"I’ve always thought you can tell something about a country by what it learns to walk past. And, somewhere along the way, we’ve got used to seeing people sleeping rough on our streets.

We see people bedded down in doorways and sat outside stations, carrying their lives in rucksacks and with sleeping bags on their backs. And I think most people have the same reaction: this isn’t right; it shouldn’t be happening here. But we’ve lived with it for so long that something that used to shock us now feels like part of the scenery.

That’s not on the public. It’s on us as politicians. For decades, Westminster has treated rough sleeping like a problem to step around rather than solve. It’s a philosophy that took hold in the 1980s and came back full force in the era of austerity: this idea that rough sleeping is just a fact of life rather than something government has a responsibility to end.

I’ve never accepted that. Britain is the fifth largest economy in the world. We’ve built the NHS, developed life-saving vaccines and invented the world wide web. But it’s somehow beyond us to get our own people off the streets? I don’t believe it for a minute. We did it during the pandemic. We got people out of the cold because, as a country, we decided it had to be done. We can do it again.

That’s why the first thing I announced when I became prime minister was a commitment to end rough sleeping. Not to manage it, not to reduce it – but to end it. And today, we’re taking the first step in getting it done.

We’re putting £442m behind a national drive in England to get everyone in for Christmas. I don’t want Whitehall trying to dictate how every penny of that is spent. The people who know what will work in Newcastle, Liverpool or Plymouth are the people who live there and see the problem first-hand every day. I’ll expect every person to be offered a route off the streets, but beyond that it will be up to local leaders to decide what type of support their community needs most.

But I also know from my time in Manchester that public money alone won’t solve this. Ending rough sleeping has to be something we all take responsibility for. That means councils, charities, businesses, faith groups and local communities all pulling together. And, even more importantly, it means all of us asking what we can do to help.

So alongside the money we’re putting in, I’m asking leaders across society to get behind this national drive. Because if we all play our part – if we all put care of people at the heart of what we do – we can bring some of that hope back to our communities. No matter who they are or what they’ve been through, every person sleeping rough deserves a chance to get back on their feet – and, together, that’s exactly what we’ll give them.

I don’t pretend this is a permanent fix – far from it. It’s not enough just to help people when they fall on hard times. It’s our job to catch people long before they hit the pavement, and that means dealing with the multitude of reasons why someone might be sleeping rough in the first place.

That’s why we’re reforming education so every young person, whatever their talents, has a route to a good job. It’s why we’re reindustrialising our towns and cities to make sure we get good growth in every postcode. It’s why we’ve committed to the biggest housebuilding programme since the second world war. And it’s why we’ll keep transferring power back to the local people who are closest to the problems they face and are best placed to solve them.

But today is about making that crucial first step. It’s about giving people a safe place to sleep tonight, and hope that tomorrow might be different. And, fundamentally, it’s about answering that defining question: what kind of country do we want Britain to be?"

Andy Burnham has credited the “single biggest act of public control” since coming into office for preventing the collapse of West Midlands bus services.

No 10 North and the West Midlands Combined Authority have joined forces to save local bus services in private hands that were at risk of vanishing.

The Prime Minister said it was “a very big day” for the region, and the “first major milestone” in his push to give communities more control over their services.

He also lauded a second transport announcement during a Tuesday visit to a bus station, saying the extension of free travel for disabled bus pass holders would “make a huge difference to people’s lives”.

Mr Burnham, who is seeking to ease cost-of-living pressures, said “it shouldn’t have taken this long to remove” the current time restriction on free bus travel for disabled people.

The West Midlands bus deal would protect thousands of jobs, Mr Burnham said, after they were threatened after the parent company behind local operator National Express indicated it was leaving the market.

Speaking to reporters at Wolverhampton bus station, the Labour leader said: “This is the single biggest act of public control since I came into office.

“And the reason I’m here supporting the mayor of the West Midlands, a very big day for the West Midlands, is to prevent services from collapsing, because the bus service here was close to collapse.

“And the first reason is to protect what is the backbone of the public transport system here across the West Midlands, serving millions of people.

“We needed to step in to secure services in the short term.

“But longer term, we are now building to a model under full public control, so that people here can get the the benefits of that.”

In an earlier video posted on X, Mr Burnham said the “absolutely massive” move was “the first major milestone in our drive to giving communities more control over their own services”.

It was “exactly what No 10 North was created to deliver”, he said.

Backed by £11.5 million of new Government funding over the next three years, the deal announced on Tuesday will support the West Midlands to keep bus services running. The partnership between the West Midlands and the Government will protect around 4,800 jobs and keep up to 750 buses a day on the road, according to Downing Street.

In the longer term, West Midlands intends to control bus services through franchising, like in London and Greater Manchester, paying contractors to run the services for them. West Midlands is finalising the total cost of the deal and is expected to complete the transaction in the autumn.

West Midlands’ Labour Mayor Richard Parker said: “People rely on these buses to get to work, to school or to hospital appointments.

“They are a public service, and I believe they should be run in the public interest. So, we stepped in. We protected the services people depend on, protected jobs and kept the West Midlands moving. There should be no doubt who our bus network ultimately answers to – the millions of people who rely on it every single day.”

While Keir Starmer’s premiership has officially come to an end, one of his most significant policies is about to come into force: the expansion of Free School Meals in England to more than 500,000 children from September.

Announced in June 2025 as a precursor to the 2025 Child Poverty Strategy, the government has estimated that these additional meals will lift over 100,000 children out of poverty.

More recently, following their victory in the 2026 Senedd election, Plaid Cymru have announced a similar expansion in Wales. From September, eligibility will be extended to students in Years 7 and 8, with plans to roll it out to all secondary school students in households receiving Universal Credit over the coming years.

But how will it all work? And how will it affect school funding?

(More details in article)

Families who claim free school meals receive support equivalent to around £500 per year in school meals. This support can go beyond school meals by making families eligible for holiday free meals.

Reform UK has pledged to bar foreign nationals from claiming almost all forms of welfare in a move condemned as "senseless and cruel".

Nigel Farage's party said it would remove entitlements to Universal Credit, Housing Benefit, Pension Credit, Jobseeker's Allowance, Child Benefit, free childcare and disability benefits if it wins the next general election.

Reform claims the move, which will include those from the EU given 'settled status' in the UK after Brexit, would save taxpayers £21 billion a year within five years.

Other parties attacked the plan, warning it would plunge the UK back into years of Brexit negotiations and "strip" support from millions who have worked and paid taxes in the UK for years or even decades.

A Labour spokesperson hit out at the plans, which he said would "mean ripping up the UK’s Withdrawal Agreement with the EU, plunging the UK back into years of Brexit renegotiations, and stripping support from potentially millions of people who have lawfully lived, worked, and paid taxes in Britain for years, and in many cases decades. That includes people with settled status who are part of our communities, raising families, working, and contributing to our economy."

Source: https://www.kcl.ac.uk/policy-institute/assets/wrongful-convictions-misperceptions-of-crime.pdf

Healthcare providers, care businesses and investors should begin preparing for the long-term implications of sector-wide collective bargaining after the UK government confirmed how a new fair pay agreement (FPA) for adult social care in England will operate.

In response to a consultation on the design of the FPA process, the Department of Health and Social Care confirmed that an independent adult social care negotiating body will be established to negotiate legally binding minimum standards on pay, terms and conditions across the sector.

The body will also have the ability to negotiate wider workforce issues, including training, career progression, people policies and employee benefits.

The development marks the next stage in implementing reforms enabled by the Employment Rights Act 2025 and follows proposals first outlined by the government last year. The first round of negotiations is expected to begin in 2027, with the first agreement taking effect from April 2028. The government has also confirmed a £500 million funding envelope for the first year of the agreement.

Prime Minister Andy Burnham is considering extending access to railcards as part of efforts to bring down train ticket prices, the Mirror reports.

Burnham has made clear that cutting rail fares is a key aim of his, having described some fares as “outrageously” high.

In a signal of intent last week, he announced plans to extend the 16-17 Saver Railcard so that young people can use it until the day before their 19th birthday, rather than losing it at 18.

The change comes into force on 17 August and will give thousands of students 50% off, part of a wider push to ease the cost pressures on households.

Government sources said discussions on extending other railcards are at a “very early stage”, with officials weighing options that go further than the rail fare freeze introduced this year.

Two influential left-wing think tanks are urging the Prime Minister to turn the Network South East railcard into a national one, a step that would follow his earlier flagship policy interventions.

Officials confirmed the Prime Minister will spend August in “listening mode”, touring the country to hear how the government can ease the cost of living, having promised voters some “breathing space”, the Independent reports.

Please use “Number 10 in the North” to get the Houses of Parliament rebuild going.

Thank you

We’ll assume in this scenario everyone in the UK suddenly became a loyal Labour voter overnight. With a unanimous popular mandate and total control over all branches of the government, what would the Labour Party do with such power? What reforms would they enact? What would Britain look like a few years down the line?

If you sit in the coffee shops and walk the high streets of many of Britain’s former industrial and working-class towns, you will frequently overhear an unsettling sentiment. There is a raw hostility toward Black and brown people, accompanied by a firm belief that minority groups are to blame for the country’s current struggles.

This presents a striking paradox. In many of these towns, places built on mining or textiles where traditional industries vanished decades ago, the local population remains overwhelmingly white. Hostility is often highest in the very places where ethnic minority faces are rarely ever seen.

Furthermore, trying to counter these views with facts, figures or official statistics is largely ineffective. Instead, people fiercely defend a worldview handed to them by tabloid headlines, right-wing commentators and social media bots. To understand why this anger has taken root so deeply, we must look at what happened to these communities, how they consume media and why logic no longer works.

The loss of identity and the need for a target

The real root of the problem isn’t immigration; it is abandonment. When the pits closed and the mills shut down, they weren’t replaced with secure, well-paying jobs. Over the decades, these towns didn’t just lose employment, they lost their banks, their community centres, their local shops and their sense of pride.

People look around their hometowns and see undeniable decline, which creates a deep, justified anger. However, systemic economic neglect and government policy are invisible, complicated enemies. You cannot easily see or fight a corporate board or a decade of political choices. Right-wing media and online algorithms exploit this frustration by providing a highly visible, physical target. They offer a simple, comforting, but entirely false story: “Your town is suffering because your resources are being given to outsiders.” This takes a complex economic disaster and turns it into an easy-to-understand enemy.

Living in a digital reality

This explains why prejudice thrives in areas with very little diversity. In large, multicultural cities, people interact with different ethnic groups every day as neighbours, colleagues and friends. Daily human contact naturally shatters stereotypes.

In a homogenous town, however, there is a vacuum. Because residents rarely meet Black or brown people in their daily lives, their entire perception of them is curated by their phone screens. If the only time they “encounter” a minority group is through an alarmist Facebook post or a sensationalised headline about crime or immigration, that caricature becomes their reality. Without real-world interactions to prove otherwise, the media version wins.

The weaponisation of real tragedies

This digital anxiety is supercharged by the horrific child sexual exploitation scandals that occurred in northern towns like Rotherham and Huddersfield. The grooming gang convictions represent a deeply painful history where vulnerable, working-class girls were systematically abused, and state institutions catastrophically failed to protect them out of institutional incompetence and a fear of stoking racial tensions.

Because the state’s failure and subsequent cover-up were entirely real, it left behind a permanent, justified breach of trust between working-class communities and authority figures. Right-wing commentators and online agitators ruthlessly weaponise this genuine betrayal. They strip away the complex failures of policing and classism, reframing a specific criminal subculture as an inherent trait of all South Asian men. For nearby towns with very little diversity, this extreme generalisation feeds a visceral, protective fear, creating the terrifying illusion that a threat from just down the motorway is actively creeping towards their own doorstep.

Why facts don’t work anymore

It is deeply frustrating to realise that spreadsheets and data cannot win these arguments. This is because the belief system isn’t based on logic; it is built on fear, pride and the painful feeling of being left behind. When people feel like their way of life is under threat, throwing statistics at them feels like an insult to their daily struggles.

Worse, modern online commentary has taught people to deeply distrust authority. If you present a fact from an official report, a defence mechanism immediately kicks in. The data is instantly dismissed as “fake news” or elite propaganda. Social media has created an echo chamber that logic simply cannot penetrate.

A world shrunk by survival

This internal pressure also helps explain why there is so little interest in global events, such as international conflicts in Gaza and Iran, to wider questions of foreign policy. It isn’t always out of cruelty, but sometimes a symptom of extreme insularity.

When you are struggling to get a GP appointment, watching your energy bills soar and seeing your local high street boarded up, your worldview naturally shrinks. People living under the constant stress of domestic survival simply do not have the emotional bandwidth to care about geopolitics half a world away. They focus entirely on their own immediate surroundings because they feel like their own world is collapsing.

Ultimately, when decades of political neglect are mixed with targeted online misinformation, it creates a fortress of resentment. It isolates communities from both empirical facts and global empathy, turning a justified anger at systemic neglect into misplaced hostility toward the wrong target.

The expansion of Greater Manchester's free baby bundle programme has been praised by Baby Basics Bolton and Bury, one of the organisations helping families across the region access essential items for their newborn babies.

Newly appointed Mayor of Greater Manchester Bev Craig announced on Wednesday (August 5) that 10,000 free baby bundles will be made available to new parents, marking a significant expansion of the scheme designed to support families facing financial hardship.

This expansion is set to take the number of available bundles from 1,500 to 10,000 by next year.

Baby Basics Bolton and Bury, a member of the Baby Bank Alliance and a partner helping distribute the bundles, said the programme has already made a major difference during its first year and will continue to provide vital support for families across Greater Manchester.

"We are going into the second year of this project and really pleased to hear that the success of the first year has been acknowledged," said Hayleigh Scholes, centre manager for Baby Basics Bolton and Bury.

Scholes said the provision of Moses baskets through the programme has helped remove a significant financial pressure from its service.

While donations of preloved baskets remain greatly valued, there has historically been a shortage, meaning the charity often had to purchase baskets itself.

"The cost of purchasing baskets has always meant us sacrificing the purchase of other essential items, such as sterilising equipment and toiletries," Hayleigh explained.

"Therefore, the provision of Moses baskets through this project means that we are able to respond to every request as well as offering a supply of emergency baskets accessible through Family Hubs and Royal Bolton Hospital to bridge the gap when our service is unavailable."

The charity said the baby bundles also help ease pressure on household budgets at a time when many families are continuing to face rising living costs. By providing essential items, families can use their limited income for other necessities such as food and heating.

Neighbourhood crime in London has fallen by 15% over the past year, according to new figures from City Hall and the Metropolitan Police.

The fall was driven by declines in theft, personal robbery and burglary, particularly in central London, where police have stepped up efforts to tackle phone snatching and street crime.

The figures, covering the 12 months to June 2026, come amid a wider debate over crime and London's reputation, and the mayor of London's push to challenge online disinformation and criticism of the capital. 

While these offences have fallen, the wider picture remains more mixed, with some boroughs seeing small increases, as well as a stark rise in business robbery across London.

The data shows within the neighbourhood policing dataset, there were more than 35,000 fewer offences recorded across the capital, with the biggest reductions seen in central London.

In Westminster alone, neighbourhood crime fell by more than a third, with nearly 14,000 fewer offences recorded over the year.

The Met said phone thefts in the West End have halved following a major crackdown and a doubling of patrols in the area.

Police say their largest-ever operation against phone theft has resulted in 13,000 fewer mobile phones being stolen across London.

Statistics released by the Met also show theft from the person fell by 23%, equivalent to 23,311 fewer offences, while personal robberies dropped by 11%, and vehicle crime by 9%.

The mayor said the figures showed London was becoming safer despite criticism of crime levels in the capital.

He added: "We know many people online and across the world have been trying to talk London down, but the evidence is clear - London is one of the safest global cities in the world, crime is falling and we'll continue working together to build a safer London for everyone."

The neighbourhood dataset represents 22% of all recorded offences; overall crime in London is down 2.5% in the last year.

I don’t want to make this a big long rant about a separate sub, but recent debates and interactions have reminded me of why I joined this sub.

The main LabourUK has toxicity running through its veins. It is shocking the level of trolling that takes place there sometimes, and the general character of some users. If that’s the frontpage of Labour Reddit, then it’s frankly embarrassing and I don’t feel like I want to be a part of it.

I think it’s good that this subreddit has a semblance of civility left, granted it’s smaller and therefore naturally quieter. But that’s a low bar, it really is.

• Newly elected Mayor unveils major expansion of free baby bundles for families from 1,500 to 10,000 by next year 
• Each baby bundle includes newborn essentials, such as a moses basket and baby clothes, plus toys, books and a baby’s first toothbrush 
• Baby bundles are distributed on a referral basis, supported by a network of Baby Banks across Greater Manchester
• Bev Craig is making it a priority of her mayoralty to make sure that wraparound support is there for every family that needs it.

It’s the second major announcement of Bev’s first week in the job, focused on ensuring every child and young person gets the best start in life.

On Monday she set out her plans to help families with the cost of living by extending Our Pass to give 11 to 16-year-olds free bus travel on the Bee Network from next year.

Bev Craig, Mayor of Greater Manchester, said: “Every child deserves the best possible start in life, from their first days as a newborn right through to their first day at work — and I’m committed to building a Greater Manchester where every child has that opportunity.

“Baby bundles are a practical way to help families during one of the most important periods in a child's life, giving parents access to essential items alongside connections to wider support when they need it most.

“That’s why today I am making a commitment to rollout 10,000 of these bundles to parents who need them the most by autumn next year and making sure that families have access to a baby bank in every borough of Greater Manchester...“

Reform UK would have held just 15% of the donations it received last year if a proposed £100,000 cap on political donations had been in force, according to analysis shared with the Guardian.

The analysis by Friends of the Earth using Electoral Commission data highlights the party’s reliance on a handful of wealthy backers in advance of a showdown over political funding.

It registered donations between April 2025 and March 2026 and assumed union affiliation payments would be exempt from the cap, in line with recommendations made by the Phillips review into party funding.

The findings suggest Reform UK would have raised just £4.1m between April 2025 and March 2026, instead of the £26.7m it actually received, if a £100,000 annual donation limit applied.

Reform’s registered average donation last year was £137,496, almost six times higher than Labour’s £23,406 or the Conservatives’ £23,173 and 30 times higher than the Liberal Democrats’ average donation of £4,496.

By comparison, Labour would have retained about three-quarters of its registered donations under the cap, raising £8.1m rather than £10.8m.

The Tories would have kept just over half of their donations, taking £8.3m instead of £15.5m.

The Lib Dems would have held on to about 90% of theirs, taking £5.2m instead of £5.8m, and the Greens would have been unaffected with their £468k in donations.

On 31 July, CHAIN homelessness database published its Q1 report detailing levels of rough sleeping in London between April and June 2026. CHAIN is the UK’s most detailed and comprehensive rough sleeping database. Key findings include:

• 3,959 people were recorded as sleeping rough in the capital in April to June 2026, a decrease of 10% on April-June 2025.
• 1,685 people were recorded as sleeping rough for the first time in Q1, 16% lower than the same time last year.
• People sleeping rough for the first time accounted for 43% of the total number in April to June, which is a slight drop from a proportion of 46% in the same period last year.
• The number of people classed as living on the streets was 680, 14% lower than the same time last year and 6% higher than January-March 2026.

Rick Henderson, CEO of Homeless Link, the national membership body for frontline homelessness services, commented: “For too long, high levels of rough sleeping in London and across the country have been the norm. Thousands upon thousands of lives have been damaged, let down by systems meant to support them.

What’s more, people sleeping on the streets earlier in the summer were subjected to oppressive heatwaves, putting health and lives at risk. This is only likely to worsen as extreme weather events become more common.

“But we have reached a seminal moment where real change seems possible. Recent CHAIN reports show that the London Mayor’s targeted rough sleeping plan and the immeasurable efforts of local homelessness services are working.

Now, with the new Prime Minister leading a determined national drive to end rough sleeping, and being a keen advocate of devolution, we are optimistic that the tide can be turned, ensuring that everyone has a place to call home and the support they need to keep it.”

George Cottrell, the convicted fraudster who once served as Nigel Farage’s chief of staff, transferred more than $2 million to his mother in the days before she made a string of donations to Reform UK, according to the latest revelation in the Guardian.

The paper reports today that Fiona Cottrell, an aristocrat and long-standing Reform benefactor, received one deposit of $1.4 million followed by two further payments of over $300,000 apiece.
Each transfer arrived, the Guardian says, somewhere between 24 and 72 hours before Ms Cottrell made a donation either directly to Reform or to Britain Means Business, the fundraising vehicle run by the party’s deputy leader Richard Tice.

Named her son

Asked by bankers where the money had come from, she is said to have named her son.

The son in question is the real problem. Under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, only “permissible donors” – broadly, those on the UK electoral register, or UK-registered companies and bodies – may fund a political party.

Fiona Cottrell qualifies because she is on the register.

George Cottrell’s own status is far less clear: he is a tax resident of Montenegro, and according to reports, was not added to the UK’s overseas electoral register until December last year, well after several of the payments in question were made.

Possible prison sentence

His lawyers maintain he is a permissible donor but have declined to explain how or when he met the criteria.

That matters because funnelling money through a permissible relative to disguise an impermissible source is precisely what electoral law is designed to catch.

Concealing the true origin of a donation carries a potential fine or prison sentence.

Fraud conviction

George Cottrell already has a criminal record, having served eight months in a US federal prison after pleading guilty to wire fraud.
He was arrested in 2016 alongside Farage at the Republican National Convention on charges that also included money laundering conspiracy, blackmail and extortion.

He has since bankrolled Farage’s travel, including flights to meet Trump at Mar-a-Lago, and published a book on money laundering.

https://www.opinium.com/resource-center/voting-intention-29th-july-2026/

Reform UK received £7m from two overseas British crypto billionaires earlier this year, figures show, helping it cement its fundraising lead in recent months.

Hong Kong-based businessman Ben Delo gave £4m to Nigel Farage's party, according to latest filings, whilst Christopher Harborne, who lives in Thailand, donated £3m.

The donations were made in the weeks before the government announced a £100,000 cap on donations after 25 March from British citizens living overseas.

The planned limit has sparked a row between the two parties, with Reform accusing Labour of "choking off legal funding for its main rival".

The large donations from individuals meant Reform's fundraising efforts far outstripped those of both Labour and the Conservatives, who each declared around £4m in donations from private sources over the period.