Tag: Rishi Sunak

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Fresh headache for Rishi over Sharma issue

Conservative MP Alok Sharma was difficult, unpredictable and could quickly lose his temper, according to four senior officials who worked with him between 2020 and 2022…reports Asian Lite News

Even as Prime Minister Rishi Sunak braces for a report on whether his second-in-command bullied staff, he’s facing new allegations that a former Cabinet minister from his party berated civil servants.

Conservative MP Alok Sharma was difficult, unpredictable and could quickly lose his temper, according to four senior officials who worked with him between 2020 and 2022. Most of the allegations stem from when he led the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the officials said, although some of the behavior continued after he started serving as president of United Nations climate talks.

Sharma would often express his dissatisfaction by insulting staff’s work and using profanity, without offering guidance on how to improve its quality, the officials said. Two of them characterized his behavior during the pandemic in 2020 as bullying, saying the then-business secretary would often call junior staff on Microsoft Teams without warning to criticize their work.

All four senior officials requested anonymity to protect their current jobs.

Civil servants raised concerns about Sharma’s behavior with their bosses on at least four occasions in 2020, although they stopped short of filing official complaints, according to two of the officials. They said they didn’t know whether staff’s concerns were relayed to then Cabinet Secretary Mark Sedwill, or his successor Simon Case, who would normally be appraised of official complaints in their job overseeing the entire civil service.

After this article’s initial publication, Sharma, 55, issued the following statement: “I have never been made aware of any ‘informal complaints’ or otherwise from staff. The Cabinet Office has confirmed that there are no records of any informal or formal complaints across government about me. I refute strongly these allegations.”

An official spokesperson said the government has no record of any complaints.

The Conservative government has faced criticism that it has tolerated an abusive work culture during its 13 years in power, with the opposition Labour Party arguing it’s time for a change in government. Several senior Tory ministers have been forced to resign or come under investigation over allegations of unprofessional behavior in the workplace and Sunak has vowed to uphold “integrity, professionalism and accountability” in government.

Sunak may be forced to decide the fate of one of his closest allies in the coming weeks, when the results of an investigation into bullying allegations against Deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab are due. Raab is facing eight formal complaints dating from his posts in three departments, incidents which UK media including the Guardian say involve at least 24 civil servants.

Raab has denied the allegations of bullying and said he “behaved professionally at all times.”

While Sharma’s time as a minister predated Sunak’s ascension to the premier’s job in October, further allegations of misbehavior by ruling party figures could increase pressure on him to take broader action to correct negative perceptions about the government. The incidents described by people who worked closely with Sharma echo complaints against other Conservative ministers.

Sharma had a career in banking before entering Parliament in 2010 when the Conservatives returned to power after more than a decade in opposition. He became a minister in 2016 and was promoted to the cabinet three years later by then Prime Minister Boris Johnson. He was made Business Secretary in 2020, a post he held for almost a year before taking charge of preparing the UN climate talks in 2021.

Sharma is among dozens of allies of Johnson’s whom the former prime minister has nominated for seats in the House of Lords, media including the Times newspaper have reported. After receiving a knighthood in December, Sharma praised the “dedicated civil servants” who had contributed to the UK’s efforts to slow global climate change during the talks in Glasgow.

Although all four senior officials who discussed Sharma’s behavior said he could be volatile, they acknowledged that working in government could be stressful and he was under a lot of pressure. One said he could be warm and friendly and sometimes rewarded officials who had worked late with pizza. The officials said they weren’t aware of any official probe into the matter.

When Sharma’s alleged calls to staff’s homes failed to stop, two of the people said that senior officials started coming into the office during lockdown to draw his criticism away from junior staff working from home. On one occasion, a lower-level official called their senior colleague in tears because Sharma had unexpectedly called them to disparage their work, one person said.

In one email sent by Sharma to senior officials during the first lockdown in 2020 and seen by Bloomberg, he detailed a list of thoughts and demands that increased in font size until a final point written in very large, red print.

The criticism grew increasingly demoralizing and caused people to fear submitting their work to him, according to two of the people. One civil servant – who has since left the role – said they resorted to anti-depressants and mental health support to cope with their boss’s treatment.

ALSO READ-Environmental groups threaten govt

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Sunak spent €500k on pvt flights

The Liberal Democrats branded the expenses as a “shocking waste of taxpayers’ money” during the cost-of-living crisis…reports Asian Lite News

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak spent more than €500,000 of taxpayers’ money on private jets in just over a week last year, according to The Guardian.

The UK government spent just under €108,000 on private jet travel for Rishi Sunak’s attendance at the COP27 summit in Egypt, flying in on 6 November and returning the following day, the newspaper said. A week later, he set off on a round trip to the G20 summit in Bali, Indonesia, at a cost of over €340,000.

Sunak’s Latvia and Estonia trip in December incurred travel costs of €62,498, with personal costs of €2,500, The Guardian report said.

The Liberal Democrats branded the expenses as a “shocking waste of taxpayers’ money” during the cost-of-living crisis.

“This is a shocking waste of taxpayers’ money at a time when people are struggling to pay their bills. Yet again this Conservative government is completely out of touch,” the tweet said.

The Downing Street said Sunak’s travel was for “vital meetings with world leaders”. “The role of the Prime Minister includes holding vital meetings with world leaders during bilateral visits and summits to discuss issues of international importance – including security, defence and trade,” a government spokesperson said.

The UK’s Opposition parties are also piling on the pressure on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak over a recent Budget policy that could allegedly benefit his wife, Akshata Murty, through her business interest in a childcare firm.

Akshata Murty, the daughter of Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy, is listed as a shareholder in Koru Kids Ltd which is likely to benefit from a new pilot scheme announced in the Spring Budget earlier this month to incentivise people to become childminders.

While 10 Downing Street has stated that Prime Minister Sunak had followed the UK’s ministerial code on the matter, the Opposition has called for further explanations.

The plane is painted with a union flag tail fin, and is a de facto equivalent to the official aircraft used by some other world leaders.

Wera Hobhouse, the Liberal Democrats’ energy and climate spokesperson, said: “This is a shocking waste of taxpayers’ money at a time when people are struggling to pay their bills. Yet again this Conservative government is completely out of touch.

“The government can pretend to care about a greener future with their so-called ‘green day’ but the reality is they are trashing their own promises.”

The Cabinet Office costings document shows nearly another £20,000 was spent on other costs for the prime ministers, including accommodation, meals and visas.

This does not include the costs for officials who also went on the trips. The delegations varied in size from the 19 who accompanied Truss to Prague to the 35 who joined Sunak in Bali.

Some prime ministerial flights, for example those to and from Bali, also carry members of the travelling UK press, who pay for the flights.

A Downing Street spokesperson defended the flights. They said: “The role of the prime minister includes holding vital meetings with world leaders during bilateral visits and summits to discuss issues of international importance – including security, defence and trade.”

Meanwhile, Opposition parties are piling on the pressure on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak over a recent Budget policy that could allegedly benefit his wife, Akshata Murty, through her business interest in a childcare firm.

Akshata Murty, the daughter of Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy, is listed as a shareholder in Koru Kids Ltd which is likely to benefit from a new pilot scheme announced in the Spring Budget earlier this month to incentivise people to become childminders.

While 10 Downing Street has stated that Prime Minister Sunak had followed the UK’s ministerial code on the matter, the Opposition has called for further explanations.

“There are serious questions for Rishi Sunak to answer over any potential conflict of interest, and any extra income his family could receive from his own government’s policy,” said Liberal Democrat chief whip Wendy Chamberlain, who has called on the Independent Adviser on Ministers’ Interests Sir Laurie Magnus to investigate.

First reported by the ‘i’ newspaper, the UK’s Companies House register lists Ms Murty as a shareholder in Koru Kids – one of six childminder agencies in England listed on the government’s website with contact details.

Labour’s Deputy Leader, Angela Rayner, said Prime Minister Sunak must explain why he failed to “come clean” about the shares his family held in a company now set to financially benefit from a childcare policy announced in his Budget, when queried during a parliamentary session of the Liaison Committee earlier this week.

“He must urgently correct the record and set out what steps he took to avoid an actual or perceived conflict of interest. No proper explanation has yet been provided by the Prime Minister as to why this was not deemed necessary to publish in the register of members’ interests,” she said.

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Sunak in N Ireland for post-Brexit trading pacts

The Northern Ireland protocol was agreed as part of Britain’s departure from the European Union…reports Asian Lite News

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak arrived in Northern Ireland to sound out whether its political parties back his plans to improve the post-Brexit trading arrangements for the province.

Officials from Britain and the European Union have been in intense talks on the post-Brexit Northern Ireland trade and customs deal known as the protocol, with expectations growing that new terms could be announced next week.

The Northern Ireland protocol was agreed as part of Britain’s departure from the European Union. But it soon sparked anger among unionists about the imposition of checks on some goods arriving from the rest of the United Kingdom, which Sunak is now trying to solve.

“Whilst talks with the EU are ongoing, ministers continue to engage with relevant stakeholders to ensure any solution fixes the practical problems on the ground, meets our overarching objectives, and safeguards Northern Ireland’s place in the UK’s internal market,” a spokesperson for Sunak’s office said.

“The Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Northern Ireland are travelling to Northern Ireland this evening to speak to political parties as part of this engagement process,” the spokesperson added.

Sunak arrived at his hotel on the outskirts of the city late on Thursday but did not speak to the waiting media. He was expected to meet with the main political parties early on Friday.

Separately, British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly was due in Brussels on Friday to meet European Commission Vice-President Maros Sefcovic, who oversees EU relations with Britain, a Commission spokesperson said.

EU ambassadors will then convene for a “restricted” meeting, an EU diplomat said. The format typically means only the ambassadors attend along with representatives from the Commission and the European Council.

One EU diplomat said it appeared a deal was close but not complete and that the meeting would prepare for a possible rapid conclusion.

The talks so far have been shrouded in secrecy with some of the main players complaining that they have not seen any detail on the possible fixes to issues including the role of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) in Northern Ireland.

In a bid to reduce checks at Northern Ireland ports, the European Commission has said it was open to the idea of “express lanes” to separate goods bound only for Northern Ireland from products heading into Ireland or elsewhere in the EU.

But some lawmakers in Sunak’s Conservative Party and in the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) want more comprehensive changes, saying they will only accept a deal if it limits the role of the ECJ, a top EU court, in Northern Ireland. That is a red line for Brussels, which insists on the ECJ being the ultimate arbiter of disputes relating to its single market.

Support from the largest pro-British party, the DUP, is likely to be crucial after it boycotted Northern Ireland’s devolved parliament over the protocol. A senior member of the DUP said on Thursday they had not seen the details.

Business leaders have said it is vital to consult Northern Ireland and not present a finished deal negotiated behind closed doors.

Sunak is also due in Munich on Saturday, where he could meet European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

Speaking ahead of his party’s meeting with the prime minister, DUP MP Sammy Wilson said Northern Ireland should not be legally separate to the rest of the UK.

“If the issue of being part of the single market rules and single market laws is removed from Northern Ireland, then there’s no need for the European Court of Justice,” he added.

Even though the DUP came second in May 2022 elections to Sinn Féin – a republican party that accepts the protocol – a new Northern Ireland government cannot be formed without its support.

The DUP has said it must be satisfied with any settlement before it agrees to return to power-sharing.

But the deal has split political opinion and the UK and the EU have been in lengthy negotiations about making changes to how it operates.

Ahead of Sunak’s visit, No 10 said: “Whilst talks with the EU are ongoing ministers continue to engage with relevant stakeholders to ensure any solution fixes the practical problems on the ground, meets our overarching objectives and safeguards Northern Ireland’s place in the UK’s internal market.

“The prime minister… [is] travelling to Northern Ireland this evening to speak to political parties as part of this engagement process.”

After the meetings in Belfast the prime minister will travel to Munich for a security summit.

However, the prime minister’s efforts to reach a deal on the protocol have exposed tensions within his Conservative Party.

Former Brexit Minister Lord Frost told the Telegraph that a “feeble deal now” would “make things worse not better”, adding that “no deal is still better than a bad one”.

David Jones, deputy chairman of the European Research Group – a Eurosceptic group of Tory MPs – tweeted that Northern Ireland “must cease to be subject to laws made in Brussels”. “It’s as simple as that,” he said. “Anything less won’t work.”

ALSO READ: UK inflation cools to 10.1%

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How has Sunak done in his first 100 days?

More crucially, Conservative MPs with majorities of less than 10,000 votes fear Sunak cannot help them retain their seats…writes Ashis Ray

As the incumbent British Prime Minister has completed 100 days in office, The Times, a centre-right daily, headlined: “How Rishi Sunak’s first 100 days as PM have been shaped by strikes and scandals.”

The leftist Guardian’s heading was: “Ratings sink and obstacles amass as Sunak completes first 100 days as PM.”

The left-of-centre Independent highlighted: “Scandals, sackings and U-turns: Rishi Sunak’s first 100 days in the job.”

But most damaging of all, the right-wing pro ruling Conservative party Daily Mail bemoaned: “Rishi Sunak mocked for “migraine-inducing” new video to mark his first 100 days in office.”

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak speaks on the phone with Leo Varadkar, the Irish Taoiseach in 10 Downing Street. Picture by Simon Dawson / No 10 Downing Street

Finally, YouGov, a polling agency, extrapolating from data gathered by it, gave its verdict as: “100 days in, Rishi Sunak’s rating are lacklustre and he has failed to salvage the Tory (Conservative) brand.”

It went on to say: “During (Sunak’s predecessor) Liz Truss’s time as Prime Minister the Conservatives plummeted in the headline voting intention polls, with (the main opposition) Labour (party) taking the largest lead over the party — 33 points — since YouGov was founded in 2000.

“Since Sunak has taken over, the polls have stabilised and the Labour lead has narrowed, but nevertheless a significant gap of 20 points remains.”

On the Sunak’s personal rating, YouGov assessed: “The Prime Minister’s personal favourability rating is comparatively better than those of his predecessors, sitting at -29 compared to Boris Johnson’s final score of -40 and Truss’s rock bottom -70.”

More worryingly for the Prime Minister though, the pollster underlined: “Sunak is increasingly seen as a bad Prime Minister, with 56 per cent of Britons saying so as of late January.”

Only 22 per cent of his compatriots would choose him over the opposition Labour leader Keir Starmer as Prime Minister.

The Mail’s view was: “Mr Sunak’s video attracted a predictably poor reception on social media…”

He is about to lose his third cabinet colleague in as the Guardian put it in “ignoble circumstances” — deputy prime minister Dominic Raab — thereby reflecting an ill-judged choice of ministers.

Rishi Sunak leaves the Conservative Party headquarters in London, Britain, on Oct. 24, 2022. (Photo by Stephen Cheung/Xinhua/IANS)

It is, however, generally conceded the UK Prime Minister’s Office is now much more functional than under Johnson and Truss, albeit Sunak is reportedly still trying to micro-manage where he should be looking at the big picture.

More crucially, Conservative MPs with majorities of less than 10,000 votes fear Sunak cannot help them retain their seats.

In short, it appears to be a tough time ahead for Sunak, popular with many though not all British Hindus.

His cultural and ethnic background, limited experience in politics and a personality seen to be somewhat uncharismatic seem to make it difficult for him to connect with voters, especially working-class Britons.

In Britain, indigenous people expect a politician to be one of them when it comes to letting one’s hair down at a pub in an evening and going to football matches over weekends.

Sunak claims to be a supporter of Southampton Football Club, who play in the English Premier League; but is not reputed to be a natural at a watering hole.

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Sunak marks 100 days as UK PM

Ambulance drivers have also been striking, joining nurses on their first-ever walkout. But Rishi Sunak is adamant that unions’ pay demands will only fuel the decades-high inflation…reports Asian Lite News

On reaching 100 days in 10 Downing Street this week, Rishi Sunak will double the duration of Liz Truss’s brutally short term as British prime minister.

But having stabilised panicky financial markets after the calamitous Liz Truss tenure, the Conservative leader has little to celebrate.

Double-digit inflation is fuelling a winter of misery for many in Rishi Sunak’s Britain.

On Wednesday, the day before his mini-anniversary, up to half a million workers will escalate a rolling series of strikes to shut down schools, railways and other public sectors.

Opposition Labour leader Keir Starmer has been portraying the wealthy premier as “weak” and out of touch, as both parties gear up for an election likely next year.

“Is he starting to wonder if this job is just too big for him?” he told Sunak in parliament last Wednesday.

The Labour leader was merciless as he ran the rule over Britain’s state of permacrisis since Brexit and the Covid pandemic, and “sleaze” among the Conservatives.

Ambulance drivers have also been striking, joining nurses on their first-ever walkout. But Rishi Sunak is adamant that unions’ pay demands will only fuel the decades-high inflation.

“Being an effective manager of public money and public services is not a sin,” senior minister Michael Gove said, rejecting criticism that Sunak is an uninspiring leader after Boris Johnson, who preceded Truss.

“It is the case that first of all we have to bring the stability — and we have — and now we have set out areas where we are performing,” he told Sky News on Sunday.

Prime Minister Sunak faces a mountainous challenge as he bids to emulate Conservative leader John Major’s surprise win over Labour in 1992.

Outside Number 10 in October, he promised “integrity, professionalism and accountability at every level” — in pointed contrast to his two predecessors.

But Rishi Sunak has been forced on the defensive by the tax affairs of the Conservative chairman Nadhim Zahawi, who until this weekend sat in the cabinet.

Starmer on Saturday accused Sunak’s Tories of “moral bankruptcy”, as less well-off voters are forced this winter to choose between eating and heating.

Prime Minister Sunak had sought to buy time by launching an internal inquiry into Zahawi, who admitted to being “careless” with his own taxes and had to pay a seven-figure sum to the UK’s tax agency — when he was finance minister in charge of the same agency.

The inquiry’s report was issued Sunday, making uncomfortable reading for both Zahawi and Sunak, who bowed to the inevitable and fired the Iraqi-born politician.

Prime Minister Sunak, a practising Hindu who at 42 is Britain’s youngest leader since 1812, has brought a smooth-talking, technocratic approach to the premiership borne of his lucrative years in private finance.

Opinion polls show he has restored some of the Conservatives’ reputation for economic competence after the short-lived “Trussonomics” experiment.

But Labour retains an average lead of 20 points overall.

Tory right-wingers such as former Brexit minister David Frost accuse Sunak of lacking vision. “Give us something to fight for,” Frost wrote in The Daily Telegraph newspaper. “And bring Conservatives back to the party.”

Sunak hopes to settle one running sore by reforming post-Brexit rules governing trade in Northern Ireland. A row over the protocol has paralysed self-government in Belfast.

But any deal with Brussels risks provoking Brexiteer hardliners among Tory MPs, many of whom accuse Prime Minister Sunak of betraying Johnson and are likely to stir trouble if local elections in May turn out badly for the party.

Tim Bale, politics professor at Queen Mary University of London and author of a forthcoming book on the Conservatives since Brexit, said Sunak had missed opportunities to carve out a fresh start from Johnson.

“Sunak may have inherited something of a poisoned chalice but he nevertheless had a real opportunity to signal a big change at the top,” Bale said.

“Yet even a cursory glance at the polls after his first 100 days suggests he’s flunked it. In short, he’s lived down to expectations. If I were to award him a C plus, I’d probably be erring on the side of generosity. Most voters wouldn’t go any higher than a D.”

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Rishi in trouble as recession looms

The grim outlook for the year ahead puts the UK far behind its counterparts in the G7 group and the only country expected by the IMF to suffer a year of declining GDP…reports Asian Lite News

The United Kingdom is a striking exception to the IMF’s brighter outlook for 2023. It has forecast that the British economy will shrink 0.6% in 2023; in October, the IMF had expected growth of 0.3%. Higher interest rates and tighter government budgets are squeezing the British economy.

“These figures confirm we are not immune to the pressures hitting nearly all advanced economies,’’ Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt said in response to the IMF forecast. “Short-term challenges should not obscure our long-term prospects — the U.K. outperformed many forecasts last year, and if we stick to our plan to halve inflation, the U.K. is still predicted to grow faster than Germany and Japan over the coming years.”

But it nudged up its outlook for UK growth in 2024 to 0.9%, up from the 0.6% expansion previously forecast.

The grim outlook for the year ahead puts the UK far behind its counterparts in the G7 group of advanced nations and the only country – across advanced and emerging economies – expected by the IMF to suffer a year of declining GDP.

It comes against a backdrop of public sector strikes over pay and predictions that the UK is heading for a recession, with inflation still standing at more than 10%.

The IMF said Britain’s predicted GDP fall reflects “tighter fiscal and monetary policies and financial conditions and still-high energy retail prices weighing on household budgets”.

It follows efforts by Chancellor Jeremy Hunt last week to talk up the UK economy and its growth prospects in his first major speech in the post, declaring that “declinism about Britain was wrong in the past and it is wrong today”.

The IMF offered a chink of light in the otherwise gloomy economic update, predicting that the global slowdown will be shallower than first feared.

It upgraded its global growth forecast, to 2.9% in 2023 from the 2.7% predicted in October as it said the reopening of China after strict Covid restrictions has “paved the way for a faster-than-expected recovery”.

The IMF also said it believes global inflation has passed its peak and will fall from 8.8% last year to 6.6% in 2023 and 4.3% in 2024 as interest rate hikes by central banks begin to cool demand and slow price rises.

But it warned that, in the UK and Europe, surging prices and the impact of action taken to rein in inflation, will continue to weigh on the economy.

It said: “Consumer confidence and business sentiment have worsened. With inflation at about 10% or above in several euro area countries and the United Kingdom, household budgets remain stretched. The accelerated pace of rate increases by the Bank of England and the European Central Bank is tightening financial conditions and cooling demand in the housing sector and beyond.”

Chief economist for the IMF, Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas, explained there were three primary factors motivating the UK’s economic outlook.

He said: “First, there is exposure to natural gas… we’ve had a very sharp increase in energy prices in the UK. There is a larger share of energy that is coming from natural gas, with a higher pass-through to final consumers. The UK’s employment levels have also not recovered to pre-pandemic levels. This is a situation where you have a very, very tight labour market but you have an economy that has not re-absorbed into employment as many people as it had before. That means there is less output, less production. The third is that there is a very sharp monetary tightening because inflation has been very elevated, that’s a side effect of this high pass-through of energy prices.

“Inflation was 9.1% last year, and it’s expected to actually remain quite high in this coming year at 8.2% (so) the Bank of England has started tightening.

“The UK has a fairly high share of adjustable rate mortgages. So when the Bank of England starts increasing rates, it feeds into the mortgage rates that mortgage holders are paying, and that is also weighing down economic activity.”

Hunt said: “The Governor of the Bank of England recently said that any UK recession this year is likely to be shallower than previously predicted, however these figures confirm we are not immune to the pressures hitting nearly all advanced economies.

“Short-term challenges should not obscure our long-term prospects – the UK outperformed many forecasts last year, and if we stick to our plan to halve inflation, the UK is still predicted to grow faster than Germany and Japan over the coming years.”

The Treasury said since 2010, the UK had grown faster than France, Japan and Italy and that since the EU referendum in 2016, it had grown at “about the same rate as Germany”.

“Cumulative growth over the 2022-24 period is predicted to be higher than Germany and Japan, and at a similar rate to the US,” a spokesman said.

Economic forecasters are not always 100% right when it comes to predicting the future. The IMF has said its forecasts for growth the following year in most advanced economies like the UK’s have more often than not been within about 1.5 percentage points of what actually happens.

The IMF did not mention Brexit in its report as a factor for the UK not performing as well as others. Today marks three years since the UK left the EU.

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UK may lift work hour limit for foreign students

UK government is reportedly planning to allow foreign students to work for longer hours, reports Asian Lite News

UK government is gearing up to plug labour shortages in a new way. International students, including Indians, in the UK are likely to be allowed to work for longer hours and take up more part time jobs in various sectors across the country, according to a report.

Presently, foreign students in the UK, who number around 6,80,000, are allowed to work for a maximum of 20 hours a week during term time.

However, discussions have begun within the government to raise this cap to 30 hours or remove it entirely in a bid to boost its economy, The Times reported.

International students made up 476,000 of the 1.1 million migrants who arrived in the country last year.

Of these, India became the largest source of students with 161,000 students, including 33,240 dependents, coming to the UK last year.

There are 1.3 million empty posts, almost half a million more than before the pandemic, and according to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, “businesses are crying out for workers”.

Government sources told The Times that lifting the cap on foreign students’ hours was “part of a swathe of ideas being considered”, adding that the idea is at a nascent stage.

But what could put a spanner in the works is Home Secretary Suella Braverman’s plans to reduce the number of foreign students coming to the country.

Students are seen on the campus of LSE (The London School of Economics and Political Science) in London, Britain, on March 8, 2021. (Xinhua/Han Yan)

With the net migration numbers rising to an estimated record of 504,000 last year, Braverman has drawn up proposals to reduce the number, which includes shortening the duration foreign students can stay in Britain post their course.

Curbs are also being considered on the number of dependents allowed into the UK and restricting foreign students attending “low-quality” courses.

However, according to the Department of Education, the restrictions will bankrupt UK universities, which depend on foreign students for money.

According to UK-based New Way Consultancy, foreign students and their dependents contributed to the UK economy not just through fees of 10,000 pounds to 26,000 pounds but also via an NHS surcharge of 400 pounds a year for the student and 600 pounds for a dependent.

It warned that curbs on graduate work visas will force Indian students to shift to countries like Australia and Canada, ultimately leading to the end of the student market in the UK.

ALSO READ: UK car production falls to lowest level since 1950s

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$1.5m sculpture for Sunak’s garden amid financial crunch

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak walks past Larry the Cat, Chief Mouser to the Cabinet Office as he leaves 10 Downing Street to attend PMQ's at the Houses of Parliament. Picture by Simon Dawson / No 10 Downing Street

The 1980 sculpture bought by the taxpayer-funded Government Art Collection is believed to have been sold at a Christie’s auction last month for just over 1.3 million pounds.

 As millions feel a financial crunch in the UK, the government has splurged 1.3 million pounds (US$1.5 m) on a sculpture for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s garden.

The bronze sculpture by Henry Moore, titled Working Model for Seated Woman, has been sent to 10 Downing Street amid burgeoning cost of living crisis in the UK, The Sun reported.

The 1980 sculpture bought by the taxpayer-funded Government Art Collection is believed to have been sold at a Christie’s auction last month for just over 1.3 million pounds.

According to the Christie’s website, the piece of art “conveys a strong sense of maternity and pregnancy — from the gentle watchfulness of the woman’s face and her guarded posture to the protective nature of her arms and the architectural shelter she offers between her lap and shoulders to this, semi-abstract, embryonic and Jean Arp-like form”.

Downing Street said no politicians were involved in the decision to buy, The Sun reported.

With inflation hitting a 41-year high of 11.1 per cent in October, Britons have been cutting back on their spending.

According to a GlobalData for VoucherCodes research, Britons will spend 8.7 billion pounds ($10.5 billion) over the Black Friday weekend (November 25 – November 28).

A new MetLife UK research said 48 per cent of the people are worried about missing their mortgage repayments due to the soaring cost of living crisis.

The study further revealed that 42 per cent have no savings to fall back on if they found themselves unable to pay their mortgage.

Sunak and his wife Akshata Murty were recently ranked 17th on the UK’s ‘Asian Rich List 2022’, with an estimated wealth of 790 million pounds.

ALSO READ: Indians get top share of UK ‘worker’ visas

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Sunak Overtakes Starmer in Popularity Poll

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak visits Croydon University Hospital where he met staff and patients. South London. Picture by Simon Walker / No 10 Downing Street

In a poll conducted on the UK’s new Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s first two days in office, 39 per cent of respondents picked the Indian-origin leader over Keir Starmer, chief of the opposition Labour Party.

The poll, conducted by Redfield and Wilton, asked 1,500 people who they thought would be a better Prime Minister.

Some 39 per cent of respondents picked Sunak, up 6 per cent from the start of September, and 38 per cent said they would prefer Starmer, down 4 per cent, the Daily Express reported.

Another weekly tracker poll by Techne UK showed Labour’s lead over the Conservatives was down from 31 to 24 points.

Labour Leader Sir Keir Starmer speaks after Rishi Sunak’s Budget speech. (UK Parliament_Jessica Taylor)

The poll of 1,624 voters showed support for Labour at 50 per cent, a drop of three points from last week.

The Conservatives, meanwhile, were up four points with their new Prime Minister at the helm from 22 per cent a week ago to 26 per cent on October 27, the Daily Express reported.

Sunak faced Starmer in his first Prime Minister’s Questions in the Commons on October 26 — a day after being appointed as Britain’s first Asian and first Hindu Prime Minister.

Despite the popularity polls, calls for a general election have escalated with more than 891,000 people signing a petition to Parliament

According to a modelling sample of 12,000 people by YouGov last week, Sunak would suffer a crushing defeat at the hands of Starmer if a general election were to take place immediately.

It said Starmer would win 389 constituencies, and Sunak just 127.

The next general election in the UK is scheduled for May 2024, under the Fixed Term Parliament Act 2011, which holds that an poll must be held at least once every five years.

According to experts, the Conservatives are likely to resist early election calls unless absolutely necessary because any new election is expected to flip around the sizable 71-seat majority in the House of Commons, which the party enjoys at the moment.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak holds his first Cabinet meeting in 10 Downing Street the morning after assuming office

After being elected as the Conservative leader, Sunak told supporters that the party must “unite or die” after the recent wave of controversy and infighting.

In a speech at Conservative Party headquarters, he said: “We now need stability and unity and I will make it my utmost priority to bring our party and our country together.”

ALSO READ: Britons slam Noah’s ‘racist backlash’ claims against Sunak

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SPECIAL – Sunak Is No Obama – By Mihir Bose

Where the Sunak story also differs from Obama, and this is very significant, is that, unlike Obama, he has emerged from the right. It is an ace in the hands of the British Tories and they will play it ruthlessly when fighting Labour. It can point to the fact that it has prominent non-whites occupying high positions in the Cabinet, including three of the top jobs …. Writes Mihir Bose exclusively for London Daily

One of the things about race in this country is to always look at what happens in the US and link events here to those in the US. Some years ago, I applied for a job at London Weekend on a program they were going to have which would look at issues about race and immigration. The interview developed into an argument where the person interviewing me would not accept that the race situation in the US was totally  different to the one in the UK . He insisted on linking it reflecting the fact that this has a long history in this country, and something people, including prominent politicians, are constantly doing.

One of the events that shaped Enoch Powell’s infamous rivers of blood speech was what was happening in the US at that time with the civil rights agitation and how the racial situation had got inflamed. Powell’s speech in April 1968 was made weeks after Martin Luther King, the civil rights leader, was assassinated at a Memphis hotel.

I have always felt to draw comparisons between the two countries on the race issue is not very helpful, if anything likely to distort the whole situation. But once again it is happening with Rishi Sunak entering No 10 as Britain’s first non-white Prime Minister. The immediate response is this is Britain’s Barrack Obama moment. Nothing could be more absurd.

Obama’s election was white America’s attempt to pay back some of the dues it owes to the black community, which had accumulated for centuries, for its original sin of slavery. Not that such dues can be paid by a single black man entering the White House. And in any case there was a distortion here as Obama is only half black and his black ancestors were not slaves who had been brought to America in chains. His Kenyan father had migrated to America to study. But in the American story of race such an edited version of what had happened in history was necessary.    

Sunak’s story is a legacy of the British empire where attitudes to race was always very different. Not that the empire was not driven by the racial belief that white people were superior. It is worth noting that the British in their empire called themselves European. The institutions the British set up in India had the name European. The clubs that excluded Indians, as nearly all of them did, said they were for Europeans only. Even the cricket team was called European. Only people of pure European blood could be members of the team.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak arrives at No10 Downing Street. 10 Downing Street. Picture by Simon Walker/ No 10 Downing Street

But where Britain differed from America is, unlike America where the whites had a blanket ban on blacks, the British iron curtain on race could be opened on certain occasions allowing the browns and blacks to interact with whites. The best example of this provided in sport. The European team of pure blood did play cricket with the Indians. In America, in contrast, the blacks were not allowed to play major league baseball and had to form their own “Negro” leagues. It was only in 1947, the year India got independence, that the first black player, Jackie Robinson, played in major league baseball.

The King received The Rt Hon Rishi Sunak MP at Buckingham Palace today. His Majesty asked him to form a new Administration. Mr. Sunak accepted His Majesty’s offer and was appointed Prime Minister and First Lord of the Treasury.

Where the Sunak story also differs from Obama, and this is very significant, is that, unlike Obama, he has emerged from the right. It is an ace in the hands of the British Tories and they will play it ruthlessly when fighting Labour. It can point to the fact that it has prominent non-whites occupying high positions in the Cabinet, including three of the top jobs, and Sunak having been chancellor already, while Labour is still stuck in its white groove. Also, the Tories have had three women prime ministers, whereas Labour is yet to have anyone who looks likely to become Prime Minister.

And Sunak, unlike Obama, has made it clear that he sees looking at colonial history, and how it is represented, as “woke”. During his losing campaign against Liz Truss at one Conservative rally he said that, “I want to take on this lefty woke culture that seems to want to cancel our history, our values and our women.”

It is also worth stressing that, unlike Obama who was elected by the American people in a general election, Sunak has got into No 10 on the vote of the Tory MPs. He has always enjoyed support among the MPs, even when he fought against Truss, but when the Conservative members voted he lost quite easily, and his defeat was never in doubt. This suggests that, while in Westminster he has appeal, how he plays out  the country remains to be seen.

And this is where he poses a challenge for Labour. When the election comes Labour, as the party of the left, cannot play the race card, or at least not openly. Yet they may find that the fact that Sunak is not-white has mileage. How it will resolve this contradiction will be interesting.

I have always thought that the row over his wife having a non-dom tax status was not only because she is immensely rich but also because there was an undercurrent of racism that dare not speak its name, that of a brown woman taking advantage of this country’s tax laws.

And here again the distinction with America needs to be drawn.

Race is not the only factor in this story. So is class. Class in America is not an issue and what is more to be rich is not a matter of shame as the rise of Trump, who has broadcast how rich is, shows. In Britain there is no getting away from class. And the feeling that the rich should be distrusted because they have largely inherited their wealth is a view shared by many. And there is no question Sunak’s wife wealth is inherited from her immensely rich father.

Where Labour may profit is that Sunak’s biggest task is to unite the Conservative party. His cabinet shows that he considers this is first job with the choice of Suella Braverman as Home Secretary. She may have had to resign only days ago because of breaking the ministerial code but Sunak needs her because she is seen as the champion of the right and he cannot afford to alienate the right.

The fact is the Tory party in parliament has become like the Labour party of old, split into factions which hate each other. For decades Tory took advantage of such Labour splits to retain power. Now Sir Keir Starmer will have to try and profit from the Tory splits. How well Sunak can unite the party by the time election comes, and Starmer learns from how the Tories used the Labour splits to its advantage, could play a major part in the election. The common belief is parties that are divided do not win. Labour knows that to its cost. If Sunak cannot unite the party he may suffer the same fate as in the past Labour has done. Then the fact that he is brown will play no part.

(Mihir Bose’s latest book is Dreaming The Impossible, The Battle To Create a Non-Racial Sports World)   

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