Minister insists Labour not committed to living wage for over-18s before election, despite manifesto pledge – UK politics live

Torsten Bell says manifesto ‘did not set out the timeline’ for changes to living wage after scale of youth unemployment crisis revealed in Milburn report In their London Playbook briefing for Politico, Sam Blewett and Noah Keate say the government still has not got a date for the publication of the long-awaited defence investment plan (DIP) – even though next week will mark a year since the publication of the strategic defence review, which identified the defence spending requirements the investment plan is supposed to fund. They say: Despite military buffs being marched up the hill by numerous positive-sounding reports in recent weeks, Whitehall officials concede that the DIP won’t be coming next week. And that means blowing past an awkward milestone – because Tuesday marks a whole year since the publication of the strategic defence review, which necessitated the investment plan. Problem is … the plan hasn’t been signed off because it hasn’t been decided how the £18bn spending uplift will be funded. There are clearly difficult “trade-offs,” as one person in Whitehall put it, in paying for all the jets, drones and attack subs needed to bring the British military up to speed. But time really is ticking to get this announced … It’s shambolic and dangerous that, as we approach a year since the strategic defence review was published, the defence investment plan is still nowhere to be found. At a time when we face an increasingly aggressive Kremlin and an unreliable ally in the White House, ministers must stop hiding and publish the DIP immediately. You cannot defend the country with a pile of unpublished reports. The Ministry of Defence is at significant risk of fraud and economic crime, with high expenditure, complex procurement, and a global workforce split between the armed forces and civil service. But over the last four years it has recouped on average just 48p for every £1 it spent tackling fraud – well below the government’s expectation of saving £3 for every £1 spent. So far, the department has not responded to the fraud threats it faces with the degree of focus and leadership that we would expect, and it cannot demonstrate that it is doing enough to protect valuable public funds that should be available to bolster the UK’s defence capability. There must be a radical change of culture within the MoD if the flow of funds lost to fraudulent activity is to be stemmed. The apparent normalisation of fraud in the procurement process is symptomatic of a wider issue; there is no overarching strategy within the MoD of how to tackle fraud and economic crime. We are turning that around, and last year we saved £1.34 for every £1 spent on counter-fraud measures, significantly increased on 33p for every £1 spent in 2023/24, and we expect this to be further improved this year. We have zero tolerance for fraud and corruption and we will continue to strengthen our controls, exploiting the latest technology to prevent and detect fraud and protecting taxpayers’ money as we help keep the UK secure at home and strong abroad. Continue reading...