Portrait of the week

Home Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, said: ‘We are working on a viable plan for the Strait of Hormuz.’ Insisting that ‘it’s not our war, but it is our duty to protect British citizens’, he urged business leaders to help protect households from soaring prices. Brent crude sloshed up to $116 and back a little. From 1 April average household energy bills fell by the equivalent of £117 a year, until they go up in July. Some 12 million drivers mis-sold car finance agreements will receive compensation averaging £829. A 17‑year‑old boy admitted shoplifting goods worth £137,342 from branches of Boots and £2,415 from Holland & Barrett shops in London. A Tesco supermarket in Orkney gave away bananas after accidentally ordering 38,000 of them.

Home Iran fired two missiles at the British-American military base at Diego Garcia, 2,400 miles away, one being intercepted by a US warship and the other failing in flight. The attack was revealed after Britain announced that in ‘collective self-defence’ it was allowing America to use British bases to launch strikes on Iranian sites targeting the Strait of Hormuz. The Israel Defence Forces said that Iranian missiles could now reach London. Iran told Yvette Cooper, the Foreign Secretary, that it had the right to respond to British ‘participation in aggression’. In the seven days to 23 March, 984 migrants crossed the Channel in small boats; the French coastguard rescued another 78 when their engine failed.

Home Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, spoke to President Donald Trump of America about the importance of reopening the Strait of Hormuz, but resisted his call for Britain’s ships to be sent there. The government considered sending British-made Octopus drone-interceptors to the Middle East. Sir Keir said £53 million would help a million households reliant on heating oil – £53 a household; ‘It’s moments like this that tell you what a government is about,’ he said. The economy showed zero growth in January, according to the Office for National Statistics. The ONS added alcohol-free beer to the basket of goods used to calculate inflation. John Lewis awarded staff a bonus for the first time in four years.

Home John Healey, the Defence Secretary, visited Cyprus after criticism of Britain’s response to drone attacks on the RAF base there. The Cyprus High Commissioner said: ‘The people are disappointed, the people are scared, the people could expect more.’ The destroyer HMS Dragon sailed for Cyprus from Portsmouth on 10 March. Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, told the Commons that inflation was likely to rise; the Office for Budget Responsibility estimated an extra percentage point increase on prices by the end of the year. The Prince of Wales aircraft carrier would not head for the Middle East. President Trump of America said: ‘That’s OK, Prime Minister Starmer… We don’t need people that join Wars after we’ve already won!

Home Britain was not involved in the attack on Iran, Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, said, but a day later he gave America permission to use British bases (including Diego Garcia) ‘to prevent Iran firing missiles across the region’. He told the Commons, ‘This country does not believe in regime change from the skies,’ and ‘the only way forward is a negotiated outcome’. ‘This is not Winston Churchill that we’re dealing with,’ said President Donald Trump of America. A drone hit RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus; the destroyer HMS Dragon was dispatched there. At least 300,000 British citizens were said to be in the Gulf.

Home Morgan McSweeney, the helmsman of Labour, walked the plank by resigning as chief of staff to Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, whom he had advised in 2024 to appoint Lord Mandelson as ambassador to Washington. Mr McSweeney’s resignation statement began: ‘After careful reflection, I have decided to resign from the government,’ as though he had been a member of the government. In a speech meant to be about funding for local communities, Sir Keir said he was ‘sorry for having believed Mandelson’s lies and appointed him’. But he added: ‘I had no reason to believe he was telling anything other than the truth’, even though the Financial Times had in 2023 reported that Mandelson had stayed at Jeffrey Epstein’s house when the financier was in prison.

Home Lord Mandelson resigned his membership of the Labour party and then retired from the House of Lords; some of the three million items released by the US Department of Justice relating to the late Jeffrey Epstein suggested that, while serving as business secretary in Gordon Brown’s cabinet, he sent market-sensitive government information to Epstein. The Metropolitan Police launched a criminal investigation into allegations of misconduct in public office by Lord Mandelson. Mr Brown sent the Met ‘relevant’ information for their investigations. In an exchange with Lord Mandelson two days before Mr Brown’s resignation as PM, Epstein emailed: ‘Bye, bye smelly?’ The Conservatives questioned in parliament the decision to appoint Lord Mandelson ambassador to Washington.

Home President Donald Trump of the United States made Britain and other countries dance to his tune. Sir Keir Starmer, telephoning him about Greenland, said: ‘Applying tariffs on allies for pursuing the collective security of Nato allies is wrong.’ Mr Trump had said he would impose tariffs on Britain, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden until ‘such time as a Deal is reached for [the US’s] Complete and Total purchase of Greenland’. Then Mr Trump posted remarks on social media saying Britain’s gift to Mauritius of the Chagos Islands, including the base at Diego Garcia, was ‘an act of GREAT STUPIDITY’. He added: ‘China and Russia have noticed this act of total weakness.

Home The government dropped plans to make digital ID compulsory to work in Britain. Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, called it ‘disgraceful’ that Grok, the online tool on Elon Musk’s X, could undress pictures of people. X limited the function to subscribers, but Liz Kendall, the Technology Secretary, said that the government would back Ofcom if it decided to block X in Britain. ‘They just want to suppress free speech,’ Mr Musk wrote on X. Sir Keir, due to visit China this month, was warned by some Labour MPs not to approve a vast new Chinese embassy in London. The government signalled a U-turn on increases to business rates for pubs in England before the ink was dry on the Telegraph’s Save Our Pubs campaign.

Home The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs announced plans to criminalise trail hunting ‘amid concerns it is being used as a smokescreen for hunting’; another part of the new animal welfare strategy will make it a crime to boil a live lobster. The government revised the threshold below which, from April, agricultural assets may be handed down without incurring inheritance tax, from a planned £1 million to £2.5 million. Downing Street cancelled regular afternoon lobby briefings and said it would hold more morning press conferences with limited questions from selected journalists.

Home Tim Davie, the director-general of the BBC, resigned, as did Deborah Turness, the CEO of BBC News. Samir Shah, the chairman of the BBC, apologised for an ‘error of judgment’ in the editing by Panorama of a speech by President Donald Trump that made it look as though he was urging people to attack the Capitol in January 2021. This had been criticised in a 19-page memorandum to the BBC board by Michael Prescott, a former standards adviser, who also set out failings over Gaza and transgender matters. The leaked memo was published by the Telegraph. Trump wrote to the BBC threatening to sue it ‘for $1 billion’; he later told Fox News it was his ‘obligation’ to take action.