Connect with us
DAPA Banner
DAPA Coin
DAPA
COIN PAYMENT ASSET
PRIVACY · BLOCKDAG · HOMOMORPHIC ENCRYPTION · RUST
ElGamal Encrypted MINE DAPA
🚫 GENESIS SOLD OUT
DAPAPAY COMING

NewsBeat

Sir David Attenborough celebrates his 100th birthday today – leave your message for British icon

Published

on

Manchester Evening News

The famous naturalist turns 100 years old today

He’s inspired countless generations to discover the natural world, bringing adventure, wonder, dinosaurs, and polar bears into millions of homes. Today, British icon Sir David Attenborough celebrates his 100th birthday.

Advertisement

With his reassuring whisper, Sir David has educated and entertained generations through his wildlife documentaries, from the scorching plains of the Serengeti to the remote depths of Earth’s oceans.

Born on 8 May 1926, his fascination with nature began in childhood when he collected fossils. He later studied Natural Sciences at Cambridge.

Click here to get the biggest stories straight to your inbox in our Daily Newsletter

Now arguably the world’s most famous naturalist, he is both a reassuring voice in our living rooms and a long-time campaigner warning of the damage being done to Earth’s natural environment.

Advertisement

His programmes have earned him awards from all over the world. In April, 2005, he was awarded the Order of Merit by the Queen, in recognition of exceptional distinction in the arts, sciences and other areas.

He was knighted in 1985. Over the years, he has received numerous honorary degrees and prestigious awards, including the Fellowship of the Royal Society.

Sir David is a trustee of the British Museum and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and president of the Royal Society for Nature Conservation.

Advertisement

As he celebrates his 100th birthday, you can leave a message for Sir David Attenborough below, wishing the TV icon a happy centenary.

Source link

Continue Reading
Click to comment

You must be logged in to post a comment Login

Leave a Reply

NewsBeat

Palestinian anger at rise in Israeli demolitions in East Jerusalem

Published

on

Palestinian anger at rise in Israeli demolitions in East Jerusalem

Holy to Jews, Christians and Muslims, Jerusalem is at the heart of the Israel-Palestinian conflict and competing claims to the land. Israel captured the east of the city, including its holy places, along with the rest of the West Bank from Jordan in the 1967 Middle East War and later annexed it in a move that is not recognised by most countries.

Source link

Continue Reading

NewsBeat

Scotland World Cup: How A Visa Row Nearly Ended 2026 Dream

Published

on

Belarussian Visa Row Threatened Scotlands World Cup Hopes

Ministers and government officials had to solve a last-minute visa row to keep alive Scotland’s hopes of reaching their first World Cup in 28 years, HuffPost UK can reveal.

Steve Clarke’s team could have been forced to forfeit a crucial qualifying match against Belarus if a solution had not been found.

That would have seen the result being registered as a 3-0 defeat for Scotland, depriving them of three crucial points.

In the end, the game went ahead at Hampden Park in Glasgow last October, Scotland beat Belarus 2-1 and ended up winning their qualifying group by two points.

Advertisement

They will play their first match of this year’s World Cup against Haiti in Boston in the early hours of Sunday morning.

But it can now be revealed that Scotland came close to not qualifying at all because of government sanctions imposed on Belarus because of the country’s support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

They included a curb on issuing travel visas to Belarussian nationals inside Belarus itself.

When the eastern European minnows played a Nations League tie in Northern Ireland in November 2024, they agreed to travel to neighbouring countries to be issued with their UK visas.

Advertisement

But as the visit to Scotland in October 2025 loomed, their position changed.

The country’s football association told UEFA, the sport’s European governing body, that unless the UK government issued visas for their players and officials inside Belarus, they would not fly to Glasgow for the game.

Under UEFA’s rules, that would have seen Scotland forfeit the game on the grounds that the UK had prevented them from travelling.

No.10, the Scotland Office, Foreign Office, Home Office and the Department of Culture, Media and Sport had to find a way to make sure the Belarus travelling party were awarded visas.

Advertisement

A source said: “It was made very clear that this Labour government cannot be responsible for Scotland failing to qualify for the World Cup.”

In the first round of qualifying matches, Belarus travelled to Athens, where they were thrashed 5-1 by Greece on September 5.

In a last-ditch bid to solve the visa problem, the then immigration minister Seema Malhotra asked the British visa centre in the Greek capital if they could process the Belarus team’s applications while they were in the country.

They agreed to open their offices specially on Saturday, September 6, so their staff could give them their visas, thereby allowing them to travel to Scotland the following month.

Advertisement

A government source said: “It all succeeded, Scotland won the game, and not one of the 49,346 crowd at Hampden ever knew the role that the government in London had played in making sure that game went ahead, and that Scotland stayed on track for the World Cup.”

Ian Murray, who was Scottish Secretary at the time, was one of those involved in making sure the Belarus players got their UK visas and the game went ahead.

He told HuffPost UK: “Like millions of my fellow Scots, I’m absolutely thrilled and so excited that the Tartan Army made it across the Atlantic for our first World Cup in 28 years.

“The serious Belarus visa issue could have derailed Scotland’s qualifying campaign and with it our World Cup dream, so I’m glad it was sorted.

Advertisement

“When you go into government you know you could take the blame for a lot of things going wrong, but this problem was not of our making and solvable.

“The sheer national joy of Scotland going to the World Cup show how important it was to get the Belarus game on. Now hopefully Steve Clarke’s men can go on to have a brilliant tournament, and do us all proud.”

Subscribe to Commons People, the podcast that makes politics easy. Every week, Kevin Schofield and Kate Nicholson unpack the week’s biggest stories to keep you informed. Join us for straightforward analysis of what’s going on at Westminster.

Advertisement

Source link

Continue Reading

NewsBeat

Ovarian cancer drug approved for NHS use will prolong lives

Published

on

Ovarian cancer drug approved for NHS use will prolong lives

A drug that can treat chemotherapy-resistant ovarian cancer has just been approved for use on the NHS in England. Mirvetuximab soravtansine (also known as Elahere) is the first new drug to be approved for hard-to-treat ovarian cancer in over 20 years.

In the UK, over 7,500 women are diagnosed with ovarian cancer every year. By 2040, it’s predicted this number will rise to 9,400.

For more than 30 years, platinum-based chemotherapy has been the standard of care for ovarian cancer. But while patients generally respond well to this treatment initially, in around 70% of patients cancer recurs and they develop a resistance to treatment. Once resistance has emerged, patient outcomes are poor – with a five-year survival rate of approximately 50%.

The approval of Elahere will help hundreds of women living in England who have treatment-resistant cancer by delaying cancer progression and prolonging life.

Advertisement

Elahere is an antibody drug conjugate (ADC). ADCs are a relatively new class of cancer treatment that have been developed to deliver highly potent chemotherapy specifically to cancer cells. This advance is an essential move away from typical chemotherapy, which can cause damage to both cancer cells and healthy cells and tissues when administered.

ADCs use antibodies, which are a type of immune protein. Antibodies are able to recognise cancer cells because of a protein found on their surface that is present at very high levels. This same protein is typically not found on healthy cells.

A chemotherapy agent is hidden within these antibodies so that the antibody doesn’t cause any damage to healthy cells when in circulation and only attacks the cancer cells. This chemotherapy agent is even more potent than those used in standard treatment.

The antibody and drug are tethered to one another by a chemical bridge known as a linker which only releases the drug from the antibody after it has entered into the cancer cells. The antibody binds to a cancer cell, hijacking a normal biological process called endocytosis which pulls the antibody into the cell.

Advertisement

Once the ADC is inside the cell, the linker will be cut by enzymes that are present inside it. This allows the antibody to release the chemotherapy, killing the cancer cell.

Elahere specifically targets the protein folate receptor-alpha (FR-alpha). The FR-alpha protein is found at high levels on many ovarian cancer tumours and includes those that have undergone metastasis (cancer which has spread from the site of the primary tumour).

ADCs only target cancer cells.
Alpha Tauri 3D Graphics/ Shutterstock

About 35% of patients with platinum-resistant ovarian cancer are eligible for treatment with Elahere, which is a significant proportion. Tumour biopsies will need to be tested for the level of FR-alpha to confirm a patient’s eligibility.

In clinical trials, patients with high FR-alpha were selected for treatment with Elahere when they had become resistant to platinum-based chemotherapy treatments. Resistance was classified as those who had received one to three rounds of first-line chemo, but their cancer had still progressed within six months of the last round of treatment. These patients had limited further treatment options and high mortality rates.

Advertisement

The clinical research showed that Elahere was able to delay cancer progression. Patients treated with Elahere also lived longer on average than patients who continued to be treated with other chemotherapies.

Patients who had been treated with Elahere survived for around 17 months after treatment, while those who had received other types of chemotherapy only survived around 13 months.

Hope for patients

Elahere will be offered to patients with specific types of ovarian cancer – called high-grade serous epithelial ovarian, fallopian tube or primary peritoneal cancer. They must also have developed resistance to traditional chemotherapy after receiving one to three rounds of this class of therapy.

Ovarian cancer is a devastating disease. It’s very hard to diagnose until it reaches an advanced metastatic stage and the survival outcomes of the disease are low.

Advertisement

Elahere treatment outcomes are comparably very effective, and it appears to be associated with fewer side-effects compared to chemotherapy.

Elahere’s approval is a breakthrough treatment. It’s use results in increased life expectancy and quality of life for patients treated with it.

Source link

Advertisement
Continue Reading

NewsBeat

164 UK tourists come back with dysentery – with 112 from just one popular location

Published

on

Daily Mirror

Foreign Office backed experts issue update as tourists from England, Scotland and Wales struck down

UK health experts have disclosed that 164 individuals have arrived back in England, Scotland and Wales from a holiday destination carrying a serious infection. In a fresh update, the Foreign Office-backed Travel Health Pro stated that people must exercise additional caution.

The surge in stomach bugs Shigella – also referred to as shigellosis or dysentery – and Salmonella has been occurring on the Cape Verde Islands, a favoured destination among British holidaymakers. Authorities confirmed that over the past eight months, cases of Shigella and Salmonella infection have been documented in travellers returning to England, Scotland and Wales from the Cape Verde Islands.

Of 164 confirmed Shigella cases, the majority – 112 – individuals reported travel to Cape Verde, predominantly to the Santa Maria and Boa Vista regions. As of June 2026, of 99 confirmed Salmonella cases, from three distinct clusters reported in England, Scotland and Wales since 1 October 2025, a total of 70 individuals reported travel to Cape Verde.

Advertisement

Cases in the largest of the Salmonella clusters reached their peak in January 2026. The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) also flagged a surge in Shigella cases amongst travellers returning from Cape Verde since September 2022.

More than 1,000 confirmed and suspected cases of shigella and other gastrointestinal infections, including salmonella, have been identified in travellers returning from Cape Verde to 13 countries across the European Union/European Economic Area: Belgium, Czechia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Sweden and the Netherlands. Cases have also been recorded amongst US travellers who visited Cape Verde.

Shigella is a bacterium that can trigger shigellosis, a gut infection capable of causing severe diarrhoea, fever and stomach cramps. The majority of people recover within a week.

However, certain individuals, such as older adults, those with weakened immune systems, anyone with complex medical conditions, pregnant women and children under five, may face a heightened risk of complications, including sepsis.

Advertisement

Shigella spreads through contact with contaminated faeces, either directly via person-to-person transmission or indirectly through food, water or surfaces tainted with Shigella. Travellers visiting destinations where food and water safety cannot be guaranteed are particularly at risk.

Globally, the majority of Shigella cases occur in children younger than five years of age, though all age groups can be affected. There is additionally a risk of sexual transmission amongst men who have sex with men.

Salmonella, also known as salmonellosis, is a bacterial illness that primarily targets the intestines. Symptoms such as diarrhoea, stomach cramps, nausea, vomiting and fever typically appear between 12 and 72 hours after infection [8].

Young children, pregnant women, those with underlying health conditions and elderly people are at greater risk of developing severe symptoms. The majority of human cases stem from contaminated food and water.

Advertisement

For further details, click here.

While you are away.

Be sure to follow these steps when travelling overseas.

Source link

Advertisement
Continue Reading

NewsBeat

Geri Halliwell Joins Only Murders In The Building Season 6 Cast

Published

on

Geri Halliwell Joins Only Murders In The Building Season 6 Cast

Throughout its first five years on our screens, Only Murders In The Building has become renowned for its star-studded cast.

Led by Steve Martin, Martin Short and Selena Gomez, the dark comedy has seen a slew of A-listers coming and going over the last few years, with everyone from Paul Rudd, Melissa McCarthy and Renée Zellweger to Oscar winner Da’Vine Joy Randolph, screen icon Shirley MacLaine and yes even Meryl Streep joining the cast in recent years.

On Thursday, it was revealed that a host of British stars would be joining the cast of Only Murders for its upcoming sixth season, with one in particular catching our eye.

Yes, we are, of course, talking about Geri Halliwell.

Advertisement

The Spice Girls star will be putting in an appearance alongside the likes of Jennifer Saunders, Bridgerton’s Simone Ashley, two-time Olivier winner Sir Derek Jacobi and comedy actor Jamie Demetriou and all we have to say is… huh?

Of course, this isn’t the first time Geri has tried her hand at acting.

Back in the mid-90s, she and her bandmates lit up the screen in the cult classic Spice World – and who could forget her oh-so-convincing 30-second cameo in Sex And The City back in the day…?

Advertisement

The chart-toping star’s other acting credits include voicing Badger in the UK version of the animated series Franklin and appearing in the 2023 sports drama Gran Turismo, playing Archie Madekwe’s on-screen mum.

Exact details of Geri’s latest role are currently being kept under wraps, but we’ll definitely be tuning in to see how this one plays out.

Other newly-announced additions to the Only Murders season six cast include Martin Freeman, Jane Horrocks, Downton Abbey’s own Lesley Nicol and Irish performer Sharon Horgan.

The first five seasons of Only Murders In The Building are now streaming on Disney+.

Advertisement

Source link

Continue Reading

NewsBeat

Trump raises the stakes on an Iran deal ahead of G7 summit

Published

on

Trump raises the stakes on an Iran deal ahead of G7 summit

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has long been looking for this weekend to be a big one for his presidency.

The World Cup returns to the U.S. on Friday for the first time in 32 years after Trump threw himself into winning the bid to co-host the soccer tourney during his first term. He’ll be feted Sunday, his 80th birthday, during a UFC fight night that’s expected to draw thousands to the White House grounds. Hours after the final bout, he’s scheduled to jet off to the G7 summit in the French Alps for talks with several world leaders he’s been beefing with over war and tariffs.

But Trump set expectations even higher for the coming days when he announced Thursday that the U.S. and Iran could come to terms this weekend on an agreement that would set the pathway to end the three-month-old war that’s been broadly unpopular with Americans and has rattled global oil markets. He said he plans to dispatch Vice President JD Vance to the signing of the agreement.

Trump has said on several occasions in recent weeks that he’s on the cusp of a deal without anything coming to fruition. A spokesperson for Iran’s Foreign Ministry told state television following Trump’s comments that mediators were active but nothing had been finalized to end the conflict.

Advertisement

Still, Trump is claiming this time might be different.

The breakthrough comes after he threatened to escalate the conflict with more intense bombardment of Iran and by seizing control of Iran’s oil industry, including capturing Iran’s vital Kharg Island oil facility. The president’s threats followed back-and-forth strikes this week that had rendered a temporary ceasefire agreed to in early April all but meaningless.

“They’ve taken a pounding like very few people could take,” Trump said in an Oval Office exchange with reporters as he explained why he was confident that, this time, a deal would come through. “And they want to make the deal a lot more than I do.”

Trump offered scant details about the settlement he says is taking shape, but told reporters that he believed the Iranian supreme leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, who is believed to have been wounded on the first day of the war and has not been seen in public since, is ready to sign off on the deal.

Advertisement

Trump is billing the deal as “very strong,” though he says it remains “a little conceptual,” and says it would ensure Iran is blocked from ever developing a nuclear weapon.

Trump’s heightened threats are aimed at creating an off-ramp

With the conflict intensifying over the past week, Trump’s threat to escalate U.S. military action seemed in part aimed at demonstrating to the hawkish flank of his political base that he was willing to play “hardball” with the Iranians if they didn’t come to a deal soon, said Ali Vaez, Iran director at the International Crisis Group.

Trump in March warned he would target Iran’s infrastructure and put American troops on Kharg Island before he ultimately backed down, and the two countries agreed to the temporary ceasefire.

Almost immediately after raising the idea again on social media Thursday, Trump appeared to back away. He called into a morning show on Fox News Channel and questioned whether Americans had the “stomach” for an option that would require putting U.S. troops in harm’s way.

Advertisement

Hours later, Trump announced he had decided to cancel orders for “very hard” strikes on Iran and said a deal was close.

Vaez said even as Trump was posting on social media Thursday about escalating strikes, mediators from Pakistan, Turkey and Qatar had been making progress in their talks with Iran.

At the same time, Iran also may have reset the equation for Trump with its decision last weekend to attack Israel directly for the first time since the ceasefire after Israeli forces carried out military strikes on Iranian-backed Hezbollah militants in Lebanon.

With the move, Iran signaled that Israel could no longer bomb Lebanon without facing a meaningful reaction and in the process also raised the cost for the U.S. to follow through on its commitment to help safeguard Israel.

Advertisement

“It really does appear to me that Trump wants to bring this to an end, but his real challenge is that he’s looking for a victory lap and an exit ramp and those two things are not necessarily compatible,” Vaez said.

Trump expresses frustration with war narrative

Trump has been boasting since the early weeks of the conflict that he’d already won the war — much of the Islamic Republic’s leadership has been killed in the bombings and the Iranian navy and air force have been severely degraded.

But Iran continues to effectively keep the Strait of Hormuz closed, choking a waterway through which about 20% of the world’s oil supply passed before the war, and has yet to agree to restart negotiations with the U.S. over its concerns about Iran’s nuclear program, the main reason Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave to justify launching the war.

But the real problem, Trump grumbled Thursday, was largely a public relations issue.

Advertisement

“They could wave the white flag of surrender. They could say: ‘We surrender, we surrender, we’re finished, we’ve had it. The United States is the greatest power, praise be to Allah,’” Trump said on Fox News. “They could say it loud and clear. And the fake news would say it was a great victory for Iran.”

Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, a former chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said Trump has grown impatient with Iran and the renewed strikes and threats on Kharg Island and Iran’s energy sector were intended to get the negotiations back to the “right place.”

Polls show that the conflict is largely unpopular with Americans. McCaul said he believes the Iranians want to “try to drag this out as long as they can,” closer to the midterm elections in November, because they see that as being to their benefit.

War will be high on agenda at next week’s G7

Deal or no deal, the war will loom large during next week’s talks at the Group of Seven summit in bucolic Évian-les-Bains, France.

Advertisement

Trump has frequently criticized some of the group leaders — British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz — for resisting his calls to aid the U.S. and Israeli war effort.

The four leaders have also angered Trump by criticizing how he’s gone about executing the war and his lack of consultation with allies before jumping into a conflict that’s hurt the global economy as oil prices have surged.

But Trump said he is optimistic he could have an agreement before his talks with leaders in France.

“The strait will officially open as soon as we sign, which could be soon, very soon — maybe over the weekend in Europe,” Trump said.

Advertisement

Source link

Advertisement
Continue Reading

NewsBeat

‘I managed England at a World Cup – this is what Thomas Tuchel must do differently’ | Football

Published

on

'I managed England at a World Cup - this is what Thomas Tuchel must do differently' | Football

Close Overlay

In The Mixer’s World Cup special

Everything you need to know about the World Cup – England updates, the games to watch and stories you missed – in five minutes, at 1pm, every day.

Source link

Advertisement
Continue Reading

NewsBeat

Katie Price says she ‘always needed a man’ as stepdad explains why she is unlucky in love

Published

on

Daily Mirror

Katie Price is looking at her past and thinks it explains her need to be in love and perhaps explains some of the bad romantic decisions she has made over the years.

Katie Price has “always needed a man” and her trouble with men stem from her childhood when her father wasn’t around.

Advertisement

The model, currently in a troubled marriage with Lee Andrews, speaks candidly about her relationship issues with men down the years in a new documentary about her life. Family members also give their side of the story’s including how Katie’s dad left the family home when she was a toddler.

Her stepdad Paul tells the new Sky documentary: “She can never be on her own. She’s always got to have a man, and this is when I was saying to myself, have I done something wrong? Is it the way she’s been brought up?

“I didn’t want to get that close. I didn’t want to feel like I’m taking over. I just wanted to be there if she needed me. I wanted her dad to be the dad, so I think that’s where she’s suffering.”

Katie agrees and says: “Paul never ever ever has made me feel like I’m not his, never. But when I think of it now, I look for in men what was probably missing from my real dad.

“I’ve always needed a man, always been vulnerable and needy. So, as much as I’ve got this power image, even though it is me, they chip away at me, and then makes me smaller as a person,. When I think of it now, I look for in men what was probably missing from my real dad.

“And through the years there’s a habitual kind of abuse for men against me, taking advantage of me from a young age for their self benefit, and each time the traumas happened, I think it affected me,”

Growing up Katie also suffered a horrific incident where a man in a park tried to abuse her aged around seven with two other children. She still remembers what the man said to her, before another pair of children raised the alarm and police arrived.

Advertisement

The former glamour model says she hopes four-part series Katie Price : Nothing to Hide, will mark a new chapter in her life, trying to move on from her problems.

She said at the premiere at the Sheffield Documentary Festival: “I am definitely the best version I’ve ever been of myself. It’s like I’ve been in a washing machine and come out the other side with the experience and the knowledge, and I am at peace with myself. I feel like I’m starting my career again, and this is the start of my new career.”

Despite currently being married she did not rule out going down the aisle again, and encouraged Sky to make another film about her in another decade or two and added: “What am I going to be like in 20 years? I should certainly look different, my face will be up here. How many more marriages? I don’t know.”

Advertisement

Katie admitted at times she found re-living her life for the cameras so stressful that she had to stop interviewing sessions early as she got too emotional going over old relationships and problems. Her life has included multiple marriage break ups, abuse as a child and overdoses.

She explained: “I am an open book. They would say we’re going to film today ten until three, and I’m like okay.

“And then sometimes after two hours, I’m like, I just can’t do it anymore. There’s some moments where I’ve had therapy to get over some of the moments in my life, and I had to relive it again, and Paddy’s very good at taking me back there, and me having to have the same feelings and I found that difficult and I’m too overwhelmed but that’s what I think makes a good show.

“Like I love watching documentaries but there’s so many people whose documentaries are so manufactured, they are in with the edits, so they look like a polished turd. I am not that, I am like so you have the footage, you do what you want, and I’ll be like everyone else and sit back and watch it. I haven’t had time to reflect on anything in my life, because it’s always the next thing.”

Advertisement

She added: “I’m a survivor. I’ve definitely got courage and the work ethic. Still hungry for it, still got the drive, and yeah, hopefully the younger generation will watch it and think it’s not easy and just putting up a picture(on social media). You’ve got to work for what you get.”

Katie Price: Nothing to Hide is launched on Sky on July 8.

If you’re struggling and need to talk, the Samaritans operate a free helpline open 24/7 on 116 123. Alternatively, you can email jo@samaritans.org or visit their site to find your local branch

Like this story? For more of the latest showbiz news and gossip, follow Mirror Celebs on TikTok , Snapchat , Instagram , Twitter , Facebook , YouTube and Threads .

Advertisement

Source link

Continue Reading

NewsBeat

Keir Starmer Insists Government Spends Adequately On Defence

Published

on

Keir Starmer Insists Government Spends Adequately On Defence

Keir Starmer has hit back at John Healey by insisting the government’s spending plans will provide enough cash for the UK’s armed forces.

The prime minister said he was “sorry” that Healey had resigned as defence secretary and rejected his reasons for doing so.

Healey stunned Westminster on Thursday morning by unexpectedly announcing he was quitting the cabinet in protest at the amount of money No.10 and the Treasury were making available in the long-delayed Defence Investment Plan (DIP).

In a blistering letter to the prime minister, he said he had been left with “no other option” after learning that defence spending will go up from 2.6% of gross domestic product (GDP) next year to just 2.68% in 2030.

Advertisement

It is understood that amounted to an extra £13.5 billion, less than half of the £28bn army chiefs said they needed.

Healey said the funding settlement would force him “to make decisions that would reduce the readiness of our Forces and increase the risk to personnel on operations, and could make the country less safe”.

But in his reply, Starmer said he was “proud of our record on funding”.

He said: “When we entered government in 2024, I took the decision to increase defence spending after the Conservatives hollowed out our armed forces.

Advertisement

“That required a cut to the international aid budget but the result was the highest sustained increase in defence spending since the Cold War. I will always do what is needed to keep our country safe.

“I thank you for your work to deliver on all of this. You are also right that we have to go further. The Defence Investment Plan does just that— delivering an unprecedented increase in defence spending in a sustainable way.”

“It will provide the resources our military needs to keep us safe and the clarity the British defence industry needs to plan. It will make the big strategic investments we need for the long term and give the certainty which private finance needs to invest.

“It will allow our armed forces to transform and modernise and back them with the tools they need to change the way we fight – and to deter our enemies.”

Advertisement

The PM added: “Taking these decisions is never easy I am determined to rebuild our country after years of being buffeted by crises.

“I am sorry that you will not be part of that work going forward.”

Tory leader Kemi Badenoch said his resignation showed Starmer’s “premiership is falling apart”.

She said: “His health secretary resigned two weeks ago. His defence secretary has resigned at a critical time when we are facing global threats, and he is doing so because the prime minister is trying to please his backbenchers by putting money into welfare instead of defence.”

Advertisement

Subscribe to Commons People, the podcast that makes politics easy. Every week, Kevin Schofield and Kate Nicholson unpack the week’s biggest stories to keep you informed. Join us for straightforward analysis of what’s going on at Westminster.

Source link

Advertisement
Continue Reading

NewsBeat

Ex-UK political aide Steve Hilton pledges ‘common sense’ overhaul if elected California governor

Published

on

Ex-UK political aide Steve Hilton pledges 'common sense' overhaul if elected California governor

A proposed ballot measure on voter ID, popular with Republican voters, could help drive turnout, he added. Hilton has said that he has not seen evidence of voter fraud in the state, but has called for electoral reform, including ending the practice of mailing ballots to California’s 23 million registered voters – a practise that largely causes the state’s slow ballot count.

Source link

Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © 2025