Dysfunctional DWP failed to notify some carers that they were accruing enormous debt for years, Liz Sayce’s damning report reveals Full story: Ministers urged to apologise after review finds systemic failures led to carer’s allowance crisis Of all the devastating passages in Liz Sayce’s 146-page criticism of the government’s failing carer’s allowance system, one above all leaps out. It describes how some felt so “overwhelmed”, ashamed and criminalised they considered killing themselves. One even investigated whether their fine would be cancelled if they died, only to find the government would still chase their family. Continue reading...

Chancellor’s fiscal statement billed as decisive moment for fate of Starmer government as she tries to fill £20bn spending gap Rachel Reeves will promise to tackle Britain’s cost of living crisis and deliver fiscal stability in Wednesday’s budget, which is billed as a decisive moment for the fate of Keir Starmer’s beleaguered government. The chancellor will say she will do what is needed to shore up the economy as she raises billions of pounds worth of taxes to help offset lower than expected growth forecasts. Continue reading...

This four-year experiment has produced exhilarating cricket – it is worth seeing the whole thing through before casting judgment Travis Head’s latest masterpiece is three days old, the postmortems are complete and England supporters have done their pained vox pops in Australia. And somehow we’re still more than a week out from the second Ashes Test. It’s a hefty gap bound to be filled by rage, moving from the defeat in Perth to the preparation for a pink‑ball affair in Brisbane. England’s first-stringers could pass the time with a day‑night knockabout against a prime minister’s XI in Canberra. Instead, as planned, it will be a Lions side that plays this weekend, joined by Josh Tongue, Matt Potts and Jacob Bethell, unused squad members in Perth. It is understandable why this has annoyed many, why Michael Vaughan’s soundbite – that it would be “amateurish” not to play the fixture – carries some substance. Continue reading...

Now that my former classmate has finally spoken about the allegations of his behaviour at school, I feel compelled to address his points directly I had thought my Dulwich days were well behind me and that I’d never again have to think about the antisemitic taunts I suffered from Nigel Farage at school. Then at some point in the late 2000s, a friend sent me a YouTube video of the then Ukip leader haranguing EU commissioners. The instant I saw Farage, my blood froze. All I could think of was his 13-year-old self sidling up to me, growling the words “Hitler was right” and other odious remarks (“To the gas chambers”, “Gas them – ssssssssss”) which he now refers to, rather quaintly, as banter. The verb “trigger” is perhaps overused, but it’s the only word I can think of to describe the stomach-churning emotions I felt in that moment I laid eyes on him again on YouTube. Peter Ettedgui is a Bafta- and Emmy-winning director and producer. Continue reading...

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⚽ Champions League updates from the 8pm GMT kick-off ⚽ Live scores | Tables | Sign up to Football Daily | Mail Scott Chelsea make five changes to their starting XI after the 2-0 win at Burnley on Saturday. Moisés Caicedo, Estêvão, Alejandro Garnacho, Wesley Fofana and Malo Gusto come in for João Pedro, Andrey Santos, Liam Delap, Jamie Gittens and Tosin Adarabioyo, all of whom drop to the bench. Barcelona have plenty of goals in their starting XI. Ferran Torres leads the way with nine so far this season, while Robert Lewandowski has eight, Fermín López seven, and Lamine Yamal six. Marcus Rashford (six) and Raphinha (three) must make do with the bench. Continue reading...

Liverpool on run of six defeats in seven league matches ‘You would never have expected us to have lost so much’ Arne Slot has admitted he feels guilty about Liverpool’s “ridiculous” slump, one no on at the club envisaged, and said he must prove himself to everyone at Anfield on a daily basis. Slot is dealing with the worst run of his managerial career after Nottingham Forest inflicted a sixth defeat in seven Premier League games, and eighth defeat in 11 matches in all competitions, on the champions on Saturday. Cody Gakpo described the 3-0 reverse at home to Sean Dyche’s team as a “kind of embarrassment”. Continue reading...

⚽ Updates from the 8pm GMT kick-offs around Europe ⚽ Live scoreboard | Table | And sign up to Football Daily Wesley Fofana, Moises Caicedo, Alejandro Garnacho, Malo Gusto and Estevao all come into the Chelsea side. Out go Tosin Adarabioyo, Andrey Santos, Jamie Gittens, Joao Pedro and Liam Delap. Lamine Yamal starts for Barcelona; Marcus Rashford is on the bench. Continue reading...

Ex-president to start serving term in 12 sq metre bedroom in police base in Brasília after time for appeals elapses Brazil’s former president, Jair Bolsonaro, has been ordered to start serving his 27-year sentence in a 12 sq metre bedroom in a police base in the capital, Brasília, after his conviction for plotting a coup. The far-right populist, who governed Latin America’s largest democracy from 2019 until 2022, was handed the punishment in September after the supreme court found him guilty of leading a criminal conspiracy to stop his leftwing rival, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, taking power. Continue reading...

The DWP’s punitive approach to benefit overpayments has caused unnecessary suffering The callous treatment of thousands of carer’s allowance claimants reflects appallingly on the priorities and leadership of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), and throws doubt on its capacity to learn. Liz Sayce’s independent review of the overpayments scandal exposed by the Guardian makes it clear that this benefit, which is mostly claimed by older women, was frequently an afterthought for officials. While Labour has begun to make improvements, there is still no single senior civil servant with overall responsibility for solving problems that have been in the public domain for years. Labour deserves credit for ordering this review, and for raising the earnings threshold so that claimants can now earn £196 a week after tax before losing the allowance, which is paid to people who spend at least 35 hours a week caring for a disabled relative. But ministers and officials have a great deal more work to do. Detail of how outstanding debts totalling £250m will be dealt with has not been announced. Reform of the benefit’s cliff-edge design – which means that claimants whose earnings exceed the limit lose their entire weekly allowance – has yet to be proposed, let alone introduced. Then there is the issue of whether hundreds of people who were taken to court at the DWP’s urging, and prosecuted for fraud, should have their convictions wiped, or receive some form of compensation. Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...

Labour is putting in place some laudable reforms. But councils need to be given financial sustainability and enabled to move beyond crisis management In a sobering report on public services published last month, the Institute for Government (IfG) struck an almost lyrical note when recalling the performance of England’s councils before they were kneecapped by austerity. “When [Labour] last left office, in 2010,” the report notes, “local authorities provided many services beyond their statutory duties that supported people to live better lives. Authorities ran more Sure Start centres and operated many more libraries. Youth clubs, and youth services, were a common feature of neighbourhoods up and down the country.” It was a different era, and one with priorities that the present government is committed to reinstating. Since returning to power, Labour has been making laudable incremental moves to that end. Last week, the local government minister, Alison McGovern, outlined a funding shake-up intended to redirect resources towards more deprived areas, where councils suffered disproportionately from austerity cuts. Multi-year financial settlements will give councils more certainty and control, while cities will welcome new backing for a modest tourist levy on overnight stays. Continue reading...

Regulator says 24 are at more immediate risk and may have to stop degree courses within next 12 months Fifty higher education providers in England are at risk of exiting the market within the next two to three years, MPs on the House of Commons education committee have been told as part of their inquiry into university funding and the threat of insolvency. The evidence follows last week’s gloomy forecast from England’s higher education regulator, the Office for Students (OfS), which warned that three in four universities were likely to be in the red next year as financial turmoil continues in the sector. Continue reading...

Brett Ratner, accused of sexual misconduct by several women, will bring his hit franchise back to the big screen Rush Hour 4 is reportedly a go at Paramount – after Donald Trump intervened on behalf of the movie. The studio will now release the next sequel by Brett Ratner, the director, who had retreated from Hollywood after numerous allegations of sexual misconduct during the #MeToo movement. Continue reading...

With one former MEP jailed for taking Russian bribes, Reform UK was under the spotlight – so no better time for its leader to make a swift exit Just occasionally the House of Commons is more remarkable for who isn’t in the chamber than for who is. So it was striking that Nigel Farage was absent for Keir Starmer’s statement on the G20 summit and the Ukraine peace process. You might have thought the man who has spent the last six months telling anyone who will listen that he will be the next prime minister might take some interest in geopolitics and Britain’s global standing. Apparently not. Only Richard Tice from Reform stayed for the session. Lee Anderson scarpered the moment it started. So brave. Maybe he had an urgent appointment with his lunch. Continue reading...

The radical plan from David Lammy has been criticised by senior lawyers, who say it could ‘destroy justice as we know it’ Jury trials for all except the most serious crimes such as rape, murder and manslaughter are set to be scrapped under radical proposals drawn up by David Lammy. In proposals that drew a swift backlash from senior lawyers, who said that they would not reduce court backlogs and could “destroy justice as we know it”, the justice secretary has proposed that juries will only pass judgment on public interest offences with possible prison sentences of more than five years. Continue reading...

Head coach’s current deal runs until 2027 RFU annual report shows net loss of £1.9m The Rugby Football Union has no plans to begin talks with Steve Borthwick over extending his contract beyond 2027 “for the foreseeable future” despite England’s 11-match winning streak and autumn clean sweep. Borthwick’s contract runs until the end of 2027 but with England halfway through the current World Cup cycle and currently third in the world rankings, the RFU chief executive, Bill Sweeney, has no immediate intentions of discussing an extension in a sea change from the union’s previous approach. Continue reading...

Chancellor says people must be ‘properly rewarded for their hard work’ with 16- to 21-year-olds also in line for raise Millions of low-paid workers in the UK are to get a pay rise of 4.1% next year, as Rachel Reeves confirmed that minimum wage rates will go up as part of the government’s ambition to improve living standards. The national living wage will rise from £12.21 to £12.71 an hour from April for over-21s, which the government said would increase the annual earnings of about 2.4 million workers by £900. A year in Westminster: John Crace, Marina Hyde and Pippa Crerar. On Tuesday 2 December, join Crace, Hyde and Crerar as they look back with special guests at another extraordinary year, live at the Barbican in London and livestreamed globally. Book tickets here Continue reading...

Kingfisher raises profit expectations for financial year from £480m-£540m to £540m-£570m Just what an embattled chancellor needs on the eve of a tax-raising budget: a leading retailer upping its profits forecast and singing about the joys of the UK economy. Unfortunately, only the first bit is true. Kingfisher, owner of B&Q and Screwfix (and similar businesses in France and Poland), raised its profit expectations for its current financial year from £480m-£540m to £540m-£570m. Continue reading...

‘We are not there yet,’ Mikel Arteta said on club’s standing Bayern visit Arsenal in Champions League on Wednesday Mikel Arteta believes Arsenal remain in a “different universe” to European heavyweights such as Real Madrid and Bayern Munich given they have yet to win the Champions League. The Premier League leaders head into their meeting with Bayern at the Emirates Stadium on Wednesday having won all four matches so far in the league phase and are the only team yet to concede a goal. Continue reading...

Parliamentary group urges government to clamp down on overseas territories before flagship anti-corruption summit The UK government has been accused of caving-in to pressure from the British Virgin Islands by allowing it to limit access to a register of company share ownership to only those deemed to have a legitimate interest. The restriction, due to be discussed at a meeting starting on Tuesday between Foreign Office ministers and leaders of the British overseas territories (BOTs) in London, is in defiance of legislation passed by the UK government as long ago as 2008 that would make the register available to all. Continue reading...

Villagers demonstrate against drive for alternative funeral practices instead of burial to preserve land resources Protests have erupted in China’s southern Guizhou province, the latest in a string of rural demonstrations that have seen incidents of unrest increase by 70% compared with last year. The protests in Shidong town started over the weekend in response to a directive from local authorities that people should be cremated rather than buried after their death. Continue reading...

Readers respond to the official report on the handling of the pandemic Re your report (‘Too little, too late’: damning report condemns UK’s Covid response, 20 November), shortly after lockdown began, my family lost an aunt and uncle within an hour of each other to Covid in different hospitals in Manchester. Their son was in a third in A&E, also with Covid, but survived. Six months later my father, who was in hospital recuperating from major surgery, was rushed out of the building late at night because of a fear of Covid on the ward. Within two weeks, he died of Covid. On the day he died, my mother tested positive and spent the next two weeks grieving in isolation. I could not visit as I lived 200 miles away and respected the travel ban. At his funeral, we followed the rules, so a very small number of people could attend. My father was such a part of the local community that people lined the roads around the cemetery, everyone respecting social distancing. I could not hug my mother at the funeral because we were not in the same bubble. Continue reading...

While such institutions have intrinsic value, that doesn’t mean they are entitled to be socially favoured or economically exceptional for ever, says Jianyang Geng In today’s evolving educational landscape, liberal arts institutions must confront a hard reality: reverence for tradition does not justify resistance to reform (Universities blame ‘societal shift’ for axing foreign language degrees, 21 November). For too long, these colleges have clung to the notion of being uniquely “noble”, insulated from market pressures and buffered by government funding and external endowments. While liberal arts institutions do have intrinsic value, that doesn’t mean they are entitled to be socially favoured or economically exceptional for ever. Continue reading...

Dr Talia Hussain says there is no incentive for lecturers to invest hours preparing a module they may teach only once I disagree with the decision of lecturers to use artificial intelligence to create teaching materials (‘We could have asked ChatGPT’: students fight back over course taught by AI, 20 November), though I understand the pressures and incentives that they are responding to. As a recent doctoral graduate, I can only get fixed or zero-hours teaching contracts. Each taught hour may take days of preparation that is not accounted for in the pay formula. I have developed material including work plans, assessments, reading lists and tutorial tasks for three different modules, requiring much more time than I was paid for. If I were able to reuse these materials, my time investment would pay off. Budget cuts and hiring freezes meant that I delivered these modules once. There is simply no incentive for someone to invest time in a module that they may teach only once on a precarious contract. Continue reading...

Listen to Reason | Wright Hassall | KG Forecast | Wideopen dentists? | Twiggs and Branch | Mutton the butcher | Medical practice | Dr Alright Talking of nominative determinism (Letters, 24 November), I’ve often said that the world would be a better place if people would just listen to Reason. Liz Reason Charlbury, Oxfordshire • My wife is dealing with solicitors after the deaths of her parents. Their name is Wright Hassall. James Cassidy Norwich Continue reading...