United Kingdom

    Brexit is legally reversible as Brits still have the right to change their minds, one of the key architects of Article 50 will say. Lord John Kerr, the former chief British diplomat, is set to claim Theresa May’s Article 50 letter can be unilaterally withdrawn at any time and therefore the die is not cast irretrievably. Speaking at an event organised by the pro-single market campaign Open Britain in London on Friday, the former UK ambassador will say: We are not required to withdraw just because Mrs May sent her letter. We can change our minds at any stage during the process. He will add: Mrs May’s letter was only a notification of the UK’s ‘intention’ to withdraw. Intentions can change. We still have all the rights of a member-state, including the right to change our mind...

    Theresa May has been warned to promote another Brexiteer into the Cabinet to keep the balance of her top team in the wake of Priti Patel’s dramatic departure. The International Development Secretary, a prominent Brexit supporter, was effectively sacked on Wednesday for holding a string of unofficial meetings with senior Israeli figures without informing Downing Street. The weakened Prime Minister is now facing pressure from pro-Brexit Tories to replace Ms Patel with another Eurosceptic MP and to retain the balance of her Cabinet, which would tip in favour of Remain after Ms Patel's departure. Is Patel's resignation enough to restore May's authority? It comes after Ms May provoked outrage in her party by appointing former chief whip Gavin Williamson to replace Defence Secre...

    Priti Patel has thanked supporters in her first tweet since she resigned from her Cabinet position amid growing fears in Europe that the government could collapse after a series of scandals. Ms Patel quit her post as International Development Secretary after she was ordered to return home from an official trip by the Prime Minister in farcical scenes yesterday following revelations about her undocumented meetings with Israeli politicians. In her first public message since her resignation, she thanked her friends, colleagues and constituents for the support they showed her. She wrote on Twitter: An enormous thank you to friends, colleagues, constituents & the public for the support & kindness you have shown me over the last few days. An enormous thank you to friends...

    Annual house price growth accelerated in October, pushing average property values to a new high, according to an index. Across the UK, the average house price stood at £225,826 in October, surpassing a previous high in September, Halifax said. Property values were up by 4.5% annually in October - marking the third month in a row that the growth rate has accelerated. In September, annual house price growth stood at 4% and in August the annual growth rate was 2.6%. House prices were up by 0.3% month-on-month in October, following a 0.8% monthly increase in September. The end of the line? Last week saw the Bank of England base rate rise from 0.25% to 0.5%, meaning millions of borrowers on a variable rate mortgage face the possibility of higher mortgage payments. Russell...

    A document obtained by the Guardian reveals the EU’s groundwork and confirms that it will be impossible for the UK to get a finished trade deal by March 2019. The British government has less than a month to make a concession on the Brexit bill in order to guarantee launching trade talks in December, the Guardian understands. Senior officials in Brussels say talks have stalled since Theresa May’s Florence speech and warn the EU will find it difficult to agree to trade talks at a December summit unless the prime minister offers more on the Brexit divorce settlement. There remains a lot to do on financial obligations, Italy’s Europe minister Sandro Gozi said on Tuesday, after meeting the Brexit secretary, David Davis, in Rome. May faces heat on Brexit and harassment - Provide...

    Useless surgical masks and robots could be scrapped to help save NHS £150 million a year, Imperial College has said, after identifying changes the health service can make to save more than £150 million each year. Researchers from the Department of Surgery and Cancer, found 71 commonly performed procedures or practices that are of high cost but low value to patients, which could be stopped. They include hernia repair operations for people with few symptoms, which currently cost the NHS £28 million a year, but do little to make people feel better. Likewise using CT scans to diagnose appendicitis was found to have little benefit above and beyond the traditional blood tests and hands-on pressure checks by doctors. Scrapping them could save the health service four million pound...

    On a street lined with rows of multi-million pound Edwardian houses and Mercedes, Porsches and BMWs, lies the Hammersmith and Fulham Foodbank in South West London. Housed within a church and open twice a week, the foodbank helps hundreds of people a year with emergency parcels. Despite its unlikely location, the wealthy London borough’s part in the roll out of Universal Credit has seen demand across the area’s three foodbanks soar by 94%, figures seen by HuffPost UK reveal. Sitting at a table looking at the list of tinned and fresh goods available with her daughter and grand-daughter is Maggie Millard. I’ve been here four times since the beginning of last month, the 57-year-old tells HuffPost. I was moved from [Employment Support Allowance] and onto Universal Credit. As so...

    Theresa May is under intense pressure to sack Boris Johnson amid fears that his latest diplomatic blunder could add an extra five years to the jail term of a British-Iranian charity worker. Already reeling from the Westminster sex harassment scandal, the PM tried to declare full confidence in both Johnson and International Development Secretary Priti Patel, who was dragged into a separate row involving Israel. The Prime Minister defended both her Cabinet ministers for doing a good job despite calls for both of them to be fired. Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe was on a family holiday in Iran last year when she was arrested for spying in Tehran, a claim vigorously denied by the British government and her family. But Johnson told MPs last week that the 38-year-old had been teaching...

    Jeremy Corbyn has implied that the Queen should apologise if her private estate invested £10m of her fortune in an offshore tax haven to avoid paying tax in Britain. Asked whether the monarch should say sorry over her investments, the Labour leader said anyone putting money offshore to avoid tax should do so and also “recognise what it does to our society”. It comes after a major leak of 13.4 million documents dubbed the Paradise Papers – which reveal the financial affairs of the global elite. The Duchy of Lancaster, the private estate of the Queen, was found to have millions of pounds invested in offshore arrangements in the Cayman Islands and Bermuda between 2004 and 2005. There is no suggestion that those involved acted illegally. The papers also traced a small portion ...

    A new controversy engulfed Westminster today when a woman accused House of Commons authorities of ignoring her claim that she was raped by a Conservative Party figure. I was raped by someone senior to me in the Conservative Party, alleged the woman, who is a Tory activist. Tory whip Chris Pincher resigns and refers himself to police over behaviour allegations It was violent. It wasn’t in Westminster, it was in my own home. And it shouldn’t have happened. The case raised questions of whether the House of Commons has done enough to protect victims after it emerged that a warning given to the authorities about the man allegedly responsible was not passed on. Theresa May was due to meet other party leaders this afternoon to try to hammer out protection for MPs’ staff who fall ...