Key events
In her interview with Times Radio this morning, Lisa Nandy, the culture secretary, more or less confirmed that a football governance bill will be in the king’s speech on Wednesday. Asked if Labour would bring back the bill, which was introduced by the last government earlier this year but dropped when the election was called, Nandy replied:
It will be a top priority for me, so I think you can read into that that there’ll be early action from this government.
I’m very keen that it becomes an issue that we take party politics out of and that we get behind the fans, we get behind grassroots football, and we get behind kids in this country who deserve the right standards.
Ministers are not supposed to say in advance what will be in the king’s speech because that is deemed a discourtesy to Buckingham Palace, but that never stops the government letting the media find out most of what it will contain. Eleni Courea wrote a good guide at the end of last week.
The football governance bill, which had cross-party support when introduced by the Tories, will set up an independent football regulator to promote teams’ financial sustainability.
Government wants ‘far more light, far less heat’ in political debate in UK, Lisa Nandy says
Lisa Nandy, the culture secretary, said this morning that the government wants “far more light, far less heat” in political debate in the UK. Expanding on what she said on Sky News (see 9.36am), she told ITV’s Good Morning Britain:
We had the independence referendum in Scotland, we had endless rows about Brexit that became very polarising across the whole of the UK and particularly in England, we found all these different ways to divide ourselves from one another, and I reflected on it a few years ago, standing in a debate in the House of Commons, where I was hearing remain-supporting and leave-supporting MPs hurling insults at each other across the floor, calling each other traitors.
It’s no surprise then that, when we walk out on to the streets of Britain, we hear that language reflected back to us, and that’s why I was so pleased that the prime minister, his first instinct [yesterday, after the attempt to kill Donald Trump] was to get on the phone to President Trump to express our utter condemnation.
Our interest, as the new government, is firmly in taking some of the heat out of this very toxic political debate that we’ve had, shedding far more light, far less heat, and showing leadership in the way that we conduct ourselves towards each other, but particularly towards political opponents that we disagree with.
Rishi Sunak should stay as Tory leader until November, says senior Tory
Good morning. This is one of those days when the main focus of the news industry is definitely not on Westminster but on the US, where people are still trying to assess the consequences of the attempted assassination of Donald Trump. But the shooting at the Trump rally may have an impact on the UK, partly because it may affect who wins the presidential election in November but also because it has revived interest in what can be done to reduce the polarisation, aggression and violence that has marred politics on both sides of the Atlantic in recent years.
Last week Lisa Nandy, the culture secretary, said that new Labour government wanted to end the era of culture wars. This morning she has been on the media, in interviews that were lined up when it was expected that the football would be the top story of the day, and, in the light of the attempt to kill Trump, her call for a calmer form of political debate has added resonance. As Peter Walker reports, she had a vivid way of expressing this on Sky News where she said:
When kids were turning on their TV sets last night across England, every single one of them will have been able to see themselves reflected in that team. And in doing so he’s told an inclusive story about the country that we can be.
It has felt very difficult for people to feel part of our national story, and it’s firmly my intention that this government will be different, will be far more Gareth Southgate, and far less Michael Gove.
The era of division needs to end, and I think this team and Gareth Southgate in particular has shown the leadership that we need in some really difficult times for this country. So we owe him an enormous debt, whatever he decides to do in the future.
Peter has the full story here.
America is not the only body with a leadership contest in the autum. The Conservatives have to find someone to replace Rishi Sunak, and later this week we are expecting to get some details from the party as to what the timetable for the contest will be. Sunak himself has said he will stay in place as leader until the process is under way, but he has not committed to remaining until his replacement as been elected and there has been talk of an interim leader standing in if the election continues until the party conference in October, or beyond.
This morning a senior Tory said Sunak should stay until the new leader has been elected. Andrew Mitchell, the shadow foreign secretary, said that, although he thought Sunak’s instinct was “almost certainly to go”, he thought he should stay on. He told Times Radio:
An interim leader is not, in my view, the best option. The best option is to seek to persuade Rishi to remain. It’s not an enormously long time in the scope of things. It’s probably till mid to end November …
I think his instinct is almost certainly to go. I hope that he won’t. I hope he will stay till November for the reasons that I have described. And at the 1922 Committee meeting last week, there was a widespread feeling of sympathy and respect for Rishi Sunak. And I’m sure that if he does stay, that will be the overwhelming feeling of the party.
Mitchell said the party should hold the leadership election after the party conference, as it did in 2005. He explained:
I think we should play it long. I think the example of Michael Howard in 2005 is a good example, allow members of the Conservative party, the country, to see what is on offer from the talented group of people who will no doubt put their names forward …
I very much hope that what the party will decide to do is to mirror what Michael Howard did in 2005 and allow the party conference the space for candidates who are offering themselves to say what they would do for their party, say what they would do for their country, and that members of the party, members of parliament, can then take a view as a result of that showcasing.
The House of Commons is not sitting today, and there is not much in the diary for the day. But we are getting a lobby briefing from Downing Street at 11.30am, David Lammy, the foreign secretary, is in Israel where he has a meeting with the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and Nick Thomas-Symonds, the minister for EU relations, is in Brussels for a meeting with his EU counterpart, Maroš Šefčovič.
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