Early evening summary Firefighters across the UK have voted for a national strike over pay for the first time in 20 years after an “overwhelming” ballot result. Strikes by teachers in England and Wales will go ahead this week after last-ditch talks between union leaders and the government broke up without any progress. Rishi Sunak has said he can “restore the integrity back into politics” as he began a fightback against the political damage from sacking Nadhim Zahawi as Conservative party chair for breaches of the ministerial code over his tax affairs. The head of an investigation into Richard Sharp’s appointment as the BBC chair has recused himself from the process, admitting the pair have met several times. Government defeated in Lords as peers insist on stricter definition of what counts as disruption in public order bill In the House of Lords peers have started voting on the public order bill. Amnesty International UK describes it as “deeply draconian” and there are a series of amendments down at report stage which would make it significantly less draconian. In the first vote, peers backed a Labour amendment, with cross-party support, designed to raise the threshold for what counts as serious disruption. The bill as drafted by the government is designed to lower the threshold, so as to make it easier for the police to arrest protesters. The amendment was passed by 243 votes to 221 – a majority of 22. Moving the amendment, Labour’s Lord Coaker said that without change, the bill would outlaw protests “that all of us would regard as reasonable, all of us would regard as acceptable”. This is from the pressure group Liberty. Health leaders say emergency care recovery plan won"t work unless NHS gets more staff Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, said the government’s recovery plan for emergency care was flawed because the NHS might not have to staff available to make it work. He told MPs: That is the super massive black hole in his plan published today – people. Virtual wards without any staff isn’t hospital at home, it is home alone, so where is [the health secretary’s] plan to restore care in the community? This is a point that has been made by several other health leaders today. Dr Tim Cooksley, president of the Society for Acute Medicine, told ITV this morning: It’s pleasing that the government recognises that the NHS is in crisis, and there are some extremely positive elements to this plan but the major concern is that there will be no recovery in urgent and emergency care without a people recovery. There isn’t the workforce to currently deliver this and that is the major concern. We have this significant workforce shortage, and we are haemorrhaging staff and unless we have some clear retention plans, and some clear plans to attract colleagues back who have left, alongside recruitment plans, this plan will not work. Dr Adrian Boyle, president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, told Times Radio: The workforce plan has been written, but it isn’t published, and is separate to this … workforce retention is key to making all of this work, because largely all the problems we see around NHS work and NHS crises, they’re related to workforce. And Saffron Cordery, interim chief executive of NHS Providers, told the Today programme: All eyes will look forward to the budget now to see whether the chancellor and the government is going to announce the fully funded and costed workforce plan for the long term that that we’ve been asking for for a very long time – because without the workforce, however much capacity we put in place, we can’t actually safely staff [the emergency care plan]. Gillian Keegan, the education secretary, said it was “hugely disappointing” that the NEU is going ahead with strike action and pledged to do everything possible to protect children’s education. In a statement she said: These strikes will have a significant impact on children’s education, especially following the disruption of the past two years, and are creating huge uncertainly for parents. With talks ongoing on a range of issues, including around future pay, workload, behaviour and recruitment and retention, it is clear that strikes are not being used as a last resort. I have been clear today that unions do not need to strike to meet with me. I also reiterated my call to union leaders to ask their members to let head teachers know if they intend to strike, helping schools to minimise the impact on children. I will continue doing everything possible to protect children’s education. The Department of Health and Social Care has now published its recovery plan for urgent and emergency care. The full document is here, and there is an NHS England summary here. In the Commons Michael Gove, the levelling up secretary, is currently making a statement confirming the plans – briefed over the weekend and announced this morning (see 10.08am) – to in effect exclude developers from the housing market if they refuse to contribute to a £2bn fund to remove dangerous cladding. Earlier, in the health statement, Labour’s Janet Daby why the government was not committing to a return to the target of having 95% of visitors to A&E seen within four hours. In response, Steve Barclay, the health secretary, conceded that that target was currently impossible. He said: We are not setting out that ambition in this statement, because the impact of the pandemic has been so severe. We need to set a target that is ambitious but achievable, and that is what we have done. No 10 says NEU"s decision to go ahead with teachers" strike "very disappointing" At the afternoon lobby briefing Downing Street said the decision by the National Education Union to go ahead with its strike on Wednesday (see 5.42pm) was “deeply disappointing”. The PM’s spokesperson said: Children were some of the hardest hit during the pandemic when schools needed to be closed. To have the ability to get into classrooms taken away from them again is particularly difficult. Obviously it has a knock-on impact on parents who will have to scramble to get childcare. So, it is very disappointing. The spokesperson also urged the Fire Brigades Union to keep negotiating before it goes on strike. Asked about the FBU strike vote (see 4.15pm), the spokesperson said: Strike action would be disappointing and concerning for the public. We will continue to work with that union to see what we can do to mitigate against the possible risks that that poses – and in the first instance call on them to reconsider and keep negotiating. Yvette Cooper, the shadow home secretary, has urged the government to negotiate a settlement on pay to avert the firefighters’ strike. (See 4.15pm.) She said: No one, including firefighters themselves, wants a strike. It is this Conservative government’s reckless behaviour that has crashed the economy, and their failure to get a grip on inflation means working people are struggling more and more. This is their mess to fix. It’s up to the home secretary to get around the table and talk. She should be doing everything she possibly can to negotiate a deal and prevent a strike. Public appointments watchdog recuses himself from inquiry into BBC chairman because they know each other A week ago William Shawcross, the commissioner for public appointments, announced that he would review the circumstances that led to Richard Sharp being appointed as chairman of the BBC. He said he wanted “to assure myself and the public that the process was run in compliance with the government’s governance code for public appointments”. Today, in a letter to the Commons culture committee, Shawcross says he will recuse himself from the inquiry because he knows Sharp. He says: As I have met Mr Sharp on previous occasions, I have decided to recuse myself from this particular investigation. I will be delegating my powers as commissioner under the 2019 order in council to an independent person who will be appointed by my office for this one investigation. They will have sole responsibility and will be supported by my officials. Firefighters vote for what would be first national strike in 20 years Firefighters in the UK have voted to go on strike. Announcing the results of a ballot, the Fire Brigades Union said its members had voted 88% in favour of strike action, on a 73% turnout. The union is taking action in opposition to the 5% pay rise it was offered last autumn. It says this would be the first national strike by firefighters since 2003, but it says it is giving government and employers 10 days to make a revised offer in the hope the industrial action can be called off. Two separate ballots, by firefighters in Northern Ireland and by control room staff in the north-west of England, also produced majorities in favour of going on strike. In a statement Matt Wrack, the FBU general secretary, said: This is an overwhelming vote for strike action against an offer which would mean further significant cuts to real-terms wages for firefighters and control room staff. They have already lost at least 12% of the value of their pay since 2010. This is an absolute last resort for our members. The responsibility for any disruption to services lies squarely with fire service employers and government ministers … The government and the employers have the power to stop strikes from happening by making a credible offer that can resolve this dispute. The ball is in their court. We have delayed calling strikes to allow the employers to meet us and to make a new offer. I hope they take that opportunity. Otherwise, in the coming weeks, we intend to announce a series of strike dates and industrial action. Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, said the health plan being announced by the government would not lead to patients seeing GPs more quickly, not restore district nursing, not improve nurses and not lead to an increase in the number of doctors and nurses. And he said the government could not even say when they would get waiting times down to safe times. Waiting 30 minutes for a stroke or heart attack victim to get an ambulance was not acceptable, he said. He said, instead of hitting their targets, ministers were moving the goalposts. Labour announced its own plans for more people to be looked after at home at its conference, he said. What the government has announced is very similar. He said he was happy for the government to adopt Labour’s. But the government’s plan would not work without extra staff, he said. Labour had a plan to double the number of places at medical school, he said. It would pay for that by abolishing non-dom status. He said he could understand why Rishi Sunak would not support that. Steve Barclay, the health secretary, is making a statement to the Commons about the emergency care recovery plan. He says this is the second of three NHS recovery plans. An elective care plan has already been published, and a primary care plan is coming, he says. He says this plan is based on best practice followed by hospitals around England. The plan is ambitious and credible, he says. By next March, the government wants 76% of patients seen within four hours, he says. And by next March it wants to see category two ambulance response times, covering strokes and heart attacks, down to 30 minutes. In due course, it wants performance on both measures to get down to pre-pandemic levels, he says. Barclay says current waiting time data at A&E starts from the point of admission, not the point of arrival. For some time experts have been calling for the clock to start at the moment of arrival. And so from April NHS England will publish data on waiting times from arrival, he says. He suggests this could be challenging. But he says he hopes the move will be a “catalyst for transformation of the urgent and emergency care pathway”. NEU teaching unions says strike going ahead on Wednesday after talks with Gillian Keegan failed to produce breakthrough The National Education Union says its strike on Wednesday will go ahead after last-minute talks with Gillian Keegan, the education secretary, failed to produce a breakthrough. In a joint statement after the meeting, the NEU’s joint general secretaries, Mary Bousted and Kevin Courtney, said: Gillian Keegan has squandered an opportunity to avoid strike action on Wednesday. The government has been unwilling to seriously engage with the causes of strike action. Real-terms pay cuts and cuts in pay relativities are leading to a recruitment and retention crisis with which the education secretary so far seems incapable of getting a grip. Training targets are routinely missed, year on year. This is having consequences for learning, with disruption every day to children’s education. We can do better as a nation, for education, for our children, if we invest more. That is in the gift of this government. It should start with a fully-funded, above inflation pay rise for teachers. Defence minister says army in urgent need of extra funding after "serial underinvestment over decades" In the Commons Tobias Ellwood, the Conservative chair of the defence committee, used defence questions to ask about a Sky News report saying that an American general told Ben Wallace, the defence secretary, that the British army was now longer regarded as a top-level fighting force. Ellwood said his committee had come to a similar conclusion. In response, James Heappey, the armed forces minister, conceded there was a problem, but suggested that defence spending would increase in the budget. He said: Serial underinvestment in the army over decades has led to the point where the army is in urgent need of recapitalisation. The chancellor and the prime minister get that and there’s a budget coming. In her Sky News story Deborah Haynes says: A senior US general has privately told defence secretary Ben Wallace the British army is no longer regarded as a top-level fighting force, defence sources have revealed. They said this decline in war-fighting capability – following decades of cuts to save money – needed to be reversed faster than planned in the wake of Russia’s war in Ukraine. “Bottom line... it’s an entire service unable to protect the UK and our allies for a decade,” one of the defence sources said. BBC economics coverage not politically biased, but too influenced by groupthink, review concludes The BBC’s economics reporting does not lean conclusively towards the left or right politically, but can be influenced by groupthink and hype and be led too strongly by the Westminster narrative, a report commissioned by the corporation has said. PA Media says: An analysis of the corporation’s coverage, which its authors said also largely applies to the rest of the UK media, found that “too many journalists lack understanding of basic economics”. It revealed that the BBC’s economic coverage at times shows bias towards both the left and the right, making “a charge of systematic political bias in this area hard to sustain”. The review said “the main issue is lack of impartiality caused by uninformed groupthink and lack of confidence to challenge arguments, often given an extra twist by hype”. It said that some journalists “feel instinctively” that debt is bad, and do not realise that this is a contestable position. And it questioned the influence of politics on the corporation’s reporting, with what is said in Westminster often meaning that economic issues are reported on by political journalists. “‘The Westminster frame on things is the elephant in the room here,’ said one senior journalist, who argued that the political angle of the day often determines coverage whether the specialist judges it significant or not,” the report said. One person outside the BBC told the authors that political editors are asked to understand economics, trade, law, and political negotiations as well as the ins and outs of daily politics, “and nobody can do that”. The BBC’s news summary of the report is here. And the full report, which was written by Michael Blastland and Sir Andrew Dilnot, is here.