “the same old Conservative Party in Wales”.
They added: “Voters have already rejected Darren Millar and his colleagues at the general election.
“Instead of trying to understand why, they are papering over the cracks. The people of Wales won’t buy it.”
Sir Keir Starmer has outlined six “measurable milestones” for voters to judge him on by the time of the next general election.
Here are the main things you need to know:
Politics Hub With Sophy Ridge is live from 7pm.
On the show tonight to discuss the prime minister’s is the work and pensions secretary, Liz Kendall.
We’ll also hear from Tory MP Matt Vickers and former Labour speechwriter Simon Lancaster.
On our panel are Labour MP Jeevun Sandher and Conservative peer Baroness Kate Fall.
Sir Keir Starmer couldn’t resist taking full advantage of his famous surroundings this morning at the start of his speech about his government’s priorities.
The prime minister was speaking from Pinewood Studios, where box office hits like Star Wars, Spider-Man, and – perhaps most famously – James Bond have been filmed.
“It’s really great to be at the iconic Pinewood Studios,” he said.
“Kemi Badenoch thinks if you do a couple of shifts in McDonald’s, then you can become working class,” he continued, referring to a previously lampooned comment from the Tory leader about her background.
“By that logic, if I keep coming back here, I could be the next James Bond.”
More than a year after being refused by the then Tory housing minister Michael Gove, Marks & Spencer has been given permission to demolish and rebuild its store at Marble Arch.
Angela Rayner has given it the all-clear, bringing to an end a bitter row between the retail giant and central government.
M&S has long been wanting to knock down the 1929 Art Deco building and replace it with a much larger 10-storey retail and office block.
It had support from local authorities, but Mr Gove blocked it in summer 2023, citing concerns about potential harm to nearby heritage landmarks and the environmental impact.
Our economics and data editor Ed Conway was another one of our experts listening in to Sir Keir Starmer’s speech.
Labour have long been pledging to achieve the fastest sustained economic growth in the G7 – the group that consists of the UK, US, Canada, Italy, Japan, France, and Germany.
Ed says the runaway lead for the US in the G7 growth table always made that goal unrealistic, points out the UK is “smack bang in the middle”.
This is on the basis of GDP – the value of everything generated in a country’s economy.
So even though we’re well off first place, it’s not all bad news.
However, Ed points out that even using a measure of disposable income per household – how much money people have “in their pocket”, which the prime minister touted today – it’s still not a great picture for Labour.
While before the budget this metric was set to rise for most of the next five years, since Rachel Reeves stood at the despatch box at the end of October the trend is now “dipping down”.
That’s because of all the tax rises she announced.
This is one to keep an eye on in the future if the government wants to raise living standards.
Our political editor Beth Rigby said a little earlier the prime minister knows his government needs an answer to Reform’s polling surge – and now there’s another sign as to why.
Nigel Farage’s party has moved above Labour and within two points of Kemi Badenoch’s Tories in a new poll by Find Out Now.
Now, it’d be remiss of us not to point out two fairly big caveats.
First, Find Out Now is the only pollster showing this kind of result right now.
Second, their projection for the general election result was way off, massively overestimating the scale of the Labour victory.
With that said, back to today’s poll:
Polling was done on 4 December, with the changes compared to one on 27 November.
Reform chairman Zia Yusuf said it showed the party “has all the momentum” and predicted it “will form the next government”.
Scotland “can’t wait” for Labour to axe the two-child benefit cap, First Minister John Swinney has said.
Mr Swinney said the pledge to mitigate the cap in Scotland has been made so he can fulfil a commitment to “leave no stone unturned in eradicating child poverty”.
He also hit out at Prime Minister Keir Starmer, saying voters “reasonably could have expected” Labour to act on the issue after being voted into office in July.
‘No stone unturned’
Sir Keir has said the policy can only be ended when the fiscal conditions allow, with no indication when this might be.
Mr Swinney said: “We can’t wait for a Labour government.
“I am acting to fulfil my commitment to leave no stone unturned in eradicating child poverty, that is what we’re going to do.”
Introduced by the Conservatives in 2017, the cap means families can only claim some benefits for their first two children, with no additional money awarded to them for subsequent children they may have.
Over to the House of Lords, where Justin Welby has delivered his final speech as the Archbishop of Canterbury.
He resigned after a report found the Church of England covered up sexual abuse by a barrister.
Delivering the speech, Mr Welby said: “It is clear that I had to stand down.”
The independent Makin review into John Smyth’s abuse of children and young men was published last month.
Across five decades in three different countries, involving as many as 130 boys and young men in the UK and Africa, Smyth is said to have subjected his victims to traumatic physical, sexual, psychological, and spiritual attacks, permanently marking their lives.
The report concluded he might have been brought to justice had Mr Welby formally reported it to police soon after he was installed as archbishop 11 years ago.
Smyth died aged 75 in Cape Town in 2018 while still under investigation by Hampshire Police.
Maggie Oliver, former detective constable at Greater Manchester Police, says today’s announcement on policing is merely a “drop in the ocean”.
Sir Keir Starmer pledged £100m in funding for neighbourhood policing, with a commitment to have 13,000 more officers on the streets.
But Ms Oliver accused the PM of “smoke and mirrors”.
She tells Sky News: “When you look into the detail, it actually is not 13,000 new police officers on the beat, it’s 3,000.
“There are 4,000 PCSOs, there are 3,000 specials.
“What we are looking at in this country is a crisis in policing.”
‘Unacceptable’
She says the criminal justice system is “on its knees”.
“We’ve had the CPS today saying the delays in serious crimes, in rapes reaching court, is unacceptable,” the former detective explains.
She draws a comparison between the cash announced today and the billions pledged to Ukraine and other foreign aid, suggesting that it all should instead be spent on domestic priorities.
“I feel like the problems we have in this country will go nowhere near being solved by this new announcement.”
One of Sir Keir Starmer’s six milestones is to cut NHS waiting lists, getting them back down to a long-missed target of no more than 18 weeks between referral and treatment.
But our health correspondent Ashish Joshi says while waiting lists have indeed “grown and grown to record numbers”, critics will say the prime minister’s target is “all about optics”.
“He needs something tangible to show the public,” says Ashish, and shorter waiting lists would indeed be just that.
“But the warning from health leaders is there is no slack in the system.”
If all the focus goes on waiting lists, they fear “other parts of the health service are going to suffer”.
It’s creating “a bit of tension” between the PM and NHS bosses, who are waiting for the health secretary to unveil his big plans for reforming the health service in the spring.
But in the meantime, “it’s going to be another miserable winter for NHS staff and patients”.
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