Business leaders have been “infuriated” by what Boris Johnson has been saying about them this week, Tony Danker, the head of the CBI, has said. (See 3.53pm.)
Voters preferred Sir Keir Starmer’s party conference speech to Johnson’s, a poll suggests. (See 9.31am and 11.39am.)
Stormont ministers have agreed to remove a legal requirement for social distancing in bars and restaurants in Northern Ireland, PA Media reports. PA says the 1-metre rule will be removed on 31 October, when nightclubs can also reopen. On that date, customers will also now be able to move around all hospitality premises freely again and dancing will once again be permitted. The executive will ask event organisers and venues to require patrons to either prove full vaccination or a negative lateral flow test or evidence of a Covid infection within the previous six months.
Sir Peter Bottomley, the Conservative leader of the Commons, has been criticised for saying MPs should be paid more. (See 2.49pm.)
Voters increasingly unhappy with government's performance on tax, inflation and economy, poll suggests
YouGov has published some new polling today showing a big increase within the last few weeks in the number of people thinking the government is doing badly on tax, inflation and the economy generally.
Public opinion on the government's handling of the economy, tax and inflation has become much more negative recently
As YouGov reports, the latest polling even suggests more people now think taxes would go up if the Conservatives win the next election than if Labour wins.
But, in his write-up, YouGov’s Adam McDonnell says the Conservatives are still ahead of Labour as the party seen as best on handling the economy. He says:
As a result of these woes, the general public are now just as likely to say Labour are the best party to handle taxation as they are the Conservatives, with both parties getting 25% of the vote on this issue.
However, despite a slight narrowing, Starmer’s party are still a long way off the Tories when it comes to trust in handling the economy in general. Three in 10 (29%) think the Conservatives are best on this issue, compared to 19% who say Labour, although this still represents a tightening from 33% vs 17% in mid-September.
Business leaders 'infuriated' by what PM has been saying about them, says CBI boss
Business leaders have been infuriated by what ministers have been saying about them this week, the head of the CBI said today.
Speaking at a CBI-run online event, Tony Danker, the organisation’s director general, said his members were angered by the constant claims that they were resistant to paying their workers more and that they just wanted to go relying on cheap, foreign labour.
Boris Johnson made this one of his main arguments at the Conservative conference, accusing businesses suffering from labour shortages of just wanting to “pull the big lever marked uncontrolled immigration”.
Danker said Johnson was wrong. He explained:
If ever such a thing existed, and I don’t think it did, I honestly don’t know a business person in the country who thinks we should pull such a lever.
Danker said business leaders agreed with Johnson in wanting to see the UK economy move to a high-wage, high-skills, high-productivity model.
But he said there were several obstacles in the way, including taxation. He said:
The crisis we have is every single piece of business taxation seems to be going up and I don’t think that’s a great plan for growth.
Danker also said Labour was looking “better on business taxes” after the shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves, promised to scrap “unpopular” business rates while the government has increased the national insurance levy.
He said that business leaders were “infuriated by the tone” of ministers in recent days. But he also suggested said that now the party conference season was over, the rhetoric might calm down.
Tony Danker, CBI director general. Photograph: Jon Super/AP
Senior Tory Peter Bottomley criticised after saying MPs should be paid more
A senior Conservative has provoked anger by arguing that MPs should be paid more.
In an interview with the New Statesman,Sir Peter Bottomley, who as the longest-serving MP is father of the house, said that for some of his colleagues trying to manage on a salary of £81,932 a year was “grim”.
In an interview with Anoosh Chakelian, he said that while he did not have any difficulties living on his salaries, that was not the case for some newer MPs. “I don’t know how they manage. It’s really grim,” he said.
Bottomley also said:
I take the view that being an MP is the greatest honour you could have, but a general practitioner in politics ought to be paid roughly the same as a general practitioner in medicine.
Doctors are paid far too little nowadays. But if they would get roughly £100,000 a year, the equivalent for an MP to get the same standard of living would be £110-£115,000 a year – it’s never the right time, but if your MP isn’t worth the money, it’s better to change the MP than to change the money.
The average GP salary in England is £100,700, the New Statesman reports.
Wes Streeting, the shadow child poverty secretary, told Radio 5 Live that he was “genuinely infuriated” by Bottomley’s comment.
Referring to the £20 per week universal credit cut being implemented this week, he said:
We are perfectly well paid, and unfortunately too many MPs on the Conservative side, at the same time as whingeing about very high – relatively high – levels of pay that MPs get in this country, at the same time they are clobbering people who are losing over £1,000 a year, which is 10% of their income in some cases.
This is my problem with the Tories – it’s not that they’re evil, bad people who go into work every day thinking ‘How can we plunge more kids into poverty?’ but, as Peter Bottomley’s comments show, they just don’t know what life is like for a hell of a lot of people in this country and they make policies that are actively hurting people who are going out, working hard, trying to make the best for their family and are really struggling.
Bottomley subsequently told LBC that he had not known the interview would be published this week, but that he stood by his remarks. He said someone such as the deputy head of a large school, or a solicitor, or the deputy general secretary of the Royal College of Nursing, should be able to become an MP without having to make a major financial sacrifice.
He also said that he was not calling for MPs to be given a pay increase now, and that MPs’ pay could be increased without any extra cost to the taxpayer if the number of MPs was cut by 10%.
Peter Bottomley Photograph: Jessica Taylor/Reuters
Campaigners have put Thérèse Coffey, the work and pensions secretary, on notice that they will launch legal action within seven days over a threat to remove EU citizens from universal credit.
The3million, the organisation campaign on behalf of EU residents in the UK, sent a letter before action in relation to a judicial review application to Coffey complaining that the government’s plans to cut people off who cannot prove their right to remain in the country is going to hit thousands of vulnerable EU citizens who may not receive or understand the letter.
It follows a letter in May from the DWP to 70,000 EU citizens in receipt of universal credit warning them they could lose their benefits if they didn’t apply for settled status.
Follow-up letters say that they will be cut off on 24 October, the3million claims.
It is concerned that thousands who suffer dementia, are disabled or people who live chaotic lives will not know or understand the DWP threat and could be made “homeless or destitute”.
Lawyers for the3million argue this is in breach of equal rights legislation.
Councils tax bills in England may have to rise by 5% a year in coming years, thinktank claims
Councils in England may need to increase council tax bills by 5% a year over the next three years to meet the demands they face, the Institute for Fiscal Studies has said.
In a report issued ahead of the budget coming later this month, the IFS said (bold from original text):
Under current government spending plans, council tax increases of 3.6% per year will be needed for the next three years just to ensure councils can provide the same range and quality of services in 2024–25 as was provided pre-pandemic – which already followed a decade of austerity. This would push up the average annual bill paid by households by £160 by 2024−25, or £77 after accounting for inflation. In fact, this is likely to be a minimum requirement. Bigger increases in underlying demand and cost pressures, or top-ups to other budgets (such as schools) which eat into the amount available for grants to councils, could easily push up the necessary council tax rises to 5% per year, or by over £220 by 2024–25.
The IFS also said one particular problem was that the amount being allocated by central government for social care of the next three years is unlikely to be enough. It said (bold from original text):
The government has said it will provide £5.4bn over three years to begin the roll-out of a new lifetime cap on care costs and more generous means-testing arrangements, as well as higher payments for care providers, increased support for informal carers, investment in housing adaptations and supported housing, and workforce development. Given the scale of what the government wants to achieve, this funding isunlikely to be sufficient to meet the government’s stated aims in full over the next three years.
Kate Ogden, an IFS economist and one of the report’s authors, said:
The government has stepped up with billions in additional funding for councils to support them through the last 18 months. It is likely to have to find billions more for councils over the next couple of years if they are to avoid cutting back on services, even if they increase council tax by 4% a year or more.
Prof Stephen Gorard, a leading expert on teacher recruitment and retainment at Durham University, says Boris Johnson’s offer of a £3,000 bonus for maths and science teachers to move to schools in disadvantaged areas is unlikely to make a difference. He says:
Our reviews of the best available evidence on this topic show that temporary or one-off payments might encourage some teachers to move to hard-to-staff schools. But they will tend to remain there only for as long as they have to - £3,000 is not enough to change teachers’ lives and uproot their families.
Sturgeon says it was 'outragreous' Johnson did not mention universal credit cut in speech
At first minister’s questions in Edinburgh, in response to a question from the SNP MSP Jim Fairlie, who said Boris Johnson’s comments about the pig industry this week were “outragreous and condescending”, Nicola Sturgeon said she agreed. She told the Scottish parliament:
I do think it was deeply regrettable that the prime minister treated the very serious issues of animal welfare with such disdain on Sunday [in his Andrew Marr interview], just as I think it was outrageous that he made an entire speech to his party conference yesterday and did not mention the fact that on that very day his government had taken away £20 a week from the poorest families across the country.
In an interview with Sky News this morning Ed Miliband, the shadow business secretary and former Labour leader, claimed that Boris Johnson’s conference speech yesterday showed that he was in denial. He explained:
The prime minister’s speech yesterday was a masterclass in Boris Johnsonism, which is big, windy rhetoric, some decent jokes - but families watching that speech will be scratching their heads and thinking, ‘Why wasn’t he talking about the cost of living crisis I’m facing? Why wasn’t he talking about the supply chain crisis?’
In fact, he’s saying ‘Crisis, what crisis?’ Why isn’t he talking about the fact that we’ve seen rising prices, that we’re seeing universal credit being cut?
I thought it was a prime minister in denial and frankly living in a parallel universe.
And I think the reaction from businesses is informative because I think they thought this was a speech of somebody who wasn’t simply not in touch with ordinary families around the country, but also small and medium sized, and indeed large, businesses who are facing the toughest of times.
So I thought it was a prime minister who seemed unaware of what most people are facing.
EU urges UK to drop rhetoric in Northern Ireland Brexit row
The EU has urged the UK to drop the “political rhetoric” in the row over Brexit negotiations for Northern Ireland, revealing it will make what it described as “far-reaching proposals” to break the impasse next week, my colleague Lisa O’Carroll reports.
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