Ten Things You Need to Know Today: 13 September 2023

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1. Blair warns Starmer on tax
2. 'Controversial' pensions tweak considered
3. Libya toll could pass 5,000
4. Wallace warns of rights 'lunacy'
5. Met investigates shop incident
6. Commuters facing eye-watering fares
7. Poll finds sadness among girls
8. Warning on voter ID law
9. Spies warned Tories on candidates
10. BP boss quits ahead of review

published 13 September 2023

1. Blair warns Starmer on tax

Labour should hold onto the centre ground and resist "taxing and spending" its way out of economic turmoil, said Tony Blair. Speaking to the Financial Times, the former PM praised Keir Starmer with bringing his party back from "the brink of extinction", but said the party leader would have to contend with a far more challenging situation than the one he faced when he took power in 1997. He said Starmer's "got a good chance" of winning the next election but will take over a country "that’s in a mess". Starmer has been "open" about seeking the advice of Blair and Gordon Brown on moving into government, said The Telegraph.

Ministers may "tweak" the calculation of the state pension increase in order to reduce the cost to the taxpayer of next year’s rise, said the inews site. Pensioners are due an 8.5% rise in their income next year, but minsters are reportedly considering whether to take out the public sector bonuses on the earnings figure, which could mean an increase of around 7.8% instead. "Any change to the way the state pension is calculated" would be "controversial", said The Guardian, because the Conservatives pledged in their last election manifesto to abide by the formula.

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More than 5,300 people are feared dead after flooding hit Libya, said Sky News. Bodies recovered from the devastating flood, which wiped out parts of Derna in eastern Libya, have been buried in mass graves. The situation the port city where two dams burst over the weekend, has been described as "disastrous beyond comprehension", as the Red Cross and local officials said at least 10,000 people were missing after the devastating floods. Storm Daniel "hit eastern Libya hard", said the Libya Herald.

Human rights laws are jeopardising national security and allowing terrorists to go "uncaptured", claimed Ben Wallace, the former defence secretary. The Tory said that international treaties such as the European Convention on Human Rights were forcing defence secretaries to choose between killing individuals by drones, or allowing them to continue plotting terror campaigns. Speaking to The Telegraph, he said "this lunacy of being unable to render people across borders or arrest people in countries whose police forces are unacceptable", means that the UK is "more often than not forced into taking lethal action than actually raiding and detaining".

The Metropolitan police are investigating an incident at a hair products shop in south London after a video appeared online apparently showing a black female customer being grabbed by the throat by a man attempting to restrain her. Officers were called out to the shop in Peckham on Monday, and appealed for calm after protesters gathered outside the store on Tuesday. BBC reporter Guy Lynn said he had been told of previous tensions between the black community and some local shopkeepers. The London mayor, Sadiq Khan, said he was "urgently seeking further information" about the incident.

Rail commuters in England are facing the "biggest fare increase since privatisation", said The Times. Fares will "jump" by almost 8% in March if ministers adopt the same formula as they did for this year’s increase, said the paper. The government aligned this year’s cap on fare increases with Britain’s average weekly earnings growth for July last year, which was 5.9%, and new official data showed that average weekly earnings rose by 8% in July this year. The Campaign for Better Transport, said that "rather than hammer rail passengers yet again", ministers should "freeze rail fares".

A "devastating" poll has found that happiness among girls and young women has hit its lowest level since 2009. Nine out of 10 seven to 21-year-olds are worried or anxious, found the researchers for Girlguiding, and only 17% of that age group now feel very happy, compared with 40% in 2009. "If I am honest", one girl told the researchers, "I am scared our world will fall into ruins and we won’t be able to do anything about it".

The government’s election watchdog has warned that hundreds of thousands of people could be excluded from voting in a UK general election because of voter ID laws. The Electoral Commission said that the laws could have a disproportionate effect on poorer people, those with disabilities and people from minority ethnic backgrounds. The government should take urgent action, it suggested, by drawing up a wider list of documents that people can show to vote and allowing people without ID to have someone else vouch for their identity.

MI5 "secretly warned" the Conservative Party that two of its potential candidates to become MPs could be spies for the Chinese state, said The Times. The security service contacted the party about two people in 2021 and 2022 and advised that they should not be on the central list of candidates because of fears that the pair had links to the United Front Work Department, a body charged with influencing global policy and opinion. A source said it was "made very clear" that the two candidates "posed a risk", and "they were subsequently blocked from the candidates list".

The boss of BP has resigned as chief executive amid a review of his personal relationships with colleagues. The oil giant said Bernard Looney, who had led the company since 2020, was stepping down with immediate effect. BP said it has started an inquiry into alleged relationships Looney had with colleagues. BP has "strong values" and the board "expects everyone at the company to behave in accordance with those values", said a spokesperson. The company informed investors that Looney "did not provide details of all relationships and accepts he was obliged to make more complete disclosure".

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