No 10 does not rule out UK joining PEM customs scheme, saying it"s "not customs union" and doesn"t cross government "red line" Downing Street has said that joining a Europe-wide customs agreement as suggested by the European Union would not cross the government’s “red lines” for closer relations with the EU. After the BBC revealed this morning that the EU has suggested the UK could join the Pan-Euro-Mediterranean Convention (PEM), a customs scheme, two ministers said that this was not something the government was proposing now. (See 9.28am and 10.10am.) But they did not rule out the idea for good, and at the Downing Street lobby briefing the PM’s spokesperson adopted a more positive tone when asked about the proposal. The spokesperson said he would not get into a running commentary on specific options up for discussion with the EU. But, when asked if the PEM would cross the red lines set out in Labour’s manifesto for EU ties (see 10.43am), he said: The arrangement that’s been discussed is not a customs union. Our red line has always been that we will never join a single market, freedom of movement, but we’re just not going to get ahead of those discussions. Afternoon summary Downing Street has said that joining a Europe-wide customs agreement as suggested by the European Union would not cross the government’s “red lines” for closer relations with the EU. After the BBC revealed this morning that the EU has suggested the UK could join the Pan-Euro-Mediterranean Convention (PEM), a customs scheme, two ministers said that this was not something the government was proposing now. (See 9.28am and 10.10am.) But they did not rule out the idea for good, and at the Downing Street lobby briefing the PM’s spokesperson adopted a more positive tone when asked about the proposal. (See 1.36pm.) Rachel Reeves will amend the finance bill to soften planned changes to the non-dom tax regime as Labour woos the wealthy in pursuit of growth. Kemi Badenoch has told shadow ministers she wants a period of silence from Liz Truss, as the Conservative leader seeks to distance herself from her predecessor’s economic legacy. The Metropolitan police have been judged to be turning around extensive failings and removed from special measures after more than two years under extra scrutiny. Share International business leaders are “unbelievably glum” about the prospects for the UK, according to George Osborne, the former Tory chancellor. Osborne has been at Davos and, speaking on his Political Currency podcast about what he learned there, he said both main parties were to blame for the way Britain is perceived. He said: The mood is unbelievably glum about Britain at the moment from business leaders. It didn’t start with this government – there’s a feeling that the rot has set in for a number of years. But there is definitely a feeling that Britain is no longer friendly to businesses, it’s no longer friendly to external investment, and particularly, it’s no longer friendly to wealthy foreigners … There are endless questions about why Rishi Sunak abolished the non-dom regime, why Keir Starmer went beyond that – and why as a result, all these wealthy individuals are leaving London. International business leaders are “unbelievably glum” about the prospects for the UK, according to George Osborne, the former Tory chancellor. Osborne has been at Davos and, speaking on his Political Currency podcast about what he learned there, he said both main parties were to blame for the way Britain is perceived. He said: The mood is unbelievably glum about Britain at the moment from business leaders. It didn’t start with this government – there’s a feeling that the rot has set in for a number of years. But there is definitely a feeling that Britain is no longer friendly to businesses, it’s no longer friendly to external investment, and particularly, it’s no longer friendly to wealthy foreigners … There are endless questions about why Rishi Sunak abolished the non-dom regime, why Keir Starmer went beyond that – and why as a result, all these wealthy individuals are leaving London. Lawyers warn that government plans to limit building delays caused by judicial review could backfire Under the government plans to limit the extent to which judicial review can hold up building projects, the first stage of the JR process – the “paper permission” stage, where the court just reviews if a case is strong enough to proceed on the basis of written submissions, not a hearing – will be abandoned. But lawyers claim this could backfire, leading to more delays. Nancy Collins, a partner at the law firm Bindmans, said that it was unclear whether the proposals would only affect planning cases or all judicial reviews. She went on: Even if it is confined to planning challenges, it seems to us that removing the written permission stage would cause a significant extra burden on judges, who would no longer have the benefit of the filter that the written stage provides. If this change were to apply to all judicial reviews, it would increase that burden still further. This may cause significant delays which would impact on individuals’ access to justice and their ability to hold public authorities to account. Lee Marsons, senior research fellow at the Public Law Project, said that the proposal could mean that both sides in judicial reviews, including public authorities and the Government, would have to pay the costs of an in-person hearing to decide permission, “even when written permission would have been enough”. He added: While the increased costs of these proposals are guaranteed across the board, the benefits are completely unguaranteed. David Richardson, partner and head of planning for Ashfords, said that streamlining the process “makes sense to cut to the chase and go straight to a hearing” rather than potentially duplicating arguments in writing first. But he went on: It might however mean a greater burden on the courts – waiting for a listing can be one of the key delays in the process. Keir Starmer has written an article for the Daily Mail about his plans to limit the extent to which judicial review can be used to hold up infrastracture projects. The article starts: A former Green party councillor spent years trying to block vital safety upgrades to the A47. The case reached the supreme court last year, which dismissed it for having ‘no logical basis’. This has been described as “disgraceful” by the campaigner and Good Law Project director Jolyon Maugham, who says in a post on Bluesky that the PM should not be stigmatising an individual in this way. *Absolutely disgraceful* from Starmer, to write using this inflammatory language, about an identifiable individual. Wildly irresponsible - reminiscent of the worst excesses of the Johnson era when Cummings fed the papers thinly disguised attack lines and I got real death threats. Reform UK chair dismisses Suella Braverman"s call for pact with Tories, saying it shows her party "waving white flag" Yesterday Suella Braverman, the former Tory home secretary, said her party should form some sort of pact with Reform UK. In an interview with GB News, Zia Yusuf, the Reform UK chair, ruled out the proposal and said it showed the Tories were now “waving the white flag” in the contest with his party. He said: I agree with [Braverman] that there isn’t space for two, and the reality is Reform has already overtaken the Conservative party. Look, how can you do a deal? How can you do a pact with a group, with a tribe who deal entirely in deception, in falsehoods, and betrayal? They have betrayed the people of Britain to such an extraordinary degree that they will fully deserve the extinction event that’s now facing them. Yusuf said other Tory figures were now proposing a deal with his party. He went on: Make no mistake, what this is is a defeated army waving the white flag, begging for mercy, of which there will be none forthcoming. Reform claim they now have more members than the Conserative party. But the Tories have almost 25 times as many MPs (121) as Reform (5), and the Conservaties are generally ahead of Reform in the polls too. "Don"t be ridiculous" - Ed Miliband rules out resigning if government goes ahead with Heathrow third runway Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, has said he will not resign if the government backs a third runway at Heathrow. In an interview with PA Media, asked if he would consider resigning if the government gives the go-ahead to another Heathrow runway, he said: “Don’t be ridiculous, no.” As energy secetary Miliband in charge of ensuring that the UK meets its net zero targets, which campaigners fear would be in jeopardy if the third runway were to go ahead. In 2009, when he was also energy secretary, he had what was described as an “epic” row with Gordon Brown about Brown’s decision to back Heathrow expansion. There were some reports that Miliband was considering resigning, but he had only been in the job three months and, in their biography of him, Mehdi Hasan and James Macintyre say he did not seriously view this as an option and instead focused on getting the best possible environmental mitigations. Miliband told PA: What the Climate Change Committee says is that we’ve got to make sure any decisions we make on aviation including expansion take place within our carbon budgets. And they are 100% right about that and that’s absolutely the position of the government. We believe that we can meet our growth mission – our number one priority – and keep within carbon budgets and indeed that our clean energy mission is crucial and a central part of meeting our growth mission. Far from them being in contradiction, they are absolutely complimentary. Asked whether Britain could still meet net zero with a third Heathrow runway, Miliband said: I’m not getting into speculation about specific issues like that. What I’m saying is that aviation is part of our economic growth and it has to take place within our carbon budgets, and that is accepted right across government because we have legally binding carbon budgets. Tory demands to look into attorney general and ‘conflict of interest’ claims dismissed Chris Wormald, the cabinet secretary, has dismissed Conservative demands for an investigation into whether the attorney general has advised the government on issues where he has conflicts of interest, Eleni Courea reports. What is PEM, and would joining it make any difference to the UK? If you want to know what the Pan-Euro-Mediterranean Convention actually is, and whether the UK should join, a good place to start is this blog by the Centre for Inclusive Trade Policy. It is by Nicolò Tamberi and helpfully it is titled: Should the UK join the Pan-Euro-Mediterranean convention? Here is an extract. As part of its European Neighbourhood Policy, the European Union (EU) has established the Pan-Euro-Mediterranean (PEM) Convention, which allows for diagonal cumulation of rules of origin among the signatory parties. This means that, if Egypt sourced materials from Turkey, Turkish materials can be considered to be “made in Egypt” for purposes of Egypt’s exports to the EU. The trade and cooperation agreement that governs UK-EU trade relations since 2021 does not allow for diagonal cumulation. If the UK were to join the PEM convention, it could count PEM inputs towards the rules of origin criteria when exporting to the EU. This would broaden the base of what counts as ‘local content’ in UK exports and would therefore render it easier for UK exporters to meet EU rules of origin. As a result, UK exports could access the EU market tariff-free more easily. To see whether this would matter in practice, we calculate the share of value-added (VA) originating in PEM countries embedded in UK exports to the EU … The contribution of PEM countries to the VA of UK exports is rather small (Figure 1). Excluding Coke and petroleum products, which exhibit by far the largest PEM VA content but already face a 0% Most Favoured Nation tariff in the EU, the PEM countries’ VA share ranges between 1.1% and 2.8%. The low shares suggest that joining PEM would not be a game-changer for UK exports to the EU. David Henig, a commentator on trade policy, former civil servant and head of the UK Trade Policy Project, has been posting on Bluesky about why he thinks joining the Pan-Euro-Mediterranean Convention customs scheme should be a simple, obvious decision for the UK. My morning has been pemmed. Which is fine, I’ve advocated for the UK joining, talked to relevant folk in the EU, heard businesses who it could help, etc. Problem is - this should be completely obvious. Every country in the region is a member. Why is it so hard for the UK? Leavers don’t care about PEM. Few businesses will lose, far more will gain. Third countries like Switzerland and Morocco want the UK to join. Yes nobody knows for sure why we didn’t previously join, or why it isn’t a priority now. Until the UK does the obvious stuff like PEM, forget having a meaningful trade policy still less any meaningful EU reset. Got to take the baby steps first... Though “not seeking to participate at the present time” But why do they have to make this so tediously hard? Probably the entirely self-defeating belief that you can’t say what you want before negotiations... PEM is mildly beneficial. And helps provide stability. Reeves to soften changes to non-dom tax regime after hearing ‘concerns’ Rachel Reeves has said she will amend the finance bill to soften planned changes to the tax regime for “the non-dom community” after intense lobbying from wealthy UK residents, Heather Stewart reports. Commenting on the move, Mel Stride, the shadow chancellor, said: Labour’s budget is falling apart in front of our eyes. At the election Labour said their plans would raise money, now they have been forced to admit their plans make the UK less attractive. No 10 does not rule out UK joining PEM customs scheme, saying it"s "not customs union" and doesn"t cross government "red line" Downing Street has said that joining a Europe-wide customs agreement as suggested by the European Union would not cross the government’s “red lines” for closer relations with the EU. After the BBC revealed this morning that the EU has suggested the UK could join the Pan-Euro-Mediterranean Convention (PEM), a customs scheme, two ministers said that this was not something the government was proposing now. (See 9.28am and 10.10am.) But they did not rule out the idea for good, and at the Downing Street lobby briefing the PM’s spokesperson adopted a more positive tone when asked about the proposal. The spokesperson said he would not get into a running commentary on specific options up for discussion with the EU. But, when asked if the PEM would cross the red lines set out in Labour’s manifesto for EU ties (see 10.43am), he said: The arrangement that’s been discussed is not a customs union. Our red line has always been that we will never join a single market, freedom of movement, but we’re just not going to get ahead of those discussions. John Swinney uses FMQs to tell Scots they should not travel because of Storm Éowyn red weather warning At first minister’s questions at the Scottish parliament, John Swinney warned the public to take the Storm Éowyn red weather warning seriously, saying that the police were due to issue an unusual ‘do not travel’ notice. Swinney, who said he would be chairing a meeting of the his government’s resilience room after the FMQs session, and told the Holyrood chamber: We have to be clear that people should not travel and the Police Scotland will issue a formal do not travel notice shortly. Councils will make decisions today on school closures. Red weather warnings are very rare, our message is simple. Please follow the advice from the Met Office and the police, take this seriously and stay safe. Kemi Badenoch ‘wants Liz Truss to shut up for a while’ Kemi Badenoch has told shadow ministers she wants a period of silence from Liz Truss, as the Conservative leader seeks to distance herself from her predecessor’s economic legacy, Kiran Stacey reports. The Conservative party has criticised the government for considering joining a Europe-wide customs agreement – despite the fact that ministers are saying they won’t do this (at least now). See 9.28am and 10.10am. In a statement issued by CCHQ, Priti Patel, the shadow foreign secretary, said: These latest reports that the government might shackle us to the European Union are deeply concerning, and once again make clear that Keir Starmer and his chums are all too happy to put their ideology ahead of our national interest, no matter the cost. Solicitor general Lucy Rigby strongly defends Lord Hermer over attacks on his pre-government work for Gerry Adams Lucy Rigby, the solicitor general, has strongly defended her boss, Lord Hermer, over the fact that he represented Gerry Adams before he joined the government. Rigby was speaking in response to an urgent question tabled by Helen Grant, her Tory opposite number, about how conflicts of interest are managed in the Attorney General’s Office. Hermer, who worked closely with Keir Starmer when they were both human rights lawyers, was an unusual choice for attorney general because he had not been an MP or peer before his appointment. Although a distinguished lawyer, he has faced criticism from the Tories because one of the clients he represented before he joined the government was Adams, the former Sinn Féin president who is widely understood to have been an IRA leader (although he has always denied this). Grant did not explicitly say it was wrong to have an attorney general who had once represented Adams. Instead, since Adams could potentially receive compensation over being interned in the 1970s as a result of a change to the Legacy Act, she asked what was being done to ensure Hermer was not giving advice on this legislation that would amount to a conflict of interest. But other Tories and unionists did refer to Adams more disparagingly, with one, the DUP’s Jim Shannon, saying Adams’ hands were “dripping with innocent blood”. Responding to the suggestions that a lawyer who represented Adams should never be attorney general in the first place, Rigby said: As the Bar Council states, barristers do not choose their clients, nor do they associate themselves with their clients’ opinions or behavior by virtue of representing them. There’s been a really cynical linking in recent days by the opposition of the attorney general with some of his previous clients. I grew up on military bases in armed forces communities’ in the 1980s. I remember what it felt like when my dad had to check underneath the car before we made every single journey. And I note this because it’s the backdrop against which I say that I would defend with every fibre of my being the duty of any barrister in this country, including Lord Hermer, to defend any client before any court, as indeed we all should. Rigby ended this point with the words “do not judge a surgeon by their patients, a journalist by their interviews, or a lawyer by their clients”, which she said was a quote from Lord Wolfston, the shadow attorney general. On the point about conflicts of interest if Hermer were to advise the government on law relating to Adams, or any of his other former clients, Rigby said that a “rigorous proess” was in place to stop these occuring. She said: The Attorney General’s Office has an established and rigorous process for identifying and dealing with conflicts and potential conflicts which arise from the law officer’s past practice. That process predates the appointment of the attorney general and it sits against the backdrop of every lawyer’s professional obligations to be alert to and to actively manage any situation which might give rise to a potential or actual conflict. Learned members of this house will keenly appreciate the importance that all lawyers place on that obligation. In identifying conflicts or potential conflicts, the Attorney General’s Office adopts a cautious and ‘beyond reproach’ threshold to any conflicts or potential conflicts. Rigby said Hermer would recuse himself in cases where there was a conflict of interest. But she said she could not say if that was happening with regard to particular cases because that would involve disclosing what matters the attorney had been asked to advise the government on – which is something law officers are not meant to reveal.