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Unemployment set to hit 10-year high

Chancellor to declare she has ‘right economic plan’ in Spring Statement as joblessness figure expected to near 1.9 million Daily Telegraph 02 March 2026 9:43pm GMT Unemployment is set to hit a 10-year high, the public finance watchdog will forecast on Tuesday, as Rachel Reeves declares she has the “right economic plan” for Britain. The Chancellor will use her Spring Statement to the House of Commons to highlight reductions in borrowing costs, inflation and interest rates. However, estimates from the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), the independent forecaster, will reveal a rise in joblessness as Ms Reeves’s tax raids on employers bite. Unemployment had been forecast to hit 1.8 million in 2026, according to the OBR’s predictions in November 2025. But the watchdog is now set to revise its figures for 2026 to closer to 1.9 million looking for work – the highest jobless rate since 2015. It comes after the Treasury increased the National Insurance (NI) rate paid by employ...
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Starmer is angering all sides with his dithering on Iran. He must act

We didn’t start this, but the UK must make some effort to finish it rather than just wringing our hands Daily Telegraph Ben Wallace 02 March 2026 7:29pm GMT I remember sitting in the president of Iran’s outer office in 2006. I had gone with Jack Straw, Lord Lamont and Jeremy Corbyn on a parliamentary visit. All of us had different positions on the regime, and a more unlikely foursome you couldn’t imagine. The regime showed us no favours. In fact, they delighted in trying to trap us into embarrassing situations while they lectured us on the British Empire and James Bond. In those days, there was a genuine tension between the Iranian hardliners and the so-called reformers. There was even a semblance of an internal challenge to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Sadly, all that has changed over the years. The hardliners strengthened their grasp. Despite the image of the mullahs being in charge, it has become ever more apparent that the IRGC, which was loyal only to the ...
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RAF base in Cyprus hit by suspected drone strike

Explosions rang out as British troops were told to take cover Daily Telegraph 02/03/26 An RAF airbase in Cyprus has been hit in a suspected drone attack. “Our Armed Forces are responding to a suspected drone strike at RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus at midnight local time,” an MoD spokesman said in a statement overnight. “Our force protection in the region is at the highest level, and the base has responded to defend our people. This is a live situation, and further information will be provided in due course.” Explosions had been heard overnight near the base in the Limassol area. There were no casualties but the airfield sustained “minor damage”, according to GB News. An RAF Voyager refuelling and transport aircraft has since been seen circling southern Cyprus, according to live flight data, in what appears to be part of the military response. The Airbus KC2 Voyager, one of the RAF’s main air-to-air refuelling tankers, took off from Akrotiri at 12.46am (10.46pm GMT) local time. Additio...
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Shut down Iran propaganda machine operating in Britain, Starmer told

Labour MPs criticise charity watchdog’s ‘inadequate’ response to Tehran’s ‘influence network’ Daily Telegraph 28/02/26 Sir Keir Starmer has been urged to clamp down on charities accused of operating as part of an Iranian influence “network” in Britain. A group of Labour MPs have warned of a web of organisations that “appear to be actively promoting the Iranian regime’s ideology and interests”. In a letter to Dan Jarvis, the security minister, the MPs argued that proscribing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) was an “important step” in limiting the regime’s ability to repress and kill protesters in Iran. They went on to list several charities, which they alleged are part of the Iranian regime’s “influence on our shores”, arguing that the response of the sector watchdog, the Charity Commission, had been “inadequate”. Labour MPs have urged the Government to proscribe the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Credit: Morteza Nikoubazl/Getty One charity cited is the Islamic Hu...
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Starmer’s gamble could be his ultimate demise

Telegraph politics 27/02/26 Keir Starmer gambled – and lost. Gorton and Denton, where the Green Party stormed to victory, may turn out to be shorthand for his ultimate demise. The question for Labour’s so-called soft-Left – sometimes considered by its own members to be “incapable of organising its way out of a paper bag” – is whether they can achieve their aims under Starmer’s leadership, or whether they conclude that they need one of their own in Number 10. There’s no two ways about it, this by-election was a disaster for Keir Starmer. “There can no longer be any doubt that he is doomed to be a one-term Prime Minister,” said former Labour MP Tom Harris this morning. On the strength of this result, he’ll be lucky to be the half-term PM. Every major decision in the run-up to the Gorton and Denton poll rests squarely with Starmer. The Burnham block backfired spectacularly – Manchester’s mayor has so far been conspicuously quiet following the result. Labour poured so much energy int...
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Starmer in crisis as Labour falls to third in by-election

Green Party wins Gorton and Denton seat after bitter contest, while Reform UK comes second Daily Telegraph 27/02/26 Sir Keir Starmer’s leadership has been plunged into further crisis after the Green Party swept to victory in the Gorton and Denton by-election. Labour was defending a commanding 13,413 majority in what should have been an easy defence in one of its safest seats. But in a tight three-way race between Labour, Reform and the Greens, Hannah Spencer secured a comfortable victory with 14,980 votes, a majority of 4,402. Ms Spencer, a Manchester plumber, becomes the Green Party’s fifth MP. On a disastrous night for Sir Keir’s party, Labour candidate Angeliki Stogia was beaten into third place by Reform. Matthew Goodwin, Reform’s candidate, won 10,578 votes, while Ms Stogia won 9,364 votes, 25.4 per cent of the vote, down from 50.8 per cent at the 2024 general election. The result shows how Labour has haemorrhaged votes to both the populist Left and Right since its landsli...
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This abominable by-election is a final warning for Britain’s democracy

Too much immigration allied with growing Left-wing extremism has become a toxic mix Daily Telegraph 25/02/26 Our democracy is dying in plain sight, and we don’t have the right to stay silent. The sectarian horror of the Gorton and Denton by-election cannot be the future of British politics. We must not become a country where our race or religion determines how we vote, where segregated communities live parallel lives and despise each other, where our liberal elites, out of cowardice or suicidal empathy, pretend not to notice. We cannot sleepwalk into becoming a Lebanon-on-Thames. This is an emergency, a last warning, and we must act now. We should start by calling out the Greens for what they have become: a hateful, despicable, extremist party that has identified an entrepreneurial opportunity in weaponising tribalism, division, stagnant living standards, misinformation and envy. Their behaviour in Gorton and Denton has been abominable. Following a playbook pioneered by far-Left ...
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