Newslinks for Sunday 16th March 2025 | Conservative Home

Welfare 1) Government “set to backtrack” on plan to freeze PIP benefit

“Liz Kendall, the work and pensions secretary, is expected to back down on plans to freeze some disability benefits next year after a backlash from Labour MPs over the government’s welfare reform plans. Kendall had been drawing up proposals to cancel an inflation-linked rise in spring 2026 to the personal independence payment (PIP) — something George Osborne avoided as chancellor during the austerity years. Usually, these payments, alongside universal credit, are increased to meet the rising living costs, when the financial year begins in April. On Saturday two sources familiar with the plans said they expected them to be ditched.” – Sunday Times

• PM faces Cabinet revolt – Mail on Sunday
• Starmer seizes his moment to launch ‘Radical Labour’ – Jason Cowley, Sunday Times
• Have Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves gone mad? – Dan Hodges, Mail on Sunday
• Labour-run Enfield council left 100 families homeless after they refused to relocate – The Observer
• John McDonnell accuses ministers of lacking empathy over benefit cuts – The Observer
• Welfare reform must end the waste of human potential – Leader, Sunday Times
• Reform the welfare state to fund defence – Leader, Sunday Telegraph

Welfare 2) Stride: We would save far more than Labour

“At the election, we set out how we would build on those plans to save a further £12 billion per year. Labour accused me of being “divisive” and when they came in, they ditched, delayed and dithered over the reforms they inherited. Now they have been forced to take them back out of the drawer thanks to the fiscal bind they have got themselves into. The Government looks set to propose £6 billion in savings. But with welfare spending projected to rise by a further £14 billion over the next five years, even £6 billion in annual savings would be completely insufficient. It means the Government is still planning to allow welfare spending to continue to rise substantially.” – Mel Stride, Sunday Telegraph

• Tories urge the Government to tackle rise of ‘sickfluencers’ helping claimants ‘game’ the benefits system – Mail on Sunday

Welfare 3) Duncan Smith: Work is the best route out of poverty

“With sickness benefit (ESA) coming into Universal Credit, the opportunity for radical change is there. Now for the first time claimants will have a jobs advisor with them helping and urging them with conditionality back into work. We know 700,000 claimants want to return to work and this help will reduce the overall cost of benefits and increase tax receipts to the Treasury…Whilst work remains the best route out of poverty, the Chancellor’s rise in National Insurance just made that route out of benefits a lot tougher. It’s much harder to get a car moving when you pull the handbrake on at the same time.” – Iain Duncan Smith, Sunday Telegraph

• Start the job hunt in class to stop spiralling benefits bill, MPs say – The Sun on Sunday

Hundreds more NHS Quangos to go, Streeting promises

“Wes Streeting has warned that hundreds of official bodies are “cluttering” up the health system as he prepares to axe more health quangos. The Health Secretary has put bureaucrats on notice of “far more change to come”, saying abolishing NHS England was just the start of his war on waste. Writing for The Telegraph, he pledges to shrug off “vested interests” such as the unions and press ahead with radical reform, insisting there is “no time to waste”. Mr Streeting announced last week that NHS England, the world’s largest quango, would be scrapped, with the health service brought back under the control of ministers.” – Sunday Telegraph

• Change is hard, but the NHS needs reform. This Government will deliver – Wes Streeting, Sunday Telegraph
• Blasting away layers of bureaucracy means getting cutting-edge tech and lifesaving medicines of tomorrow into the hands of staff and patients faster – Karin Smyth, Health Minister, Sunday Express
• NHS job cuts may exacerbate health service’s challenges – Leader, The Observer

Farage in talks with Cummings

“The most interesting meeting Farage has had in the past few months, however, took place before Christmas in conditions of far greater secrecy. It was then that the Reform leader met Dominic Cummings, campaign director of Vote Leave, who was credited both with helping Boris Johnson win a landslide in the 2019 election and then with bringing him down three years later. Once bitter enemies, Cummings and Farage rowed for years over who was really responsible for Brexit and who is more toxic with the public. The interesting thing is that the conversation focused not only on how to win power but on what to do with it, evidence Farage is already taking seriously the idea he could become prime minister. A Reform source confirmed that “Nigel and Dom did have a meeting — they discussed how to take on the blob”, Cummings’ description of the Whitehall bureaucracy he blames for holding Britain back.” – Sunday Times

• Farage ‘horrified’ as Reform devastated by civil war – Sunday Express
• Voters in over half of constituencies think Farage would be better PM than Starmer, poll finds – The Sun on Sunday

US launches air strikes on Yemen’s Houthis

“The US has launched a “decisive and powerful” wave of air strikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen, President Donald Trump has said, citing the armed group’s attacks on shipping in the Red Sea as the reason. “Funded by Iran, the Houthi thugs have fired missiles at US aircraft, and targeted our Troops and Allies,” Trump wrote on his Truth social platform, adding that their “piracy, violence, and terrorism” had cost “billions of dollars” and put lives at risk. The Houthi-run health ministry said at least 31 people were killed and 101 others were injured in the strikes.” – BBC

Vallance was told Covid leak came from China

“A Labour minister was last night at the centre of an explosive row over claims he rubbished high-level intelligence pointing to Covid’s origins in a Chinese laboratory. The Mail on Sunday can reveal that a former spy chief submitted a secret dossier to No 10 early in the pandemic reporting that the virus had originated with a leak from a Wuhan facility. But Lord Vallance, the science minister who was the Government’s chief scientific adviser at the time, is accused of ignoring the report, possibly for fear of offending the Chinese or jeopardising research funding.” – Mail on Sunday

• Boris was convinced by my evidence. But the scientists swallowed Beijing’s propaganda on the origin of the Coronavirus – Sir Richard Dearlove, Mail on Sunday
• Why was Lord Vallance so reluctant to believe Covid leak warnings? – Leader, Mail on Sunday

Allies 1) Starmer hosts “coalition of the willing” conference call

“Sir Keir Starmer thrashed out plans for a western peacekeeping force of more than 10,000 troops for Ukraine yesterday at a virtual meeting of the “coalition of the willing”. Two minehunter ships, which were transferred from the Royal Navy to Ukraine’s fleet last year, are also taking part in training exercises, ready to be deployed to the Black Sea in the event of a ceasefire. They have been unable to enter during the war because the Bosphorus Strait has been closed.” – Sunday Times

• I’ve seen Ukraine’s new gadgets which will leave Putin reeling – Lord Ashcroft, Sunday Express
• Putin’s war will not end until the Soviet empire is rebuilt – Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, Sunday Telegraph
• Slow progress, but peace cannot be on Putin’s terms – Leader, Sunday Times
• Putin is dithering – Mark Galeotti, Sunday Times
• The era of Trump and Putin is not a new thing. It is a very old one – Janet Daley, Sunday Telegraph

Allies 2) Hannan: There are three countries we can really trust

“Within hours of Britain’s declaration of war on 3 September 1939, Michael Joseph Savage, New Zealand’s first Labour prime minister, made a statement from his hospital bed (he was to die seven months later). “Both with gratitude for the past and confidence in the future, we range ourselves without fear beside Britain. Where she goes, we go. Where she stands, we stand.” With how many nations do we have such a bond, an alliance so instinctive and automatic that it needs no explanation? The list is a short one, but it surely includes the three countries with whom we truly do have a special relationship, namely Australia, Canada and New Zealand.” – Daniel Hannan, Sunday Telegraph

>Today: ToryDiary: We have dodged the bullet of the EU Customs Union. Now, let’s embrace free trade unilateralism.

Other political news

• The truth about my 18-month affair with Liz Truss – Serialisation of Mark Field’s memoirs, Mail on Sunday
• UK pensioners captured by Taliban being held in separate prisons – Sunday Times
• We must build new reservoirs in Britain – or face rationing within a decade, warns water minister – Mail on Sunday
• Why is NHS planning a clinical trial of banned puberty blockers? – Sunday Times
• Civil servants splash out on Barbados yacht club trip with taxpayer-backed credit card – Sunday Telegraph
• Birmingham bin collection strike offers ‘banquet’ for rats, pest expert says – The Observer
• Civil servants blew huge sum of taxpayer cash on cardboard cutouts of celebs – The Sun on Sunday
• King plans early meeting with Canada’s new prime minister Mark Carney – Sunday Times
• Labour councillor convicted of exposure resigns – BBC

Trott: Remove the academies clauses from the education bill

“The government should remove the academies clauses and the restrictions on good schools expanding from the bill — this is something that is supported by education professionals and even some Labour MPs. If it makes this change, the bill will not face fierce opposition in the House of Lords. However, if the government continues to refuse to engage at all, and refuses to remove the academies clauses, then we will continue the fight in parliament. There are many education experts in the Lords who have grave concerns about the bill, and I am confident that if it is unchanged, they will bring their excellent powers of scrutiny to bear. There is a deal to be done here, if Labour wants to save school standards. It makes no sense to continue, head in sand, down a road that teachers, head teachers, the children’s commissioner, many parents and even Labour MPs are saying is wrong. It is not too late for common sense to prevail.” – Laura Trott, Sunday Times

• Chancellor spending hundreds of thousands in legal fees defending her VAT raid on private school fees – Mail on Sunday
• ‘Tough’ subjects could be dropped in schools to make way for ‘renewed focus’ on AI and climate science, curriculum tsar hints – Mail on Sunday
• Number of male secondary teachers at record low – Sunday Times

Colvile: Is this a bonfire of red tape — or yet more smoke and mirrors?

“Starmer is absolutely right that Britain’s addiction to regulation is a drag on growth. But his government has done nothing but increase the burden on the private sector — with disastrous economic consequences. As for making a speech promising to cut compliance costs on the same day that his party blithely votes through a massive hike in them without even pausing to get an accurate estimate? There’s a word for that. But not one I can use in print.” – Robert Colvile, Sunday Times

• Welcome to the politics of Sir Pushmi-Pullyu – Dominic Lawson, Sunday Times

News in brief

• Debunking the myths about the ECHR – Peter Lilley, The Spectator
• Boom! Heroes are still building the future – James Price, CapX
• Collapsing Russian oil industry may force Putin’s hand – Ralph Schoellhammer, Unherd
• Have we finally reached Peak Woke? – Will Jones, Daily Sceptic
• More UN lies about Israel – Brendan O’Neill, Spiked Online