Keir Starmer welcomes Iran war ceasefire as he heads to Gulf to meet regional leaders – UK politics live

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Racing open to more direct protests in campaign against affordability checks

The chief executive of the British Horseracing Authority, Brant Dunshea, has revealed that the sport will consider more direct action protests as they continue to battle against government plans to introduce affordability tests for punters, Matt Hughes reports.

UK opening new oil and gas fields would imperil global climate goals, experts say

Opening new oil and gas fields in the North Sea would “send a shock wave around the world”, imperilling international climate targets, undermining the UK’s climate leadership and encouraging developing countries to exploit their own fossil fuel reserves, experts have warned. Fiona Harvey has the story.

At a press conference in Aberdeen later, Richard Tice, the Reform UK leader, and Malcolm Offord, the party’s Scottish leader, are expected to say they want the applications for the Jackdaw (gas) and Rosebank (mostly oil) developments in the North Sea to be approved.

As Andrew McDonald and Bethany Dawson reports in the London Playbook briefing for Politico, this will just bring Reform UK into line with their main opponents in the Holyrood election.

[Reform UK’s position is] a framing aimed at bashing Keir Starmer and Ed Miliband, who are yet to throw their weight behind more oil and gas drilling, despite the potential for energy price pain to come. But in Scotland that position actually brings Reform in line with … the SNP and Scottish Labour. The latter’s leader Anas Sarwar has split from his party in Westminster to say he thinks they should be approved, while the former tree-huggers in the SNP have signaled they support them too. Watch out for whether Reform tries to indicate if they’re even more oily than the other contenders up north.

Trump's threat to wipe out Iranian civilisation not 'appropriate', James Cleverly says

James Cleverly, the shadow housing secretary and a former foreign secretary, told Sky News this morning that Donald Trump’s threat yesterday to wipe out Iranian civilisaton was not “appropriate”.

Asked about the comment, Cleverly said:

This is not language that we would use. I don’t think that that is appropriate language even in a situation like this.

But look, we know that President Trump uses incredibly ostentatious, hyperbolic language. We recognise that it’s not the position that a Conservative leader, whether it be Kemi or a foreign secretary, would take.

IFS thinktank says tax cuts proposed by Scottish Tories 'cannot credibly be funded' by admin savings, as they claim

Yesterday the Scottish Conservatives published their manifesto for the Holyrood election. This morning the Institute for Fiscal Studies thinktank has published its initial response to the plans, and it says the tax cuts proposed “cannot credibly be funded” by administrative savings, as the Tories claim. To fund their tax cuts, the Tories would probably have to implement “substantial cutbacks” in services, the IFS says.

Summing up the analysis, David Phillips, head of devolved and local government finance at the IFS, says (bold type from IFS):

The Scottish Conservatives’ two flagship tax proposals are significant cuts to income tax and business rates. Together, the party estimates that these would cost £3.7bn a year by the end of the parliament in 2031–32. Over £2bn a year of additional spending on a range of priority areas takes the total cost of ‘new measures’ to around £6bn a year by 2031–32.

It is welcome that these costs are set out clearly in a costings document. But these are big tax cuts and spending increases – equivalent to almost 10% of current forecasts for Scottish government day-to-day spending in 2031. While specific cuts to disability benefits have been identified to pay for around a third of the £6bn package, history suggests there is a significant risk that the amount saved from these cuts would be lower than the £2.1bn a year pencilled in by 2031–32. The almost £4bn a year expected from various measures to reduce back-office, administration and civil service costs is very large relative to existing budgets – and relative to what Reform UK said it would aim to save from such measures …

Taking the entire package of measures together, this may be a costed plan on paper but whether it would survive contact with reality is far from clear. Scotland can have lower taxes and higher spending on some services – but giveaways on the scale proposed by the Scottish Conservatives cannot credibly be funded largely through back-office and administrative savings. In addition to the cuts to benefits set out in the manifesto, there would likely need to be substantial cutbacks to either the range or quality of some services used by households and businesses too.

James Cleverly, the shadow housing secretary, claimed on GB News this morning that Keir Starmer has lost credibility through his response to the Iran war. Commenting on Starmer’s visit to the Gulf, Cleverly said:

The prime minister is desperately trying to regain some credibility, having been slow and indecisive throughout this situation.

He’s changed positions. He was opposing the United States using their own aircraft from British bases. Then he was in favour of it.

He delayed the decision to deploy British naval assets. He left British military personnel and our allies in the region not properly defended. And now he’s finally engaging properly with this situation.

Unfortunately, he has cost this country credibility on the world stage. And I know a lot of our friends and allies in the region and beyond are very disappointed in Britain’s response, and that is entirely because of decisions that Keir Starmer failed to make.

This is one view, as you might say. A recent YouGov opinion poll found the public split fairly evenly on Starmer’s handling of the Iran war – with 43% saying he was doing badly, and 38% saying he was doing well. These figures might look quite poor, but compared with Starmer’s overall approval ratings, they’re a huge improvement. Kemi Badenoch has veered from initially supporting the war without reservation to saying Trump has made a “mess” of the whole thing, and Starmer clearly believes that his handling of Iran has been good for him politically because he constantly keeps comparing his stance to Badenoch’s and Nigel Farage’s.

Green leader Zack Polanski urges Starmer to respond to ceasefire by 'suspending US military from UK soil'

Zack Polanski, the Green party leader, has renewed his call for the UK to ban the US military from using bases in Britain.

He has posted these messages on social media, responding to Keir Starmer’s statement about the ceasefire. (See 8.30am.)

The Prime Minister FINALLY speaks.

He says “we must do all we can to sustain the ceasefire.”

Surely that must means suspending US military from UK soil?

The President is not some abstract threat. We’ve seen repeatedly exactly who he is - and we should have no part in it.

The last 24 hours have shown what many have said for a long time.

Britain’s role as an accomplice to Trump’s America must end.

We must urgently decouple from a rogue US & seek security with allies closer to home. That starts with suspension of the US bombers on British soil.

And Polanski also posted this, commenting on a clip of an interview given this morning by Sarah Jones, the policing minister.

This Government both want us to believe they’ve played a leadership role here - and that they don’t know the terms of the agreement.

It’s simply not plausible.

While European Allies banned US use of their airspace, we’ve let bombers launch from the UK.

Yesterday Polanski was saying the government should stop letting the US use British bases for any operations against Iran. Today he seems to be calling for a more permanent ban on American warplanes being based in the UK.

Minister says ceasefire 'emerging news' and 'we need to see how that develops'

Sarah Jones, the policing minister, has been giving interviews. She has been talking about Keir Starmer’s visit to the Gulf, but hasn’t said anything that really adds to the (rather limited) information about the visit put out by Downing Street.

Jones told Times Radio:

[Starmer] is going to the Gulf for a number of reasons. Firstly you will have seen last week with the foreign secretary, and this week with our officials, where we have played a real leading role bringing together about 40 countries looking at the challenge that we have in the strait [of Hormuz] and how we can make sure that opens up as quickly as possible to bring some normality back to that system. so there will be that aspect.

He wants to see the work of our brave personnel who are there in the region, of course, with our three very key principles of protecting British interests and protecting British citizens and our allies. He will want to see the work of that.

And, of course, this ceasefire is very much emerging breaking news. We need to see how that develops.

FTSE 100 rises as stock market opens after Iran ceasefire announcement

The FTSE 100 jumped by 268.28, or 2.59%, to 10,617.07 points after the London markets opened this morning, the Press Association reports. PA says traders and investors welcomed a conditional two-week ceasefire between the US and Iran. It came as the price of crude oil plunged in value, falling by around 14% in early trading.

Keir Starmer welcomes Iran war ceasefire as he heads to Gulf to meet regional leaders

Good morning. Keir Starmer has welcomed the ceasefire agreement between the US and Iran. Here is Andrew Roth’s story about the overnight news.

And this is what Starmer has said, in a statement issued by No 10 this morning.

I welcome the ceasefire agreement reached overnight, which will bring a moment of relief to the region and the world.

Together with our partners we must do all we can to support and sustain this ceasefire, turn it into a lasting agreement and re-open the Strait of Hormuz.

No 10 released this statement in a news release saying that he is travelling to the Gulf today “to meet with Gulf partners and discuss diplomatic efforts to support and uphold the ceasefire in order to bring about a lasting resolution to the conflict and protect the UK and global economy from further threats”.

This trip was arrangement before the ceasefire was announced, Downing Street has stressed. Starmer did not decide to hop on a plane after reading Donald Trump’s ceasefire announcement on Truth Social last night.

We don’t have details of where Starmer will be going, or who he will meet. But this is what Downing Street says about the purpose of the visit.

On the visit, the prime minister will make clear his government’s commitment to de-escalation, and hold further talks on practical efforts to restore freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz following promising progress reported as a result of the ceasefire. As announced by the prime minister last week, the United Kingdom is continuing to lead the international effort, convening allies from across the world to ensure the Strait of Hormuz is reopened.

He will also see in person the defensive support the UK has provided in the collective self-defence of our allies in the region and thank UK personnel for their brave service.

And we don’t know when we will hear or see Starmer – but, as soon as we do, you will read about it here.

Here are the other things happening today.

Morning: Sadiq Khan, the Labour mayor of London, is at an event announcing funding for youth clubs.

Morning: Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, is campaigning in Yorkshire.

Morning: Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, is campaigning in Edinburgh, where he is talking about culture policy. John Swinney, the first minister and SNP leader, is visiting Na h-Eileanan an Iar (the Western Isles), and Russell Findlay, the Scottish Tory leader, is on a campaign visit in Ayrshire.

12.3pm: Richard Tice, Reform UK’s deputy leader, and Malcolm Offord, the party’s leader in Scotland, hold a press conference in Aberdeen.

Afternoon: Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, is on a visit in London.

At some point today the Welsh Liberal Democrats are launching their Senedd election campaign.

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