Boris Johnson latest news: PM warned of national strike over 90,000 job cuts & More Trending News

Richard Ratcliffe mentioned Boris Johnson didn’t particularly apologise for his dealing with of his spouse Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s detention in Iran, following talks at No 10.

Asked if the PM apologised throughout their first assembly since her launch, Mr Ratcliffe instructed reporters in Downing Street: “Not specifically.”

The Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union is to carry an emergency assembly subsequent week to debate its response to authorities plans to chop jobs within the civil service, warning that “national strike action is very much on the table”.

PCS General Secretary Mark Serwotka condemned the plans and mentioned: “Cuts have consequences. Not just on those whose jobs are being sacrificed to throw red meat to the dwindling number of Conservative voters, but on everyone who relies on the services our members provide.

“The government complains about longer delays for passports and driving licences at the same time as sacking the people who are working so hard to clear the backlog.

“Let’s be clear, this is not about efficiency. This is about the prime minister trying to create a smokescreen to detract from his utter shambles of a government. 

“He has chosen to cause our cost-of-living crisis and is desperate to point the blame somewhere – and he has chosen to point the finger at hard working PCS members who kept the country running throughout the pandemic.

“Our members will not be the scapegoats for a failing government. We have our conference in 10 days’ time: taking national strike action is very much on the table.”

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has arrived at Downing Street along with her household and MP Tulip Siddiq for a gathering with Boris Johnson.

Asked how they have been, her husband Richard instructed the media: “Much better times.”

Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe didn’t reply to reporters’ questions on what she would discuss to the Prime Minister about.

The household and Tulip Siddiq posed for images exterior the entrance door with their seven-year-old daughter Gabriella joking to reporters: “You can only take one photo.”

The government committee of Wakefield’s native Labour Party has resigned en masse in protest over the national get together’s dealing with of the choice of a candidate in a forthcoming by-election.

In a serious bust-up with Labour HQ , the 16-strong physique hit out on the lack of a “local candidate” on the shortlist, and determined to stop their positions throughout a gathering on Thursday night.

Here is the total story from my colleague, Ashley Cowburn:

Downing Street has didn’t rule out obligatory redundancies beneath Boris Johnson’s plans to slash tens of hundreds of jobs from the Civil Service.

A No 10 spokesman mentioned: “I’m not going to pre-empt specific measures.’’

But he added that a lot of the cuts are hoped to be done through “natural wastage’’.  

The government could cut as many as 90,000 civil service jobs in a cost-saving exercise touted by Boris Johnson, as ministers come under increasing pressure to help ease the cost of living crisis with possible tax cuts.

My colleague Tom Batchelor reports on the story that has been making a splash today:

Conservative MP Lee Anderson caused uproar this week when he claimed there wasn’t ‘this massive use’ for food banks in the UK and that people could really do with a few cooking lessons instead, writes Cathy Newman.

Read Cathy’s piece here:

The prime minister’s unpopularity is about to be brought home to Conservative MPs in dramatic fashion, writes John Rentoul.

Read John’s full piece here:

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe will meet with Boris Johnson today and demand answers as to why it took the government so long to secure her release from detention in Iran.

She will be joined by her local Tulip Siddiq. Ms Siddiq said her constituent “deserves to hear directly” from the prime minister.

She said: “We will use the meeting as an opportunity to raise the plight of British citizens like Morad Tahbaz who are still being held hostage in Iran and push the Prime Minister to do much more to secure their release.

“He has a responsibility to ensure that others do not have to endure the six years of torment that Nazanin was put through.

She added: “I will also be submitting evidence to the Foreign Affairs Committee’s inquiry on hostage taking, which I hope will get the bottom of the Government’s abject failure in handling cases like Nazanin’s.

“Never again must the government allow British citizens to be taken hostage with so little done to secure their release and so few reprisals for those responsible.”

Former Tory MP Neil Parish who admitted watching pornography in the Commons chamber is taking “soundings” on standing in a by-election triggered by his own resignation.

It comes after Mr Parish stood aside in the Tiverton and Honiton constituency in April after becoming the focus of a political storm when two female MPs reported him to party whips.

Our politics correspondent Ashley Cowburn reports: