Starmer and Merz hold press conference
Keir Starmer and Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, are holding their press conference at the Airbus factory in Stevenage.
There is a live feed here.
Key events
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Starmer defends suspending 4 Labour rebels, saying government must be able to deliver change
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Starmer and Merz hold press conference
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Voting age in Northern Ireland should be cut to 16 in time for local and Stormont elections in 2027, first minister says
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New party donation rules ‘don’t pass the Musk test’, campaigners claim
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Parties, candidates and campaigners spent almost £100m at 2024 election, up 38% on 2019, figures reveal
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Minister declines to back call from Labour’s Liam Byrne for cryptocurrency donations to political parties to be banned
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No 10 rejects claims rules on foreign donations being tightened to stop Elon Musk giving to Reform UK
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Labour taking Diane Abbott’s latest comments on racism ‘incredibly seriously’
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Starmer and Merz sign UK-Germany friendship and cooperation treaty
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SNP welcomes votes at 16, saying it’s ‘good to see’ UK government following Scottish government’s lead
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Liberal Democrats welcome election reform plans, but urge Labour to go further and introduce PR
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Minister accuses Tories of doing ‘nothing’ to close loopholes allowing foreign donations to influence UK elections
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Starmer says 16-year-olds should be able to vote because they’re ‘old enough to pay taxes’
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Up to 8m more people could vote in elections under move towards automated voter registration, government says
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Starmer speaks at civil society summit
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Tories say letting people vote at 16, but not be candidate until they are 18, ‘hopelessly confused’
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Democracy minister Rushanara Ali makes statement to MPs about plans for votes at 16
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Voting age to be lowered to 16 in UK by next general election
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Labour says Reform UK putting thousands of jobs at risk by warning firms they will lose green subsidies if Farage wins
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UK unemployment rises and wage growth slows as jobs market ‘weakens’
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Rachael Maskell says being suspended from Labour over rebel votes won’t stop her speaking up for disabled people
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Diane Abbott says she stands by racism comments that led to suspension from Labour
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Jess Phillips says four MPs suspended from Labour were being punished for persistent disloyalty, not welfare bill revolt
Starmer defends suspending 4 Labour rebels, saying government must be able to deliver change
The opening remarks are open, and now they are taking questions.
Q: [From Beth Rigby from Sky News] Will the UK be involved in the Trump plan to sell arms to Ukraine?
Starmer says this offer is really important. Germany and the UK are working together on that, he says. It shows the strength of Germany, France and the UK working together.
Q: When 47 Labour MPs rebelled against Tony Blair over welfare in his first year, he did not suspend any of them. Why are you so rattled by this? Doesn’t this make you look weak?
Starmer says Labour was elected to change the country for the better. It inherited a broken economy and broken public services. No new government has had both those problems. He says he has to deal with people who “repeatedly break the whip” because the government needs to implement change.
Merz says President Trump’s announcement about supplying more weapons to Ukraine earlier this week was “very important”.
European countries will pay for them, he says. German will make an important contribution, he says. But he says they need to discuss the details with allies.
Merz says Germany is linked to France by treaty, and the UK also has a treaty link with France. All three treaties (ie, including the UK-Germany one) are complementary, he says. He says it is “no coincidence” that he is in London just after President Macron’s state visit.
Merz is speaking now. He starts in English, but quickly switches to German.
He says he and Starmer signed their treaty in the V&A museum today. That is why it is called the Kensington Treaty. And they chose the V&A because “the union of Queen Victoria and her German husband, Prince Albert, lasted a lifetime and was a happy one”.
One of the features of the deal announced today includes plans to a direct rail link between the UK and Germany, the government says. It says:
This significant step forward on establishing direct rail services comes as the UK and Germany commit to enhancing sustainable transport links and collaborate in the field of sustainable, innovative and universally accessible transport solutions and mobility.
Starmer opens the press conference by talking about the cooperation treaty signed today.
Here is the No 10 readout of their earlier talks in Downing Street.
Starmer and Merz hold press conference
Keir Starmer and Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, are holding their press conference at the Airbus factory in Stevenage.
There is a live feed here.
Here is Rowena Mason’s analysis of the significance of allowing 16-year-olds to vote in parliamentry elections.
And here is an extract.
There is … an unspoken belief among many in Labour that the change may benefit the left, given that younger people have historically tended to be more left wing. The Conservatives were certainly not keen on the policy, saying it was “confusing” that the age group would be able to vote “but not stand as candidates, and they will be able to vote but not permitted to buy a lottery ticket, consume alcohol, marry or go to war”.
The impacts of the change, however, are far from certain. Polling of 500 aged 16 and 17 conducted by Merlin Strategy for ITV News showed Labour had most support with 33%, ahead of Reform UK on 20% and the Conservatives on 10%. But half of them thought they should not yet be allowed to vote, and only 18% said they would definitely vote if there was an election tomorrow.
Only half said they had a positive view of democracy, and more than a fifth said they viewed a military strongman with no government or elections positively.
Voting age in Northern Ireland should be cut to 16 in time for local and Stormont elections in 2027, first minister says
Michelle O’Neill, the Sinn Féin first minister of Northern Ireland, has urged the UK government to ensure that 16 and 17-year-olds can vote in elections to councils and to the Northern Ireland assembly in 2027. In a post on social media she said:
I welcome the news that the British Government is to introduce votes from the age of 16 for elections.
This is a step forward for democracy and will enable young people to have a say in their future.
I’ll now be contacting the British Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, urging him to ensure that the right to vote at 16 applies to the 2027 Assembly and Council elections in the north.
In Scotland and Wales 16 and 17-year-olds can already vote in devolved elections. The UK government is responsible for election rules in Northern Ireland, and in its modern elections strategy published today it says: “Where we jointly believe it makes sense, we will aim to align the rules and processes for elections reserved to the UK government with devolved elections in Scotland and Wales.”
As the BBC reports, the Electoral Commission has said the voting age in Northern Ireland will be lowered to 16 for all elections – but that this is “unlikely” to be implemented in time for the 2027 council and Stormont elections.
The DUP has opposed lowering the voting age, but other parties at Stormont are in favour.
We would like to hear from readers about their experience of special educational needs and disabilities (Send) provision for children and young people. The government is planning changes to the way the system operates in England, and we are interested in hearing what you think ministers should do.
You can contribute here.
New party donation rules ‘don’t pass the Musk test’, campaigners claim
Unlock Democracy, which campaigns for a “vibrant, inclusive democracy” has welcomed the measures set out in the government’s modern election strategy. But it says the changes to political donation rules do not go far enough. Shaun Roberts, its campaigns director, said:
The government’s proposed changes to donation rules don’t pass ‘the Musk test’, in that they would still allow foreign business owners to make big money donations, providing they have ‘sufficient’ income generated in the UK. The public already thinks rich donors massively shape what parties and politicians do and say. Labour’s unwillingness to consider capping donations will leave millions of voters still wondering, ‘who’s pulling their strings?’
Roberts also said Labour should have reversed the changes introduced by the Tories giving the government more say over what the Electoral Commission does. He said:
When the last government took away the Electoral Commission’s independence, Labour loudly condemned it. Labour’s silence now [on Electoral Commission independence] is deeply concerning.
Parties, candidates and campaigners spent almost £100m at 2024 election, up 38% on 2019, figures reveal
The Electoral Commission has published a report today saying that parties, candidates and campaigners spend a record £94.5m at the 2024 general election. That is £25m more than at the previous election. Here are the key figures by party.
The campaign group Transparency International UK has welcomed the crackdown on foreign donations announced today (see 12.19pm), but it is urging the government to go further. It says:
The elephant in the room remains untouched – a growing arms race in election spending that is fuelling political parties’ dangerous dependence on a handful of billionaire backers.
With 66% of private political donations in 2023 coming from just 19 mega donors political access, influence and honours risk being sold to the highest bidder.
The Electoral Commission today confirmed that spending at the 2024 UK general election reached a record high of £92m, a full £25m higher than in 2019 (a 38% increase).
Between 2019 and 2024 the last government increased the cap on spending by political parties in an election year from £19.5m to £35m.
Minister declines to back call from Labour’s Liam Byrne for cryptocurrency donations to political parties to be banned
During the UQ in the Commons Liam Byrne, the Labour chair of the business committee, said that elections bill planned by the government should also include a ban on cryptocurrency donations to political parties. He said:
[The government plans to tighten the rules on foreign donations] will mean nothing unless we move forward aggressively to ban cryptocurrency donations into British politics. They are used for money laundering. They are used to disguise our money. They have no role in British politics.
Rushanara Ali, the democracy minister, would not give that commitment, but she said cryptocurrency gifts would be covered by the changes being made that will tighten rules affecting donations.
This is another issue with particular relevance to Reform UK. There is a prominent “Crypto” tab at the top of the Reform UK website and the party explictly invites donations in crypto, saying:
Reform UK is committed to upholding the values of Freedom, Choice, and Opportunity. Cryptocurrency represents these core values.
At the 2024 general election the Conservatives suggested that a Labour government would allow EU nationals to vote in general elections. That was because in the past Keir Starmer backed the idea. As the election got closer, worried about the reaction from Brexiters, Starmer ruled it out.
In the Commons earlier the Conservative MP Nick Timothy asked Rushanara Ali, the democracy minister, if the government could “rule out ever extending the franchise to foreign nationals beyond existing rules”. Ali ducked the question, and just said: “The focus of this strategy is on eligible voters in this in this country.”
Although Labour committed to votes at 16 in its election manifesto, campaigners were not always 100% confident that the government would go ahead and legislate for this. In a post on social media, the polling firm Ipsos points out why. It says research it carried out last summer found that votes at 16 was the least popular of all the Labour manifesto policies it tested.
No 10 rejects claims rules on foreign donations being tightened to stop Elon Musk giving to Reform UK
At the start of the year there was speculation in some papers that Elon Musk might donate a multi-millon sum to Reform UK. The figure of $100m quoted in reports, although both sides dismissed that. As a foreigner, Musk could not donate as an individual, but some of his companies operate in the the UK and it was claimed a legitimate donation could be made via that route.
At the Downing Street lobby briefing this morning the No 10 spokesperson denied suggestion that the government was tightening the rules on foreign donations to stop Refom getting Musk’s money. He said:
It’s not about specific individuals or parties. The current status quo means that a new company registered today, owned by anyone and funded from anywhere, can donate and have influence in British politics.
That leaves our democracy vulnerable, it undermines trust in our politics, and that’s why we’re placing strict new requirements on donations from organisations.