Tory leadership latest: Truss tax plans could force cuts to public services, warns Sunak ally

The European Union has launched fresh legal action against the UK over failures to comply with post-Brexit Northern Ireland Protocol, in a further souring of relations.

The European Commission triggered four new infringement procedures on Friday. They said that it had been forced to act because the UK had failed to take part in “meaningful discussion” over the Northern Ireland protocol since February.

The commission accused the UK of failing to comply with customs requirements and not imposing EU rules on VAT for e-commerce.

They said: “Despite repeated calls by the European Parliament, the 27 EU Member States and the European Commission to implement the Protocol, the UK Government has failed to do so.

“In a spirit of constructive cooperation, the commission refrained from launching certain infringement procedures for over a year to create the space to look for joint solutions with the UK.

“However, the UK’s unwillingness to engage in meaningful discussion since last February and the continued passage of the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill through the UK Parliament go directly against this spirit.”

Additional reporting by Press Association

The Brexit divorce bill negotiated by Boris Johnson has increased by nearly £10bn compared to the official estimate when the UK left the EU, ministers have admitted.

The Treasury slipped out an “updated government estimated of the financial settlement” in a written ministerial statement on Thursday as MPs headed back to their constituencies for summer recess.

The statement, from chief secretary to the Treasury Simon Clarke, says the bill is now £42.5bn, which “shows an increase against the original range”.

When Britain left the EU in January 2020 the Office for Budget Responsibility put the figure at £32.9bn, meaning the cost of the financial settlement has soared by nearly £10bn.

Opposition parties said Boris Johnson’s “terrible deal” was costing taxpayers

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Liz Truss has a 70 percent chance of becoming PM, according to bookmaker Coral.

Ms Truss is now the shortest price she has ever been to win the Tory leadership election, at 4/9. Sunak is 7/4 to win the vote with Conservative party members.

“Liz Truss is now the shortest price any candidate has been to win the Conservative Leadership election. Our odds suggest she has a 70% chance of picking up the most votes,” said Coral’s John Hill.

Foreign secretary Liz Truss was asked why Boris Johnson hasn’t been “kicked out yet” by children on the campaign trail in Peterborough.

In the meeting at local children’s charity Little Miracles, one teenager exclaimed: “This is so awkward”.

Another asked “Where’s Boris Johnson?”, and another butted in saying: “We hate him.”

Ms Truss met children, parents and staff at the charity during an hour-long visit on Thursday afternoon.

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Former US president Donald Trump said lots of things that “proved to be true”, Tory leadership candidate Liz Truss has said as she vowed to get tougher on China.

The foreign secretary said she wanted the G7 group of leading democracies to be turned into an “economic Nato” that can defend itself better against Chinese influence around the world.

Ms Truss – favourite to be the next prime minister as she vies with Rishi Sunak for the leadership – set out her credentials as a hawk on China and Russia in an interview with The Atlantic.

Asked if Trump had been proved right that China had “stolen America’s lunch”, Truss said: “There’s a lot of things that Trump has said that have proved to be true.”

The foreign secretary then added: “There are also things he’s said that haven’t proved to be true.”

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The former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is reportedly being encouraged by close supporters to run for mayor of London.

His allies apparently want Mr Corbyn to seek an “alternative power base” in the capital for his progressive politics, HuffPost reported.

Mr Corbyn is currently an Independent MP for Islington North, a constinuency in London.

A source told the online news website: “There are people who have encouraged him to run for mayor.

“There are people who feel that given the left’s progressive agenda through some of the metro mayors, having Jeremy do something similar in London would be a good axis.

“It’s not something he has ever said he has an appetite to do, but it has been discussed by people close to him”.

Senior Tory MP Rob Halfon – a supporter of Rishi Sunak’s campaign to be PM – has warned that tax cuts promised by Liz Truss could lead to cuts to “vital public services”.

“Tory members know that he’s not making promises he can’t keep – if he wanted to be popular he could say anything and everything about tax cuts,” Halfon told Sky News.

“The money doesn’t grow on trees,” said the chair of the education select committee.

He added: “You can’t just have unfunded tax cuts because you have to deal with the debt, you have to fund public services. If you just have unfunded tax cuts, where is that money going to be for vital public services?”

Defending Sunak’s loyalty to Boris Johnson, Halfon said: “He was there almost till the very end.”

Foreign secretary Liz Truss was asked why Boris Johnson hasn’t been “kicked out yet” by children in Peterborough.

In the meeting, one child exclaimed: “This is so awkward”.

Another asked “Where’s Boris Johnson?”, to which another butted in saying: “We hate him”.

Foreign Office minister Graham Stuart has said the government was trying to resolve the congestion at Dover – but said it was French authorities’ “problem”.

“We have been working closely with French authorities, because it’s their staff, who have the ability to cope and process people, that’s caused the backlog,” he told Sky News.

Mr Stuart said the French authorities had added three additional booths at Dover. “We’ve worked with them to get those staffed up,” she said.

The minister added: “It’s not a Border Force problem, as such, it is the French authorities. All we can do is continue to work with them to make sure their technology and people are in place, and we can get these queues reduced as quickly as possible.”

Rishi Sunak has said that he flew back home to the UK from California to stop a December lockdown last year.

However multiple government sources have told The Daily Mail that Mr Sunak had little or no involvement in the decision.

Mr Sunak was on a government trip to California and was due to extend his stay to join his family for a break in Santa Monica, but was instead forced to fly to the UK.

He told LBC: “What I did in December was fly back from a government trip overseas. And I flew back to this country to stop us sleepwalking into a national lockdown.

“We were hours away from a press conference that was going to lock us down again because of Omicron. And I came back and fought very hard against the system because I believed it would have been the wrong thing for this country with all the damage it would have done to businesses, to people’s lives.”

However two Cabinet sources told the paper that when Mr Johnson asked Mr Sunak for his views on a lockdown at a crunch meeting, he replied: “Oh no, no-one wants to hear from me, prime minister.”