Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood wants the prime minister to sack migration minister Mike Tapp (Alamy)

3 min read3 hr

Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Mahmood have clashed over whether Tapp should keep his job as parliamentary under-secretary of state for migration and citizenship, which he has held since last September.

Tapp wrote a piece for The Times on Thursday in which he said he supported care workers being made exempt from Home Office plans to change visa rules for migrants already living in the UK.

The plans, which have been criticised by many Labour MPs, include doubling the time it takes for most migrants to qualify for permanent residence from five to 10 years.

Mahmood, who has spearheaded the plans, wants Tapp to be sacked for breaching ministerial rules of collective responsibility, with a Home Office source telling reporters on Thursday that Tapp was expected to be fired.

“He has taken possible ideas that the home secretary and her team were working on, and briefed them as his own to try to win a job in the new administration,” they said.

Andy Burnham, who is widely expected to take over from Starmer as Labour leader and PM in the coming weeks, has said he supports the “broad thrust” of Mahmood’s proposals, but has previously said he would be against applying the changes retrospectively.

However, the prime minister has ultimate power over ministerial appointments and dismissals, and No 10 briefed out on Thursday that Tapp is “still in his job” and there is no intention to fire him.

On Friday, the prime minister’s official spokesperson told journalists that Starmer was taking advice on whether Tapp broke government protocol.

Tapp has been a loyal supporter of Starmer, and before the prime minister announced his resignation, insisted that if the PM was ousted, the country should go to the polls in a general election to stop the “constant churn” of politicians.

In a post on X on Friday morning, Tapp said: “It’s gone from ‘he broke the ministerial code’ to ‘he stole my idea’.

“I have put my views across on a policy I’ve been working on for months (I have the receipts) in an op ed in The Times. Give it a read, and let’s continue to discuss.

“I won’t be intimidated to drop my views. Stay classy!”

Accompanying the post with a selfie, Tapp added that he was at a wedding in San Francisco, but “happy to talk more when I’m back”.

Justice Minister Jake Richards told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that the debate over the proposed immigration rules “should happen perhaps more privately than Mike – who is a friend and a good man – has shown in the last 24 hours”.

He urged other MPs to “take a deep breath” and criticised “some of the silliness we’ve seen over the last 24 hours”.

(Jonathan Goldberg / Alamy)

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According to the GMB, the trade union that represents the cleaners, Churchill Cleaning is looking to cut over 1,100 hours of cleaning per week. GMB estimates that this equates to roughly 47 jobs, or around a third of the 132 cleaners employed on weekdays. About 30 further cleaners, who clean the kitchens and work on weekends, are understood to be exempt from the process.

It comes after the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister, Darren Jones, earlier this month announced that the government plans to end “outsourcing by default” across government.

Under new guidance, government departments with over £100m in annual contract spend will create five-year roadmaps to rebuild their in-house capabilities for services like cleaners and security staff. In Parliament, the majority of cleaning services have been outsourced since 2004.

“This redundancy process is a prime example of why we must end outsourcing in the public sector,” said GMB regional officer Dan Anderson.

“Churchill Cleaning are placing their bottom line ahead of looking after staff and improving the service, as so many outsourcing firms do. 

“They have been unwilling to seriously pursue options to reduce the number of workers who will face compulsory exits, such as voluntary redundancies.

“Such a substantial reduction in the workforce will be devastating for our members, who will either lose their jobs, or stay and face a far heavier workload. 

“The cuts will also impact the entire estate and its staff, as the amount of cleaning delivered will inevitably be affected.”

According to GMB, the cuts also come after a significant round of voluntary redundancies less than two years ago, which saw 18 cleaners depart.

Labour MP Margaret Mullane said the situation was “a disgrace”, while her party colleague Tim Roca said Parliament should end the outsourcing of its cleaning service. 

Leader of the House of Commons Alan Campbell told Roca such a decision would be “in the purview of the House authorities, and if my honourable friend should wish to make his case to the appropriate House official, then I would help him in that process”.

Churchill Cleaning has not responded to requests for comment. 

A UK Parliament spokesperson said: “Cleaners in Parliament perform a vital role and are hugely valued. Contracts with our suppliers are awarded on the basis that high standards are always met, as well as ensuring that employment rights are respected.

“Both Houses are being kept updated and both House administrations are working to ensure there is no impact upon the cleaning standards expected by members, staff and the wider parliamentary community.” 

Aerial view of the Manchester skyline (Bardhok Ndoji/Alamy)

4 min read5 min

Our most beloved and successful places were not created by accident, but through civic ambition, long-term thinking, and a belief that good design serves the public interest.

City architects have historically shaped this belief, helping to create high-quality homes and places that continue to provide lasting benefit today.

The Government is rightly focused on building new homes, new towns, and stronger regional economies. But if we want to deliver at scale, we need to think not only about how many homes are built, but equally about whether the places we create will work for the people who live in them. That’s why RIBA is calling for a three-year pilot programme to fund city architects in combined authorities across England.

At the very moment we are asking local areas to deliver more developments at a faster pace, much of the expertise needed to shape that growth has been hollowed out. Planning departments have faced severe funding pressures, and nearly a third of local authorities have reported skills gaps in urban design and architecture. Without this design capacity, too many opportunities are missed: difficult sites become stalled, planning becomes slower and more fragmented, and the quality of new places suffers.

The value that city architects provide is tangible, as demonstrated in our new report, Making the case for city architects. Using the Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) as an example, the report shows that improvements across four housing quality factors could generate £47.6 million in additional value over three years.

Our modelling further suggests that if city architects helped the GMCA increase housebuilding, even by just 1% of its existing spare capacity, this could deliver dozens of additional homes. This modest uplift would generate nearly £1 million in additional tax revenue, alongside £10.6 million in additional economic output and £4.4 million in Gross Value Added to the local economy and construction sector.

We can also see the benefit of architect-led planning in Nottingham. Access to in-house design expertise in Nottingham City Council is helping to support a consistent uplift in housing numbers on residential developments. Across the sites where design-led housing models were adopted, projects saw an increase in green spaces by 17% and up to 20% more homes.

When we prioritise good design, we do not compromise growth; we improve it

These are the kinds of outcomes we should be aiming for. Not a choice between quantity and quality, but a planning system capable of delivering both. Not development that simply meets a target, but development that strengthens the places we live in. Not short-term volume at the expense of long-term value, but growth that is more intelligent, more efficient, and more durable.

The value of a well-designed built environment cannot be overstated. It affects health and wellbeing, economic opportunity, social connection and confidence in the places around us. When we prioritise good design, we do not compromise growth; we improve it.

From Sir Christopher Wren’s reimagining of London to Edwin Lutyens’ civic grandeur, and from the great public housing and urban visions of the twentieth century to the work of architects such as Norman Foster today, this country has repeatedly shown how design can shape national confidence and improve everyday life. As we embark on another era of ambitious housebuilding, we should be making the case for the next generation of figures with that same civic imagination. Architects should be empowered not only to design individual buildings, but to help shape the towns, cities, and communities of the future.

City architects are not a relic of the past. They are a modern solution to modern problems, and a way to ensure that national ambition becomes a lasting national value.

Chris Williamson is President of the Royal Institute of British Architects

Andy Burnham takes a selfie with Labour MPs (Alamy)

4 min read22 min

But economic reform ideas are just the first hurdle and there are many more hurdles ahead: fiscal constraints, geopolitical instability, the artificial intelligence transition, demographic pressure. Each brings painful trade-offs, which demands political craftsmanship.

So the real question is not whether Manchesterism makes sense on paper. It is whether it has a politics to match its ambition.

Manchesterism has a storm ahead

The politics is already tightening. Commitments to the triple lock and manifesto tax promises are narrowing Andy Burnham’s room for manoeuvre. Without a strategy to manage trade-offs, every new ambition risks hitting a red line. Can Manchesterism persuade a country not just to hope for change, but to endure it?

And then there is the state. Public control of utilities is a grand ambition for the capacity of the British state. But the rhetoric of economic transformation has to face the institutional reality: a weak centre, an unwieldy stakeholder state and a powerful Treasury with an instinctive caution.

Look no further than HS2 for a warning. And why should this time be different? A new economic compact has to answer that.

We have seen this before

Britain is not ‘ungovernable’. It has dealt with worse in the past and it can do again.

After the 1930s destitution and a world war, Clement Attlee and William Beveridge overhauled fiscal orthodoxy and rebuilt the institutional landscape. After the 1970s stagflation and industrial disruption, Margaret Thatcher let unemployment rise over three million to forge a new consensus. The lady was not for turning.

Whatever one thinks of those economic visions, they shared something essential: a political project around a willingness to tolerate short-term pain, and not just economic reform, but shifting communities, culture, and the very meaning of citizenship.

When Keir Starmer warned that “things will get worse before they get better”, the public heard the pain but not the purpose. “Mission-driven government” promised a new governing philosophy, but failed to materialise.

The lesson? Telling people that change will be hard and branding it as “missions” isn’t enough. You have to convince them that change is worth it and build transformational institutions. For that, citizens need to be embedded in the change. We at Demos call it the “Citizen Economy”. It’s built on the idea that people aren’t simply units of consumption or production in the economy, they are moral agents rooted in communities, with the power to accelerate or put the breaks on progress.

We need a Citizen Economy

The new leadership should start by redesigning how economic policy is made around this new assumption. We need to rewire the state’s core frameworks to ‘think citizen’, from the Treasury’s Green Book to council procurement systems. We need to connect institutions with citizens, from regional authorities to the British Business Bank. We also need to engage the public directly in economic choices.

The next task is reshaping the foundations of the economy – targeting opportunities where the role of citizens has been overlooked. This means tackling the social drivers of rising NEET numbers – be it the low social status in apprenticeships or lack of social capital. It means building citizens’ consent for falls in short-term consumption to raise investment in national renewal. It means confronting difficult questions – be it the unsustainable triple lock and welfare bill or outdated council tax – through a new fiscal contract grounded in shared values.

Can Manchesterism survive?

Britain is becoming richer in economic ideas, but short of the political strategies to sustain them. The Citizen Economy offers a way through: an economic compact in which citizens’ relationships, consent, and contribution is no longer overlooked. It is central to the New Deal between citizen and the state that is needed to reverse the ‘democratic doom loop’.

Because if citizens are not part of the project, they will become its constraint.

Dan Goss is lead researcher at the cross-party think tank, Demos

Dr Sarah Ingham is the author of The Military Covenant: its impact on civil-military relations in Britain.

“Infamy! Infamy! They’ve all got it in for me!”

Thanks to a mega-decibel boom-box, Sir Keir Starmer’s resignation speech on Monday morning failed to bring to mind any of Shakespeare’s majestic reflections on the transition of power: it was less Coriolanus, more Carry on Cleo.

For the fourth time in four years the Downing Street lectern can be likened to a scaffold, signalling the death of Prime Ministerial authority. But what should have been a solemn national moment became farcical, down to that Prat in the Hat, Steve Bray.

The fanatical Remainer has been sounding off in Whitehall and around party conference venues at a gunfire decibel-level for the best part of a decade. He imposed himself on London’s Clubland when a Boris Johnson portrait was unveiled.

Rejoiners have been only too happy to indulge their pet jester’s antics. Things Can Only Get Better at full volume when Rishi Sunak called a General Election in 2024? What larks!

The joke wasn’t quite so funny for Labour on Monday as Sir Keir’s announcement was accompanied by Beethoven’s Ode to Joy belting out across SW1 – and into ears around the world.

It is unthinkable that, with their sense of national pride, historic moments in France or the United States could be similarly marred by a monomaniac. But here in Britain, we must suck it up, buttercup.

Who said irony is dead? A human rights lawyer, Sir Keir was in no position to object. Buffoon Bray’s right to breach our peace has been legally tested and ruled to be protected in law under Articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights, linked to the right to protest.

On Wednesday, Kemi Badenoch wrote to Met Police Chief Sir Mark Rowley asking why the Force had not appealed the court’s finding in favour of Bray.

Alas, by not acting, the Met is making clear whose side it is on. Similarly, Gaza march protestors in London got away with chanting “Israel is a terror state, kill all Jews.” Instead of arresting them for incitement, police officers preferred to turn a deaf ear.

The Human Rights Convention was drafted in 1950, shortly after Britain’s collective national endeavour of fighting total war.

The Conservative Party is committed to leaving the ECHR, as Rowley was reminded. Bray is providing another reason for doing so. It is time to sweep away British legislation based on an antiquated Convention that no longer serves Britain as it is now, rather than how the world was back in the 1950s.

Today, the closest most will get to combat is Call of Duty: Black Ops 7. In our Insta era of influencers and selfies, it is unthinkable there could be political resignations over NHS dentures as there were in 1951. Today, who under 30 wanting Love Island-contestant teeth would trouble an NHS dentist?

Since PM Starmer’s ousting, commentators have asked whether Britain is ungovernable. With the 10th anniversary of the referendum, inevitably many blame Brexit for the political turbulence. But few are reflecting on whether out-sourcing policymaking to Brussels damaged Britain’s ability to think for itself. Spoon-fed by Eurocrats for decades, instead of asking what works, the British state has grown fat, lazy and useless.

By raising the rights of the individual over the collective, human rights legislation is now actively undermining Britain as much as fish discos, unaccountable quangos and a £270 million, 350,000-page planning application.

On Monday, the logical conclusion was reached. One person’s narcissism superseded others’ focus on a moment of political significance – which could also have an impact on the global financial markets. The turnover in No.10 is already bewildering this country’s friends and allies: throw in the jowly jester’s Yakety Sax soundtrack (the Benny Hill Show theme) and it’s no wonder bond traders have taken fright at Basket Case Britain.

Perhaps Monday’s unamusing opera buffa was loud enough to awaken some doubts among supporters of the ECHR, a charter which makes it almost impossible to deport the 43,806 detected arrivals who came to Britain via illegal routes in the 12 months to March 2026.

The illegal migrants, the Gaza marchers and the Prat in the Hat are quick to claim their rights to gatecrash this country, to disrupt London week in, week out and to impose their views on the rest of us. Me. Me. Me. It really is all about them and, probably, their social media posts. They are exempt from any balancing responsibility to Britain, their fellow citizens or to the greater good.

Britain’s unwritten social contract relies on the state maintaining good order in the public realm. “O Freunde, Nicht Diese Töne!” (“Oh Friends, Not These Sounds!”), as Beethoven wrote in Ode to Joy. But Monday illustrates that human rights protect the discordant individual rather than the silent majority.