Politics

Former Liberal Democrat leader Sir Nick Clegg has landed a top job as head of Facebook’s global affairs and communications team. The ex Deputy PM will take up the role to help the social media giant navigate EU regulatory challenges as Zuckerberg looks to cosy up to Brussels. According to BBC sources the Facebook founder was personally involved in the recruitment and may have spent “months” trying to woo him over. Clegg will become the most senior addition to Facebook’s tight-knit...

A Tory backbencher has said he wouldn’t vote for his own government if he wasn’t an MP in an explosive interview with The House magazine. Johnny Mercer branded the current administration a “shit show” and said he would not have stood as an MP if the situation was like it is now". He argued his party is being “openly ridiculed” and suggested it has nothing to offer voters beyond Brexit. In a scathing attack of the Prime Minister he labelled...

Chuka Umunna is in line to get paid £65,000 a year to chair a new centrist think tank for just 12 hours a month. The Labour MP announced this month he will be heading up the advisory board of Progressive Centre UK, which has the “aim of connecting progressives from across the UK with the latest ideas and experience from across the globe”. But according to Buzzfeed News reports, his work will come at a cost of £5,420 a month...

The richest countries in the world have this week collectively advised Britain to reverse Brexit or risk destroying its economy. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), an intergovernmental economic organisation made up of 36 member countries, made the explosive suggestion of a further referendum to reverse Brexit after a report warned of severe consequences following the divorce. Its analysis suggests a “no-deal” Brexit would wipe up to a staggering £40 billion off UK economic growth by 2019, with...

Australian analysis of a post-Brexit trade deal with Britain paints a gloomy picture of life outside the European Union. With the UK starting the consultation process for the Australian trade agreement Steve Analyst posted a report that already details what a future deal might look like from an Australian perspective, and it doesn’t look good. Despite promises from Liam Fox to reinvigorate the Commonwealth partnership with a host of trade deals after Brexit a parliamentary enquiry on trade relationship with...

“I have no constituency vote clouding my view of Brexit. I have no ambition driving my support for it. I have no party whips demanding loyalty before conscience"

Conservative ministers have today revealed that the number of people affected by the infamous ESA blunder has more than doubled. Last year it emerged that some 70,000 people had been underpaid the Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) for up to 6 years. But now the Department of Work and Pensions says up to 180,000 claimants were victims of the mistake, leaving arrears of £970 million to be paid out by the government just a day after very costly plans to...

South Thanet MP Craig Mackinlay, 51, overspent on his 2015 General Election because of the “threat” posed by the former UKIP leader

MP Frank Field has warned that the government’s flagship welfare project is driving women into the sex trade as opposition to Universal Credit continues to mount.   In a nod to I, Daniel Blake he said women in his Birkenhead constituency are taking to the red light district for the first time in order to make ends meet. Speaking in the Commons, the independent MP invited work and pensions secretary Esther McVey to “come to Birkenhead and meet those women’s...