Lammy says he was not ‘equipped with the details’ when facing questions on mistaken prisoner release at PMQs – as it happened

David Lammy has recorded a pooled interview about the prisoner release mistakes reveaved after yesterday’s PMQs. There were three main lines in the excerpt available so far.Lammy, the deputy PM and justice secretary, defended his decision to dodge questions at PMQs yesterday about whether there had been another prisoner let out by mistake. The Conservatives have strongly criticised him for this, with Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, saying that Lammy’s non-answer was “dishonest”, and Robert Jenrick, the shadow justice secretary, saying Lammy’s PMQs performance was “a disgrace” and “a dereliction of duty”. (See 9

Badenoch accused of ‘interfering’ in lobbying scandal linked to Cameron

Lex Greensill has accused Kemi Badenoch of “interfering” in an insolvency case “for political ends” as the last Conservative government sought to protect David Cameron from scrutiny for his involvement in a lobbying scandal.The financier, whose companies paid Cameron millions of pounds, claimed that the current Tory leader used her former ministerial position as business secretary to restructure an inquiry into his activities.Greensill alleged that the move was made to protect Cameron as he was elevated to the House of Lords in November 2023 and brought back into government as the foreign secretary.The allegations were made in a letter sent to the current business secretary, Peter Kyle, as Greensill contests the possibility of being disqualified from company directorships for up to 15 years.Greensill claimed the decision to omit Cameron’s involvement from the Insolvency Services’s inquiries meant the case against him should be dropped because it was “based on allegations that have no merit and little or no evidence”

Labour MPs revive ‘desperately needed’ soft left group to take on Reform

Senior MPs who were the architects of the Labour welfare rebellion are to revive a powerful caucus on the party’s soft left to influence the budget and beyond, in a move likely to further unnerve No 10.The former cabinet minister Louise Haigh and Vicky Foxcroft, a former whip who resigned to vote against welfare cuts, are to take the reins of the Tribune group with the aim of giving an organising voice to their wing of the party.Key figures in the group, which hopes it will attract more than 100 MPs to revitalise the caucus, were major players in Lucy Powell’s successful deputy leadership campaign.They also include the former minister Justin Madders, Sarah Owen, the chair of the women and equalities committee and Debbie Abrahams, the chair of the work and pensions select committee. Two other new MPs will also steward the group – Yuan Yang and Beccy Cooper

Lancashire’s Reform-run council plans to close care homes and day centres

Lancashire’s Reform-run council has been accused of “selling off the family silver” through its plans to save £4m a year by closing five council-run care homes and five day centres and moving residents into the private sector.One of the care home residents, a 92-year-old woman, said she would leave only by “being forcibly removed or in a box”.Another resident’s son, a Reform party member, said any move would “kill” his mother, and he vowed to quit the party if the closures went ahead.Questions are also being asked about a potential conflict of interest involving Reform’s cabinet member for social care in Lancashire, who owns a private care company with his wife.Reform UK took control of Lancashire county council (LCC) from the Conservatives in May, winning 53 of the 84 available seats

Reform’s public-sector pensions plan could cost billions extra, union warns

Reform UK’s plans to make public-sector pensions less generous could cost billions extra a year and cause a ticking timebomb in the public finances, a leading trade union has warned.Prospect said the plans unveiled by the party’s deputy leader, Richard Tice, would damage the public finances rather than save money “and end up costing taxpayers tens of billions of pounds in the years to come”.The union challenged Tice after he said he would want to change public-sector pensions from a defined benefit system to a defined contribution scheme for new entrants, a move that would mirror what has happened in the private sector and would result in less generous payouts in retirement.A defined benefit scheme gives a guaranteed annual income for life after retirement, while a defined contribution pension provides a pot that can be drawn on until it runs out.Tice said he believed Prospect had misunderstood the changes he proposed and that the move would help the country avoid a slide into bankruptcy on the back of huge unfunded pension liabilities, which he said ran into trillions

London mayor sees parallels in Zohran Mamdani’s victory: ‘Hope won’

Sadiq Khan, the city’s first Muslim mayor, says: ‘We are united by something far more fundamental, our belief in the power of politics to change people’s lives for the better’While the soon-to-be first Muslim mayor of New York, Zohran Mamdani, was in the final throes of his mayoral campaign on a brisk day in New York, Sadiq Khan, the first Muslim of mayor of London, was wrapping up a two-day climate summit in a steamy if overcast Rio de Janeiro.“Hope is not gone,” Khan told the 300 city mayors gathered in the Brazilian city’s museum of modern art.The London mayor was referring to the challenges faced by regional politicians in dealing with the climate emergency in the face of the scepticism or outright denial of the science by national governments – including that led by Donald Trump.But on hearing of Mamdani’s win, Khan suggested that this too had given him hope. London and its mayor have been repeatedly raised by figures such as Trump’s former chief of staff Steve Bannon as the disastrous outcome that New Yorkers had to avoid