Politics latest: Rwanda bill delayed again after Lords vote to pass new amendment - as Tory peer blasts Brexit and calls for speedy election (2024)

Lord Stuart Rose, Tory peer and Asda chair, tells Politics Hub With Sophy Ridge that both Labour and the Tories "need to set out very clearly what is in the plan" for after the next election.

"The Labour Party haven't done yet," he says. "I understand why they haven't done it, but they haven't told us what the detail is

" And that's what Rachel Reeves will get grilled on. That is what Keir Starmer will get grilled on, and quite rightly.

Asked about Labour's plans to expand employment rights, Lord Rose says: "I would say be very, very careful.

"We have one huge benefit in this country in fairly flexible labour laws. They give a significant protection to employees, but they give flexibility to employers.

"And we must make sure that what we do isn't retrograde because business needs help."

The House of Lords has just passed a fresh amendment to the Rwanda bill, meaning it will be sent back to the Commons for debate once again.

This first of two amendments expected to be voted on this evening says Rwanda "cannot be treated as a safe country" until the Independent Monitoring Committee - created by the treaty agreed with Rwanda - affirms that the mechanisms it creates have been fully implemented.

The result of the vote is:

• 245 in favour;
• 208 against.

That means there is a sizeable 37 vote majority in favour of adding the amendment.

Next, Sophy Ridge asks Asda chairman and Conservative peer Lord Stuart Rose, for his view of his own party, whose record he has recently described as "not very exciting".

Asked if the Tories should win the next election, he replies: "If this was a government judged like a chief executive of a corporation might have been judged, he or she wouldn't have lasted 14 years.

"The shareholders would have said, 'on your bike'."

He adds: "We'll see what happens in October, but I'm not hopeful. "

Lord Rose continues: "We need to have an election sooner rather than later. What on earth are we waiting for? I think the electorate is desperate now to have some sort of clarity about where we're going.

"What we need to do then is if an election is announced, whatever that period is - 4 to 6 weeks of electioneering - both parties need to set out very clearly what is in the plan."

Next, Sophy Ridge asks Asda chairman and Conservative peer Lord Stuart Rose, for his view of his party's policies in recent years.

He replies: "We are the architects of our own demise, and our own demise started in 2016 when we made the ridiculous vote to come out of Europe.

"Now, you know, you would say, well, you are an old moaning remainer. But of course I am!

"But of course, if you look at the stats, nobody has yet convinced anybody that coming out of Europe was the right thing to do."

He says a 50% barrier required for Brexit in the referendum was "too low", and people making up the 2% of the vote or so that got Brexit over the line "have died because they were mostly older people".

"Ask young people today if that's what they wanted - ask if that's the right thing to have done? Ask business leaders now are they happy with the result? And the answer is no.

"So we made a big mistake.

"Everything that has happened since then, apart from the one big factor which nobody could have predicted, COVID, has a link back to what we did when we came out on Brexit."

Away from Politics Hub with Sophy Ridge for a moment, voting in the Lords on more amendments to the Rwanda bill is under way once again.

This first of two amendments expected to be voted on this evening says Rwanda "cannot be treated as a safe country" until the Independent Monitoring Committee - created by the treaty agreed with Rwanda - affirms that the mechanisms it creates have been fully implemented.

We will bring you the result in the next few minutes or so.

The first guest on tonight's Politics Hub With Sophy Ridgeis Asda chairman and Conservative peer Lord Stuart Rose.

We ask firstly he shares the optimism of the chancellor, who has told Sky's Ed Conway that the fundamentals of the UK economy are "very strong" and there are "better times ahead" (see previous post).

Lord Rose replies: "Well, I'd like to share his optimism. And at the end of the day, he is the chancellor, and it's his job to be optimistic because we have to have something to hope for."

But he says inflation at 3.2% is still ahead of the 2% Bank of England target.

"We mustn't get carried away, Sophy, because, you know, we've got a long way to go.

"And if you look underneath it, there are still signs that core inflation is still quite persistent."

He also argues interest rates should not come down immediately, saying: "There's no guarantee the inflation might not pop up a little bit. It did in America again last week."

He adds that "of course" he wants them to come down, but says: "I wouldn't get carried away just yet."

Lord Rose is the chairman of Asda, and previously ran Marks and Spencer, so we ask how tough it is out there for families now, or if things are improving.

He replies: "The last two years for consumers have been probably the toughest in the last 25/30 years."

"Some people think that prices are coming down. They're not coming down. They're just not going up by quite as much.

"But if you look at basics, whether it's spaghetti, whether it's bread, whether it's milk, whether it's flour, - they have gone up, and they've gone up by a significant amount of two years."

The "good news", he says, is that wages have risen, and the chancellor has cut national insurance.

But the key solution, he says, is growth, and asked how he would achieve it, he replies that Rishi Sunak is "more business friendly than previous prime ministers have been", criticising Boris Johnson's attitude in particular.

He goes on: "We are finding it very difficult to get debt down. And the only way to do it is to increase productivity and get the economy going."

The way to do that, he argues, is to "get people into work" because "we can't keep coughing up money without actually increasing the amount of money in circulation".

BySarah Taaffe-Maguire, business reporter and Ed Conway, economics and data editor

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has said that "better times are ahead" but that the fundamentals of the UK economy are "very strong".

Speaking to Sky News in Washington, Mr Hunt pointed to price rise data from today showing adrop in the rate of inflationas well as the latest jobs figures andIMF economic growth predictions.

Mr Hunt said: "I think the economy, we are seeing, has turned the corner, people are beginning to feel that."

"That will continue during the course of this year. But the fundamentals for the UK economy, yes, are very strong indeed," he added.

You can read more from the chancellor's interview here:

I thought we were going to start the show tonight with a different headline.

I thought that FINALLY - two full years after the policy was first announced - I would be sitting here saying the PM’s flagship plan to send migrants who arrive in the UK on small boats to Rwanda had at last cleared its final parliamentary hurdle.

But guess what?

It hasn't.

Instead, the Lords have reinserted two amendments.

There had been talk MPs might have to stay late tonight to force it through - the latest we're hearing is it looks like they won't vote until Monday - and the parliamentary ping-pong continues until next week.

And yes, I feel like I’m slightly losing my mind here, I don't know about you.

We've been talking about sending migrants to Rwanda for TWO YEARS. No planes have taken off. A grand total of zero people have been sent to Rwanda under this plan.

And MPs, peers, and all the rest of us, are stuck in this endless loop.

When will we break out of it? Tonight? Monday? Never? At this stage, who the hell knows?!

No wonder the public is increasingly sceptical the Rwanda plan is going to happen at all.

Our weeknight politics showPolitics Hub With Sophy Ridgeis live now on Sky News.

The fast-paced, extended edition of the show dissects the inner workings of Westminster, with interviews, insights, and analysis - bringing you, the audience, into the corridors of power.

Tonight, Sophy is joined byLord Stuart Rose, Tory peer and chairman of Asda supermarkets, to discuss inflation, the state of the Conservative Party, and Labour's proposals for government.

On Sophy's panel tonight are:

• Josh Simons, director of the Labour Together think tank;
• Rehman Chishti,Tory MP and former party deputy chair.

Watch live in the stream at the top of this page, and follow all the latest updates and key moments right here in the Politics Hub.

WatchPolitics Hub With Sophy Ridgefrom Monday to Thursday on Sky channel 501, Virgin channel 602, Freeview channel 233, on theSky News websiteandappor onYouTube.

Kemi Badenoch is due to deliver a speech tomorrow, in which she will say people have "forgotten" that Conservatives have "an underpinning philosophy" in recent years.

In a wide-ranging speech to TheCityUK - a financial services industry body - the business secretary is expected to say that Conservative have not had "as much of an opportunity as we would like to articulate our values".

The broad speech comes a day after the former Tory leadership contender publicly opposed Rishi Sunak's flagship bill to ban young people from ever smoking, which passed despite her opposition.

Ms Badenoch is expected to say that since the financial crash of 2008, the "ever-rising tide of micromanagement" has been part of a "slow and steady shift in Western societies and economies toward a new, controlled and regulated vision".

She will say: "People have forgotten that Conservatives are always motivated by an underpinning philosophy because we have not had as much of an opportunity as we would like to articulate our values."

The senior Tory will also hit out at Labour, warning that the "tide of ever more intervention will accelerate and become even stronger".

"The idea that we all need to be micromanaged, whether in social or economic terms, comes very easily to the Labour Party," she will say.

She will warn against "ever greater regulatory capture, stifling of the free market, and the weakening of the wealth generation we need".

The business secretary will also criticise shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves's employment rights plans, such as no probationary periods for new staff, a ban on contacting employees outside of work hours, and reporting "burdens", such as "mandatory ethnicity pay reporting".

Sky News understands that No10 has seen and approved the text of the speech, due to be delivered tomorrow morning.

We will have coverage here in the Politics Hub from 10.45am, so do join us.