Starmer hopes to regain momentum with unveiling of dozens of bills in king’s speech
Keir Starmer will attempt to regain the political initiative on Wednesday as his government announces a package of 35 bills for the next parliamentary session, covering everything from housing to immigration,The embattled prime minister will release details of dozens of bills that he intends to pass over the next 12 months, even as his own MPs line up to demand his resignation,Starmer, who insisted on Monday that he wanted to oversee radical change over the next few years, will announce a bill to move closer to the EU, one to strengthen the immigration system and one to all but end the leasehold system,He said on Tuesday night: “The British people expect the government to get on with the job of changing our country for the better,Cutting the cost of living, bringing down hospital waiting lists and keeping our country safe in an increasingly dangerous world.
“Britain stands at a pivotal moment: to press ahead with a plan to build a stronger, fairer country or turn back to the chaos and instability of the past.My government will deliver on the promise of change for the British people.”His words underline his message to the cabinet on Tuesday, when he told ministers: “I take responsibility for the change we promised.”The prime minister has been planning for his second king’s speech for months, and security arrangements are already in place for the monarch to attend the state opening of parliament.However, royal sources told Politico on Tuesday that the ceremony could prove embarrassing for King Charles.
“It is very embarrassing for the king that his government is such a shambles that he has to read out something that may or may not still be the government’s programme by the end of the week,” one said.The source said that, according to the people familiar with the matter, in one recent discussion Charles’s senior aide asked top government officials including the cabinet secretary, Antonia Romeo, whether the king should go ahead with Wednesday’s ceremony.The palace was told that it was constitutionally correct for the king to open parliament on Wednesday as planned.Buckingham Palace declined to comment on the report.As part of the package that the king will read out, ministers have included a bill to enable British regulations to be changed to align with EU ones – a key step in the prime minister’s promised “reset” with Brussels.
Also to be announced is an energy independence bill designed to facilitate the transition to clean power, including implementing the measures recommended by the infrastructure expert John Fingleton to make it easier to build nuclear power plants.As promised by the prime minister on Monday, the king will announce a bill to fully nationalise British Steel, which has already been taken into government control.Ministers will also launch a long-awaited leasehold reform bill, which will ban the sale of new leasehold flats – though the housing minister recently admitted the bill will not actually take effect until after the next election.Wes Streeting, the health secretary and a likely rival to Starmer, will oversee a bill to abolish NHS England, as he first announced last year, while Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary, will legislate for her reforms to special educational needs.More controversially, however, the government is planning to legislate for some of its immigration changes, which have proved unpopular with many backbench MPs.
An immigration bill will make it harder for some migrants to earn settled status in the UK, and some claimants will be made to wait 10 years before qualifying, double the present length of time.The bill will also restrict how people can use article 8 of the European convention on human rights to appeal against asylum decisions.The state opening of parliament on Wednesday will be the first chance many Labour MPs have had to see each other since the local elections and the leadership speculation they have sparked.Government aides are hoping the pomp of the event will help dissuade prospective rebels from using their return to parliament to immediately organise and agitate for the prime minister’s removal.Additional reporting by Caroline Davies
Google announces raft of free upgrades for Android phones
Google has announced a range of features coming to Android phones this year, including a new Gemini Intelligence AI system and a tool to help users avoid distracting apps.Revealed in a livestreamed “Android Show” event, the free upgrades are scheduled to arrive in waves over the next year for high-end new and old phones alike, including Samsung and Pixel devices. Google also revealed that a new lineup of laptops will arrive in the autumn.Gemini Intelligence will combine the company’s top AI tools into one system aimed at being more proactively useful.It will be able to automate tasks by directly interacting with the apps already on a phone
Head of Microsoft’s Israel branch to step down after inquiry into dealings with Israeli military
The head of Microsoft’s Israeli subsidiary will step down in the wake of an inquiry that has scrutinised its business dealings with the Israeli military.Microsoft ordered the inquiry last year in response to a Guardian investigation revealing the military had used the company’s technology to operate a powerful surveillance system that collected Palestinian civilian phone calls on a mass scale.The joint investigation with the Israeli-Palestinian publication +972 Magazine and the Hebrew-language outlet Local Call found the military’s elite spy agency, Unit 8200, had used Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform to store a vast trove of intercepted calls from Gaza and the West Bank.The inquiry commissioned by Microsoft is understood to have recently concluded. Its findings are unclear; however, sources familiar with the situation said they prompted an announcement last week that Microsoft Israel’s general manager, Alon Haimovich, would leave the company
GameStop’s $55.5bn bid for eBay rejected as ‘neither credible nor attractive’
The board of eBay has rejected the US video games retailer GameStop’s surprise $55.5bn bid (£41bn) for the online marketplace, describing the proposal as “neither credible nor attractive”.Earlier this month, GameStop made an unsolicited bid for eBay, publishing a letter on its website outlining a half-cash, half-stock proposal.This was despite the US games company – which became a global household name during the meme stock craze of 2021 – being worth far less than its takeover target. GameStop had a market valuation of roughly $12bn before its bid, almost a quarter of eBay’s $46bn valuation
Trump heads to China to spread the gospel of American tech
Hello, and welcome to TechScape. I’m your host, Blake Montgomery, US tech editor at the Guardian.Donald Trump is headed to China this week. If his guest list is any clue, he wants to discuss technology with Xi Jinping, though perhaps after the war in Iran.On Monday, news broke that outgoing Apple CEO, Tim Cook, as well as SpaceX and Tesla’s CEO, Elon Musk, would join Trump
Trump heads to China to spread the gospel of American tech while emulating Xi Jinping on AI
Donald Trump is heading to China this week. If his guest list is any clue, he wants to discuss technology with Xi Jinping, though perhaps after the war in Iran.On Monday, news broke that outgoing Apple CEO, Tim Cook, as well as SpaceX and Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, would join the US president. Other guests from the tech sphere include Meta’s recently appointed president, Dina Powell McCormick; Sanjay Mehrotra, CEO of computer memory maker Micron; Chuck Robbins, CEO of longtime telecom giant Cisco; and Cristiano Amon, CEO of semiconductor maker Qualcomm, according to a White House official.Jensen Huang, Nvidia’s CEO – who is close to Trump but criticized the US’s limitations on chip sales to China in an April interview, saying that he didn’t want a “loser mentality” to cost the US its edge in AI – will not be joining the president
Molière Ex Machina: AI used to create ‘new work’ by beloved French playwright
Molière is to the French what Shakespeare is to the English: the last word in historical literature, drama, wit and satire.Now, more than 350 years after his death, the 17th-century dramatist has been revived after scholars at the Sorbonne University in Paris used artificial intelligence to help write an experimental play in his style.L’Astrologue ou les Faux Présages (The Astrologer, or False Omens), a three-act comedy, made its debut at the Royal Opera at the Château de Versailles last week.The two-hour play tells the story of a wealthy bourgeois Parisian who, under the instruction of a charlatan astrologer called Pseudoramus, insists his daughter Lucile marry a debt-ridden and elderly wigmaker.While the theme could well have been dreamed up by Molière, the dialogue, music, costumes and scenery were all created with the help of a French AI tool called Le Chat (The Cat)
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