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Reform's £72m donations 'entirely in line with law', Jenrick says

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Reform UK’s £72m donations may be caught by new bill, Rayner suggests
Minister points to legislation’s retrospective effect, but Reform says it is confident funding is within the law UK politics live – latest updates Reform UK’s record £72m in donations from two crypto billionaires could be caught in a new bill which will apply retrospectively, a cabinet minister has suggested. Labour MPs have voiced anger on internal WhatsApp groups that the government did not act last week to restrict domestic donations in the elections bill after two donors – Christopher Harborne and Ben Delo – gave Reform UK a total of £72m over the weekend. Continue reading...

Reform’s Robert Jenrick ‘very confident’ £72m donations are ‘perfectly legal’ – UK politics live
Party’s economic spokesperson says donations are a ‘breakthrough moment’ as Labour’s Angela Rayner warns of possible retrospective action Christopher Harborne matches £36m Reform donation of Ben Delo Analysis: Donations of £72m make Reform’s prospects both rosier and riskier Just wanted to highlight this statement too from Jenrick, insisting to both the BBC and Sky this morning that wealthy donors wouldn’t get formal favours, if Reform were to come into power. He said “there are all these people in the House of Lords who are Tory donors. 24 out of the last 25 Tory Party treasurers sit in the House of Lords.” “ Reform is different. We are not going to give peerages, or knighthoods, to people who go around giving us donations,” he says. A reminder that Jenrick was a Tory MP for 12 years (and the former shadow justice secretary) before defecting to Reform in January of this year. More from

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Campaigners say at current glacial pace some unpaid carers will die before receiving a refund Unpaid carers who were pursued for bills for thousands of pounds after welfare officials unlawfully changed benefit rules could wait years before learning whether they will get the money back, campaigners have warned. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) is working through 200,000 cases where carer’s allowance benefit recipients were incorrectly given overpayments. An estimated 25,000 carers could receive full or partial refunds. Continue reading...

Warning: our democracy won’t survive the death of reading. Read on if you still can | John Harris
While fascists protest in UK ports and purvey nonsense and poison online, ever fewer people have the perspective or analytical tools to challenge them Imagine this. Quite by chance, your TikTok feed presents you with footage of the fascists who recently took part in highly organised shows of strength in Dover and Portsmouth (and, on Wednesday, outside the London offices of the Daily Mail , demanding a new house for the mother of their leader, Daniel “Tommo” Thomas). For as long as the images hold your attention, you see and hear flashes of explanation, but then, as usual, you scroll away to someone leaping off a tall building, a fight on the London Underground, or a trick-performing dog. Hypothetically, TikTok users are able to skip through 260 videos in under 35 minutes . And it’s this distracted, quick-fire way that so many people receive information that may be responsible for a worry

How a young woman became an ISIS bride — and then an informant, helping save others
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Burnham must understand Wales is ‘not a region in England’, says first minister
Rhun ap Iorwerth, the first non-Labour Senedd leader, questions Westminster’s willingness to relinquish powers Andy Burnham has to be serious about devolution and understand that Wales is a nation and “not a region in England”, according to the country’s first minister. Rhun ap Iorwerth, who is the first non-Labour leader of the Senedd since devolution, told the Guardian that while he was encouraged by initial discussions with the new UK prime minister, he was wary about Burnham being captured by a consensus Westminster view against relinquishing further powers. Continue reading...