Latest news with #OliverDowden
The National
26-05-2025
- Politics
- The National
It's time to take the UAE-UK relationship to the next level
Oliver Dowden is the MP for Hertsmere and former deputy prime minister of the UK
Daily Mirror
25-05-2025
- Politics
- Daily Mirror
Badenoch denies ignoring security advice over taxpayer funded private driver
Tory leader's comments follows reports she refused a vehicle from the official government car service (GCS) and instead given access to a private driver Kemi Badenoch has denied ignoring security advice over a taxpayer-funded private driver she used to ferry her around as a Cabinet minister. It follows reports the Tory leader refused a vehicle from the official government car service (GCS), which offers a fleet of cars to senior ministers. Instead during her time at the top of government she was given access to a Jaguar and driver from a private firm based in her constituency. It was reported she entered into the arrangement days after being appointed Trade Secretary in September 2022 and after rowing with a GCS worker. The Sunday Times alleged she blamed the driver for being 21 minutes late to her first Cabinet meeting and also argued it was not "fair" for her driver, who lived in Kent, to make a two-hour journey from her house in London. It was also said she was repeatedly advised to stop using the Jaguar over security fears including the risk of the car being bugged. It was also reported Oliver Dowden, the Deputy PM, circulated a memo to the Cabinet at the start of 2025, saying: 'Private hire cars do not provide a secure working environment to conduct sensitive conversations." He added: 'Where it is possible to use the GCS service, this is advisable.' Asked why she ignored security advice, Ms Badenoch dismissed the report as a "nonsense story", telling the BBC on Sunday: "I never ignored security advice. The driver was security cleared, actually recommended by GCS [Government Car Service]. It was a contract that had been in place for about five years and I renewed that contract. "A memo was sent by someone who was unfamiliar with the contract asking about security concerns, and other civil servants said there were no security concerns. That's the end of the matter." She added: "What is destructive is that someone leaks a memo without seeing the full picture." But a Labour Party spokesman said: ' Kemi Badenoch must explain why she hired a private chauffeur at taxpayers' expense rather than relying on the government car service like other ministers. The Tory leader cannot just dismiss the security concerns that were raised at the time and hard working families deserve to know how much this extravagant arrangement cost." The Conservative Party has been contacted for comment.
The Guardian
07-05-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
Tory Brexiters contradict Badenoch criticism of UK-India trade deal
A series of senior Conservatives have contradicted Kemi Badenoch after she criticised a landmark UK-India trade deal because it temporarily exempts seconded Indian workers from national insurance payments in the UK. Tories including Oliver Dowden, who was deputy prime minister under Rishi Sunak, said the deal should be hailed as a dividend of Brexit that would bring economic growth and cheaper goods from India. The deal was announced on Tuesday after more than three years of negotiations. It cuts tariffs on a series of goods and will add an estimated £4.8bn a year to the UK economy by 2040. In an initial response, the shadow trade secretary, Andrew Griffith, praised it, saying it showed the government recognised 'that reducing cost and burdens on businesses in international trade is a good thing, and that thanks to Brexit, we can do'. But later on Tuesday the tone changed, with Robert Jenrick, the shadow justice secretary – who regularly roams beyond his brief – tweeting that the national insurance exemption, which applies mutually to seconded UK workers in India, showed that 'British workers come last in Starmer's Britain'. Badenoch, the party leader, soon followed suit, saying in a tweet that this was 'two-tier taxes from two-tier Keir'. But several influential Tories and figures from the pro-Brexit camp pointedly disagreed, noting that such opt-outs for seconded workers, which prevent double taxation, were routine in trade deals and had featured in some negotiated under the Conservatives. Dowden, who is still an MP, welcomed the deal, writing on X that it 'builds on significant progress made by [the] previous Conservative government'. Steve Baker, who dealt with trade as a Brexit minister under Theresa May, wrote: 'This deal is great news. It further cements the path which I and others worked so hard to secure … The tax issue will likely turn out to be a red herring. We should be celebrating that a Labour government has furthered free trade in the national interest outside the EU.' Another leading Tory Brexiter, Jacob Rees-Mogg, who was business secretary under Liz Truss, tweeted: 'Cheaper food and drink including rice and tea, footwear and clothing thanks to a welcome trade deal with India. Exactly what Brexit promised.' Praise for the deal – and scepticism about Badenoch's view – also came from some influential Brexit campaigners. In an opinion piece for the Telegraph, Daniel Hannan, a Tory former MEP who is now a peer, wrote that the UK had 'pulled off something that no other country has, at least not on anything like the same scale'. Noting that some people had criticised the deal based on the tax issue, as well because of worries about its impact on migration and apparently uneven tariff reduction, he wrote: 'All three are nonsense.' Shanker Singham, a pro-Brexit trade economist who advised Liam Fox when he was international trade secretary, wrote on X: 'This is a significant achievement for UK trade policy. If the UK can lock in a deal with the US, it will be one of the few countries with deals with the key trade players.' He approvingly retweeted a post from another trade expert who pointed out that in 2012 under the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition, a UK-Chile trade deal exempted seconded Chilean workers from UK national insurance contributions for five years – compared with three years in the India deal. Defending the deal on Wednesday, the business secretary, Jonathan Reynolds, said he expected that the deal overall would bring a net contribution to tax revenues, not a deficit. 'This is not a tangible issue,' he told Sky News. 'This is the Conservatives – and Reform – unable to accept that this Labour government has done what they couldn't do and get this deal across the line.'
The Guardian
07-05-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
Business secretary says critics of UK-India trade deal ‘confused' and ‘British workers are not being undercut'
Good morning. Yesterday the government was able to announce some good news – a major trade deal with India. There is cross-party consensus that trade deals are a good thing, the last Conservative government was working on a trade deal with India too, and at least some Tories were happy to welcome the deal. Oliver Dowden, the former deputy PM, posted this on social media. Welcome progress with conclusion of UK-India FTA. I remember firsthand Jonathan Reynolds's commitment to the relationship from our cross-party delegation to India! Builds on significant progress made by previous Conservative government. Free trade is a win-win for both nations And Jacob Rees-Mogg, the former business secretary who is on the opposite wing of the party to Dowden, posted this. Cheaper food and drink including rice and tea, footwear and clothing thanks to a welcome trade deal with India. Exactly what Brexit promised. But Dowden and Rees-Mogg did not get the memo about the official opposition line. As reported on the blog yesterday afternoon, Kemi Badenoch decided to attack the deal on the grounds that it includes a double contribution convention, which means that Indian workers temporarily living in the UK will not have to pay national insurance contributions for three years – with British workers in India benefiting in the same way. Crucially, Badenoch found an effective means of putting a negative spin on this relatively niche feature of the deal – she described it as 'two-tier' taxation, involving 'tax refunds for Indians not available to us'. Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, was quickly making the same argument too, claiming the government was making it 20% cheaper to employ an Indian worker than a British worker. In a video he said the deal was 'appalling', and claimed it showed Labour had 'in a big, big way betrayed working Britain'. Badenoch has certainly been successful at landing her message with the rightwing papers. Here are some of today's front pages. Telegraph splash Photograph: Telegraph Mail splash Photograph: Daily Mail Times splash Photograph: The Times Jonathan Reynolds, the business secretary, has been giving interviews this morning. His main task was to counter the Tory/Reform UK claims and he insisted that this was a routine feature of trade deals, applying to just a sub-category of workers (employees from firms with operations in both the UK and India, seconded temporarily from one country to another), and the British workers were not being undercut. The Tories and Reform UK were 'confused', he said. He told the Today programme: There is no situation where I would ever tolerate British workers being undercut through any trade agreement we would sign. That is not part of this deal. What the Conservatives are confused about, and Reform as well, is a situation where a business in India seconds someone for a short period of time to the UK, or a UK business seconds a worker to India for a short period of time, where you don't pay in simultaneously now to both social security systems … This is exactly the sort of deal we have with 50 countries already, with the US, Canada, Japan, South Korea, New Zealand. The Conservatives recently, well a few years ago when they were in government, signed one with Chile for five years. So no, British workers are not being undercut. Asked whether the agreement meant Indian workers paying less tax than British counterparts doing the same job, Reynolds told the programme: 'No.' In an interview with Sky News, Reynolds said that the trade deal would generate more than £1bn in extra tax revenues for the Treasury. He said the double contribution convention would cost 'less than a tenth of that'. Here is the agenda for the day. 8.30am: Rhun ap Iorwerth, the Plaid Cymru leader, gives a speech in Cardiff marking one year to go until the next Senedd elections. 9.45am: Pat McFadden, the Cabinet Office minister, gives a speech to the CyberUK conference in Manchester. 10.30am: John Swinney, Scotland's first minister, gives a speech in Edinburgh on SNP strategy running into next year's Holyrood elections. Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, is also giving a speech this morning, at 10.45am, as is the Scottish Consevative leader, Russel Findley, at 12.30pm. 10.55am: Lindsay Hoyle, the Speaker, attends a 'Turning of the Page Ceremony' in the Commons, with the book of remembrance naming MPs killed in both world wars, as part of the VE Day 80th anniversary celebrations. Noon: Keir Starmer faces Kemi Badenoch at PMQs. Lunchtime: Rachel Reeves, the chancellor is visiting a Scotch whisky distillery near Edinburgh to promote the UK-India trade deal (which cuts tariffs on whisky exports to India). 2.30pm: Nick Thomas-Symonds, the Cabinet Office minister, gives evidence to an infected blood inquiry hearing about compensation payment arrangements. If you want to contact me, please post a message below the line when comments are open (normally between 10am and 3pm at the moment), or message me on social media. I can't read all the messages BTL, but if you put 'Andrew' in a message aimed at me, I am more likely to see it because I search for posts containing that word. If you want to flag something up urgently, it is best to use social media. You can reach me on Bluesky at @ The Guardian has given up posting from its official accounts on X but individual Guardian journalists are there, I still have my account, and if you message me there at @AndrewSparrow, I will see it and respond if necessary. I find it very helpful when readers point out mistakes, even minor typos. No error is too small to correct. And I find your questions very interesting too. I can't promise to reply to them all, but I will try to reply to as many as I can, either BTL or sometimes in the blog. Share
Sky News
15-03-2025
- Business
- Sky News
Premiership Rugby rivals and CVC to fund Newcastle Falcons loan
English rugby union's top teams and the sport's private equity backer are in advanced talks to fund a multimillion pound loan to Newcastle Falcons to help it meet financial criteria allowing it to play next season. Sky News has learnt that the nine other Gallagher Premiership Rugby sides, which include current league leaders Bath, Saracens and Harlequins, and CVC Capital Partners are drawing up plans for a loan worth about £4m to the north-east club. The Falcons, who are propping up the Premiership table with just two wins from 11 matches, are said to need the additional funding in order to meet the tests applied by the league's recently created Financial Monitoring Panel. Newcastle's plight comes two years after Worcester, Wasps and London Irish all went out of business, leaving the Premiership with just ten teams. A further loan, which could be finalised within weeks, would require approval by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), according to insiders. The exact size of the loan has yet to be determined but one source said it could be worth between £4m and £5m. Premiership clubs are said to be keen to ensure that any new funding they provide ranks on at least equal terms to emergency loans provided to the sport by the government during the pandemic. In 2021, the then culture secretary, Oliver Dowden, signed off an £88m support package to the top flight of English rugby to ensure the league's survival. Much of that funding has yet to be repaid. CVC, which bought into Premiership Rugby in 2019, owns a 27% stake in the league. Under its stewardship, broadcast audiences and attendances have turned a corner, with total TV audiences up 40% this year - partly as a result of an increase in the number of games being shown. Sponsorship revenues are said to have nearly doubled since CVC's initial investment, with fan interest among the crucial 18-34 age demographic rising by 30% during the last year, according to insiders. The Newcastle loan talks come amid negotiations over a new broadcast rights deal for Premiership Rugby, with sources suggesting this weekend that TNT Sports, the incumbent rights-holder, was expected to agree to a renewal at a premium to the current sum in the coming weeks. One insider said the sport's improving commercial backdrop meant it made sense for Newcastle's nine fellow Premiership clubs and CVC to support the bottom side financially. It emerged last November that Semore Kurdi, who has backed Newcastle Falcons for more than a decade, had put the club up for sale. Rugby executives said this weekend that a number of family offices were among the parties which had expressed an interest in buying the Falcons. It was unclear, however, whether any form of deal was imminent. A takeover would include the club's 30-acre Kingston Park stadium site. The Falcons have been lossmaking for some time, despite Mr Kurdi's moves to cut costs, with Newcastle Falcons spending millions of pounds less on wages than it is permitted to under the sport's salary cap. Of the clubs which collapsed, London Irish has been acquired by a consortium fronted by Eddie Jordan, the former Formula One team-owner, while Wasps said in November that it had secured land in the south-wast to build a new stadium as part of its revival plans. Worcester Warriors said this month it had submitted an application to the Rugby Football Union to enable it to compete again from next season.
