James Cleverly also says PM ‘played by union paymasters’ in offers to train drivers and junior doctors

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Senior Tories have accused Keir Starmer of losing control of public sector pay by agreeing deals to end strikes, but a Labour minister said it was unfair to suggest workers would just keep demanding higher wages.

James Cleverly, the shadow home secretary and a Tory leadership candidate, said on Friday that the prime minister was being “played by union paymasters” in making an offer to train drivers and junior doctors.

Chris Philp, shadow leader of the Commons, says Labour has ‘lost control of state sector pay’ after teachers and NHS look set to receive rises

Overnight Conservative leadership candidate Priti Patel has defended the previous government’s record on migration, saying it was “lazy” to suggest net migration was too high.

Speaking on GB News , she said:

During the pandemic our borders were effectively closed. There was no travel. What about all those international students they came in after the pandemic? Are we saying that they should not have come into the country?

What did the government choose to do? I think this is the right thing to do. We absolutely made sure we gave the NHS the support that it needed through health and social care visas.

Agency says long-running investigation into company run by Tory peer Michelle Mone’s husband will be concluded as quickly as possible

The National Crime Agency has said it is “not scared” of lawyers acting for PPE Medpro, the company led by the Conservative peer Michelle Mone’s husband, Doug Barrowman, and is progressing an investigation into it “as fast as we can”.

The NCA is conducting a long-running investigation into suspected criminal offences committed in the procurement by PPE Medpro of £203m of government contracts to supply personal protective equipment during the Covid pandemic.

Age at which voters become more likely to choose Tories than Labour was 63 in July election, up from 39 in 2019

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Young Conservatives have warned the party that it needs to stop exclusively chasing older voters, after it emerged that the average age at which a voter is more likely to choose the Tories than Labour was 63 at the last election.

Figures from YouGov released after the election showed that the “crossover” age to becoming a Tory voter had risen by 24 years since the 2019 election under Boris Johnson, when it was 39.

Education secretary says they make ‘important contribution’ but new government has not yet seen the effects of restrictions

Education secretary Bridget Phillipson has said that A-level results are expected to be “broadly in line with last year”. The results for England, Wales and Northern Ireland are published at 9.30am, and you can follow that live with my colleague Rachel Hall …

The chancellor, reacting to those GDP figures, echoed the messaging of her colleague Darren Jones yesterday about inflation, saying the government is “under no illusion” about the situation.

The new government is under no illusion as to the scale of the challenge we have inherited after more than a decade of low economic growth and a £22bn black hole in the public finances.

That is why we have made economic growth our national mission and we are taking the tough decisions now to fix the foundations, so we can rebuild Britain and make every part of the country better off.

Without a clearer sense of a national destination, the prime minister risks being cast as an agent of continuity instead of change

There is always a stark contrast between the simplicity of a slogan that wins an election and the complexity of the task that greets an incoming government. For Labour, the challenge is especially acute because the headline promise of Sir Keir Starmer’s campaign was a single word: “change”. Aside from new faces in ministerial offices, the reality for most people was always going to feel like more of the same for some time.

Wednesday’s release of official economic data, showing inflation up by 2.2% last month, illustrates the point. The increase is on the lower end of analysts’ expectations, but high prices, especially for essential groceries, will still shape the public mood. The cost of living crisis that was a major factor in bringing down the Tories is now Labour’s problem.

Both Conservatives and Labour systematically created a hostile environment, writes Neil MacMaster. Also letters from Jabeer Butt, Paddy Eckersley and Margot Crookshank

George Monbiot is right ( These riots are more than thuggery: they’re the outcome of 14 years of Tory race-baiting, 6 August ), but the rot of governmental responsibility lies much deeper. As I pointed out over 20 years ago in my book Racism in Europe, extreme rightwing thugs had remained politically isolated until provided with some legitimacy by governments that themselves turned to anti-immigrant rhetoric. Both major parties, including Labour with its Immigration and Asylum Act of 1999, systematically created a hostile environment.

Immigrants were presented as problematic, a parasitic drain on the welfare state, rather than as major contributors to national wealth and a dynamic, rich culture. Unfortunately, heavier policing cannot provide a quick fix for street violence. The government needs to reverse its “Fortress Britain”, tough-on-immigration position to contain the further advance of Nigel Farage and xenophobia.
Neil MacMaster
Norwich

Pay-as-you-go simcard seller often filed late returns, had accounts queried by auditors and was embroiled in eight-year VAT battle

Lycamobile, a telecoms company that has given more than £2m to the Conservative party, has been issued with a winding-up petition by HM Revenue and Customs, amid a long-running VAT dispute.

The company, founded by businessman Allirajah Subaskaran in 2006 , sells pay-as-you-go sim cards that are popular with low-paid workers wanting to make cheap phone calls to family overseas, as well as in the UK.

Former PM said ‘that’s not funny’ when remote-controlled banner was unfurled behind her at event in Suffolk

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Liz Truss suddenly left the stage at an event to promote her own book after campaigners unfurled a banner emblazoned with the phrase: “I crashed the economy.”

The former prime minister , who lasted 45 days in office, was in Suffolk discussing the US presidential election on Tuesday when the campaign group Led By Donkeys , lowered its remote-controlled banner with a huge picture of a lettuce, behind her.