Jamie Driscoll to stand as independent candidate for north-east mayor after quitting Labour and raising £30,000 – UK politics live | Politics

Carpenters, bricklayers and roofers are among migrant workers who will be allowed to apply for work visas and get a discount on fees in a bid to fill UK job shortages, PA Media reports. PA says:

The Home Office said it was “temporarily easing visa restrictions” for a string of construction roles by adding them to the shortage occupation list.

This means foreign workers trained in certain professions qualify for a work visa and are allowed to pay a reduced application fee.

The government hopes the move will help boost the economy, “stimulate development” and “attract new talent”, the department said.

The announcement comes in the wake of calls from some Tory MPs who urged Rishi Sunak to cut immigration and cut back on temporary visa schemes.

Bricklayers, masons, roofers, roof tilers, slaters, carpenters, joiners, plasterers and other “construction and building trades not elsewhere classified” have all been added.

Those working in a shortage occupation can be paid 80% of the job’s usual going rate.

Planning for emerging infectious disease outbreak ‘woefully inadequate’ ahead of Covid, inquiry told

Robert Booth

Planning for an emerging infectious disease outbreak in the NHS was “woefully inadequate”, the doctors’ union has told the UK Covid-19 public inquiry, saying: “We felt so unprepared”.

In the final week of the inquiry’s investigation into the UK’s preparedness for the pandemic, the British Medical Association chair, Prof Philip Banfield, said it had warned years before the virus hit that a decision to split public health directors from the NHS would ““threaten the ability to mount an effective pandemic response”. But when the virus hit, he said, “I’ve never seen doctors so worried.”

The UK had prepared for pandemic flu, but the 2019 version of the national risk register also contained a planning assumption for an emerging infectious disease outbreak of 2,000 cases and 200 fatalities. But there were only eight beds in four units around the country ready to treat people in those cases, according to evidence to the inquiry fro NHS England.

Banfield agreed, under questioning from a lawyer for the Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice group, that this was “woefully inadequate”.

Meanwhile the TUC revealed that workers were not consulted during pandemic planning and the Health Foundation said not enough money was invested in the NHS to keep pace with demand, with spending £40bn below France’s, and social care and public health funding slashed by 12% and 15% per capita respectively.

Kate Bell, deputy general secretary, said the TUC had in 2016 made “an unprecedented series of warnings, raising the alarm about pressures on the NHS”. She went on:

There was very clear evidence that the NHS was under pressure in terms of its capacity … but also in terms of staffing levels, and it was having a significant impact on the ability to cope with additional shocks.

Gillian Keegan, the education secretary, is making a Commons statement on the plan to limit the number of students studying what the government calls “rip-off” courses in England.

Until now the government has not given a clear definition of how it judges if a course is not leading to students getting good jobs. (See 1.15pm.)

But Keegan may have given a hint when she told MPs there are 66 higher education providers where fewer than 60% of graduates go on to high-skilled employment, or further study, within 15 months. “This is not acceptable,” she said.

Jamie Driscoll has now raised more than £30,000 to fund his campaign to run as an independent candidate for mayor of the north-east next year. That is more than the target he set for fundraising by the end of August (see 1.55pm), and it means he is definitely running. He has confirmed that by tweeting a link to an Elton John song – I’m Still Standing.

The Labour party has put out a statement suggesting that Jamie Driscoll was blocked from standing in the contest to be the party’s candidate for north-east mayor because he was not good enough. In a statement on Driscoll’s decision to quit the party, a spokesperson said:

The Labour party is delighted that local party members have selected Kim McGuinness as our candidate for the north-east mayoral election next year.

With Keir Starmer as leader, the Labour party is a changed party, relentlessly focused on delivering for working people, and we make no apologies that Labour candidates are held to the highest standard.

The Tories have let our region down, and as Labour mayor, Kim will be the strong voice the north-east deserves.

Labour has said Driscoll was blocked because he shared a platform with Ken Loach, the film director who has strongly defended Jeremy Corbyn against the claims that Corbyn tolerated antisemitism in the party. Driscoll has said he was talking to Loach at an arts event, about Loach’s films set in the north-east, and that if that is unacceptable for a Labour figure, the party is in a “dark place”.

Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, has said that Scottish Labour is opposed to the two-child benefit cap (see 9.35am) and will push Keir Starmer to get rid of it if he wins the next general election. Sarwar told the Daily Record:

Scottish Labour policy has not changed. We continue to oppose the two-child limit. We continue to believe that it exacerbates poverty, and we continue to believe that it needs to change.

What we recognise is an incoming Labour government will inherit economic carnage and that means we will not be able to do everything we want, and we won’t be able to do everything as fast as we want.

But we will continue to press any incoming UK Labour government to move as fast as they can within our fiscal rules to remove this heinous policy.

Jamie Driscoll, the North of Tyne mayor, has resigned from the Labour party. He was recently banned from standing in the contest to be the party’s candidate for mayor of the north-east (a new post, including the area covered by the North of Tyne mayoralty, with a wider chunk of the north-east also included), and at the time the decision was seen as one of the most extreme of many recent cases of candidates not wholly aligned with Keir Starmer and his politics being purged from Labour contests on dubious grounds.

In a series of tweets, Driscoll says that if he can raise £25,000 for a campaign by the end of August, he will stand as an independent against Labour’s candidate for north-east mayor. He says:

I’ve decided to resign from @UKLabour and serve as an Independent Mayor.

People are tired of being controlled by Westminster and Party HQs. They want someone to stand up for them. Let the people decide. £25k by end of Aug & I’ll stand as North East Mayorhttps://gofund.me/98547c6b

The only ‘whip’ should be the people. The North East needs an experienced, independent voice. Even if you don’t live here, this affects you. Our politics is a mess. Millions feel no one speaks for them. Politicians should answer to you, not to party bosses in London HQs.

Since my barring by @UKLabour, I’ve received overwhelming support. The cry for me to run as an independent has come from business leaders, community workers, trade unionists and politicians cross party. People have stopped me in the street asking me to run!

But I won’t have big party machinery behind me, or a national press office. I’ll need £150k to run a full campaign. If I can raise £25k by the end of August, I’ll run. The decision is yours. There’s more info here

This is not a time for faint hearts. It’s a time for bravery. If you back me, I’ll run. If I run, we can win. #ShyBairnsGetNowt. If you want to find out more about me and my vision for the future, you can find out more on my website

And here is a full summary of that was said at the Downing Street lobby briefing about the government’s plan to limit the number of people studying what are deemed low-value courses in England.

• No 10 refused to give examples of what it sees as “rip off” courses. Asked to give examples, the PM’s spokesperson said that under the plans it would be for the Office for Students to decide what courses were not value for money. He said the OfS would focus on particular courses, not entire subjects. He said:

This is not about specific subjects. We are subject-agnostic when it comes to this.

As to how the OfS would decide what courses did not offer value for money, the spokesperson did not give precise details, but he highlighted two criteria that would apply: drop-out rates (“regardless of the subject, you wouldn’t want to see students being signed up to a course where half of the students drop out”, the spokesperson said); and whether the course leads to students getting good jobs.

• The spokesperson would not say whether Rishi Sunak thought too many students were going to university. Asked if he thought too many people were going to university, the spokesperson said Sunak thought “working to an arbitrary number is not the right approach”.

No 10 has said some “rip-off” university courses could be closed down under the plans announced by the government today.

The government says it wants to impose a limit on the number of students in England who can study courses deemed as poor value for money, either because of their drop-out rates or because they don’t help students get good jobs.

But at the No 10 lobby briefing this morning, the PM’s spokesperson said the cap could be as low as zero. He said:

In extremis, recruitment limits could be used to prevent any recruitment to a course.

The OfS [Office for Students] has powers to suspend a provider’s registration or even remove it from their register if they wish, but it’s up to them to decide the scope and nature of any recruitment.

I will post more from the briefing shortly.