The Prime Minister will release the Office for Budget Responsibility forecast on November 23, despite calls for an earlier release of the report.
Liz Truss and chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng are rejecting calls to publish the tax body’s assessment despite the market turmoil.
Ms Truss and Mr Kwarteng held an emergency meeting this morning with Richard Hughes, chairman of the OBR, which appeared to last less than 50 minutes.
Shortly after the meeting with No 10, the OBR said it would deliver “an initial forecast” on October 7 on “the economic and fiscal outlook and the impact of government policies”.
In a statement, the OBR said: “The forecast will, as always, be based on our independent judgment about the economic and fiscal outlook and the impact of government policies.”
Kwarteng unveiled a series of tax cuts last week in a fiscal state that fell short of the OBR’s forecasts. The forecaster said he had offered to prepare a draft for the new chancellor in time for the mini-budget, but it was not accepted.
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Lawyers will vote next week on whether to end the strike, part one
Lawyers will be asked to vote next week on whether to end strike action following a government pay offer.
A poll for members of the Criminal Bar Association (CBA) will open on Tuesday and close on Sunday, a spokesman said. The decision will be announced on Monday, October 10.
The body agreed to re-vote members after talks with the new justice secretary, Brandon Lewis, in which he decided to propose further reforms to the government’s fees for legal aid advocacy work, he said the Ministry of Justice (MoJ).
The deal represents “an additional investment of £54m in criminal advocacy and solicitors”, according to the department.
Criminal lawyers in England and Wales are engaged in a continuing slump after a row with the government intensified over fees and conditions.
Before they went on strike every other week and refused to do certain types of work.
There had been anger that a 15% rise in fees for lawyers due from the end of September – meaning they will earn £7,000 more per year – would only apply to new cases and not those who are already waiting to be treated. with the courts.
But now the Ministry of Justice has said the fee hike will apply to the “vast majority of cases currently before the Crown court”, as well as offering a pay rise for lawyers, with new measures which will be announced in the coming weeks.
This is despite the department previously saying it had “repeatedly explained” to the CBA that retroactive pay would require a “fundamental change” in the way fees are paid, adding: “This reform would cost a disproportionate amount of taxpayers’ money and it would take longer. to implement, meaning lawyers would have to wait longer for payment.”
Maryam Zakir-Hussain September 30, 2022 7:43 p.m
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Green Party calls for £75bn tax package for polluters and rich
The Green Party has called for a £75bn emergency tax package aimed at polluters and the country’s wealthiest individuals, to fund a national insulation and renewable energy programme.
At the party’s annual conference in Harrogate, co-leader Carla Denyer called for a new wealth tax for the richest 1% of households, starting with a marginal rate of 1% for those with 3 .4 million pounds, rising to 10% for those with £. 18.2 million and more.
He said there should be a “gross profits tax” on North Sea oil and gas that would be used as a stepping stone to a permanent carbon tax on polluting industries.
And he said the Government’s new energy price cap should be extended to limit the price of oil and gas to where it was last October, while the five energy retailers should to nationalize
“We have the leakiest houses in Europe – we lose huge amounts of energy through poorly sealed windows and poorly lined walls,” he said.
“We could be saving hundreds, thousands of pounds through insulation, reducing energy waste, reducing bills and emissions. It’s not really rocket science. The cheapest bill is the one you don’t have to pay.”
His co-leader Adrian Ramsay added: “Rich people are getting richer and everyone else is getting poorer and more distressed, and the new Prime Minister, as we suspect, is doing everything she can to maintain that status what
“She has doubled down on the Tories’ lack of compassion and awareness of people’s real-life concerns as the cost of living crisis is allowed to continue and increase in pace.
“This government is nothing short of dangerous.”
Maryam Zakir-Hussain September 30, 2022 7:03 p.m
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Polls find growing anticipation that Starmer will become prime minister
Half of the public now believe Sir Keir Starmer is likely to become Prime Minister, as expectations grow of a Labor general election victory amid problems for the government.
A poll of 1,000 adults by Ipsos found 51% think Sir Keir will go into No.10, up from 38% polled in May.
More than a third of voters (35%) said Sir Keir was unlikely to become prime minister, down from 50% in January.
Half of those polled on September 28-29 said they think Prime Minister Liz Truss is doing a bad job, with fewer than one in five (18%) saying she is doing a good job.
This compares with 26% who thought Boris Johnson was performing well just before he announced his resignation in July.
The poll also found that 39% of Tory voters in 2019 believe Ms Truss is doing a poor job, while 18% say she is doing a good job.
The findings come amid widespread criticism of the government’s economic strategy, with the pound falling in value after Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-budget last week.
The proportion of respondents who say a Labor government led by Sir Keir would do a better job than the Tories has risen to 41%, compared to 36% last month when Johnson was still prime minister.
This is the highest percentage since Ipsos started asking the question in 2021.
Maryam Zakir-Hussain September 30, 2022 6:19 p.m
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City cancels bonfire night to focus finances on cost-of-living crisis
One of England’s biggest cities has canceled its bonfire night because it says it needs to focus all its finances on tackling the cost of living crisis.
Leeds has scrapped all six fireworks shows as it struggles with budget pressures caused by rising energy and food bills.
The cuts are part of the Labor council’s efforts to cut all “non-essential” spending in another sign of the problems caused by rising inflation.
My colleague Colin Drury has more:
City cancels bonfire night to focus finances on cost-of-living crisis
Rising energy and food bills mean the council says it must cut all non-essential spending, including fireworks
Maryam Zakir-Hussain September 30, 2022 5:40 p.m
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One in five are looking for better paying work to cope with rising costs
Around one in five adults are looking for new work to maintain their standard of living as costs rise, new data shows.
Almost everyone (91%) surveyed by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said their costs had risen in the past year.
As a result, 19% of working adults said they were looking for a job that pays more money, which could include a promotion or moving to another employer, the ONS said.
Additionally, 15% said they are working extra hours at their jobs because costs are rising and they need more money. About 4% said they had taken on another job to help cover their costs.
The survey found that 7% will work more often to save on their energy bills.
The research was published a day before the new price cap on energy bills comes into force.
Under the cap, households will pay 34p. per unit of electricity and 10.3 p. per unit of gas they use.
For the typical household (2.4 people as calculated by Ofgem), this will mean bills of £2,500 a year. But of course that depends on how much power they use.
The calculation is based on 2,900 units of electricity and 12,000 of gas, plus the ongoing charges that all households pay regardless of how much they use.
But the ONS data contains at least some light at the end of the tunnel.
While 91% of people said their costs have increased in the past year, only 73% said they had increased in the past month, indicating that households are seeing what they think they are having at least some respite.
Maryam Zakir-Hussain September 30, 2022 5:10 p.m
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Dignity Funeral Home considers ‘fuel surcharge’ for cremations on top of high energy costs
Funeral group Dignity said it is considering introducing a surcharge on cremation services to cushion the impact of higher fuel costs as it announced losses of nearly £50m.
The group, which owns more than 800 funeral homes in the UK, said its revenue had fallen by £8.6m as a result of the lower post-Covid death rate.
There were almost 400,000 fewer deaths in the first three months of this year compared to the same period last year, Dignity said.
It operated at a loss of £48m in the first half of the year, a big drop from the £41m profit reported a year ago.
The funeral home considers a “fuel surcharge” for cremations on top of energy costs
The group, which owns more than 800 funeral homes in the UK, said its revenue fell by £8.6m as a result of a lower death rate in the UK.
Maryam Zakir-Hussain September 30, 2022 4:45 p.m
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Private tenants abandon Tories amid doubts over promises of new powers for tenants
Private tenants are ditching the Tories amid fears Liz Truss is watering down promises of new powers to challenge bad landlords, a poll has found.
One in three tenants who voted Conservative in the 2019 general election, a total of 400,000 people, now plan to vote for another party, the survey found.
The analysis suggests this so-called ‘rent wall’ could deprive the Tories of key swing seats such as Hastings and Rye, Milton Keynes North and Gloucester, helping to force…