UK politics: government plan for compulsory Covid jabs for NHS England staff criticised – live

Latest updates: Prof Adam Finn, JCVI member, says forcing staff to get jabs is ‘kind of an admission of failure’

• Unvaccinated health and care workers in England could be redeployed

10.00am BST

According to a report in the Financial Times (paywall), the government’s own internal analysis of its decision to cut universal credit from the start of October (by ending the temporary £20-per-week uplift introduced during the pandemic) says the impact will be “catastrophic”. The paper says:

A well-placed Whitehall official said the government’s own analysis highlighted the deep impact of reversing the change. “The internal modelling of ending the UC uplift is catastrophic. Homelessness and poverty are likely to rise, and food banks usage will soar. It could be the real disaster of the autumn.”

One minister warned that the political backlash over universal credit, which is claimed by 6m people, was likely to be more serious for prime minister Boris Johnson than the debate about social care.

This cut will impose the biggest overnight cut to the basic rate of social security since the foundation of the modern welfare state.

Our analysis has shown that 6 million low-income families will lose £1,040 from their annual income, creating serious financial hardship and leave 500,000 people to be swept into poverty - including 200,000 children. Families with children will be disproportionately impacted and worryingly, 6 in 10 of all single-parent families in the UK will be impacted.

9.47am BST

In another interview this morning Helen Whately, the care minister, said she thought it was “highly unlikely” that Gavin Williamson, the education secretary, was racist. She was responding to questions about how he muddled up two black sportsmen, Marcus Rashford and Maro Itoje.

Asked on LBC whether Williamson’s mistake was due to incompetence or racism, she replied:

Honestly, I don’t know. All I know is that Gavin has put out his explanation, and there’s really nothing more that I could say about it.

I can’t believe for a moment that he is [racist]. I think that sounds highly unlikely.

You’ve given me a false choice, you’re trying to put me in a trap to say it’s one thing or the other.

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from The Guardian https://ift.tt/3l6VL5i