Good news from Mission Control | The No 10 press office briefing on this morning's cabinet meeting said: "The prime minister thanked cabinet for its work on the upcoming King's Speech, which will support the government's central mission of economic growth." As if by magic, the IMF upgraded its forecast for the UK at about the same time, predicting 0.7 per cent growth this year, instead of 0.5 per cent. This is no more to do with the Labour government than the official figure for growth in May – 0.4 per cent in just one month – that was published last week. Labour's "mission" of achieving the highest growth in the G7 remains as far out of reach as ever, with the IMF still forecasting that the US and Canada will both grow faster than the UK this year and next. But the upgrade does raise the intriguing possibility that Rachel Reeves, the new chancellor, could benefit from better economic news than expected, even as she tries to convince us that her inheritance from the Conservative government is utterly disastrous. | |
| Which Zone 1 London Underground station has the same name as a station on the Paris Metro? | Answer at the bottom of today's email | |
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| | The Labour government hits the ground reviewing | |
| | Kate Devlin reveals more of the real reasons the former prime minister called a snap election | |
| | Labour leader in Wales said it had been an 'honour' but he will 'begin the process of stepping down' | |
| What else you need to know today | - Clive Lewis, the show-off Labour MP for Norwich South, had to affirm his loyalty to the King again, having left out some of the required words first time round in a republican protest
- I have written that the real tests of Keir Starmer's government are nothing to do with the King's Speech
- I wrote at the weekend about Rachel Reeves copying George Osborne's strategy of blaming the other side for "crashing the economy", even if the state of the public finances was mostly not the previous government's fault
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| Will the King's Speech deliver division in the Labour Party? |
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| Labour's New Deal for Working People is a flagship policy that has already split the party as Keir Starmer stands accused of watering down the bill to benefit employers... Read more |
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| Tomorrow inside the Westminster bubble | Our political commentator Andrew Grice on what to look out for | A big day for the new government, as the King's Speech sets out its programme of legislation for the year ahead. The day starts with the monthly inflation figure, published at 7am. The state opening of parliament begins when MPs gather in the Commons at 11.25am, before being summoned to the Lords to hear the King read the speech.
MPs resume at 2.30pm for their first day of debate on the speech. Two backbenchers will be followed by Rishi Sunak, in his first major address as leader of the opposition, before Keir Starmer speaks.
Later the prime minister will host Simon Harris, his Irish counterpart, at Chequers ahead of the European Political Community summit at Blenheim Palace on Thursday.
John Healey, the defence secretary, will speak at the chief of the air staff's annual conference. | |
| "What is the first truly Islamist country that will get a nuclear weapon? Maybe it is Iran, maybe Pakistan already kind of counts, and then we finally decided that it's actually the UK – since Labour just took over" JD Vance, Donald Trump's running mate in the US presidential election, last week |
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