Leveling bill fails to include funding needed to make leveling pass, MPs say
Although the House of Commons will not be sitting for the summer, MPs who chair select committees are still doing some work and some of them have been sending letters. Clive Betts, the Labor MP who chairs the equalization committee, says that when Greg Clark replaced Michael Gove as equalization secretary in July, he asked Betts to tell him over the summer what the committee thought about the project of law of leveling and regeneration.
Not much seems to be the answer. Today Betts released the letter he sent to Clark on behalf of his committee to evaluate the bill and here is the key paragraph.
The committee considers that the main tool to achieve leveling will be through adequate funding in the areas that need it most. This funding will help advance leveling missions related to public transport and local connectivity; transform digital connectivity; improve educational outcomes; increasing the number of adults completing high-quality skills training; and increase healthy life expectancy. None of the provisions of the bill will directly contribute to progress towards the achievement of these missions, except to establish them. There is also no funding to upgrade associated with the bill.
Like all select committees, this one has a narrow Conservative majority.
And in a statement to reporters, Betts said:
In its current form, the bill does little to reassure that leveling up will be more than just a slogan and that we will see meaningful change in local communities across the country. In key areas, it is unclear how the government intends to drive change and they have yet to commit to the spending needed to level the country.
Our research has focused on the Bill’s planning provisions, which can be described as loosely coupled proposals to tinker with the current system in the hope of some improvement. Scrutiny has been difficult to conduct because many details of the provisions have not yet been released.
Updated at 3.16pm BST
Key events
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According to polling firm Ipsos UK, three-quarters of all voters and two-thirds of people who voted Conservative in 2019 believe the privilege committee’s inquiry into whether Boris Johnson misled MPs about Partygate is justified. This is from Kelly Beaver, the company’s CEO.
This is bad news for the Mail newspapers which have published news articles and opinion pieces clearly designed to kill the inquiry. The mail group remains strongly pro-Johnson and at the weekend published a story based on a briefing circulated among MPs arguing, in effect, that if the inquiry went ahead it could inhibit ministers who are unsure what are they from tell parliamentarians it’s true. There was also an op-ed that said the investigation resembled a show trial of Stalin’s Russia, written by someone who had clearly forgotten what really happened to the victims of Stalin’s show trials.
Pure Privilege Panic in the Mail: Three more pages of attack on the Commons Committee, including an explanation of what Kafkaesque means, Johnson is clearly in serious trouble here… Dacre is fighting like hell. pic.twitter.com/fyTXGV8LmJ
— David Yelland (@davidyelland) August 20, 2022
Updated at 3.56pm BST
Boris Johnson has been walking in Kyiv with President Zelenskiy.
The Kyiv Independent has some photos.
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson was seen walking in central Kyiv with President Volodymyr Zelensky on August 24.
Johnson’s visit was unannounced.
Ukraine celebrates its 31st Independence Day and exactly six months of total war with Russia on August 24.
📷Kostyantyn Chernichkin pic.twitter.com/ksLJJqvNmT
— The Kyiv Independent (@KyivIndependent) August 24, 2022
And Visegrád 24 has some video footage.
BREAKING:
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has arrived in Kyiv on a surprise visit to celebrate Ukraine’s Independence Day with Zelensky.
It looks like the Russians will have to call off any plans for strikes on government buildings today. pic.twitter.com/5XoY0bcQP5
— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) August 24, 2022
UK to provide Ukraine with £54m drone and missile package
Boris Johnson has announced a new package of military support to Ukraine during his visit. The UK is contributing a £54m package of drones and “stray munitions”, missiles that stay in the air until they identify a target to strike.
In its press release about the package, Number 10 said:
This package of unmanned aerial systems will represent a further step forward in Ukraine’s current capability, enhancing its long-range surveillance and defensive targeting capability.
It includes 850 hand-launched Black Hornet microdrones, which are specifically designed for use in cities and towns, and are deployed to detect approaching enemy forces.
Military personnel can be trained to fly the helicopter drones, which are smaller than a mobile phone, in less than 20 minutes. Each drone returns live video and still images to enable forces on the ground to safely defend urban areas.
In a statement, Johnson said:
Today’s support package will give the brave and resilient Ukrainian Armed Forces a new capability boost, enabling them to continue to push back Russian forces and fight for their freedom.
What happens in Ukraine matters to us all, and that is why I am here today to convey the message that the UK is with you and will be with you for the days and months ahead, and that you can and will win.
This is Johnson’s third visit to Kyiv since the Russian invasion in February. To mark his support for Ukraine, Johnson received the Order of Freedom, the country’s highest award for foreign citizens.
Updated at 3.29pm BST
Johnson visits Kyiv to confirm UK support for Ukraine
Boris Johnson has revealed he is in Kyiv for what will almost certainly be his last meeting as Prime Minister with Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the Ukrainian president.
What happens in Ukraine matters to all of us.
That’s why I’m in Kyiv today.
That is why the UK will continue to stand with our Ukrainian friends.
I believe Ukraine can and will win this war. pic.twitter.com/FIovnqJGTS
— Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) August 24, 2022
Leveling bill fails to include funding needed to make leveling pass, MPs say
Although the House of Commons will not be sitting for the summer, MPs who chair select committees are still doing some work and some of them have been sending letters. Clive Betts, the Labor MP who chairs the equalization committee, says that when Greg Clark replaced Michael Gove as equalization secretary in July, he asked Betts to tell him over the summer what the committee thought about the project of law of leveling and regeneration.
Not much seems to be the answer. Today Betts released the letter he sent to Clark on behalf of his committee to evaluate the bill and here is the key paragraph.
The committee considers that the main tool to achieve leveling will be through adequate funding in the areas that need it most. This funding will help advance leveling missions related to public transport and local connectivity; transform digital connectivity; improve educational outcomes; increasing the number of adults completing high-quality skills training; and increase healthy life expectancy. None of the provisions of the bill will directly contribute to progress towards the achievement of these missions, except to establish them. There is also no funding to upgrade associated with the bill.
Like all select committees, this one has a narrow Conservative majority.
And in a statement to reporters, Betts said:
In its current form, the bill does little to reassure that leveling up will be more than just a slogan and that we will see meaningful change in local communities across the country. In key areas, it is unclear how the government intends to drive change and they have yet to commit to the spending needed to level the country.
Our research has focused on the Bill’s planning provisions, which can be described as loosely coupled proposals to tinker with the current system in the hope of some improvement. Scrutiny has been difficult to conduct because many details of the provisions have not yet been released.
Updated at 3.16pm BST
The Institute of Fiscal Studies thinktank has released its own assessment of the significance of today’s Scottish Government Revenue and Expenditure (GERS) report for 2021-22. (See 12.02pm) He says the underlying public finances are improving in Scotland due to oil and gas revenues, but long-term challenges remain.
Summarizing the IFS analysis, David Phillips, associate director of the think tank, says:
Today’s GERS figures are a tale of two stories. Headline figures show Scotland’s deficit fell more in relation to GDP than the UK as a whole, boosted by a rebound in oil and gas revenues and a recovery in GDP after a bigger fall during the peak of the pandemic. However, digging deeper shows that land income grew less rapidly than the UK as a whole – it is now £800 lower per person, compared with around £500 lower over the previous five years, and is broadly similar to the average for United Kingdom in the early 2010s. . Public spending also fell less in Scotland last year than in the UK as a whole.
The figures for the current financial year, 2022-23, will come just before the date the Scottish Government hopes to hold a referendum on independence. This timing could be fortuitous for the “yes” camp, as further increases in oil and gas prices, along with a windfall tax on the profits of oil and gas producers, mean that the overall global deficit Scotland could be at a similar or even lower level than the UK as a whole for the first time in over 10…