Scotland Office Minister Robin Walker was given a tour of Heriot-Watt University’s world leading robotics facilities as he discussed progress on the creation of a National Robotarium yesterday. Continue reading Government Minister for Scotland visits Edinburgh robotics centre
A major UK Government-supported project has helped over 70,000 people and hundreds of elephants live side-by-side peacefully in Myanmar.
The Asian elephant’s habitat ranges across 13 countries in Asia, but it is an endangered species with less than 40,000 remaining worldwide – less than one-tenth of the African elephant population. Continue reading World Elephant Day: UK Government supports iconic mammals
• Zimbabwe is facing a chronic food crisis and without support more than 5.5 million people will not have access to the food they need by 2020
• International Development Secretary Alok Sharma announces UK aid support to help malnourished children, families and communities following a UN appeal
• He also urges Government of Zimbabwe to act on its promise to deliver fundamental political and economic reforms
Hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans will receive life-saving access to food and water thanks to UK aid as the country faces a potentially catastrophic famine.
International Development Secretary Alok Sharma yesterday announced £49 million of UK aid. This will be given to trusted partners to help malnourished children, families and communities following a UN Zimbabwe appeal.
He also urged the Zimbabwean Government to act on its promise to deliver fundamental political and economic reforms.
International Development Secretary Alok Sharma (above) said: “The Government of Zimbabwe must do more to deliver the promised fundamental political and economic reforms and take responsibility for the humanitarian crisis affecting its people.
“The UK stands with the people of Zimbabwe at a time when millions are at risk of starvation and disease. Through trusted partners we will continue to give families access to food and clean water, and support children to gain a decent education.”
Zimbabwe is facing a chronic food crisis as crops have been devastated by the effects of drought, economic crisis and a powerful cyclone. Without support, more than 5.5 million people in Zimbabwe will not have access to the food they need by 2020.
The food crisis is closely linked to the economic challenges in Zimbabwe which has led to high unemployment and high inflation.
Having already experienced outbreaks of cholera following the devastation of Cyclone Idai earlier this year, water shortages are also leaving the country more susceptible to further outbreaks as people struggle to find clean sources of drinking water.
First Minister warns a ‘no deal’ exit will “inevitably cause disruption”
The Scottish Government will do everything in its power to stop a deeply damaging ‘no deal’ Brexit, the First Minister has confirmed.
At a cabinet meeting ministers also agreed to step up preparations for a ‘no deal’ after the UK Government’s refusal to enter into negotiations with the EU made such an outcome more likely.
The First Minister will chair a meeting of the Government’s Ministerial Group on EU Exit Readiness next week.
The First Minister said: “In its first week the UK Government has shown it is willing to risk a ‘no deal’ Brexit. Taking Scotland out of the EU in any way is deeply undemocratic but the Prime Minister’s refusal to engage with the EU has dramatically increased the prospect that we will face a deeply damaging ‘no deal’ Brexit.
“If the Prime Minister continues with this approach Scottish jobs will be lost and our economy seriously damaged and it will be entirely the UK Government’s responsibility.
“Having assessed the actions of the new UK Government our work to prepare for ‘no deal’ will intensify in the coming weeks and months. But even with the best possible preparations, leaving the EU without a deal will hurt Scotland’s businesses, disrupt trade and impact on all aspects of society. There is simply no way to mitigate every impact that ‘no deal’ will have, no matter how hard we try.
“The willingness of the UK Government to pursue this approach, against all the evidence, shows why we must continue to make preparations for a referendum that will give people the right to decide Scotland’s future, instead of being dragged out of the EU against their will.”
Despite the Scottish Government’s concerns a No Deal Brexit is looking increasingly likely. The EU is not minded to renegotiate an agreement and the Westminster government’s rhetoric suggests that the UK will leave the EU on 31 October, deal or no deal.
Yesterday, Communities and Local Government Secretary Rt Hon Robert Jenrick MP (above) said local councils should be fully prepared to leave the European Union by the end of October, as he ramped up preparations.
Mr Jenrick thanked councils for all the work they have already done, but said they must step up vital preparations and committed £20 million for councils across England to prepare for delivering Brexit on 31 October, whatever the circumstances.
He has asked each council to designate a Brexit lead to work with central government and oversee teams in every community who will work with stakeholders in their area to plan intensively for Brexit.
The new funding comes in recognition of the central role councils will play to make sure their residents are ready for Brexit, and is expected to support a range of activity including communications, training and the recruitment of staff.
Mr Jenrick will continue to talk to local council leaders to give them the opportunity to discuss preparations and the opportunities of Brexit ahead.
Communities and Local Government Secretary Rt Hon Robert Jenrick MP said: “From Whitehall to town halls – everyone needs to be ready to fulfil our democratic mandate to leave the European Union by the end of October.
“Local government has a vital role in helping to make Brexit a success and it is absolutely right that together we intensify preparations in every community.
“And to do this successfully I have asked every council (in England – Ed) to appoint a Brexit lead to work with government. We’ll be providing £20 million for councils to support the major step up in preparations.
“I want all of us – central and local government – to be fully prepared for leaving the EU on 31 October whatever the circumstances. I know that we can achieve this, by continuing to work side by side with renewed national focus and intensity.”
The UK government recognises that certain areas face more acute pressures. It is currently considering how best to allocate funding to ensure that those areas where greater impacts are expected, such as high impact ports of entry, get the funding they need in order take appropriate steps.
At his first meeting with senior leaders from English local authorities since becoming the Communities and Local Government Secretary earlier this week, Mr Jenrick told representatives that the government will support them to ensure they are ready to leave the EU in just under 90 days’ time.
Departments will continue to assess and, if appropriate, fund any potential new requirements of local authorities as part of Brexit work they are undertaking.
In January the UK Government committed £58 million of funding to support local authorities in their preparations for Brexit.
An immediate cash boost to help get the UK ready for Brexit on 31 October has been announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sajid Javid. Continue reading Chancellor allocates extra £2.1 billion to ‘turbo-charge No-Deal Brexit preparations’
PART OF THE UNION: Jonson comes to Scotland to announce new funding for local communities
Prime Minister Boris Johnson will make his first official visit to Scotland today, where he will announce the expansion of Growth Deals across Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, backed by £300 million of new funding. Continue reading Charm offensive: Johnson visit aims to bolster union
MP for Dumfries and Galloway, Alister Jack, has been appointed as Secretary of State for Scotland.
Following his appointment, Alister Jack said: “I am honoured to have been appointed Secretary of State for Scotland at a time when we face very significant challenges as a country. Continue reading Alister Jack leads new Tory team at the Scotland Office
First Minister highlights risk of Brexit.
The First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has written to the new Prime Minister to set out the potential impact of Brexit and urge a change in course to protect Scotland’s people and economy.
Full text of the letter:
Congratulations on your appointment as Prime Minister.
I will be shortly writing to you, along with the First Minister of Wales, to set out jointly our position on a range of urgent matters that require consideration by a meeting of the Heads of Government. Such a meeting should be convened as soon as possible.
However, I am writing to you today to draw your attention to work carried out by the Scottish Government which details the likely specific impact of Brexit on Scotland. Given the gravity of the potential damage to jobs and livelihoods, this material should be at the top of your in-tray.
You will be aware that people in Scotland voted overwhelmingly to remain in the European Union. Subsequent Scottish Government analysis shows that a no-deal outcome could cost 100,000 Scottish jobs. Even a free trade agreement could see a fall in Scottish national income of around £1,600 per person compared with continuing EU membership. I urge you to study this analysis closely so that you understand the implications for Scotland of the policy you are pursuing on Brexit and why it is therefore imperative that you change course immediately to avoid causing lasting harm to the people of Scotland.
However, given your public comments about leaving the EU on October 31 with or without a deal, “come what may” and “do or die” , it is now – more than ever – essential that in Scotland we have an alternative option.
In line with the democratic mandate given to us in 2016, the Scottish Government will continue to make preparations to give people in Scotland the choice of becoming an independent country.
The right of the people of Scotland to determine their own future is a basic democratic principle that must be respected.
Similarly any decision of the Scottish Parliament on whether to give people that choice must be respected. The Parliament will consider the necessary framework legislation for a referendum after the summer recess, and I look forward to taking this matter forward with you once MSPs have had the opportunity to debate the issue further.
NICOLA STURGEON
Boris Johnson’s first speech as Prime Minister (now there’s a line I never thought I would have to write! – Ed)
Good afternoon
I have just been to see Her Majesty the Queen who has invited me to form a government and I have accepted
I pay tribute to the fortitude and patience of my predecessor and her deep sense of public service but in spite of all her efforts it has become clear that there are pessimists at home and abroad who think that after three years of indecision that this country has become a prisoner to the old arguments of 2016 and that in this home of democracy we are incapable of honouring a basic democratic mandate.
And so I am standing before you today to tell you, the British people, that those critics are wrong.
The doubters, the doomsters, the gloomsters – they are going to get it wrong again. The people who bet against Britain are going to lose their shirts because we are going to restore trust in our democracy and we are going to fulfil the repeated promises of parliament to the people and come out of the EU on October 31, no ifs or buts, and we will do a new deal, a better deal that will maximise the opportunities of Brexit while allowing us to develop a new and exciting partnership with the rest of Europe based on free trade and mutual support
I have every confidence that in 99 days’ time we will have cracked it but you know what – we aren’t going to wait 99 days because the British people have had enough of waiting.
The time has come to act, to take decisions to give strong leadership and to change this country for the better and, though the Queen has just honoured me with this extraordinary office of state, my job is to serve you, the people because if there is one point we politicians need to remember it is that the people are our bosses.
My job is to make your streets safer – and we are going to begin with another 20,000 police on the streets and we start recruiting forthwith.
My job is to make sure you don’t have to wait 3 weeks to see your GP and we start work this week with 20 new hospital upgrades, and ensuring that money for the NHS really does get to the front line.
My job is to protect you or your parents or grandparents from the fear of having to sell your home to pay for the costs of care and so I am announcing now – on the steps of Downing Street – that we will fix the crisis in social care once and for all with a clear plan we have prepared to give every older person the dignity and security they deserve.
My job is to make sure your kids get a superb education wherever they are in the country and that’s why we have already announced that we are going to level up per pupil funding in primary and secondary schools and that is the work that begins immediately behind that black door.
And though I am today building a great team of men and women I will take personal responsibility for the change I want to see. Never mind the backstop – the buck stops here.
And I will tell you something else about my job.
It is to be Prime Minister of the whole United Kingdom and that means uniting our country, answering at last the plea of the forgotten people and the left behind towns by physically and literally renewing the ties that bind us together, so that with safer streets and better education and fantastic new road and rail infrastructure and full fibre broadband, we level up across Britain.
With higher wages, and a higher living wage, and higher productivity we close the opportunity gap, giving millions of young people the chance to own their own homes and giving business the confidence to invest across the UK, because it is time we unleashed the productive power not just of London and the South East but of every corner of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, the awesome foursome that are incarnated in that red white and blue flag who together are so much more than the sum of their parts and whose brand and political personality is admired and even loved around the world for our inventiveness, for our humour, for our universities, our scientists, our armed forces, our diplomacy for the equalities on which we insist – whether race or gender or LGBT or the right of every girl in the world to 12 years of quality education and for the values we stand for around the world.
Everyone knows the values that flag represents. It stands for freedom and free speech and habeas corpus and the rule of law and above all it stands for democracy – and that is why we will come out of the EU on October 31, because in the end Brexit was a fundamental decision by the British people that they wanted their laws made by people that they can elect and they can remove from office and we must now respect that decision and create a new partnership with our European friends – as warm and as close and as affectionate as possible.
The first step is to repeat unequivocally our guarantee to the 3.2 m EU nationals now living and working among us and I say directly to you – thank you for your contribution to our society, thank you for your patience and I can assure you that under this government you will get the absolute certainty of the rights to live and remain.
And next I say to our friends in Ireland, and in Brussels and around the EU I am convinced that we can do a deal without checks at the Irish border, because we refuse under any circumstances to have such checks and yet without that anti-democratic backstop and it is of course vital at the same time that we prepare for the remote possibility that Brussels refuses any further to negotiate and we are forced to come out with no deal, not because we want that outcome – of course not – but because it is only common sense to prepare: and let me stress that there is a vital sense in which those preparations cannot be wasted and that is because under any circumstances we will need to get ready at some point in the near future to come out of the EU customs union and out of regulatory control, fully determined at last to take advantage of brexit because that is the course on which this country is now set with high hearts and growing confidence we will now accelerate the work of getting ready …
… and the ports will be ready
… and the banks will be ready
… and the factories will be ready
… and business will be ready
… and the hospitals will be ready
… and our amazing food and farming sector will be ready and waiting to continue selling ever more not just here but around the world
and don’t forget that in the event of a no deal outcome we will have the extra lubrication of the £39 bn and whatever deal we do we will prepare this autumn for an economic package to boost British business and to lengthen this country’s lead as the number one destination in this continent for overseas investment
And to all those who continue to prophesy disaster I say yes – there will be difficulties, though I believe that with energy and application they will be far less serious than some have claimed, but if there is one thing that has really sapped the confidence of business over the last three years it is not the decisions we have taken, it is our refusal to take decisions, and to all those who say we cannot be ready, I say: do not underestimate this country. Do not underestimate our powers of organisation and our determination because we know the enormous strengths of this economy in life sciences, in tech, in academia, in music, the arts, culture, financial services.
It is here in Britain that we are using gene therapy, for the first time, to treat the most common form of blindness, here in Britain that we are leading the world in the battery technology that will help cut CO2 and tackle climate change and produce green jobs for the next generation and as we prepare for a post-Brexit future it is time we looked not at the risks but at the opportunities that are upon us, so let us begin work now to create freeports that will drive growth and thousands of high-skilled jobs in left behind areas.
Let’s start now to liberate the UK’s extraordinary bioscience sector from anti genetic modification rules and let’s develop the blight-resistant crops that will feed the world.
Let’s get going now on our own position navigation and timing satellite and earth observation systems – UK assets orbiting in space with all the long term strategic and commercial benefits for this country
Let’s change the tax rules to provide extra incentives to invest in capital and research – and let’s promote the welfare of animals that has always been so close to the hearts of the British people
and yes, let’s start now on those free trade deals, because it is free trade that has done more than anything else to lift billions out of poverty.
All this and more we can do now and only now, at this extraordinary moment in our history and after three years of unfounded self-doubt it is time to change the record, to recover our natural and historic role as an enterprising, outward-looking and truly global Britain, generous in temper and engaged with the world.
No one in the last few centuries has succeeded in betting against the pluck and nerve and ambition of this country.
They will not succeed today.
We in this government will work flat out to give this country the leadership it deserves – and that work begins now.
Thank you very much,
New forms of packaging and plastic made from plants, wood chippings and food waste could be a step closer, thanks to new business and UK Government investment.
Continue reading UK to lead global innovation in sustainable plastics in drive to net zero
