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Courts backlog will fall despite scrapping of jury trial plan, minister says

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Badenoch says Tories want policies ‘for everybody’ as she defends plan to let millionaires get free childcare – UK politics live
Conservative leader defends plan to extend free childcare to high earners, as Tory conference begins in Birmingham today On Friday the Times revealed that Katie Lam , the communities secretary, told a meeting in private earlier this year that the state pension system needs a fundamental overhaul. Speaking in June, when she was a frontbencher but not yet in the shadow cabinet, Lam was asked at a meeting with activists if she thought the pensions triple lock was sustainable. She replied: Ultimately I think what we will need in the end is an entirely new pension system. I mean, a baby that is born today has a 20% chance of living to be 100 and I don’t think we can fund one in five people half of their lives, you know, for the first 20 and the last 30 years. But obviously if you are 90 you probably can’t go out and get a job right, so I think you have to be realistic about how you would tape
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Badenoch unveils plan to end £100,000 childcare 'cliff edge' ahead of Tory conference
The Conservative leader tells the BBC the earnings threshold for government support stops people "working harder".

Court quashes block on mothers and children in Gaza joining families in UK
Immigration court judge finds ‘unsafe journeys’ policy was applied unlawfully to two families A decision by the Home Office to block mothers and children in Gaza from joining their families in the UK has been quashed by a court. Families abroad who have had their applications approved to reunite with loved ones in the UK usually have to undergo biometric checks, including fingerprinting and facial images at a visa application centre. But the VAC in Gaza has been closed since October 2023 and it is difficult to get out of the territory. Continue reading...

Can teaching schoolchildren about Britain’s role in the transatlantic slave trade remain optional? | Morgan Ofori
Mounting evidence about how slavery shaped Britain shows that teaching about its history cannot be a matter of choice I often think back to my years as a secondary school history teacher, and to what I was and wasn’t able to teach. History is a foundational subject in England, taught to children from the age of five to 14 to build critical thinking, weigh evidence and help pupils understand the world they’ve inherited. The key stage 3 national curriculum , covering ages 11 to 14, states that pupils should understand how “Britain has influenced and been influenced by the wider world”, including a historically grounded understanding of empire. Continue reading...