Joe Bedell-Brill

In the last few days, Keir Starmer has agreed to let the US military use UK bases to conduct specific defensive actions against Iran, and the aircraft carrier HMS Prince of Wales has been prepped to set sail from Portsmouth. Nevertheless, President Trump was scathing about Starmer, declaring, ‘This is not Winston Churchill we’re dealing with’, and yesterday telling the prime minister, ‘We don’t need people that join Wars after we’ve already won’. This morning on Sky News, Trevor Phillips asked Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp about former Defence Secretary Ben Wallace’s criticism of the government’s readiness to respond to the conflict in the Middle East. Phillips pointed out that defence cuts had occurred under the Conservative government.

John Healey: ‘Few people will mourn the Ayatollah’s death’ Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is dead, after the US and Israel launched joint military attacks on Saturday. The conflict is ongoing, with Iran firing retaliatory strikes at multiple countries, and the outcome of President Donald Trump’s actions is highly unpredictable. In a statement, Keir Starmer made clear that the UK had ‘no role’ in the attacks, but said British planes were ‘in the sky’ to protect allies. On Sky News this morning, John Healey, the Defence Secretary, told Trevor Phillips that Khamenei and his regime were a ‘source of evil’ who had murdered thousands of protestors and exported terror around the world. Phillips noted the use of the word ‘evil’.

Boris Johnson: Britain should send troops to Ukraine now In an interview with the BBC, former prime minister Boris Johnson expressed regret that western allies have not given more decisive military and financial support to Ukraine, to bring the conflict to an end. Laura Kuenssberg, asked Johnson what specific action he would call for. Johnson said the West needed to ‘flip a switch in Putin’s brain’, so that he believes the outcome of the war will be a ‘free, sovereign, independent, westward facing Ukraine’. The former prime minister called for increased military and financial assistance, impounding Putin’s ‘shadow fleet’, and for non-combat British ‘boots on the ground’ in Ukraine.

Two years on from the death of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, the UK has released a joint statement with Sweden, France, Germany and the Netherlands, declaring that Navalny was killed by Russia with a poison found in Ecuadorian dart frogs. On Sky News this morning, Trevor Phillips told Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper that the Russian embassy had described the report as a ‘mockery of the dead’, made by ‘feeble minded fabulists’. Cooper said the UK and its allies had been pursuing the truth for two years, and had found evidence of the toxin in Navalny’s body at the time of his death. She claimed Russia had wanted to ‘silence him’, and that only Russia could have administered this toxin while Navalny was imprisoned in Siberia.

Pat McFadden: ‘I don’t think it’s good for the country to change prime minister every 18 months’ Keir Starmer’s government is reeling as pressure continues to grow around the prime minister’s appointment of Peter Mandelson as US ambassador, despite knowledge of his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. Starmer has issued an apology to Epstein’s victims for having ‘believed Mandelson’s lies’, and has acknowledged the ‘anger and frustration of Labour MPs’. On the BBC this morning, Laura Kuenssberg asked Work and Pensions Secretary Pat McFadden if Starmer’s leadership is under threat. McFadden said it shouldn’t be, because Starmer has a ‘five year mandate’, and is focused on fixing the cost of living crisis.

Steve Reed: ‘We need to hear from Peter Mandelson’ The latest tranche of Epstein files released by the US Department of Justice feature disturbing pictures of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor crouched over a woman lying on the floor, and also evidence of more links between Lord Mandelson and the disgraced financier. Jeffrey Epstein appears to have sent Mandelson $75,000 across three payments in 2003 and 2004, and more money to Mandelson’s husband in 2009 to pay for ‘osteo course expenses’. Keir Starmer has suggested Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor should testify before the US Congress. On Sky News this morning, Trevor Phillips asked Steve Reed, the Housing Secretary, if Mandelson should be stripped of his peerage.

Lisa Nandy: The future of Greenland is ‘for the people of Greenland’ President Trump has escalated his rhetoric over Greenland, threatening NATO allies, including the UK, with tariffs if a deal to buy the territory is not reached. The president reacted to NATO countries sending troops to Greenland by calling it ‘a very dangerous situation for the safety, security and survival of our planet’. On Saturday evening, Keir Starmer called Trump’s tariff threats ‘completely wrong’, and this morning on Sky News Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy echoed the prime minister’s words. Nandy said the future of Greenland is for Denmark and Greenland to determine ‘alone’, and that the US and its NATO allies need to be working together.

Protests have swept across Iran in the last couple of days, and reports suggest hundreds of people may now have been killed by the regime’s ensuing crackdown. On Sky News this morning, Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said the UK government has ‘always viewed Iran as a hostile state’, and that the priority is to ‘stem the violence’ against protesters. She told Trevor Phillips that Iran has a ‘destabilising effect on the world’, and said the UK would like to see a peaceful transition where Iranians can enjoy ‘fundamental freedoms’ and ‘proper democratic values’.

Keir Starmer: ‘We simply haven’t got the full picture at the moment’ The US has struck Venezuela’s capital Caracas and captured President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores. Maduro is now in detention in New York. In a press conference after the military operation, President Trump said that the US will ‘run the country until such time as we can do a safe… transition’, and that America’s ‘greatest oil companies in the world’ will be ‘very much involved’. In a long interview with Prime Minister Keir Starmer this morning, Laura Kuenssberg asked if an American attack on a sovereign state was in breach of international law, and whether the prime minister would condemn Trump’s actions.

As Trevor Phillips began his Sky News show this morning, news broke of a mass shooting at Bondi beach in Sydney, where over a thousand people had gathered to celebrate Hanukkah. New South Wales Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon said at least 11 had been killed, with 29 injured. State premier Chris Minns said the attack was ‘designed to target Sydney's Jewish community.’ One of the suspected gunmen is dead, another is in a critical condition. Police are investigating if a possible third gunman was involved. Lanyon said the violence was not ‘our way of life’ and called for calm in the community.

Benefits could be withdrawn for young people not engaging with Youth Guarantee scheme The number of 16 to 24-year-olds not in employment, education or training is now at almost a million, having risen sharply for the last four years. The government have announced an £820 million Youth Guarantee scheme to provide 350,000 work experience placements, and 55,000 subsidised jobs to young people. Work and pensions secretary Pat McFadden was interviewed this morning, saying he wanted the issue to be a major ‘Labour cause’. On Sky News, Trevor Phillips asked McFadden if those who didn’t engage with the Youth Guarantee scheme might have their Universal Credit benefits removed. McFadden said: ‘They could be… we see this as both an offer, and an obligation’.

The Budget is out and, as expected, its measures include the removal of the two-child benefit cap, along with tax rises of £26 billion. Today, though, the headlines focus on whether Chancellor Rachel Reeves deliberately misled the public about the state of the public finances to soften the reception of her Budget. On the BBC, Laura Kuenssberg asked Reeves why she had given the impression she would have ‘no choice’ to put taxes up, when in fact the Office for Budget Responsibility had said there was a £4 billion surplus. Reeves said her headroom had been downgraded from the £9.9 billion she had in the spring and claimed that £4 billion would be ‘the lowest surplus that any chancellor ever delivered against their fiscal rules’.

Heidi Alexander: ‘Tackling child poverty is in the DNA of the Labour Party’ The expectation is that Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ upcoming budget will lift the two child benefit cap. On the BBC this morning, Laura Kuenssberg suggested that Labour have been giving mixed messages, with the chancellor saying she was determined to get welfare spending under control. Alexander said that growing up in poverty creates a ‘lifetime of consequences’, and three quarters of children in poverty are in households where both parents work. The transport secretary said she was confident that there would be fewer children in poverty at the end of Labour’s term. However, when pushed to confirm that the two child cap would be removed, Alexander said she couldn’t ‘get ahead of the budget’.

Tomorrow Shabana Mahmood, the Home Secretary, is set to announce changes to Britain’s asylum system, designed to discourage those who arrive through illegal routes. Those changes will include making housing and financial assistance ‘discretionary’ so that they can be denied to those who are able to work, and increasing the length of time asylum seekers have to wait before they can apply to settle permanently to 20 years. On Sky News this morning, Trevor Phillips asked Mahmood how she responded to the accusation that she is being ‘panicked into a racist immigration policy’. The Home Secretary rejected the claim, saying this is a ‘moral mission’ for her as the child of immigrants.

The BBC is set to apologise for the misleading editing of a Donald Trump speech it featured in the Panorama documentary ‘Trump: A Second Chance?’. The documentary spliced together different segments of Trump’s speech to make it look like he said he would walk to the US Capitol with them to ‘fight like hell’. Speaking to Laura Kuenssberg, Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy said there were a number of ‘serious allegations’ against the BBC, the most significant of which is that there is ‘systemic bias in the way that difficult issues are reported’. Nandy said that the language used by the BBC in its reporting is ‘entirely inconsistent’, and it is often left to individual journalists to make decisions.

Bridget Phillipson: ‘We’ve played a key role behind the scenes’ Israel and Hamas have agreed on a ceasefire, and Israeli troops are withdrawing from parts of Gaza, as Hamas prepares to release the remaining hostages on Monday morning. Later that day, Donald Trump and the Egyptian president Abdel Fatah al-Sisi will chair a peace summit with other leaders, including Keir Starmer. The ceasefire represents a big diplomatic success for President Trump. On Sky News this morning, Trevor Phillips asked Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson what role the UK had played in the negotiations. Phillipson said she recognised ‘the critical role that the American government played’, but suggested the UK was involved in ‘complex matters of diplomacy’.

Shabana Mahmood: Government must ‘stem the rising tide of anti-Semitism’ This week, two Jewish people were killed in a terrorist attack at a synagogue in Manchester. On Sky News, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said it was ‘devastating’ that some British Jews don’t feel safe in their country. She said the government had to ‘stem the rising tide of anti-Semitism’ and ensure that Jewish life can ‘continue to flourish’ in the UK. Trevor Phillips played Mahmood a clip showing Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy being jeered by the crowd at a vigil held for the victims of the attack, and asked whether that reaction was caused by the government recognising the state of Palestine, or not stopping weekly pro-Palestine demonstrations in London.

Chaos continues to follow the prime minister, as damning emails between Peter Mandelson and Jeffrey Epstein were made public, forcing Keir Starmer to sack the UK ambassador to the US just days before Trump’s scheduled state visit. Details of the emails were reportedly given to Downing Street on Tuesday, but Starmer defended Mandelson in the House of Commons on Wednesday, apparently not knowing about the contents of the emails until Wednesday evening. On Sky News this morning, Business Secretary Peter Kyle told Trevor Phillips that Starmer had taken ‘decisive action’ hours after coming across the emails. Phillips asked Kyle how it was possible that the vetting process had not brought these emails to light.