Unite warns government it has five days to stop NHS strike spreading The general secretary of the Unite union, Sharon Graham, has urged the government to convene NHS pay talks or see the strikes spread. Graham warns that Rishi Sunak’s administration has five days to “do the responsible thing by the country”, and resume pay negotiations. She says: “It must not waste this weekend. Ministers need to give themselves a shake and get into serious pay talks or see this strike spread next week. “Anyone with a passing knowledge of the NHS can see that this government has brought it to its knees. A decade of pay cuts and a chronic staffing shortage is crushing our NHS and putting patients’ lives at risk. Our NHS members feel that they are fighting to save the very NHS itself. “Unless the government shapes up, this strike will deepen next week and the blame for this will lie firmly at ministers’ door.” Unite’s members across three English ambulance trusts are set to walk out on 21 December over the government’s refusal to shift on its four per cent pay offer. With RPI inflation rate hitting 14.0% in November 2022, this is a real terms pay cut of 10%, Unite points out. But as we covered earlier, Sunak insisted today that the NHS pay offer is “appropriate and fair”, as he resisted pressure from health leaders and some Conservative MPs. Summary Rishi Sunak has refused to concede to the pressure from health leaders and some senior Conservatives to negotiate pay with nurses to prevent further strikes. Mick Lynch, the head of the RMT union, raised hopes that future rail strikes could be averted as travel was disrupted by a fresh 48-hour walkout and nurses warned their action could escalate. Planned strikes next week will be “very challenging” for the health service, hospital bosses have warned, after they conceded that Thursday’s nurses strikes had had a “significant impact”. The prime minister, Rishi Sunak, has said he is working “flat out” to try and restore the powers sharing executive in Northern Ireland but warned that an imminent breakthrough is unlikely. Keir Starmer has said “it’s time for a Labour government”, after the party held the Stretford and Urmston constituency in a byelection. The Earl of Shrewsbury (Con) and Lady Goudie (Lab) have both been recommended to be suspended from the House of Lords after having been found to have breached the House of Lords code of conduct for providing parliamentary advice and services in return for payment. Wes Streeting declined to say whether a Labour government would agree to a pay rise for nurses. The general secretary of the Unite union, Sharon Graham, has urged the government to convene NHS pay talks or see the strikes spread. You can read the full report on the suspension of two members of the House of Lords here. A House of Lords watchdog has ordered that two peers be suspended from the upper house for long periods for taking thousands of pounds to promote companies, in breach of parliamentary rules. In two reports published on Friday, the House of Lords Conduct Committee recommended a suspension of nine months for the Earl of Shrewsbury, a former Conservative, now non-affiliated, hereditary peer, and six months for the Labour-appointed peer Mary Goudie. In what the committee called a “lucrative relationship”, SpectrumX, a healthcare firm, paid Shrewsbury £57,000 over two years to lobby ministers and officials. His proposed punishment would be the most severe sanction imposed on a peer found to have broken the rules by being paid to lobby. The committee said his misconduct was “extremely serious” and damaged the reputation of the House of Lords. The UK government has undermined talks at the Cop15 biodiversity conference by failing to set targets for water quality or habitat protections in England, campaigners have said. Environmental experts have been disappointed by the delayed legally binding targets mandated by the 2021 Environment Act, which were released on Friday, six weeks after the deadline. Not only do they fail to set overall targets for river health and protected sites, the targets are weaker than those set out in the consultation. For example, the consultation recommended an increase in tree canopy and woodland cover from 14.5% to 17.5% of total land area in England by 2050. The new target is 16.5%. Water pollution targets have also been delayed from 2037 to 2038, giving an extra year for rivers to be polluted with nutrients and chemicals. The environment secretary, Thérèse Coffey, announced the targets as part of a six-minute talk to delegates at Cop15 in Montreal, in which she spoke mainly about the oceans and said she was “a big fan of science”. She said: “Today in the UK, I’ve announced our new legally binding environmental targets will include the restoration of 70% of designated features in marine protected areas to get them back to favourable condition – because we have to keep sight of the magnitude of the environmental challenge that we face.” Defra says Coffey may talk about the targets again, but that nothing is currently scheduled. Unite warns government it has five days to stop NHS strike spreading The general secretary of the Unite union, Sharon Graham, has urged the government to convene NHS pay talks or see the strikes spread. Graham warns that Rishi Sunak’s administration has five days to “do the responsible thing by the country”, and resume pay negotiations. She says: “It must not waste this weekend. Ministers need to give themselves a shake and get into serious pay talks or see this strike spread next week. “Anyone with a passing knowledge of the NHS can see that this government has brought it to its knees. A decade of pay cuts and a chronic staffing shortage is crushing our NHS and putting patients’ lives at risk. Our NHS members feel that they are fighting to save the very NHS itself. “Unless the government shapes up, this strike will deepen next week and the blame for this will lie firmly at ministers’ door.” Unite’s members across three English ambulance trusts are set to walk out on 21 December over the government’s refusal to shift on its four per cent pay offer. With RPI inflation rate hitting 14.0% in November 2022, this is a real terms pay cut of 10%, Unite points out. But as we covered earlier, Sunak insisted today that the NHS pay offer is “appropriate and fair”, as he resisted pressure from health leaders and some Conservative MPs. A cross-party group of MSPs has tabled amendments to Scottish government plans to streamline how transgender people change their legal sex, in order to address concerns about abusive males taking advantage of the new system. The moves come days before a parliamentary vote on the bill, and as a UN expert on gender identity warned that attempts to postpone or weaken it could be based on “unfounded negative stereotypes about trans women as violent or predatory”. Victor Madrigal-Borloz, the independent expert on protection against violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, wrote in a letter sent to the UK government that UN bodies had consistently found “legal recognition of gender identity through self-identification is the most efficient and appropriate way to ensure the enjoyment of human rights”. He is the second senior UN official to intervene in the Holyrood bill, after the special rapporteur on violence against women and girls, Reem Alsalem, raised concerns that the reforms would “open the door for violent males” to abuse the process. Gillian Martin, a Scottish National party MSP who has previously expressed doubts about gender recognition reforms, is collaborating with Jamie Greene, the co-chair of Holyrood’s LGBTQ+ group and the only Scottish Conservative to have voted for the general principles of the bill at its first reading. A new Conservative attack advert appeared on Friday, showing Keir Starmer with his head bowed next to a triumphant-looking Mick Lynch, the head of the striking RMT rail union, and Angela Rayner’s smiling face in between them. It showed the Tories once again reaching for its old union-bashing comfort blanket that worked for Margaret Thatcher and, to an extent, for some subsequent leaders, such as David Cameron against Ed Miliband and Boris Johnson against Jeremy Corbyn. But not all Conservative MPs nor its strategists believe this demonisation of Labour by linking the strikes to supposedly unpopular unions will work. Nor is it an easy assumption that the public are anti-strikes, with opinion polls suggesting strong, although slightly declining, support for the nurses’ strike rather than the government’s position of refusing to negotiate over pay. George Osborne will collect a share of a £26.5m payout for his first year working as partner at the City advisory firm Robey Warshaw. The former chancellor, who orchestrated the austerity drive after the 2008 financial crisis, is one of four partners at the Mayfair-based investment banking company, which announced on Friday it would pay out a total of £26,482,914 to four men. Robey Warshaw did not reveal how much Osborne, who joined the firm in April last year, would collect. Most of the money – £17.2m – will go to its co-founder, Sir Simon Robey, who is known as the City’s “trillion-dollar man” for the cumulative size of the mega-deals he has worked on, including advising the Cadbury board on the sale of the 197-year-old chocolate company to US rival Kraft in 2010. RMT head calls on both sides to work quickly to end long-running dispute over rail worker"s pay The head of the RMT union has said that both sides involved in the long-running dispute over rail workers’ pay and jobs need to “work quickly” to end the strikes. Speaking to the BBC, Mick Lynch said there had been “an exchange of views”, but it was important that employers, ministers and unions were getting together. He added that he would like to see the proposals on pay and working conditions for its members improved. “We need to work quickly, and we need a bit of goodwill from all parties,” Lynch said. On Friday, rail workers began another two-day walkout following strikes earlier this week. Detectives are investigating after four people died when a small boat capsized in the Channel. PA reports: Earlier this week, the prime minister, Rishi Sunak, announced more funding for the NCA – Britain’s version of the FBI – to tackle organised immigration crime in Europe. Kent police said they were looking into the circumstances surrounding the incident on Wednesday with the National Crime Agency (NCA), amid reports that those on board paid thousands of pounds to people-smugglers to make the journey to the UK. Officers were also trying to identify the people who died and track down their relatives, the force said on Friday. Reports of a boat in distress in the early hours of Wednesday morning prompted a major search and rescue operation off the coast of Kent involving the British and French navies, the UK Coastguard, the RNLI, police and ambulance services. A fishing boat was the first on the scene and was one of three to help with the rescue. Thirty-nine people were found alive, many of whom were pulled from the freezing water. The search was called off at 5pm on Thursday. People onboard the dinghy told fishermen they had paid £5,000 each to people-smugglers for the journey from France to the UK, according to media reports. It has since emerged that another rescue took place on the same day. Government officials said a different boat carrying 50 people started to sink and five ended up in the water, but everyone was rescued by Border Force teams. In his latest column, Simon Jenkins argues that instead of fighting for the centre ground, Keir Starmer should look to the radical changes pushed through under Harold Wilson. Wes Streeting has declined to say whether a Labour government would agree to a pay rise for nurses. Following his speech to the Policy Exchange thinktank, the shadow health secretary said when asked about whether Labour would push for a pay rises for nurses: “I’ve been honest about the fact that if Labour were in government today, we wouldn’t be able to offer inflation plus 5%. But we would be willing to negotiate.” He said Labour was “anxious not to make promises we can’t keep”, not knowing what the public finances and inflation would look like in two years. “I’m not going to make a commitment today about precisely where Labour would set pay. “But I do understand why the nurses feel the way they do. And I think it is the most reasonable request in the world to say to a government ‘we’ll suspend our strike action if you’re just prepared to sit down and talk and seriously negotiate on pay’.” The Earl of Shrewsbury (Con) and Lady Goudie (Lab) have both been recommended to be suspended from the House of Lords after having been found to have breached the House of Lords code of conduct for providing parliamentary advice and services in return for payment. This follows the Earl of Shrewsbury having faced his second investigation, over allegations that he misused his parliamentary position to lobby for a firm that was paying him. In August, the Guardian revealed that the earl also tabled nine questions in parliament that elicited information from the government about issues that appear to be connected to SpectrumX, which marketed products to combat coronavirus. After he had received answers from a minister, the peer forwarded them on to SpectrumX. The earl will face a suspension for nine months, while Goudie will face suspension for six months. Keir Starmer says Labour byelection win in Stretford and Urmston shows it"s time for Labour government Keir Starmer has said “it’s time for a Labour government”, after the party held the Stretford and Urmston constituency in a byelection. The Labour leader said the result, which saw the party increase its share of the vote, showed people were “fed up of 12 years of Tory failure”. Labour had been expected to retain the Greater Manchester seat, which it has held since it was created in 1997. Andrew Western won 70% of the vote, an 11% swing away from the Conservatives. The turnout was low, only 25%, which has been attributed to problems with postal ballots amid industrial action. Western, who has led Trafford council since 2018, achieved a majority of 9,906. The 37-year-old succeeds Kate Green, who resigned last month after being nominated as deputy mayor of Greater Manchester. Starmer congratulated Western on Twitter, although he is not expected to visit the constituency following the result. Rishi Sunak has insisted householders in Northern Ireland will receive stalled energy support payments before the winter ends as he promised an announcement “very soon”. Households in the region are waiting on £600 to help pay energy bills amid the cost-of-living crisis, which includes a £400 payment as part of a wider UK-wide support scheme and an additional £200 in recognition of Northern Ireland’s dependence on home heating oil. While consumers in the rest of the UK have already begun to receive energy support payments, householders in Northern Ireland continue to wait, with the Government claiming the political impasse at Stormont is hampering efforts to get the money paid out. People in Great Britain are receiving their payments in instalments, the last of which will be made in March. Northern Ireland Secretary Chris Heaton-Harris has said the payments would already have been made in the region if a powersharing executive were in place. He claims the lack of ministers at Stormont has made the roll out “very, very complicated”. He also said that everyone in the region was already benefitting from the Government’s energy-price guarantee. “That is worth around 900 of support for a typical family,” he added. The prime minister added: “What I can say is we will be making an announcement very soon about how that is going to be delivered. But it will be delivered this winter. For many people it will be delivered faster than for others in Great Britain. “We have been working on it, we want to get that support to people, we recognise it is important. It is a great example of why we do need the Executive back up and running. “These are exactly the type of challenges that we shouldn’t be needing to deal with because they should be dealt with by an executive here. In the absence of that the Government has focused on it and the announcement will be made shortly.” Rishi Sunak said there are parts of the protocol which threaten Northern Ireland’s place within the union. He said: “I am not going to give a running commentary on the negotiations, it wouldn’t be appropriate. “What is of paramount importance to me is protecting Northern Ireland’s place in the union. “The protocol, clearly there are areas of it which threaten that. “I want to resolve those and I want to protect Northern Ireland’s place in the union. “That is what I am setting out to do. If we can do that, we can get the Executive up and running, that is what people need and deserve.” Sunak says not to expect imminent breakthrough in talks to resolve Northern Ireland protocol issues The prime minister has said he is working “flat out” to try and restore the powers sharing executive in Northern Ireland but warned that an imminent breakthrough is unlikely. Speaking during a visit to Belfast, Rishi Sunak said: “I am really committed to resolving some of the issues with the (Northern Ireland) protocol, protecting Northern Ireland’s place in the union, in the United Kingdom, and in doing so, restoring the Executive. “That is what the people in Northern Ireland need and deserve and that is what I am working flat out to try and deliver. “I have not put a strict deadline on the talks (between the Government and the EU) and I don’t want to raise people’s expectations of an imminent breakthrough. “What I can tell you is I am very committed to resolving this issue. “The Foreign Secretary met with his counterpart just this week, talks are ongoing and I will work as hard and as fast as I can to find a resolution to the issues with the protocol. “I want to do that as soon as practically possible.” Sunak’s comments come after he met with the leaders of Stormont’s five political parties during his first visit to norther Ireland as prime minister. Planned strikes next week will be “very challenging” for the health service, hospital bosses have warned, after they conceded that Thursday’s nurses strikes had had a “significant impact”. The comments from NHS Providers came amid mounting pressure on the government from senior backbenchers and usually supportive newspapers to try to resolve the dispute. The Royal College of Nursing is planning another strike next Tuesday, which will be followed on Wednesday by a strike by ambulance workers. Saffron Cordery, the interim chief executive of NHS Providers, outlined the increased challenges the strikes would present to hospitals. Speaking to the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, she said: “It’s going to get increasingly difficult for trust leaders to manage this process because we know that the winter is always a very tricky time in the NHS and we know it’s a particularly demanding time. “Coming alongside an ambulance strike on the following day, I think it’s going to be a very challenging time next week.” She also described the “very demanding” impact of Thursday’s nurses’ strike. She said: “What we saw yesterday was a really mixed picture, so we’re receiving varied reports from trust leaders across the country. “I think we do know that there were some real pressure points around emergency departments, for example, including things like the slow transfer of patients out of those departments. “In terms of things like routine operations, so far we’ve heard that probably between around 40 to 60% of those routine operations have been cancelled in places where the strikes were held. “So it’s fair to say that there’s been a relatively significant impact and I think it was a very demanding day overall, on the frontline in the NHS.” Several senior Tories have urged the government to negotiate with nurses. They include the former health minister and current health committee chair, Steve Brine, former cabinet ministers Jake Berry and Robert Buckland and the doctor and former health minister Dan Poulter. RMT leader Mick Lynch says compromise on conditions and pay "achievable" amid latest rail workers" strike Mick Lynch raised hopes that future rail strikes could be averted as travel was disrupted by a fresh 48-hour walkout and nurses warned their action could escalate. PA reports: The RMT leader believes compromise on conditions and an improvement in the pay offer are “achievable” after talks with the government. His members at 14 companies and Network Rail again walked out on Friday, crippling services across the country a day after an unprecedented nursing strike. Health leaders warned the situation in the NHS will become “increasingly difficult” next week when nurses walk out again before ambulance staff strike. With the Government under growing pressure to offer better pay deals to end the disruption by Christmas, the RMT attended talks with rail minister Huw Merriman on Thursday. Lynch said there are “no new proposals on the table” but said there were “soundings-out” of possible solutions ahead of further talks with rail bosses. “So we need some compromise on some of the conditions they’re putting on the offer and we’ll need an improvement in the pay offer. That is achievable, in my view,” he told Sky News. “I know that there are some very simple steps that the employers and ourselves could take together to get a solution to this. That means a common-sense approach – both sides get into a position where there’s some commonly held positions. “And I think we could do that in the next period. And if that is done very quickly, we can consider the industrial action going forward.” Rail workers in England, Wales and Scotland will walk out again on Christmas Eve if there is no breakthrough. The TSSA union accepting a pay offer from Network Rail was used by Merriman to argue there is “clearly an appetite amongst the workers themselves to strike a deal”. But Lynch said those workers at the comparatively “miniscule” union in terms of Network Rail membership are “not affected by the changes” proposed. “They are supervisors and white collar workers. They don’t do the work that our members do, who are profoundly affected by the changes,” he said. Nurses in England, Wales and Northern Ireland will walk out again on Tuesday after the Royal College of Nursing’s (RCN) first national action. Some senior Conservatives have urged Rishi Sunak to get nurses a better pay deal, either by directly proposing one or by getting the NHS pay review body to recommend a fresh offer. Rishi Sunak refuses to concede to pressure as Tory row over nurses’ pay grows Rishi Sunak has refused to concede to the pressure from health leaders and some senior Conservatives to negotiate pay with nurses to prevent further strikes. Speaking to the BBC during a visit to Belfast, the Prime Minister said: “The Health Secretary has always been clear, the door is always open, that’s always been the case, but we want to be fair, reasonable and constructive, that’s why we accepted the recommendations of an independent pay body about what fair pay would be.” This follows the strike action taken by nurses across the country yesterday, who have indicated plans of more disruption unless their pay award was improved. Sunak has faced pressure from senior conservatives including the former party chairman Jake Berry who said that the government should compromise. “It’s a complicated issue,” he told TalkTV on Wednesday night. “The government is going to have to improve its offer.”