Shadow defence secretary James Cartlidge says Starmer’s comment about critics of deal ‘beneath contempt’
James Cartlidge, the shadow defence secretary, is responding to Healey.
He starts by saying that what Keir Starmer said at his press conference about opponents of the deal being on the side of Russia and China was “beneath contempt”.
He says by opposing the Chagos Islands deal, the Tories would not be traitors, they would be patriots.
Key events
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Early evening summary
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Why government says Chagos Islands deal will cost £3.4bn
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Tories and Lib Dems criticise DfE for not fully funding pay rise for teachers in England
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Richard Tice says ‘when’ Reform UK win next election, they will rip up Chagos Islands deal and cancel further payments
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Badenoch claims Chagos Islands deal is turning UK into ‘global laughing stock’
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Healey claims Labour’s deal with Mauritius better than version Tory government negotiating
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Shadow defence secretary James Cartlidge says Starmer’s comment about critics of deal ‘beneath contempt’
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John Healey makes statement to MPs about Chagos Islands deal
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MPs vote down Lords amendment on copyright, as Peter Kyle says UK needs both creative industries and AI to prosper
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Tories accuse Starmer of ‘baseless and disgusting slurs’ about opponents of Chagos Islands deal
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Extracts from Starmer’s statement justifying deal transferring sovereignty of Chagos Islands to Mauritius
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Starmer says Chagos Islands deal will give UK control of what happens up to 100 nautical miles from Diego Garcia base
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Starmer says US paying running costs of Diego Garcia base, which are ‘far greater’ than what UK paying
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Starmer says net cost of Chagos Islands deal will be £3.4bn under government accounting rules, accepted by OBR
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Starmer suggests any MPs opposed to deal ‘not fit to be PM’, because they would be risking future of Diego Garcia
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Starmer says Badenoch and Farage have lined up with Russia, China and Iran in opposing Chagos Islands deal
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Starmer says Chagos Islands deal will cost £101m a year
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Keir Starmer holding press conference on Chagos Islands deal
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NEU teaching union threatens industrial action over government not fully funding pay award
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BMA calls for talks with Streeting over 4% pay offer to ‘avert strike action’
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Mahmood says judges to get 4% pay rise, not 4.75% as recommended, but recruitment problems being reviewed
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Prison officers to get 4% pay rise, Mahmood says
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Phillipson says teachers will get 4% pay rise, but schools will have to fund quarter of this from own budgets
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GPs and hospital doctors to get 4% pay rise, Streeting says, and nurses and other NHS staff to get 3.6%
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Members of armed forces to get 4.5% pay rise, John Healey announces
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Government starts publishing public sector pay awards, with senior civil servants getting 3.25% pay rise
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Universities warn 37% fall in number of foreign students coming to UK puts their finances at risk
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High court lifts injunction stopping Starmer signing Chagos Islands deal
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Why Gauke proposals will lead to big reduction in number of women in prison
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Mahmood says chemical castration can lead to 60% reduction in offending by sex offenders
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Mahmood rejects claim that changes will make sentencing system less transparent
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Mahmood says sentencing plans will lead to ‘huge reduction in number of women going to prison’
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Mahmood confirms she will consider case for mandatory chemical castration for sex offenders
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Shabana Mahmood gives statement to MPs on sentencing review
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‘Extremely high’ asylum initial refusal rates leaving people ‘trapped in limbo’, charity says
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Asylum claims hit record high of 109,000 in year ending March 2025, Home Office figures show
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Tories says it is ‘outrageous’ ministers won’t reveal teachers pay award figure to MPs this morning, but will publish it later
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High court starts hearing over injunction blocking Chagos Islands deal
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Tories must ‘get moving’ on new policies or face crisis, says Robert Jenrick
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How SNP using WFPs issue in Hamilton byelection, where Labour worries about coming 3rd behind Reform
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Former Tory home secretary James Cleverly says net migration halved because of his visa policies, not Labour’s
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How polling shows public were expecting net migration to rise, not fall
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Net migration fell by almost 50% in 2024 to 431,000, ONS says
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High court judge blocks UK from concluding Chagos Islands deal
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Tories accuse Labour of ‘decriminalising crimes’ as plans to reduce sentencing announced
Early evening summary
For a full list of all the stories covered here today, scroll through the key events timeline at the top of the blog.
Why government says Chagos Islands deal will cost £3.4bn
At his press conference Keir Starmer said that the cost of the Chagos Islands deal amounted to £3.4bn over 99 years. He has not convinced everyone to accept this figure. The Telegraph website is leading on a headline saying it will cost £10bn. The Daily Mail claims the cost will be closer to £30bn. In the Commons Richard Tice, the Reform UK deputy leader, put it at £40bn. (See 5.44pm.) On X Nigel Farage, his party leader, has gone even further, and put the total cost at £52bn.
It would be fair to say that Starmer did not do a very good job at his press conference of explaining at the press conference why the government is using the £3.4bn. (See 3.39pm.)
At a briefing this afternoon, a government official did a slightly better job. They said that the £101m annual payments won’t increase every year in inflation and that, even though 99 x £101m takes you to about £10bn, that does not take account of the fact that in 99 years’ time the economy is likely to be much bigger, and £10bn worth less. They said the government needs a system for calculating the cost of decades-long financial projects like this, and that under the system it uses the Chagos Islands deal has a net present value cost of £3.4bn.
Tories and Lib Dems criticise DfE for not fully funding pay rise for teachers in England
Richard Adams
Richard Adams is the Guardian’s education editor.
The Conservatives and LIberal Democrats have attacked Bridget Phillipson for failing to fully compensate school budgets in England for the 4% teacher pay award from September. Phillipson said that only around three-quarters of the pay increases would be covered by additional funding out of existing Department for Education budgets, with schools having to make efficiencies to meet the rest of the bill. (See 2.02pm.)
Laura Trott, the Conservative shadow education secretary, said the the funding gap would leave schools £400m in the red. Trott said:
Labour pledged they would hire 6,500 more teachers but this funding shortfall today will leave 6,500 teachers’ jobs at risk. Schools, teachers, and children deserve better. Labour must end this education vandalism.
And Munira Wilson, the Liberal Democrats’ education spokesperson, said:
The government is building castles in the sky if it thinks that schools have any more ‘efficiencies’ to make. By deciding not to fully fund this pay rise, the government is gouging millions out of threadbare school pockets.
When schools are already struggling to make ends meet — forced to strip out vital subjects and ask teachers and parents to pay personally for classroom essentials — this could cause a tidal wave of redundancies.
Richard Tice says ‘when’ Reform UK win next election, they will rip up Chagos Islands deal and cancel further payments
Back in the Commons Richard Tice, the Reform UK deputy leader, says this is “the worst ever deal in history by this country”. He claims that, allowing for inflation, the £101m annual cost means the deal will cost £40bn, taking into account inflation. He goes on:
When reform win the next general election, we will rip up this deal and tear it up and stop all future payments.
Healey says Tice is talking “total rubbish”.
Badenoch claims Chagos Islands deal is turning UK into ‘global laughing stock’
Kemi Badenoch has claimed the Chagos deal makes Britain “a global laughing stock”. She posted this on social media.
It speaks volumes about this shameful Prime Minister that he attacks me instead of owning up to another wrong-headed, wasteful, and dangerous deal.
I make no apology for opposing this disgraceful Chagos sell-out:
•At least £30 billion of taxpayers’ money thrown away in a Surrender Tax—and likely much more
•British territory handed over to a country aligned with China
•Our national security needlessly weakened All to appease the lawyers and activist elite
Keir Starmer surrounds himself with. Other countries may nod along, but behind closed doors, they must think we’ve lost our minds. Labour is turning Britain into a global laughing stock.
Healey claims Labour’s deal with Mauritius better than version Tory government negotiating
Back in the Commons James Cleverly, the former foreign secretary, says when he was in government, he did not see anything that led him to believe that transferring sovereignty was the only way of protecting Diego Garcia. He says that, when Labour came to power, it said that it could lose a binding court case against it within weeks. Where was that legal threat coming from?
Healey says the last Conservative government conceded the principle that the UK should transfer sovereignty.
And he says the deal struck by Labour is better than the one on the table part-negotiated by the Tories. He says Labour has secured an effective veto across the archipelago, a buffer zone, a 99-year deal, with the option of a 40-year extensive, and an agreement for Mauritius to take responsibility for migrants. He says none off those items were in the Tory version.
He does not answer Cleverly’s problem about the imminent legal threat.
Here is the full text of the agreement with Mauritius about the Chagos Islands.
James Cartlidge asked Healey about a line in the treaty with Mauritius saying that the UK would have to inform Mauritius “expeditiously” of any attack on a third party launched from Diego Garcia. He asked if this meant the UK would have to tell Mauritius about any attack on Iran. Tom Harwood from GB News has posted the extract from the treaty on social media.
Healey did not address this in his response, which was mostly devoted to defending his argument that failing to support the deal would amount to failing to guarantee the future of Diego Garcia.
Shadow defence secretary James Cartlidge says Starmer’s comment about critics of deal ‘beneath contempt’
James Cartlidge, the shadow defence secretary, is responding to Healey.
He starts by saying that what Keir Starmer said at his press conference about opponents of the deal being on the side of Russia and China was “beneath contempt”.
He says by opposing the Chagos Islands deal, the Tories would not be traitors, they would be patriots.
John Healey makes statement to MPs about Chagos Islands deal
John Healey, the defence secretary, is making a statement to MPs about the Chagos Islands deal.
He claimed that anyone who abandoned the deal would be abandoning the Diego Garcia base. That provoked a lot of shouting from the opposition, with MPs shouting “rubbish”.
MPs vote down Lords amendment on copyright, as Peter Kyle says UK needs both creative industries and AI to prosper
Proposals to protect the creative industries against artificial intelligence (AI) have been rejected by MPs, after parliament heard both sectors need to succeed to grow Britain’s economy.
As PA Media reports, Peter Kyle, the science secretary, pledged to set up a series of expert working groups to find a “workable way forward” for both industries, as he urged MPs to reject the Lords’ amendment.
Peers amended the data (use and access) bill by adding a commitment to introduce transparency requirements, aiming to ensure copyright holders are able to see when their work has been used and by who. Today MPs voted 195 to 124, majority 71 to disagree with the amendment, tabled by Beeban Kidron.
Speaking in the Commons, Kyle said:
Pitting one against the other is unnecessarily divisive and damages both.
The truth is that growing Britain’s economy needs both sectors to succeed and to prosper. Britain has to be the place where the creative industries, and every bit as much as AI companies, can invest, grow, are confident in their future prosperity, that is assured.
We have to become a country where our people can enjoy the benefits and the opportunities of both.
It is time to tone down the unnecessary rhetoric and, instead, recognise that the country needs to strike a balance between content and creativity, transparency and training, and recognition and reward.
That can’t be done by well-meaning, but ultimately imperfect, amendments to a bill that was never intended to do such a thing.
The issue of AI copyright needs properly considered and enforceable legislation, drafted with the inclusion, the involvement, and the experience of both creatives and technologists.
To that end, I can tell the house that I am now setting up a series of expert working groups to bring together people from both sectors, on transparency, on licensing and other technical standards to chart a workable way forward.
Tories accuse Starmer of ‘baseless and disgusting slurs’ about opponents of Chagos Islands deal
Priti Patel, the shadow foreign secretary, has accused Keir Starmer of making “baseless and disgusting slurs”. Referring to what Starmer said at his press conference about Kemi Badenoch siding with China, Russia and Iran over the Chagos Islands deal (see 3.28pm), she said:
Keir Starmer is captured by the socialist mindset that anyone who disagrees with him or who cares about his appalling capitulation to Mauritius and abandonment of the Chagossian people, is in same league as Britain’s adversaries – the Ayatollahs of Iran, Vladimir Putin and President Xi.
Starmer has slandered the Chagossian community and he is so arrogant and out of touch with British values and the national interest that he has resorted to baseless and disgusting slurs – whilst he himself hands control of Chagos to a country that is actually cosying up with Russia and China.
Today is a day of shame for our country, and Keir Starmer and David Lammy are the chief architects of it.
Extracts from Starmer’s statement justifying deal transferring sovereignty of Chagos Islands to Mauritius
Here are extracts from Keir Starmer’s opening statement at his press conference defending the Chagos Islands deal.
On US support for the deal
Almost everything we do from the base is in partnership with the US.
President Trump has welcomed the deal along with other allies, because they see the strategic importance of this base and that we cannot cede the ground to others who would seek to do us harm.
On the risk of the UK losing a legal case to Mauritius if it did not settle the sovereignty issue
If Mauritius took us to court again, which they certainly would have, the UK’s longstanding legal view is that we would not have a realistic prospect of success and would likely face provisional measures orders within a matter of weeks.
On why ignoring court defeats in international law would not be an option
This is not just about international law, it’s about the operation of the base, even if we choose to ignore judgments made against us, international organisations and other countries would act on them and that would undermine the operation of the base, causing us to lose this unique capability.
One example of this is the electromagnetic spectrum. Countries have the right to manage this spectrum as they wish within their borders, a right that’s recognised in regulations and overseen in the International Telecommunication Union.
The use of the spectrum is key to understand and anticipate those who seek to do us harm. If our right to control it is put into doubt, we would lose the first line of defence against other countries who wish to interfere and disrupt this capability, rendering it practically useless.
In addition, if we did not agree this deal the legal situation would mean that we would not be able to prevent China or any other nation setting up their own bases on the outer islands or carrying out joint exercises near our base, we would have to explain to you, the British people and to our allies, that we’d lost control of this vital asset.
No responsible government could let that happen. So, there’s no alternative but to act in Britain’s national interest.
On how the last Conservative government conceded the sovereignty issue
Other approaches to secure the base have been tried over the years and they have failed. Boris Johnson failed in his efforts to endlessly delay. Liz Truss then started the negotiation. We inherited a negotiation in which the principle of giving up UK sovereignty had already been conceded by the previous Tory government.
On why the cost is justified
Our deal has concluded those negotiations in the national interest. Now, there’s obviously a cost to maintaining such a valuable asset, we pay for other military bases, allies like the US and France do the same.
This cost is part and parcel of using Britain’s global reach to keep us safe at home and it will be less than the cost of running one aircraft carrier for a year.
Today’s agreement is the only way to maintain the base in the long term. There is no alternative. We will never gamble with national security. So, we have acted to secure our national interest, to strengthen our national security.
Photograph: Thomas Krych/Reuters