A group of people are brought in to Dover, Kent, by the RNLI Dungeness Lifeboat following a small boat incident in the Channel, December 28, 2024
IMMIGRATION rule changes blocking refugees from gaining citizenship are counterproductive and a dark moment in British history, campaigners warned today.
Under the updated Home Office “good character” guidance which took effect on Monday, applicants who entered Britain illegally will “normally” be refused citizenship, regardless of how long they have lived here.
The new rules specifically target those who arrived via dangerous routes, stating: “A person who applies for citizenship from February 10 2025 who has previously arrived without a required valid entry clearance or electronic travel authorisation, having made a dangerous journey, will normally be refused citizenship.”
A dangerous journey, the guidance adds, includes but is not limited to travelling by small boat or being concealed in a vehicle.
The change comes as Labour’s new Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill, which scraps the previous Tory government’s Rwanda plan, passed its first hurdle in the Commons on Monday.
The Bill includes new criminal offences and grants counter-terror-style powers to police and enforcement agencies in a bid to crack down on people-smuggling gangs in the Channel.
Activists from Fossil Free London and Green New Deal Rising take part in a protest against a third runway at Heathrow, and expansion at Gatwick and Luton, outside Siemens Healthineers in Eynsham, Oxfordshire, January 29, 2025
HEATHROW expansion cannot be the quick fix to the economy, campaigners warned today after the government backed a new multibillion-pound investment programme.
The airport’s chief executive Thomas Woldbye announced funding for upgrades and expansion ahead of its proposal for a third runway, expected to be submitted to the government this summer.
The government said that the investment programme will secure thousands of steel jobs by increasing the demand for British-made steel.
But polling by climate charities suggests a majority of the public believes expansion is the “wrong priority,” with 67 per cent of respondents also saying they did not see much, if any, benefit to taxpayers.
No Third Runway Coalition chairman Paul McGuinness called the announcement “almost Orwellian,” arguing that the government had relied on a Heathrow-commissioned report to promote the project rather than its own Treasury assessment.
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Greenpeace UK’s chief scientist Dr Doug Parr said that the “real winners” will be Mr Woldbye and “the rest of the polluting aviation industry.”
“The only ‘perks’ for most people will be noise, air pollution and climate emissions,” he said.
Dr Parr said a third runway is “bad economics,” saying: “Instead of picking up any old polluting project from the discard pile, the Chancellor should focus on green industries that can attract investment and bring economic and social benefits for years to come, like secure jobs, affordable energy bills and cheaper, better transport.”
Labour’s refusal to honour an ombudsman recommendation to compensate Waspi women has been deeply unpopular
LABOUR MPs have been banned from publicly criticising government policies in a new clampdown by the beleaguered Starmer regime, it was revealed today.
It is understood that Labour whips have written a threatening letter to the 10 Labour MPs who voted against the government’s refusal to compensate the Waspi women over pension maladministration, as recommended by an ombudsman.
In an unprecedented injunction, the letter includes the warning that “you are not entitled to criticise the government in public.”
The move forms part of an increasing authoritarianism by Labour’s leadership as the government’s popularity plummets in the polls.
Three left MPs have had their six-month suspension for an earlier rebellion over the two-child benefit cap extended for an open-ended period, indicating that they are unlikely ever to be readmitted to the parliamentary party.
Government business managers had only imposed a one-line whip, the lightest form of parliamentary discipline, on the Waspi vote, since it was on a purely symbolic motion tabled by the Scottish National Party.
Protesters rally against U.S. President Donald Trump and Elon Musk outside the Michigan Capitol in Lansing, Michigan on February 5, 2025. (Photo: Jeff Kowalsky/AFP via Getty Images)
“We are in the midst of a constitutional crisis right now,” said one legal expert. “We never have seen anything like this.”
The Trump administration’s defiance of court orders that threaten to hamper the president and unelected billionaire Elon Musk’s assault on federal agencies and basic rights has legal experts and other observers warning of a perilous new phase in the United States’ rolling constitutional crisis.
On Monday, the Revolving Door Project (RDP) launched an effort to track the Trump administration’s refusal to comply with orders from the federal judiciary and detail the impact that obstinance is having across the country.
The watchdog group pointed to several specific examples, including the Environmental Protection Agency’s refusal to “disperse already-awarded grants funded by the Inflation Reduction Act, in apparent defiance of” federal judges’ orders against the Trump administration’s sweeping funding freeze.
“NOTHING is more important than civil society pressuring judges to have a spine in the face of Musk and Trump’s intransigence,” Jeff Hauser, RDP’s executive director, wrote on social media late Monday. “Judicial orders must be enforced!”
Journalists Judd Legum and Noel Sims highlighted another example on Tuesday, noting that the administration is “prohibiting National Institutes of Health (NIH) staff from issuing virtually all grant funding” despite two federal court injunctions against the freeze.
David Super, a professor at Georgetown University Law Center, told Legum and Sims that the Trump administration is “in contempt of court,” calling the continued freeze on NIH grants “completely unlawful.”
“The administration cannot choose which law it will follow or ignore. These are not partisan or political issues. These are rule of law and process issues. We cannot afford to remain silent.”
Super is among a growing number of legal experts sounding the alarm about the nation’s descent into a full-blown constitutional emergency.
“We are in the midst of a constitutional crisis right now,” Erwin Chemerinsky, a constitutional law expert and dean of the University of California, Berkeley School of Law, told The New York Times late last week. “There have been so many unconstitutional and illegal actions in the first 18 days of the Trump presidency. We never have seen anything like this.”
“Systematic unconstitutional and illegal acts create a constitutional crisis,” Chemerinsky added.
Both President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance have levied criticism at the federal judiciary in recent days as it has put up roadblocks that have hindered the new administration’s ability to lawlessly impose its will.
“Certain activists and highly political judges want us to slow down, or stop,” Trump wrote in a social media post early Tuesday, just days after Musk floated allowing “elected bodies” to terminate “the worst 1% of appointed judges.”
In a statement on Monday, American Bar Association (ABA) president William Bay noted that “in the last 21 days, more than a dozen lawsuits have been filed alleging that the administration’s actions violate the rule of law and are contrary to the Constitution or laws of the United States.”
“The administration cannot choose which law it will follow or ignore,” said Bay. “These are not partisan or political issues. These are rule of law and process issues. We cannot afford to remain silent. We must stand up for the values we hold dear. The ABA will do its part and act to protect the rule of law.”
“We urge every attorney to join us and insist that our government, a government of the people, follow the law,” he added. “It is part of the oath we took when we became lawyers. Whatever your political party or your views, change must be made in the right way. Americans expect no less.”
Climate Science Denier Donald Trump says Burn, Baby, Burn.Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
Protesters rally against Elon Musk-led attacks on civil servants outside the U.S. Capitol on February 11, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Photo: Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)
President Donald Trump’s latest executive order “gives Elon Musk, an unelected, hyper-partisan billionaire, unfettered authority over this country’s civil service,” warned one advocacy group.
U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday signed an executive order handing an Elon Musk-led commission sweeping power to oversee federal hiring across non-military departments, entrenching what’s been described as a “shadow government” spearheaded by an unelected billionaire.
The new order states that the leader of each non-military federal agency “shall develop a data-driven plan” in coordination with the Department of Government Efficiency( DOGE), an advisory body that has infiltrated departments across the U.S. government—and accessed highly sensitive data—as part of an unprecedented effort to gut spending and the federal workforce.
“This hiring plan shall include that new career appointment hiring decisions shall be made in consultation with the agency’s DOGE Team Lead, consistent with applicable law,” the order continues. “The agency shall not fill any vacancies for career appointments that the DOGE Team Lead assesses should not be filled, unless the Agency Head determines the positions should be filled.”
The order also instructs agency directors to prepare for “large-scale” cuts to the federal workforce.
“It’s a complete takeover of the federal government by Musk,” investigative journalist Carole Cadwalladr wrote in response to the executive action.
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office with Musk at his side, Trump on Tuesday called the order “very important” and attacked federal judges who “want to try and stop us,” alluding to court orders against DOGE’s attempt to access vital government systems.
Musk, who is leading DOGE while simultaneously heading companies that are benefiting directly from his work inside the Trump administration, insisted he’s not orchestrating a “hostile takeover” of the federal government, declaring that the public voted for “major government reform” and “they are going to get what they voted for.”
The mega-billionaire also falsely claimed DOGE has been transparent as it rampages through the federal government.
“In reality,” The Guardian noted, “Musk has taken great pains to conceal how DOGE has operated, starting with his own involvement in the project. Musk himself is a ‘special government employee,’ which the White House has said means his financial disclosure filing will not be made public. The DOGE team involves about 40 staffers, but the actual number is not known. Staffers have tried to keep their identities private and refused to give their last names to career officials at the agencies they were detailed to.”
Trump’s latest executive order (EO) is poised to supercharge the Musk-led assault on and total dismantling of federal agencies, from the U.S. Agency for International Development to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
“This new EO signed today appears to create DOGE as a shadow government across the entire federal government,” Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo wrote late Wednesday, adding that the order “seems to make Elon as head of DOGE functionally the president or perhaps something more like a prime minister.”
Skye Perryman, president and CEO of the advocacy group Democracy Forward, warned in a statement that “this latest attack on public service gives Elon Musk, an unelected, hyper-partisan billionaire, unfettered authority over this country’s civil service.”
“People and communities across the nation depend on a non-partisan, committed civil service,” said Perryman. “Democracy Forward will pursue all legal options available to protect our civil service and the American people from harms that would stem from this executive order.”
Climate Science Denier Donald Trump says Burn, Baby, Burn.Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
