Police officers and protesters clash in Trafalgar Square during a March for Palestine in London, October 14, 2023
CAMPAIGNERS celebrated a ”huge victory for democracy” today after the Court of Appeal ruled key anti-protest legislation was forced through unlawfully.
The Home Office had appealed a High Court ruling that struck down laws brought in by the previous Tory government in 2023.
The measures expanded police powers to interfere with protests, lowering the threshold from what is considered “serious disruption” to community life, from “significant” and “prolonged” to “more than minor.”
Civil rights group Liberty challenged the law change, arguing that the measures had been voted down months earlier and that then home secretary Suella Braverman had used secondary legislation, which requires far less parliamentary scrutiny, to implement them.Ms Braverman used so-called “Henry VIII powers” to introduce the laws by clarifying the definition of “serious disruption” under the Public Order Act 1986.
Liberty argued that the broad redefinition of “serious disruption” effectively granted the police “almost unlimited powers to impose conditions on protests.”
The High Court ruled it unlawful last May, but the previous government initiated an appeal, which was continued by Labour after it came to power.
Upholding the ruling today, Lord Justice Underhill, Lord Justice Dingemans and Lord Justice Edis said that ”the term ’serious’ inherently connotes a high threshold … [and] cannot reasonably encompass anything that is merely ‘more than minor’.”
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and actor Ross Kemp join the national phone bank at the Labour Party headquarters in central London, during campaigning for tomorrow’s local elections, April 30, 2025
LABOUR MPs, trade unions and campaigners called on the government to urgently change course today after Reform UK overturned the party’s majority of 15,000 to win the Runcorn and Helsby by-election by six votes for its candidate, former Conservative councillor Sarah Pochin.
Thursday’s local elections saw the far-right party also take their first mayoralty in Greater Lincolnshire for ex-Tory MP and minister Andrea Jenkyns, and come close seconds to Labour in three other mayoral races, as well as taking hundreds of council seats from the Tories and winning control of many councils.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer responded to the losses by saying ”I get it,” and pledged to go ”further and faster” in changing Britain.
But veteran Labour MP Diane Abbott said: ”Labour leadership is saying the party will go further and faster — in the same direction.
”They don’t seem to understand: it is our current direction that is the problem.”
Former shadow chancellor John McDonnell MP said: ”The message to ministers is: drop plans to attack disabled people.”
And Labour MP for Leeds East Richard Burgon said that Labour’s defeat in Runcorn was ”entirely avoidable” and a ”direct result of the party leadership’s political choices.”
Keir Starmer says that the Labour Party under his leadership all feel a small part of Scunthorpe.Nigel Farage explains the politics of Reform UK: Racism, Fake anti-establishmentism, Deregulation, Corporatism, Climate Change Denial, Mysogyny and Transphobia.Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves discuss wasting money including David Lammy spending £1MILLION on private jets.
“Tony Blair has decided to mimic Nigel Farage on net zero and sounds like he is speaking on behalf of petro-states like Saudi Arabia and Kazakhstan for whom he has lobbied for more years than he was prime minister.
“It is vital that the government distance itself from this latest dodgy dossier from Blair and turn its attention instead to what the Climate Change Committee is saying today. Their report could not be clearer: we are woefully unprepared for the impacts of climate breakdown as a country. Tomorrow is likely to be the hottest local election day on record – a potent reminder that we need a comprehensive plan to prepare for increasingly extreme weather events.
“The future is green; Labour must not allow yesterday’s man to drag us back into the dark ages. The government must press ahead with the drive towards clean energy and the green economy and all the advantages that will bring in creating good quality jobs, cutting energy bills and creating a healthier society.”
Rapidly phasing out fossil fuels and limiting energy consumption to tackle climate change is “a strategy doomed to fail” according to former UK prime minister Tony Blair.
In the foreword of a new report, Blair urges governments to rethink their approach to reaching net zero emissions.
Instead of policies that are seen by people as involving “financial sacrifices”, he says world leaders should deploy carbon capture and storage, including technological and nature-based approaches, to meet the rising demand for fossil fuels.
But speak to many academic experts on climate change and they will tell a very different story: that there is no strategy for addressing climate change that does not involve ending, or at least massively reducing, fossil fuel combustion.
“There is a wealth of scientific evidence demonstrating that a fossil fuel phase-out will be essential for reining in the greenhouse gas emissions driving climate change,” says Steve Pye, an associate professor of energy at UCL.
“I know because I have published some of it.”
Ed Hawkins, a climate scientist at the University of Reading, agrees.
“Rapidly reducing our reliance on fossil fuels, and not issuing new licenses to extract oil and gas, is the most effective way of minimising future climate-related disruptions,” he says.
“The sooner those with the power to shape our future recognise this, the better.”
Fossil fuels are responsible for 90% of the carbon dioxide heating the climate. The amount burned annually is still rising, and so is the rate at which the world is getting hotter. Scientists now fear we are approaching irreversible tipping points in the climate system, hence their support for an urgent replacement of fossil fuels with renewable energy.
Blair is confident that an emergency response on this scale can be avoided by absorbing CO₂ immediately after burning fossil fuels, from the smokestacks where the greenhouse gas is concentrated.
Not all of the emissions responsible for climate change would be prevented. UCL earth system scientist Mark Maslin says that natural gas, which would linger as an energy source thanks to carbon capture, still leaks from pipelines and storage vessels upstream of power plants.
Commercial applications of the technology also have a poor track record. Just two large-scale coal-fired power plants are operating with CCS worldwide – one in the US and one in Canada.
“Both have experienced consistent underperformance, recurring technical issues and ballooning costs,” Maslin says.
Blair might baulk at what he perceives to be the expense of ditching fossil fuels. But economic modelling led by Oxford University’s Andrea Bacilieri suggests his concern is misplaced. A rapid phase-out of fossil fuels could save US$30 trillion (US$1 trillion a year) by 2050 she concludes, compared with allowing power plants and factories to keep burning them with CCS.
Developing CCS will be necessary to help manage an orderly transition from fossil fuels according to Myles Allen, a professor of geosystem science at Oxford University. But it is not a substitute for undergoing that transition, he says.
“Above all, we need to make sure the availability of CCS does not encourage yet more CO₂ production.”
Keeping the public on board
Is Blair right to fret about a public backlash to lower energy use? Academics suggest multiple reasons to think otherwise if the alternative is prolonging the use of fossil fuels.
Replacing a gas boiler with a heat pump that runs on electricity, for example, can lower a household’s energy consumption without a deliberate effort. That’s because renewable appliances convert power to heat more efficiently (how much depends on how well insulated the home is).
In fact, it’s dependence on fossil fuel that is preventing many households from making this switch. The high wholesale price of gas determines the cost of electricity for UK consumers.
“Crucially, the public wants and needs the government to show clear and consistent leadership on climate change,” they say.
Meanwhile, what can corrode public acceptance of sacrifices is the high-consuming behaviour of a minority (think pop stars in rockets, as Westlake recently argued). And, arguably, the statements of powerful people like Blair.
New research even suggests the politics that Blair and many others like him favour might also play a role here. Felix Schulz (Lund University) and Christian Bretter (The University of Queensland) are social scientists who study how ideology affects personal views on climate policy.
They identified respondents in six countries (the UK, US, Germany, Brazil, South Africa and China) who shared Blair’s neoliberal worldview, which the pair define as a belief that individuals are primarily responsible for their own fortune, and need to take care of themselves – as well as an abiding faith in the free market.
“We observed a strong link between a neoliberal worldview and lack of support for the climate policies in our study,” they say.
Schulz and Bretter urge us to consider how someone’s ideology ultimately shapes their understanding of the problem and its solutions as well.
The right to social security is enshrined in several international agreements on human rights. But the UK’s system – even before the disability benefits cuts announced earlier this year – falls way below these standards.
For a new report published today, Amnesty International asked my colleague Lyle Barker and me to review the evidence about the state of the UK’s social security in relation to international human rights law.
The UK has signed and ratified a number of international agreements on human rights. One of these is the 1966 International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), which lays out the right to social security. An accompanying document defines the three key principles of this right as:
Availability A social security system established in law, administered publicly, and materially reachable by those who need it.
Adequacy Benefits must be suitable, both in amount and in duration, to realise essential socioeconomic rights.
Accessibility Everyone should be covered by the social security system, paying particular attention to disadvantaged and marginalised individuals and groups.
The conclusion of our study for Amnesty International is crystal clear: even disregarding the cuts announced in March, the UK’s social security system does not meet these standards.
Availability
Our review of the literature shows a widespread underclaiming of benefits. It has been estimated that in 2024, £22.7 billion in income-related benefits went unclaimed, a £4 billion increase from the previous year.
Gaps in official data hinder a clear understanding of why many people are missing out on the support they are entitled to. But qualitative evidence suggests this is largely due to fear, stigma, bureaucratic and digital hurdles, and eligibility cliff edges for means-tested benefits.
In recent years, the UK government has adopted a contentious and punitive stance toward benefit recipients. Media and political rhetoric have portrayed those who claim benefits as idle or undeserving scroungers.
This stigma harms the mental health and self-esteem of people experiencing poverty. It can result in shame and secrecy, and create barriers to people accessing support they are entitled to.
Our research for Amnesty International concludes that UK claimants do not get enough information and support about their rights to benefits. Combined with the stigma of claiming, the UK is falling far short of making benefits “available” in line with international standards.
Adequacy
Since the austerity policies of the 2010s, the UK’s social security system has become significantly less adequate in supporting vulnerable people and families. The basic rate of universal credit (the main benefit for working-age people on a low income) is at 40-year low in real terms amid a cost of living crisis.
Restrictive policies, such as the benefit cap (introduced in 2013 to set a maximum limit to the total benefits received by a household) and the two-child limit have curtailed access to essential benefits. Although inflation adjustments in the last two years provided some relief, many benefits still fail to keep up with rising living costs.
The two-child limit is the cruellest expression of the inadequacy of the UK’s social security system. Introduced by the Conservative government in 2017, the two-child limit restricts financial support through universal credit to two children. It is likely to be the most significant single cause of child poverty in the UK, including in families where adults work but do not earn enough to make ends meet.
When Labour returned to power, there was much speculation about whether they would reverse the two-child limit. But despite pleas from experts and people with direct experience, the government has persisted in retaining it.
Accessibility
Our study lays out the many barriers to accessibility in the UK’s system. For example, the bureaucratic hurdles in the assessment process, and the disproportionate impact of punitive sanctions on lone mothers and on minority ethnic claimants.
The UK operates a benefits sanction regime, which imposes penalties on claimants who fail to meet certain conditions. These include attending jobcentre appointments or accepting job offers. In general, sanctions and the fear of sanctions erode the trust between benefit claimants and the social security system.
Benefits sanctions are just one of the barriers to accessing social security. 1000words/Shutterstock
As it did in its previous review in 2016, in February the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights recommended that the UK review the use of benefit sanctions to ensure they are used proportionately and are subject to prompt and independent dispute resolution mechanisms.
Another accessibility concern is the shift to a digital-by-default system in the 2010s. While intended to make accessing benefits more efficient, it has become an administrative barrier.
Many people, particularly the elderly and others who are less digitally literate, struggle to navigate the benefits system. It excludes people without reliable internet access, underscoring a digital divide that prevents meaningful access to social security.
Meeting standards
Given the evidence, it is no surprise that earlier this year, the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights urged the UK government to assess the cumulative effects of the austerity measures introduced in the 2010s.
In particular, the committee recommended reversing the two-child limit, the benefit cap and the five-week delay for the first universal credit payment, and increasing the budget allocated to social security. These recommendations were made before the changes announced in the spring statement.
To live up to the internationally recognised right to social security, the UK should recognise in law, policy and practice that social security is a human right. And, that it is essential to the fulfilment of other human rights.
Amnesty International recommends the government set up a commission with statutory powers, to produce a strategy for “wholesale reform” of the social security system. The UK must establish a minimum support level and an essentials guarantee, to ensure beneficiaries can consistently meet their basic needs. A good way to start would be abolishing the two-child limit once and for all.
Keir Starmer says that the Labour Party under his leadership all feel a small part of Scunthorpe.Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves wear the uniform of the rich and powerful. They have all had clothes bought for them by multi-millionaire Labour donor Lord Alli. CORRECTION: It appears that Rachel Reeves clothing was provided by Juliet Rosenfeld.
Police officers and protesters clash in Trafalgar Square during a March for Palestine in London, October 14, 2023
