Starmer welcomes Zelenskyy to Downing Street ahead of Friday’s Putin-Trump meeting
Keir Starmer has welcomed Volodymyr Zelenskyy to Downing Street as Europe braces for Donald Trump’s face-to-face discussions with Vladimir Putin on Friday.
The Ukrainian president and the prime minister embraced and posed for the cameras in front of Number 10 with a handshake as he arrived in Westminster on Thursday morning while gathered media in Downing Street shouted questions. A red carpet had been rolled out for his arrival.
The prime minister’s meeting with Zelenskyy comes after he said Britain stands ready to “increase pressure” on Russia if necessary.
Key events
Phillip Inman
Growth of 0.3% is a positive sign but the chancellor still has major difficulties to confront, writes Phillip Inman:
Britain’s economy has defied the doomsayers. After growing strongly in the first quarter this year, it expanded again in the three months to June – and not by the measly 0.1% forecast by City economists, but a respectable 0.3%.
The latest data shows a 0.4% expansion in June alone as manufacturing recovered its mojo. Meanwhile, the construction sector, hit by a slowdown in new projects, turned its hand to repairs and maintenance, reversing a fall in May to post a solid 1.2% growth rate over the second quarter.
Probably the most cheering aspect for Rachel Reeves from the latest Office for National Statistics data was the feedback from businesses involved in scientific research and development. This sector posted an 8.3% rise in activity in June alone, closely followed by the architectural and engineering sectors, which collectively expanded by 6.7% on the previous month.
The chancellor is keen for everyone to forget about the missteps of the past year when one miscalculation after another has set off fireworks either inside the Labour party or the business community, or both.
Jane Clinton
Education secretary Bridget Phillipson has vowed to tackle the “yawning inequalities” in educational attainment.
Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme, she said:
Alongside the post-16 white paper that we’ll be publishing later on this year, I will also bring a big focus through our schools white paper on how we tackle these thorny generational challenges where white working-class kids across our country don’t get the start that they deserve.
Now the school system is an important part of how we respond to that, but I would say alongside it so much of this develops and opens up in the early years.
“The attainment gap that we see between less well-off students and better-off students opens up before the age of five.It’s why early years has been such a priority, because if we get that right then we set up children to succeed, but we will take more action in the school system to ensure that those gaps that we see, those yawning inequalities, are addressed.
It’s something the last government failed to tackle. It is something this government will grasp.
You can follow the Guardian’s A-level live blog here:
Starmer welcomes Zelenskyy to Downing Street ahead of Friday’s Putin-Trump meeting
Keir Starmer has welcomed Volodymyr Zelenskyy to Downing Street as Europe braces for Donald Trump’s face-to-face discussions with Vladimir Putin on Friday.
The Ukrainian president and the prime minister embraced and posed for the cameras in front of Number 10 with a handshake as he arrived in Westminster on Thursday morning while gathered media in Downing Street shouted questions. A red carpet had been rolled out for his arrival.
The prime minister’s meeting with Zelenskyy comes after he said Britain stands ready to “increase pressure” on Russia if necessary.
Education secretary Bridget Phillipson said that the government is “taking our time” to make sure it gets right its guidance on gender-questioning children in schools.
She told Times Radio this morning:
The last Conservative government published a draft version of the guidance, because the consultation on that concluded after the election in July. What also has happened is that we had the final review from Dr Hillary Cass in the intervening period. And therefore I think it is right that any guidance to schools on gender-questioning children aligns fully with the recommendations put forward by Dr Hillary Cass.
She added:
We’re taking our time to get this right.
I understand the need for guidance, and we do believe that is important, but critically, we’re talking about quite sensitive issues of children’s wellbeing and we want to make sure that any guidance that’s published reflects the important need to get this right for children and young people, but also ensures that schools have the clarity that they want on this important, but quite sensitive, topic.
Phillipson also said there is “no obligation” for people to call non-binary teachers Mx instead of Miss or Sir, reports the PA news agency.
She said:
They are able to make that request, but they’re not able to insist that people use that term. A teacher can, of course, make that request, but you can’t insist that it’s followed.
Asked whether she would call someone Mx, Phillipson told Times Radio:
I think that’s a hypothetical situation. I’ve never been asked to do that.
As a matter of principle, on a wider point, I would usually seek to respond to someone in a way that they would prefer, but there is no obligation for people to do that.
Education secretary Bridget Phillipson has said there has been a “steadying of the ship” after the disruption from the Covid-19 pandemic.
Speaking to BBC Breakfast, she said:
What we’ve seen is a steadying of the ship, both this year and last following some of the disruption that we saw during the pandemic.
These are young people who have not had disruption in recent times, but have had the full normal assessment process. These are also young people who would have been the first to sit GCSEs under normal circumstances. So they’ve gone through the full regular GCSE cycle that you would have expected before the pandemic.
So, this is a normal year, the kind of year that we would have seen before the pandemic hit.
According to the PA news agency, Phillipson also spoke to Sky News about the government’s investment in technical and vocational learning routes. She said:
As a government, we’re also investing more in technical and vocational education as well.
Just this week, I launched 10 new construction technical excellence colleges, one in every region, because there are also great routes that are out there, including apprenticeship opportunities where, you know, young people can have fantastic careers.
Rachel Reeves has said that Thursday’s GDP figures “show that the economy beat expectations in the second quarter of this year”.
Speaking at a construction site in Doncaster, the chancellor said “there’s still more to do to make sure that people in all parts of the country benefit” from growth.
According to the PA news agency, she said:
We are the fastest-growing economy in the G7 for the first half of this year, with a GDP growth of 0.3% this quarter, and that’s after GDP growth of 0.7% the quarter before that.
I recognise there’s still more to do to make sure that people in all parts of the country benefit from that growth, but since the general election, when I became chancellor, the economy has grown by 1.2% and GDP per capita – so for every person in the country – GDP per capita is up by 0.7%.
So, encouraging numbers today but, of course, we need to build on that to make sure people in all parts of the country are better-off.
Preparations have been under way at 10 Downing Street this morning for the visit of Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Importantly, Larry the cat is ready.
UK economy posts surprise 0.3% growth in three months to June
Richard Partington
The UK economy grew at a faster rate than expected in the second quarter, official figures show, despite a slowdown from a strong start to the year amid pressure from tax increases and Donald Trump’s global trade war.
Figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed growth in gross domestic product slowed to 0.3% in the three months to the end of June, down from a rate of 0.7% in the first quarter.
Although beating forecasts for a slowdown to 0.1% growth made by City economists and the Bank of England, the latest snapshot underscores the challenge for the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, as she considers options for boosting the economy and raising revenues at her autumn budget.
Liz McKeown, an ONS director of economic statistics, said:
Growth slowed in the second quarter after a strong start to the year. The economy was weak across April and May, with some activity having been brought forward to February and March ahead of stamp duty and tariff changes, but then recovered strongly in June.
The latest snapshot showed the economy grew at a faster rate than expected in June of 0.4%, after two consecutive months of shrinking output. The ONS also revised its initial estimate for April’s GDP contraction from -0.3% to -0.1%.
Reeves said the quarterly figures were positive as it showed that Britain had recorded a strong start to the year and continued growth in the second quarter, “but there is more to do to deliver an economy that works for working people”.
International students ‘always welcome’ says education secretary, but adds some universities have ‘become too dependent’ on them
Education secretary Bridget Phillipson has said that the government has taken action to help universities, but that there is more to do, reports the PA news agency.
Asked about universities’ financial struggles, Phillipson told Times Radio:
I’ve made it a priority to put our universities on a more sustainable footing.
The action that we’ve taken in turning around the regulator, the Office for Students, [has] much more of a focus on universities’ financial health, but also the difficult but necessary decision that we took quite early on as a government to increase tuition fees to make sure that universities have a more stable funding stream into the future.
There is more to do and later on this year we’ll be setting out our plans for post-16 education overall, including universities, through a white paper we’ll be publishing.
On international students, the education secretary said they made an “important contribution” to the UK’s universities and economy, and “will always be welcome in the UK”.
She added:
It is also fair to say that some institutions, their business model has allowed them to become too dependent on international students, and therefore too open to any fluctuations that may happen around that.
Education secretary Bridget Phillipson has said it is a “day of celebration” for young people ahead of A-level results on Thursday.
Speaking to Times Radio, she said:
I’ll just start by saying that this is a really exciting day for young people. They’ve worked really hard. They’ve had brilliant support from their teachers and parents. It’s a day for celebration for our young people and there are lots of great routes out there.
University is one of them, but for young people who are considering other routes there are apprenticeships and plenty of other opportunities available too, and lots of advice available if you haven’t quite got what you needed, through Ucas and clearing, and also through the National Career Service.
Asked about the drop in pupils choosing to study arts and languages at A-level, Phillipson told Times Radio:
I think it’s a matter of personal choice.
I do think it’s a good thing that more young people are studying subjects like maths. There are often great roots into careers. The same is, of course, true of subjects like languages, and that was my personal passion.
But we, of course, look at some of those trends over time and keep under consideration what some of the reasons might be that we see changes in subject choice.
Keir Starmer to meet Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Downing Street
Keir Starmer will be joined by the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy at Downing Street on Thursday morning, as Europe braces for the outcome of Donald Trump’s face-to-face discussions with his Russian counterpart later this week.
The prime minister’s meeting with Zelenskyy comes after he said Britain stood ready to “increase pressure” on Russia if necessary. Meanwhile, Trump threatened Russia with “severe consequences” if a ceasefire was rejected by its leader.
During a call with the US president and European allies on Wednesday, Starmer praised Trump for his work to bring forward a “viable” chance of an end to the war.
Concerns have been raised over Zelenskyy’s exclusion from the meeting between Trump and Putin, which is scheduled to take place in Alaska.
Speaking on Wednesday, Starmer said:
This meeting on Friday that President Trump is attending is hugely important. As I’ve said personally to President Trump for the three-and-a-bit years this conflict has been going on, we haven’t got anywhere near a prospect of actually a viable solution, a viable way of bringing it to a ceasefire.
And now we do have that chance because of the work of that the president has put in.
Starmer is scheduled to meet Zelenskyy at 9.30am.
Also today, education secretary Bridget Phillipson has been on the morning media rounds as students in England, Wales and Northern Ireland received their A-level exam results. Phillipson is also expected to visit Trafford College in Altrincham, Greater Manchester. The shadow secretary of state for business and trade Andrew Griffith has been on the morning media rounds for the Conservatives. I’ll bring you any lines from them in a moment.
But first, in other developments:
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The UK economy grew at a faster rate than expected in the second quarter, official figures show, despite a slowdown from a strong start to the year amid pressure from tax increases and Donald Trump’s global trade war. Figures from the Office for National Statistics showed growth in gross domestic product (GDP) slowed to 0.3% in the three months to the end of June, down from a rate of 0.7% in the first quarter.
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Rachel Reeves has promised to use her autumn budget to prioritise fixing Britain’s dismal record on productivity as she sought to downplay mounting tax speculation with a focus on economic growth. Writing exclusively for the Guardian, she said: “If Labour’s first year in power was about fixing the foundations, then the second year is about building a stronger economy for a renewed Britain.”
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David Lammy has referred himself to the environment watchdog after going fishing with JD Vance without the required licence during the US vice-president’s trip to the UK. The foreign secretary hosted Vance and his family at Chevening House in Kent last week, where the pair fished from the property’s private lake. Anglers aged 13 and over must hold a rod licence to fish for freshwater species such as carp in England and Wales.
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The Scottish Greens have to broaden their appeal beyond middle-class urbanites by talking to voters in industrial towns facing wholesale job losses, a Green leadership candidate says. Gillian Mackay is one of four Scottish Greens bidding to win two co-leader posts after Patrick Harvie, the UK’s longest-serving party leader, quit as co-convener earlier this year.
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