News Round-Up

• “Rayner suggests Labour could ban huge donations after Reform gets £72 million” – Labour could move to cap political donations after two crypto billionaires based abroad handed £72 million to Reform UK and make the new rules retrospective, reports the Mail.
• “Rayner accused of ‘two-tier’ donation rules to protect union funding” – Angela Rayner has suggested that political donations from wealthy individuals could be capped, prompting claims of a “two-tier” system to protect Labour’s union funding, says the Telegraph.
• “Reform UK’s £72 million donations ‘safe from Labour’s retroactive law change’” – Nigel Farage’s party insists its £72 million donation is legally protected and accuses the Government of threatening the rule of law by exploring a retrospective block, according to the Times.
• “Families will be unfairly hit by Labour’s tourist tax” – Labour’s plan to slap a tax of up to 5% on accommodation is set to push up the cost of holidays in Britain, reports the Telegraph.
• “‘Hotel police’ to enforce Burnham’s tourist tax” – Andy Burnham’s tourist tax will be enforced by so-called “hotel police” empowered to issue fines and enter businesses without permission, says the Telegraph.
• “Burnham’s bottled chance to create jobs and slash bills” – In the Mail, Kemi Badenoch writes that Andy Burnham has failed to make a single significant decision on defence, welfare or oil and gas – all things he promised to tackle during his leadership coronation.
• “UK economy being held back by ‘five giants’ warn business grandees” – The Prosperity 2030 Alliance has warned that neglect, gridlock, discouragement, myopia and powerlessness are the main factors choking off British growth, says the Mail.
• “Iceland boss and ex-Labour cost of living czar tells Chancellor: please stop squeezing business dry!” – The boss of Iceland is publicly urging the Chancellor to ease the burden on business, according to This is Money.
• “Burnham is not the tough-minded leader Britain needs” – The Prime Minister’s loyalties lie with the hard Left rather than the national interest, writes Liam Halligan in the Telegraph.
• “Labour uses Equality Act to reduce hardship of the working class” – Experienced teachers, nurses and police officers could lose out on pay rises under Labour’s class equality rules, after a similar approach in Scotland was used to justify restraining increases for higher earners, reports the Times.
• “Benefit claimants could face softer sanctions for first-time breaches” – Benefit claimants could be spared sanctions for a first breach of welfare rules under a “softer” regime being tested by the Government, according to the Times.
• “Rupert Lowe reveals he rejected Elon Musk’s money offer to his party” – Rupert Lowe says he turned down Elon Musk’s offer to give Restore “as much money as we wanted”, citing both the “optics” and the legal bar on accepting foreign donations, reports the Mail.
• “PM ‘struggling’ to find time to head back to his beloved Manchester” – Andy Burnham’s No 10 North is turning into a “fiasco” with the PM “struggling” to find the time to leave London to head back to his beloved Manchester, says the Mail.
• “Compulsory lentils in Labour school meals shake-up” – Schoolchildren will be made to eat lentils and chickpeas once a week and ice cream will be restricted under Labour plans, according to the Telegraph.
• “RNLI crews vow not to give in to boat demo bullies” – RNLI volunteers targeted by protesters in Dover and Portsmouth for rescuing migrants at sea are pledging to stand firm in the face of intimidation, reports the Mail.
• “Anger at BBC’s Muslim focus in 9/11 reports” – The BBC’s coverage of the 9/11 anniversary has been slammed for focusing heavily on the Muslim experience, with one Westminster source comparing it to “starting D-Day memorials by remembering the plight of the Nazis”, says the Mail.
• “Bank of England boss urged to pause bond sales costing UK taxpayers £100 billion” – The Bank of England’s Governor is facing calls to halt bond sales that have already cost UK taxpayers £100 billion, according to This is Money.
• “Inheritance tax faces axe if Kemi Badenoch wins next election” – Kemi Badenoch is preparing to campaign on abolishing inheritance tax at the next general election, reveals the Mail.
• “Students to be better warned about loan costs after ‘mis-selling’ scandal” – The Government has been forced to overhaul how student loans are presented to applicants after MPs accused it of “mis-selling” the true cost to millions of students, says the Telegraph.
• “Even in leafy London, social breakdown is all around me” – Drug users and beggars have become a fixture of even affluent London neighbourhoods, writes Zoe Strimpel in the Telegraph. The change in two decades has been remarkable.
• “Labour must scrap its trail hunting ban” – Lord Blunkett has called on the Prime Minister to overturn Sir Keir Starmer’s ban on trail hunting as part of a “reset” of the party’s relationship with the countryside, reports the Telegraph.
• “Spare us the righteousness, Ed Miliband. You’re a disgrace” – The Foreign Secretary’s grandstanding over Israel places him on the same side as monsters and mass murderers, says Allison Pearson in the Telegraph.
• “Boris Johnson hits out at ‘warped’ Putin after drone attack” – Boris Johnson has condemned Putin as “warped” after the private train he was travelling on was forced to accelerate across the Polish border following a drone strike, reports the Mail.
• “The asylum deportation system that became the envy of Europe” – Stockholm is giving asylum seekers £46,000 to leave as its coalition government pushes for “net zero migration”, according to Lily Shanagher in the Telegraph.
• “Police ignored dossier of evidence on Andrew, whistleblower claims” – A former royal protection officer has shared information with the FBI about Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor after claiming he was ignored by police in the UK, says the Telegraph.
• “US smuggled ‘paedophile’ diplomat out of Britain” – American officials secretly flew a US diplomat out of Britain without informing the police after he was accused of possessing indecent images of children, reports Sky News.
• “Letby’s lawyer: public inquiry ‘clouded by her innocence’” –  Lucy Letby’s barrister Mark McDonald argues that the Thirlwall Inquiry is built on the false premise that crimes took place at Chester hospital, according to the Telegraph.
• “I feel overwhelming relief for my daughter after defeat of the assisted dying bill” – The rejection of the assisted dying bill is a victory for all disabled people whose lives could have been put at risk, writes Rosa Monckton in the Telegraph.
• “Revolut leak shows the cost of constant ID collection” – The Revolut data breach exposes a far deeper problem: the growing number of companies being encouraged or required to hold copies of customers’ most sensitive identity documents, says Ken Macon at Reclaim the Net.
• “Trump dismisses ‘negative forces’ calling for AI slowdown” – President Trump has dismissed the “very negative forces” calling for an AI slowdown after leading tech rivals agreed it may pose an existential threat, reports the Sunday Times.
• “Anthropic’s demand for AI slowdown is dubious at best” – Dario Amodei’s claim that bots could take over the internet doesn’t make sense, according to Andrew Orlowski
• “Musk attacks Britain over ‘stifling’ driverless car rules” – Elon Musk’s Tesla has attacked Britain over driverless car laws that it says will “stifle innovation” and result in the UK falling behind the rest of the world, says the Telegraph.
• “Amazon admits selling fake ‘Net Zero’ plugs to UK shoppers” – Amazon has acknowledged it is still listing dangerous fake “energy saving” plugs that pose a fire risk, despite having previously assured MPs the products would be removed, says the Telegraph.
• “Approving oil and gas licences in North Sea ‘vital to UK growth’” – A poll of economists shows eight in 10 back the approval of new licences for oil and gas exploration in the North Sea, according to the Times.
• “Expert’s stark winter warning as families brace for energy bill hike” – A leading analyst has warned that Britain is facing a perfect storm of the Iran war, record-low gas reserves and a water shortage in Norway that could send energy bills sharply higher, reports the Mail.
• “Reform vows to block carbon clean-up in Midlands” – Reform has promised to stop the Peak Cluster scheme, which would store carbon emissions from cement and lime producers in Derbyshire and Staffordshire under the Irish Sea, says the Times.
• “Circular logic all the way down” – The circular reasoning embedded in global climate models makes them fundamentally unfit for purpose, argues Mike Jonas in Watts Up With That?
• “Hottest summer on record? A closer look at US data” – An examination of NOAA temperature data raises serious questions about whether the summer of 2026 was genuinely the hottest on record in the US, writes Chris Martz for Clintel.
• “Raving in the nave” – In Country Squire Magazine, Sean Walsh asks where the Church of England is heading after St Paul’s Cathedral agreed a four-year deal with London nightclub Fabric, which was temporarily closed in 2016 following drug-related deaths.
• “The price of British citizenship” – In the Spectator, Swaran Singh argues that those who condemn Britain as uniquely or exceptionally racist clearly haven’t visited many other countries.
• “Investigator who had stroke ‘from murder cases’ sues police for £100k” – A forensic investigator with 27 years of experience who handled up to 50 murders a year is suing police for £100,000 after claiming the relentless stress of the role caused him to suffer a stroke, reports the Mail.
• “The age of the ego” – In the American Conservative, Theodore Dalrymple argues that graffitists and modern architects share the same impulse – a narcissistic urge to impose their selves on public space.
• “The fourth plinth pisstake” – On his Substack, Frank Haviland takes aim at the latest ‘artwork’ to occupy Trafalgar Square’s fourth plinth.
• “Ask me anything” – On his Substack, Dr David McGrogan responds to questions about Reform, Left-wing bias among judges and lawyers, the feminisation of culture and why there is no such thing as free speech.
• “Mass censorship on social media” – On GB News, the Free Speech Union‘s Connie Shaw discusses a new report warning that the Government is planning state-backed online censorship, forcing algorithms to promote approved ‘trusted’ media at the expense of sources like the Daily Sceptic.

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