Apparent Your party implosion leaves big political vacancy on the left
A repeated question for Zack Polanski since becoming Green leader has been about cooperating with Zarah Sultana and Jeremy Corbyn, and his answer has been consistent: it’s hard to know when their party doesn’t properly exist and can’t even agree on a name,Thursday’s events show such caution was merited,It seems increasingly likely that Your party, as it was tentatively known, will not survive as originally billed, a joint enterprise between Corbyn, the former Labour leader, and Sultana, the leftwing Coventry MP, both of whom sit in the Commons as independents,Creating a new party is always difficult, particularly under the UK’s first-past-the-post system,Even Nigel Farage, one of the most naturally gifted politicians the country has produced in recent history, took 30 years and three parties to even get into parliament.
Bumps in the road are inevitable and Corbyn and Sultana have managed to sort out some previous disagreements, such as when Sultana began seemingly unilateral moves to have people sign up to the new movement in July.But the exchange of densely typed X statements on Thursday afternoon feels terminal, beginning with Corbyn saying he had taken legal advice about an “unauthorised email” sent to people who had registered interest in the new party.Eleven minutes later came Sultana’s withering response.She launched a “membership portal” after claiming to being frozen out by Corbyn and what she called a “sexist boys’ club” – meaning the four independent MPs who co-signed Corbyn’s statement, all men elected last year after campaigns that focused on Gaza.“I have been treated appallingly and excluded completely,” she said, accusing Corbyn of reneging on a promise to have gender balance on the working group devising the organisation.
It is something of a political cliche that leftwing politicians are prone to splits, and not entirely without truth, even if this does ignore the Conservatives’ recent fondness for toppling leaders and forming themselves into increasingly atomised “tribes”.But the seemingly irreconcilable split demonstrates that, much like a political right in which Conservatives MPs are defecting to Reform and some Reform MPs are quitting to go solo, the British left is less a coherent force than a semi-allied collection of micro-groups, often with competing interests.On top of what might be called traditional Corbynism, with its left-tilted economics and populist tendencies, we now have the more explicitly Gaza-focused independents, an increasing threat to Labour fuelled by public disquiet about Israel’s actions.It is within this changed paradigm that Sultana criticised Corbyn last month for, she said, having “capitulated” as Labour leader for agreeing to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism.Sign up to First EditionOur morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what’s happening and why it mattersafter newsletter promotionThat said, it does appear that the current split is motivated less by ideology than personality.
Much of the friction has been caused by the hugely energetic Sultana seemingly losing patience with the pace of decision-making by Corbyn and his allies.The former Labour leader, meanwhile, is arguably similar to Farage in that both find it hard to share control.What is certainly true is that even if Your party, or whatever it was to be called, has imploded, it leaves a sizeable political vacancy on the left, as shown by the 700,000-plus people who signed up to express interest in the Corbyn-Sultana vehicle.For now at least, it would seem they are still politically homeless.
What is quantitative tightening and how has it affected UK finances?
The Bank of England has announced that it will scale back its multibillion-pound “quantitative tightening” programme.The process is significant for the UK economy and the public finances. But how will it work?The process is the opposite of quantitative easing – the tool used by the world’s most powerful central banks during the 2008 financial crisis.Often referred to as “printing money”, QE involved central banks buying bonds from financial institutions, such as commercial banks and pension funds. This helped to push down yields – in effect the interest rate – on bonds, lowering borrowing costs and supporting economic activity
Bank’s interest rate vote and bond plans are little help to Reeves before budget
“Gradual” and “predictable” are the watchwords at the Bank of England. But for Rachel Reeves, preparing for a tough autumn budget, a more activist approach from Threadneedle Street could have helped.The central bank had two pieces of bad news for the chancellor on Thursday: borrowing costs would be left unchanged at the current elevated level, while the Bank would proceed with a plan to sell billions of pounds in UK government bonds.Both decisions had been widely expected in financial markets. But an alternative outcome was not outside the realms of possibility and could have helped bail out the Treasury a little before the autumn budget
Meta announces first Ray-Ban smart glasses with in-built augmented reality display
Meta has announced three new pairs of AI smart glasses, including the first Ray-Bans with a built-in screen for augmented reality.The Meta Ray-Ban Display will be the first smart glasses with a heads-up display from a mainstream brand since the ill-fated Google Glass. They use a classic Wayfarer-like styling to avoid looking too obviously like wearable technology, while still having a camera, speakers and microphone.A small, bright and crisp colour display is projected on to the inside of the right lens, which appears to float just below the wearer’s eye line, and can show anything from text and images to live video calls. The display appears when interacting with the glasses, but isn’t visible from the outside
Google DeepMind claims ‘historic’ AI breakthrough in problem solving
Google DeepMind claims it has made a “historic” artificial intelligence breakthrough akin to the Deep Blue computer defeating Garry Kasparov at chess in 1997 and an AI beating a human Go champion in 2016.A version of the company’s Gemini 2.5 AI model solved a complex real-world problem that stumped human computer programmers to become the first AI model to win a gold medal at an international programming competition held earlier this month in Azerbaijan.In a performance that the tech company called a “profound leap in abstract problem-solving”, it took less than half an hour to work out how to weigh up an infinite number of possibilities in order to send a liquid through a network of ducts to a set of interconnected reservoirs. The goal was to distribute it as quickly as possible
Nottinghamshire stun Surrey, Glamorgan promoted and more: county cricket, day four – as it happened
Josh Tongue, thundering in on his great long legs, bowled Nottinghamshire to victory in an electric Championship slug-fest at the Oval, giving Notts a 14-point advantage over Surrey going into the final round, and putting one East Midlands hand on the trophy.It was a game full of unexpected twists with Surrey often on top in their chase of 315. Ollie Pope made 41 until he was caught off Lyndon James then Dan Lawrence and Tom Curran attacked with a bravado that had Surrey members purring. In an inspired bit of captaincy, Haseeb Hameed then called up Liam Patterson-White for one over, Curran charged him and was stumped for 33. Lawrence was lbw for 50 to Dillon Pennington but some clean ball striking from Tom Lawes once more tipped the scales
Keely Hodgkinson escapes boredom to lift British spirits at world championships
It has not been the greatest world championships for Britain so far, with only Jake Wightman’s 1500m silver medal lifting the gloom. But on Thursday the cavalry finally arrived in the form of Keely Hodgkinson.The Olympic 800m champion has been so bored in her hotel in the 35c heat she has even taken to staging playful indoor races with her training partner, Georgia Hunter Bell. But she dusted off the cobwebs in qualifying comfortably for Friday’s semi-finals in 1min 59.79sec
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