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Goldman Sachs boss calls for second Brexit referendum - Politics live

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Thu 16 Nov 2017 12.11 ESTFirst published on Thu 16 Nov 2017 04.08 EST
Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of Goldman Sachs.
Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of Goldman Sachs.
Photograph: Alessandro Della Valle/EPA
Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of Goldman Sachs.
Photograph: Alessandro Della Valle/EPA

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Goldman Sachs boss calls for second Brexit referendum

Lloyd Blankfein, the head of Goldman Sachs, has come out in favour of a second referendum on Brexit. He has just tweeted this.

Here in UK, lots of hand-wringing from CEOs over #Brexit. Better sense of the tough and risky road ahead. Reluctant to say, but many wish for a confirming vote on a decision so monumental and irreversible. So much at stake, why not make sure consensus still there?

— Lloyd Blankfein (@lloydblankfein) November 16, 2017

Given the position of bankers generally, and Goldman Sachs in particular, at the apex of leave camp demonology, this endorsement may not be particularly helpful to those mobilising for a second referendum.

Lloyd Blankfein, pictured giving evidence to a US senate committee hearing earlier this year. Photograph: Jim Young/REUTERS
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David Miliband says Brexit is 'greatest giveaway of political power a country has voluntarily ever done'

David Miliband, the former Labour foreign secretary, told BBC Radio 5 Live that Brexit was “the greatest giveaway of political power that a country has voluntarily ever done”. In an interview to promote his new book about the refugee crisis, Miliband, who now runs the US charity, the International Rescue Committee, he said:

Brexit, by definition is trashing the history of the last 40 years, I think it is putting at severe risk many of the gains. I see Brexit as an act of unilateral political disarmament. It’s the greatest giveaway of political power that a country has voluntarily ever done, because we are ceding our position at the table with 27 other countries. Together we can fashion a foreign policy that really does have clout. On our own it’s much harder to do so.

Former foreign secretary David Miliband has told BBC Radio 5 live that Britain is “trashing” its own interests by going ahead with Brexit, and that triggering article 50 was “ridiculously dangerously premature.”

Miliband said he was in the Foreign Office at the time when article 50 was adopted, as part of the Lisbon treaty.

For the first time ever the European Union had made provision for a country to leave. Never in my wildest dreams did I expect it to be Britain that was the country that was going to leave but what I do remember having a conversation about is, you’d have to be mad to trigger Article 50 until you’re absolutely sure what your game plan is to get out. As once you’ve triggered it, you hand all your cards over to the European Union.

Asked if it was a “mad move” for the government to trigger article 50 in March, he replied:

It was ridiculously premature, it was dangerously premature to hand over that. We should never have triggered article 50 until we were absolutely clear what kind of Brexit we were going to negotiate.

David Miliband at the IRC headquarters in New York. Photograph: Christopher Lane for the Observer New Review/The Observer

In the universal credit debate Conservative MP Heidi Allen said she supported the principle of UC. But she strongly criticised the way it is being implemented. Citing figures from the research published today by the Women’s Budget Group and the Runnymede Trust about the impact of the cuts to UC (see 1pm), she said she did not think UC would function properly until the cuts to the taper rate and the work allowance, which have made UC less generous than originally planned, were reversed.

Peter Walker
Peter Walker

The communities secretary Sajid Javid has lambasted baby boomers who believe young people could afford a home if only they cut back “on nights out and smashed avocados”, saying such critics were out of touch with a broken housing system.

Warning that a failure to make homes more affordable could see an entire generation becomes rootless, and resentful of both capitalism and politicians, Javid said urgent action was required.

In a speech in Bristol Javid had tough words for “baby boomers who have long-since paid off their own mortgage” who believed there was no need to build more homes, saying they were “living in a different world”.

Such people argue that “affordability is only a problem for millennials that spend too much on nights out and smashed avocados,” Javid said, adding: “It’s nonsense. They’re not facing up to the reality of modern daily life and have no understanding of the modern market.”

With the average house price now eight times the average income, and the mean age of a first-time buyer hitting 32, vast numbers of people were forced to remain living with their parents, he said.

“Where once it would have taken an average couple three years to save for a deposit it will now take a quarter of a century. Assuming, of course, they can afford to save at all,” Javid said.

“And last year, the average first-time buyer in London needed a deposit – a deposit – of more than £90,000. That’s a lot of avocados.”

Sajid Javid. Photograph: Oli Scarff/AFP/Getty Images

These are from Labour’s Stella Creasy, who has been contributing to the debate.

When our food banks are saying they need an extra 2,000 tonnes of food to cope with universal credit you can’t argue this system is working or saving exchequer money - we will all pay for the consequences of the delays in system. Government must stop for sake of all!

— stellacreasy (@stellacreasy) November 16, 2017

Just raised inherent problem with universal credit delays that will mean those with rent arrears more likely to be evicted - already contacted by residents in walthamstow terrified for when it comes to us in new year. Govt just not listening to mess & fear system will create!

— stellacreasy (@stellacreasy) November 16, 2017

Scotland has fortnightly payments - no reason for delay in universal credit for weeks unless government wants to encourage debt. So too if tenants want rent paid direct simpler & less expensive for all concerned-lots of ways to improve system but govt refusing to act at present..

— stellacreasy (@stellacreasy) November 16, 2017

The Labour MP Barry Gardiner claims Tory MPs are refusing to sit behind the minister on the front bench because they are embarrassed by the government’s record.

In 20 years I have never before seen every Tory backbencher refuse to sit behind their front bench but move across the aisle.
Clearly nobody can justify Universal Credit#PauseAndFix
Sadly not allowed to photograph in chamber

— Barry Gardiner (@BarryGardiner) November 16, 2017

This shows the scene in the Commons chamber a few minutes ago. The government benches are on the left. Gardiner is referring to the way most Tories are sitting “below the aisle”, not behind the minister.

Commons chamber as MPs debate universal credit.
Commons chamber as MPs debate universal credit. Photograph: BBC

Frank Field tells MPs words cannot express 'horror' of universal credit

Here are some more quotes from Frank Field’s speech.

  • Field, the Labour chair of the Commons work and pensions committee, said he did not have the words to describe the “horror” of universal credit.

I want to begin by confessing my own inadequacies. I’m sure most of us, all of us, when we get up to debate in this great place, reflect on how we simply do not have the language to match up to the tasks that we are trying to present, through this chamber, to the nation on what is happening. I have to say, this is the most important debate that I have ever participated in in nearly 40 years as the member of parliament for Birkenhead. And I have never more felt the inadequacies of the language that I have to try and tell the House what horror is happening now to a growing number of my constituents under what is called this welfare reform programme.

In his speech he described UC as “organised chaos” and a “national scandal” and gave examples of constituents facing extreme hunger or poverty because under UC they were missing benefit payments.

  • He ridiculed the idea that it was acceptable to make people wait six weeks for their first UC payments. This is what MPs are voting on today, and he said:

More than half of low and middle income families have no savings at all to fall back on us. Two thirds of us have less than a month’s savings to tide us over a criss. The idea that families can wait for six weeks, the most vulnerable people that we have the honour to represent in this House - in the cold light of day, you wonder how any decent set of people [can think that].

  • He also proposed five other reforms to UC.

1 - Payments every two weeks, instead of monthly. Field said that this was the case in Scotland, and that Northern Ireland was going to get fortnightly payments too. He said England should adopt the same policy.

2 - Payments direct to landlords if tenants want. Under UC (which replaces housing benefit and five other benefits), all the money goes to tenants, instead of housing benefit going directly to landlords. Field said, if tenants want, they should be able to revert to having their rent money going direct to the landlord.

3 - Warnings to housing associations. Field said the department for work and pensions shoud automatically tell local authorities and housing associations that their tenants would be pushed into debt.

4 - Sharing free school meals data. Field said babies and toddlers were going without healthy start vouches, and low-income pupils going without free school meals, because UC data which could be given to local authorities was not being passed on. He said “that terrible nonsense” should end.

5 - Duty on work and pensions secretary to promote the welfare of claimants. Field said that he objected when the government removed a line in legislation saying the work and pensions secretary had a duty to promote the welfare of claimants. He was told that statement was unnecessary, he said. But he said the duty should be reintroduced, because he said it was incompatible with the current, punitive sanctions policy (which leads to claimants losing money if they don’t comply with very strict conditions.)

Frank Field. Photograph: BBC
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Frank Field says food banks will need 2,000 more tonnes of food because of universal credit rollout

In the debate Field says the Trussell Trust estimates that food banks will need an extra 2,000 tonnes of food because the impact of the rollout of universal credit.

He says, when the Commons work and pensions committee looked at this, it decided that the first thing that could be done to alleviate the problem would to change the system so that UC claimants get their first payment after a month, not after six weeks.

The committee set out its argument in this report. Here is the key recommendation.

The baked-in six week wait for the first payment in Universal Credit is a major obstacle to the success of the policy. In areas where the full service has rolled out, evidence compellingly links it to an increase in acute financial difficulty. Most low income families simply do not have the savings to see them through such an extended period. While increased availability of advance payment loans, of up to half the estimated monthly award, are welcome, they are not a solution to a fundamental flaw in the current design. Universal credit seeks to mirror the world of work, but no one in work waits six weeks for a monthly paycheque. We recommend the government aims to reduce the standard waiting time for a first universal credit payment to one month.

Field says UC was created with “noble intent”. But it has not lived up to that promise, he says, and it has become “a personal nightmare” for his constituents.

He ends by saying UC is “a national scandal which the government could stop”.

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MPs debate call to cut waiting time for first universal credit payment to one month

In the Commons Frank Field, the Labour chair of the Commons work and pensions committee, has just started the backbench debate on universal credit. MPs are debating a motion that calls on the government “to reduce the standard initial wait for a first universal credit payment to one month.” Currently claimants have to wait six weeks for their first payment.

Field says that, in almost 40 years as an MP, he does not think he has spoken in a more important debate.

Here is the full text of John McDonnell’s speech. It does not contain new policy, but it fleshes out the Labour budget demands and the critique of austerity that he set out in his overnight briefing (see 9.08am) and in his Today interview (see 9.30am.)

In the speech he reiterated his demand for a pause in the rollout of universal crexit.

Since the last autumn statement, the government has accelerated the roll out of universal credit despite evidence it is causing poverty, debt and evictions.

The six week delay in payments has taken some families into outright destitution.

The Trussell Trust has found a 30 per cent increase in foodbank usage in areas where universal credit has been rolled out.

And under the guise of reforming the system, the government have pushed through swingeing cuts now amounting to £3bn a year.

Those cuts will now mean a million more children living in poverty.

McDonnell also cited research published today jointly by the Women’s Budget Group and the Runnymede Trust looking at who loses out from cuts to universal credit. The report compares what individuals and households would have got under the original plans for universal credit published in 2013 with what they will get now, following the 2015/2106 changes making universal credit less generous. There were various cuts, but the key one was a reduction in the work allowance.

The research says “low paid workers will lose the most from cuts and changes to universal credit with women and ethnic minorities hardest hit”. “By April 2021 employed individuals who live in households claiming universal credit will be £1200 a year worse off than they would have been under the original UC system,” it says. And it says increases to the national living wage and the raising of the personal tax allowance will not, despite government claims, compensate for the cuts.

Here is a chart from the report, showing the impact of the UC cuts on people by gender, ethnicity and employment status.

Impact of universal credit cuts Photograph: Women's Budget Group/Runnymede Trust

More on this story

More on this story

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  • UK faces two decades of no earnings growth and more austerity, says IFS

  • Budget 2017: Hammond masks gloomy outlook with stamp duty cut

  • Hammond to borrow extra £90bn after lower productivity forecast

  • Key points from budget 2017 – at a glance

  • Autumn budget: the winners, the losers and the overlooked

  • 'Forget stamp duty, we need a pay rise' – people respond to the budget

  • Hammond boosts housing and NHS spending as growth forecasts are slashed

  • Cough sweets, Clarkson and booze: Hammond brings out budget jokes

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