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Category: UK News

  • Egyptian Museum Reloaded

    Egyptian Museum Reloaded

    This phase marks another step forward for the GEM, following the successful soft openings of select areas, including private tours and events since November 2022…reports Asian Lite News

    The Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) announced the start of trial operations of its main galleries, offering visitors an exclusive preview of 12 meticulously curated exhibition halls.

    This trial phase, which will commence on Wednesday, is part of the museum’s ongoing efforts to ensure a seamless visitor experience ahead of its highly anticipated official opening.

    This phase marks another step forward for the GEM, following the successful soft openings of select areas, including private tours and events since November 2022.

    “The 12 main galleries cover an area of 18,000 square meters. These galleries tell the history of ancient Egypt in terms of ancient Egyptian society throughout the ages… visitors will encounter a rich array of artifacts, presented within three interconnected themes — kingship, society, and beliefs,” Abbas al-Tayeb, assistant minister of tourism and antiquities for archaeological affairs at the GEM, told Xinhua.

    He added that the artifacts on display at the galleries tell the stories of ancient Egyptian history, noting the latest up-to-date display methods are used in the galleries.

    So far, al-Tayeb said, about 57,000 artifacts have been transferred to the museum, and more than 14,000 artifacts have been placed in the main display galleries.

    “The complete collection of King Tutankhamun, which consists of 5,390 pieces, is also at the GEM, but these pieces are not available for visiting during the trial operation period,” he revealed

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  • Reeves’ hunt for £40bn

    Reeves’ hunt for £40bn

    Reeves is now drawing up plans to find £40bn in order to avoid real-terms cuts to departments….reports Asian Lite News

    Chancellor Rachel Reeves is looking to make tax rises and spending cuts to the value of £40bn in this month’s Budget, government sources have said.

    At a political cabinet meeting, Reeves told ministers that filling the “£22bn black hole inheritance from the previous government” would only be enough “to keep public services standing still”.

    Reeves is now drawing up plans to find £40bn in order to avoid real-terms cuts to departments, sources say, as first reported in the Financial Times and the Times.

    Reeves warned ministers there would be “difficult decisions on spending, welfare, and tax” to come in her Budget this month.

    The chancellor is finalising details of her first Budget, to be announced on Wednesday 30 October. She recently said there would be “no return to austerity” under this government and promised a boost to government investment, designed to kickstart growth.

    The chancellor is setting herself a new borrowing rule which means all day-to-day spending should be funded from taxes raised, not from borrowing. It is this rule which is binding the government’s hands, and why they are seeking some welfare savings as well as a series of tax rises at the Budget.

    A HM Treasury spokesperson said: “We do not comment on speculation around tax changes outside of fiscal events.” In an interview on Tuesday, the Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, did not rule out a National Insurance increase for employers in the Budget.

    Treasury officials are reportedly exploring National Insurance on employer pension contributions to raise Budget revenue. Employers pay NI at a rate of 13.8% on all employees’ earnings above £175 per week, but pension contributions made by employers are currently exempt from the levy.

    The prime minister side-stepped questions over whether Labour’s manifesto promise not to raise taxes for “working people” covered employers’ NI too. The Labour Party’s 2024 manifesto ruled out raising taxes for “working people”, such as National Insurance, income tax and VAT.

    On Monday, Reeves said Labour’s election pledge not to increase NI on “working people” related to the employee element, as opposed to the sum paid by employers. Leading business groups in the UK raised concerns over the potential tax rise, warning that it would “hobble” economic growth and “hammer” the hospitality sector.

    The £40bn figure is much higher than government has previously acknowledged, as ministers come to terms with the economic reality of delivering on their promise that there will be “no return to austerity”.

    The prime minister has talked about how those with the “broadest shoulders” should bear the “heaviest burden”.

    There are two weeks to go until we see what that means. There will no doubt be plenty more pitch-rolling in the days ahead.

    Treasury sources said internal calculations showed that the huge in-year sum, which Reeves announced in July, was a conservative estimate of the amount of money needed to cover the cost of areas including public sector pay, support for Ukraine and the asylum system.

    “Ministers do kind of know that we’ll need to fix the black hole every year, but because they see these things through the lens of their own departments, it feels they haven’t really clocked that the scale of the challenge at the budget is so much worse than we expected,” a source said.

    UK urges China to exercise restraint  

    The government called for China to exercise restraint on Monday after it held large-scale military exercises around Taiwan, Taiwan News reported.

    China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) announced on Monday that it would hold the “Joint Sword-2024B” military exercises around Taiwan.

    In response, the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) issued a statement seeking to de-escalate the situation after Beijing’s military actions, Taiwan News reported.

    In the statement, the FCDO expressed its concern about the PLA drills around Taiwan and warned they “increase tensions and risk dangerous escalation in the Taiwan Strait.” The office reiterated the UK’s policy of supporting peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait, which it said is “of critical importance to global prosperity.”

    The office called for the resolution of disputes between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait through dialogue, “without the threat or use of force or coercion.” The FCDO stressed the UK does not support unilateral attempts to alter the status quo in the strait.

    “We are concerned by China’s military exercises around Taiwan, which increase tensions and risk dangerous escalation in the Taiwan Strait. The UK reaffirms our clear interest in peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait, which is of critical importance to global prosperity. We consider the Taiwan issue one to be settled by people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait through constructive dialogue, without the threat or use of force or coercion. We do not support any unilateral attempts to change the status quo,” the statement read.

    The statement called for restraint in the area.

    “We call for restraint and the avoidance of any further actions that may undermine peace and stability,” the statement said.

    Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) thanked the UK government for closely monitoring the situation in the Taiwan Strait and for “clearly stating the importance of peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait to the world.” The ministry said Taiwan is a responsible member of the international community and will continue to work with like-minded partners to “defend the rules-based international order.”

    It also expressed hope that democratic countries around the world will “unite in calling on China to return to rationality and restraint, and stop threatening Taiwan and unilaterally escalating regional tensions,” as per Taiwan News. (ANI)

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  • ‘Engage With China On Human Rights’

    ‘Engage With China On Human Rights’

    Parliamentarians hit with sanctions by Beijing have urged David Lammy to engage with China and raise human rights concerns during his trip to the country…reports Asian Lite News

    David Lammy must “engage with China as it really is under the leadership of Xi Jinping” and raise human rights concerns during his trip to the country, UK parliamentarians who have been hit with sanctions by Beijing have said.

    The foreign secretary is expected to hold high-level meetings in China this week. The visit forms part of an effort by Labour to improve relations with China after they deteriorated under successive Conservative governments. Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, plans to travel to the country next year and restart high-level economic dialogue.

    The rapprochement is controversial because of human rights and security concerns about China, including its treatment of the Uyghur Muslim minority in Xinjiang and crackdown on democratic freedoms in Hong Kong.

    In a letter to Lammy on Tuesday, the group of parliamentarians wrote that “Beijing is testing the UK’s resolve [and] seeking to establish new parameters for engagement”, The Guardian reported.

    Beijing imposed sanctions on the group, which includes the Labour peer Helena Kennedy, in 2021 for criticising its human rights record in Xinjiang.

    In their letter, the parliamentarians urge Lammy to raise the case of political prisoners in Hong Kong, including the British citizen Jimmy Lai, and the “heinous treatment” of the Uyghur community.

    They call on the foreign secretary to express “deep concern” about China’s “unilateral alteration of the status quo” in Taiwan. The Chinese military held drills around Taiwan on Monday in what it called a “stern warning” against those seeking “independence” for the self-ruled island.

    Last week, the Foreign Office had asked that a visit to the UK parliament by Tsai Ing-wen, the former Taiwanese president, be delayed so as not to anger China before Lammy’s trip. Tsai is travelling to Prague and Brussels on her first international tour since leaving office.

    The letter warns that “the projected $10tn impact of a conflict over Taiwan to the global economy is intolerable and would be catastrophic for China’s standing in the world”. Taiwan, which has never been ruled by the People’s Republic of China, has grown increasingly opposed to Beijing’s claims of sovereignty over it. There are fears China will eventually try to annex the island by force.

    Signatories of the letter include the former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith, the former security minister Tom Tugendhat and the former health minister Neil O’Brien.

    “We must engage with China as it really is under the leadership of Xi Jinping, not as we all hoped it would become after accession to the World Trade Organization,” they wrote. “Our own political environment means that the temptation to prioritise short-term economic advantage over UK resilience and values is strong, but will only disadvantage the UK in the long run.”

    The letter urges Lammy to underline that the UK’s concerns are not a product of alignment with US foreign policy but “a result of non-negotiable values which rest at the heart of the UK national interest”.

    The last foreign secretary to visit China was James Cleverly in August 2023. Earlier this year the UK and US governments accused Chinese state-backed hackers of a years-long cyber-attack targeting politicians, journalists and businesses.

    In its manifesto, Labour pledged to conduct a Whitehall audit of the UK-China relationship. In the past, Labour has also committed to taking steps to recognise China’s treatment of its Uyghur minority as genocide.

    Lady Kennedy and Duncan Smith are UK co-chairs of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, which is strongly critical of Beijing.

    A FCDO Spokesperson said: “This government will take a consistent, long term and strategic approach to managing the UK’s relations with China, rooted in UK and global interests. We will co-operate where we can, compete where we need to, and challenge where we must. It is only right that we engage pragmatically with China where there are clear UK and global interests. That includes on areas where we agree and more importantly where we disagree, as the foreign ssecretary did during his meeting with Wang Yi at ASEAN. Foreign secretary travel will be confirmed in the usual way.”

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  • Reeves hints at rise in employer national insurance

    Reeves hints at rise in employer national insurance

    Chancellor says businesses will understand balancing the books is necessary for fiscal stability…reports Asian Lite News

    Rachel Reeves has dropped her strongest hint yet that she is planning to raise employer national insurance contributions in the budget, prompting accusations Labour is about to break a manifesto promise.

    The chancellor used the government’s international investment summit at London’s Guildhall on Monday to warn of tax rises to come in this month’s announcement, insisting that business would understand the need for fiscal stability.

    After days of rumours that Reeves is planning to increase employer national insurance contributions, the chancellor refused to rule out doing so, adding that executives would understand the need for such decisions.

    “We will stick to the commitments we made in our manifesto,” she said. “But you know there is a £22bn black hole over and above anything we knew about going into the election that we need to fill, and that’s not just a one year, that persists throughout the forecast period. So we are going to need to sort of close that gap between what government is spending and bringing in through tax receipts. But we are going to be a government that sticks to our manifesto commitments, including that one [on not raising taxes on working people].”

    Introducing national insurance on employer pension contributions could raise as much as £17bn a year for the exchequer, while putting up regular employer national insurance by 1p would raise about £8.5bn.

    Reeves’s message was underlined by Keir Starmer, who told the summit in his keynote speech: “Our public services need urgent care, our public finances need the tough love of prudence – challenges we can’t ignore. Because we know, just as every leader here knows, that those early weeks and months are precious, and no matter how many people advise you to ignore it, that you must run towards the fire to put it out, not let it spread further.”

    Speaking as the government said nearly 38,000 UK jobs would be created after a total of £63bn of international investment was announced in areas such as renewable energy, datacentres and artificial intelligence, Reeves said tax rises on employers would not count as anti-business.

    “Unless you put Britain on a stable economic and financial path, we’re not going to be able to get that investment in,” she said. “And that will mean some difficult decisions, including on taxation. But businesses get that. They know that we have got to pay for day-to-day spending through tax receipts, they want to see a path to balance the books, but we’ve got to do it in a way that is also ensuring that we remain competitive in the global economy.”

    Reeves has said she will have to take painful decisions in the budget because of the £22bn hole that Labour says it inherited from the last government.

    But critics say that hiking employers’ national insurance contributions would directly violate Labour’s manifesto commitment not to raise income tax, VAT or national insurance.

    Paul Johnson, the head of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, told Times Radio on Monday that such a move would count as a “straightforward breach” of the manifesto. “I went back and read the manifesto and it says very clearly, we will not raise rates of national insurance,” he said.

    Jeremy Hunt, the shadow chancellor, posted on X: “It’s obvious to most people that raising national insurance would breach Labour’s manifesto pledge to … not raise national insurance!”

    Craig Beaumont, an executive director at the Federation of Small Businesses, said: “You don’t get to a pro-small business budget without the government honouring its cast-iron manifesto commitment to not increase national insurance contributions, including on small employers.

    “At a stroke this will make every job in all our local communities more expensive to maintain, which will see the current fall in job numbers in UK SMEs [small- and medium-sized enterprises] gather pace. Fewer jobs and lower pay is not the way forward.”

    Labour ministers, however, say the pledge referred to taxes on working people, and therefore did not cover employer contributions. Labour was also accused of watering down its manifesto commitment to invest £7.3bn in the national wealth fund, which it has set up to invest in green projects, after confirming the fund would only get £5.8bn. Officials said the remaining £1.5bn had been allocated elsewhere.

    Reeves’s comments on tax formed part of a careful balancing act the chancellor tried to maintain on Monday as she wooed international corporations to invest more in Britain while also being clear about the tax decisions to come.

    The summit was attended by high-level executives from a number of global companies, including Google, BlackRock and GlaxoSmithKline.

    Andrea Rossi, the chief executive of M&G, a headline sponsor of the investment summit, said he expected Reeves’s budget would be “pragmatic” and focused on growth. However, he warned large tax rises risked “killing the economy”.

    “You’re not going to grow the economy if you tax the economy much, much more,” he said.

    It was the attendance of the Dubai-owned DP World that caused the most attention however, after the company originally threatened to pull out after Louise Haigh, the transport secretary, called P&O Ferries, which it owns, a “rogue operator”.

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  • Tribunal rules academic’s anti-Zionism beliefs are protected under law

    Tribunal rules academic’s anti-Zionism beliefs are protected under law

    The tribunal, which first ruled in February that Miller had been unfairly discriminated against, has now published a 120-page judgment outlining its decision…reports Asian Lite News

    An employment tribunal in the UK has ruled that an academic’s anti-Zionism should be protected under anti-discrimination laws as a “philosophical belief,” concluding that his views were “worthy of respect in a democratic society.”

    The judgment came after Prof. David Miller’s dismissal from the University of Bristol in 2021, where he taught political sociology, for alleged antisemitic remarks in which he argued Zionism was inherently “racist, imperialist, and colonial,” leading to apartheid and ethnic cleansing.

    The tribunal, which first ruled in February that Miller had been unfairly discriminated against, has now published a 120-page judgment outlining its decision, acknowledging the divisive nature and controversy of his comments but concluding that his beliefs were genuinely held and protected.

    Judge Rohan Pirani said: “Although many would vehemently and cogently disagree with (Miller)’s analysis of politics and history, others have the same or similar beliefs. We find that he has established that (the criteria) have been met and that his belief amounted to a philosophical belief.”

    The tribunal also recognized Miller’s expertise in the field and confirmed that his dismissal was due to the expression of these protected beliefs.

    Miller gave a lecture in 2019 in which he identified Zionism as a pillar of Islamophobia, which prompted complaints from Jewish students and led the Community Security Trust, which campaigns against antisemitism, to call his remarks a “disgraceful slur.”

    A university review found Miller had no case to answer because he did not express hatred toward Jews, but he was dismissed for gross misconduct two years later after sending an email to the university’s student newspaper.

    In the email, he said, “Zionism is and always has been a racist, violent, imperialist ideology premised on ethnic cleansing” and claimed the university’s Jewish Society was tantamount to an “Israel lobby group.”

    His statements were deemed offensive, leading to his eventual sacking.

    However, the tribunal found that Miller’s comments were lawful and did not incite violence.

    “What (Miller) said was accepted as lawful, was not antisemitic and did not incite violence and did not pose any threat to any person’s health or safety,” the tribunal decided.

    Pirani found that Miller’s anti-Zionism did not equate to antisemitism or opposition to Jewish self-determination, but rather “opposition to Zionism’s realization of exclusive Jewish rights within a land that also includes a significant non-Jewish population.”

    Although Miller won his case, the tribunal acknowledged that his public statements “contributed” to his dismissal, resulting in any compensation being reduced by 50 percent. The final amount will be determined in a future hearing.

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  • Royal left tearful after visit to Sudanese refugees in Chad

    Royal left tearful after visit to Sudanese refugees in Chad

    Abdullah, cradling her 9-month-old baby Bayena, said they had traveled for 60 km to reach safety…reports Asian Lite News

    Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh, was brought to tears during a visit to survivors of the ongoing Sudanese genocide on the border with Chad. The duchess told The Times that she had private audiences with female survivors of the violence, which included stories of rape in return for safety and food for their families.

    “What they do to the children is … I can’t even use the words,” she told the newspaper. “These women have no option but to leave.” The duchess spoke to one refugee, Hadidah Abdullah, in the town of Adre on the Chadian border with the war-torn Darfur region.

    Abdullah, cradling her 9-month-old baby Bayena, said they had traveled for 60 km to reach safety. Around 230,000 refugees are in Adre, with many comparing the situation to that of the previous genocide in Darfur over 20 years ago, which killed 300,000 people.

    The region, which is being fought over by the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces, is also experiencing famine, with millions at risk of starvation.  One woman who arrived at the camp in Adre during the duchess’s visit with five children in tow said she had not seen her husband since the outbreak of the conflict in April 2023.

    Others talk of the RSF forcing young men and boys into service, and killing people who refuse to cooperate. The duchess has traveled to numerous conflict zones, including Kosovo, Sierra Leone, Ukraine and the Democratic Republic of Congo, as part of her work helping victims of sexual violence in war.

    After meeting five women at a hospital in Adre, one of them told The Times that she and her family had been trapped in the city of Geneina where they witnessed RSF atrocities, including rape and looting.

    She said: “If you tried to go out … some can kill you or threaten sexual violence. More than 10 people were killed at a time and they took whatever from the houses.”

    She added that her teenage son was taken by the RSF alongside her brothers to fight, and that when she and her remaining relatives escaped, they saw bodies stacked “like a wall” in the streets.

    The duchess told The Times that the experience of talking to the women about their ordeals had left her feeling “quite wobbly.” She said the international community’s attention is “focused very much on other conflicts around the world,” and she wants to “shine the light” on the crisis in Sudan which, The Times said, “aid organisations rank as the world’s gravest” humanitarian crisis.

    “This is a human catastrophe that is vast and Chad is having to pick up the pieces when it can ill afford to do,” Sophie said. “The organisations are saying they are seeing budgets being pulled back and things like that because the money is being siphoned to go elsewhere. And, again, whose need is greater? Everybody’s need is great but this is pretty desperate. We’ve got to keep the attention on this.”

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  • 500 Afghan soldiers to become eligible to live in UK

    500 Afghan soldiers to become eligible to live in UK

    Pollard said there had been 2,000 cases in which there had been “an inconsistent approach” to decision taking….reports Asian Lite News

    An estimated 500 elite Afghan soldiers who fought alongside the British are expected to become eligible to come to the UK after a previous decision rejecting their applications was overturned.

    Fresh information has been discovered in about a quarter of the 2,000 rejected cases proving that the at-risk veterans were paid and employed by the UK government in Afghanistan, despite previous claims that no such evidence existed. A review had been launched by the Conservatives in February.

    Luke Pollard, the minister for the armed forces, told the Commons on Monday that the emergency reassessment reflected “the problems that have dogged the Afghan resettlement scheme under the previous government”.

    Pollard said there had been 2,000 cases in which there had been “an inconsistent approach” to decision taking. Of the cases that had been reviewed under Labour, the minister said “we are expecting an overturn rate of approximately 25%”.

    Some of the Afghans have been in hiding from the Taliban, who have been in charge of Afghanistan since the western withdrawal in summer 2021, while a couple of hundred fled to Pakistan where they are at risk of deportation. Six are said to have been murdered for having collaborated with the British.

    They include members of the elite Afghan 333 and 444 units, known as the Triples, who fought alongside and worked closely with British forces, including the SAS, during more than a decade of UK military involvement in Afghanistan.

    The SAS also had a veto on whether Afghan veterans could come to the UK, but defence sources indicated this was not the reason for the cases being overturned – rather, it was the belated discovery of fresh financial records.

    Pollard said: “Officials have now confirmed that there is evidence of payments from the UK government to members of Afghan specialist units, including ‘CF triple three’ and ‘ATF triple four’, and that for some individuals this demonstrates a direct employment relationship.”

    There had been concern over a conflict of interest, because a public inquiry is examining allegations that the SAS carried out 80 unlawful, summary killings in Helmand province between 2010 and 2013. Afghan veterans may in theory be able to give evidence that contradicts the SAS position.

    In February the then minister for the armed forces, the Conservative James Heappey, said “we do not hold comprehensive employment or payment records” for members of the Afghan special forces. He said they had reported directly to the former government of Afghanistan.

    Pollard, his Labour successor, said he had seen “no evidence” suggesting there was a deliberate effort to prevent eligible Afghans from coming to the UK. Conservative ministers had acted “in good faith”, Pollard said, and he placed the blame on problems with information flows between government departments. “I am clear that this sort of systems failure is not good enough,” he added.

    The unexpectedly rapid takeover by the Taliban after the US-led withdrawal led to the UK announcing several schemes to allow Afghans who had helped the British to come to the UK. Since the withdrawal, 12,874 Afghans have been granted indefinite leave to remain in the UK – including about 400 members of the triples.

    In opposition, Labour had campaigned for the Conservative government to reassess cases involving the Afghan veterans. Pollard told MPs that “it should not have taken this long” to start overruling decisions, and that the review announced in February should have been completed before the July general election.

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  • Govt believes Putin authorised Salisbury novichok attack

    Govt believes Putin authorised Salisbury novichok attack

    The inquiry also heard that the former Russian spy Sergei Skripal, who was the target of the attack, blamed Putin. .reports Asian Lite News

    The UK government believes that the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, authorised the Salisbury novichok poisonings, which could have killed thousands of people, an inquiry has been told.

    A senior Foreign Office (FCDO) official has given a statement to the inquiry spelling out that the British government has concluded the nerve agent attack was so sensitive that Putin himself must have given it the go-ahead.

    The inquiry also heard that the former Russian spy Sergei Skripal, who was the target of the attack, blamed Putin. In a new statement provided to the inquiry, he said: “I believe Putin makes all important decisions himself. I therefore think he must have at least given permission for the attack.”

    Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, were poisoned by novichok on 4 March 2018 in Salisbury, where he had been settled after a spy exchange.

    On 30 June 2018, Dawn Sturgess, 44, and her boyfriend, Charlie Rowley, fell ill at his home in Amesbury, 11 miles north of Salisbury, having been poisoned with novichok that Rowley had apparently found in a perfume bottle left in a bin. The Skripals and Rowley survived, but Sturgess died on 8 July.

    The inquiry, which began at the Guildhall in Salisbury on Monday, has been set up to examine Sturgess’s death but it will also look in detail at the attack on the Skripals.

    Andrew O’Connor KC, counsel to the inquiry, described the circumstances of Sturgess’s death as “extraordinary, unique”.

    The barrister said: “When Dawn Sturgess was poisoned by novichok four months after the Skripal poisoning, the real possibility emerged that she had been caught – an innocent victim – in the crossfire of an illegal and outrageous international assassination attempt.”

    O’Connor continued: “The evidence will suggest that this bottle, which we shall hear contained enough poison to kill thousands of people, must earlier have been left somewhere in a public place.”

    He told the chair of the inquiry, Lord Hughes of Ombersley: “You may conclude that those who discarded the bottle in this way acted with a grotesque disregard for human life.”

    Jonathan Allen, a senior official at the FCDO, had provided a statement summarising the UK government’s assessments on who was behind the poisonings.

    His statement says: “In light of the required seniority under Russian law to approve assassinations….outside Russia, and that this incident concerned a politically sensitive target (Mr Skripal was a UK citizen, and was targeted on UK soil), it is HMG’s view that President Putin authorised the operation.”

    The inquiry was told Skripal had expressed his own views on the matter. When interviewed in May 2018 by the police, he said it was his “private opinion” that Putin was responsible, and the “number one reason” for the assassination attempt was that Russia believed he was still working for the west.

    In a further statement, provided to the inquiry in the last week or so, Skripal said: “I do not know for certain how Putin personally viewed me. As far as I know I never spoke to him, although I was in the same room as him two times many years ago.

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  • Badenoch criticised for pamphlet’s ‘stigmatising’ remarks on autism

    Badenoch criticised for pamphlet’s ‘stigmatising’ remarks on autism

    The 36-page essay, titled Conservatism in Crisis, claims to identify factors holding back economic growth…reports Asian Lite News

    The Tory leadership candidate Kemi Badenoch has been criticised for a campaign pamphlet that said autistic people received “better treatment” and “economic privileges and protections”.

    A pamphlet published by Badenoch’s campaign team at the Conservative party conference argued that conditions such as anxiety, as well as an autism diagnosis, had gone from something “people should work on themselves as individuals” to “something that society, schools, and employers have to adapt around”.

    The 36-page essay, titled Conservatism in Crisis, claims to identify factors holding back economic growth. It was not written solely by Badenoch but it features her campaign branding throughout, and she promoted it at conference fringe events.

    Robert Buckland, a former cabinet colleague of Badenoch, criticised the remarks about autism and suggested they were “stigmatising” the spectrum condition.

    Buckland, a former justice secretary who published a review into employment rates among autistic people, told the i paper that the essay’s section on autism appeared “muddled” and should not be “stigmatising or lumping certain categories in with each other”.

    “Anxiety is not a neurodiverse condition … autism is not a mental health condition,” he said. “That part of the report didn’t seem to me to be based on any evidence, and mixing up autism with mental health is not right. It’s not the correct approach to be taken into this.”

    Anxiety is considered a mental health condition by the NHS, while the National Autistic Society defines autism as a developmental disability.

    The Buckland review found that at least 700,000 autistic people were economically inactive because of the barriers they faced in finding work.

    The essay said being diagnosed as neurodiverse had gone from “an individual focused challenge” that “meant you could understand your own brain” to something that “offers economic advantages and protections”.

    It said diagnoses of anxiety or autism were being treated similarly to race or sex discrimination, and that children with the conditions “may well get better treatment or equipment at school” including transport to and from home.

    It added that an autism diagnosis in the workforce came with better employment protections against unfair dismissal and a requirement for workplaces to make reasonable adjustments.

    The essay said it was positive there was more openness around mental health, but the requirement for schools and workplaces to make adjustments for it had “created costs and failed to improve people’s mental health outcomes”.

    A spokesperson for Badenoch told the i that it was “wrong to infer any prejudice” from the report and that it was “essential that we are able to talk about these issues without the media deliberately misleading their readers for the sake of easy headlines”.

    “If we are to resolve the problem of deteriorating mental health, we must be able to point out that it is happening and how society has changed its approach to it and determine whether that approach is working,” they said.

    Badenoch, who is seen as the frontrunner in the Tory leadership contest, has repeatedly been criticised for controversial comments. During the Tory conference, she faced backlash for suggesting that maternity pay in the UK, which is among the lowest in member countries of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, was “excessive”.

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  • Labour pulls out all the stops to woo investors

    Labour pulls out all the stops to woo investors

    Beyond a big bash to show Britain was “open for business” again after the chaotic years of Conservative government, the prime minister inviting the money changers to the temple had a symbolic message…reports Asia Lite News

    Labour governments were once famed for doing deals over beer and sandwiches in Downing Street. But under Keir Starmer, a charm offensive to win the backing of the world’s most powerful bosses required a bit more.

    After a rain-soaked day of meetings and speeches at the 15th-century Guildhall in the heart of the City of London, the hundreds of bosses from global firms including Goldman Sachs, BlackRock and HSBC were whisked by private coach, escorted by ceremonial military guard, to St Paul’s Cathedral.

    The order of the evening: an exclusive reception with King Charles, entertainment from Elton John, and dining by the three-star Michelin chef Clare Smyth, as Labour pulled out all the stops to woo the captains of industry – helping to secure what it tallied as £63bn of foreign investment pledges.

    It came after a glitzy bash at Lancaster House on Sunday night – in the more informal surrounds of a mansion on the Mall, a stone’s throw from Buckingham Palace, where guests were treated to canapés, Chapel Down wine and BrewDog beer.

    But there were tough issues to solve, too – including the fallout from an explosive cabinet row involving Louise Haigh, the transport secretary, after the Dubai-based company DP World threatened to withhold an announcement of £1bn of investment in Britain.

    Over a breakfast of kedgeree at the Guildhall, the prime minister and his business secretary, Jonathan Reynolds, sought to smooth over the problem. There were though no apologies, and Haigh was not present. Yet she was, along with the rest of the cabinet, at the investment summit throughout the day.

    Beyond a big bash to show Britain was “open for business” again after the chaotic years of Conservative government, the prime minister inviting the money changers to the temple had a symbolic message. Labour wanted to roll out the red carpet for private investment. It was the key to the government’s national mission, Starmer told the ranks of bosses in the Guildhall’s stain-glassed 19th-century Old Library.

    “You are pivotal to this great cause of our times,” he said, in a speech opening the event, near the Guildhall school of music, where the prime minister played flute as a student.

    After grumblings about whether the summit could be a flop – given its awkward timing two weeks before the chancellor Rachel Reeves’s budget – the guest list was in the end a who’s who of global business.

    The CEOs of Goldman Sachs and BlackRock, David Solomon and Larry Fink, were there, alongside the chiefs of Lloyds Banking Group, HSBC, Barclays, and Brookfield. So packed was the Old Library that Andrew Bailey, the governor of the Bank of England, was sat a handful of rows from the back.

    Some Labour ministers were clearly enamoured of the attention. “Are you enjoying Davos in London?” Reynolds asked journalists from the world’s media – who were forced to stay in the Guildhall crypt, an area dating back to the time of Edward the Confessor.

    “Personally I’m enjoying it a great deal,” the business secretary said. “I think you can feel the buzz in the room. It is incredibly exciting.”

    Among bosses the mood was more one of curiosity. “We’re here to listen,” said the head of one global bank. Several of the most powerful CEOs had time for intimate chats with members of Starmer’s cabinet. Executives from Airbus, Rolls-Royce and Google also had a chance to question the new head of Labour’s industrial strategy council, the Microsoft UK CEO Clare Barclay, on the party’s flagship policy, on the day it was launched.

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