UK politics live: Priti Patel says four-day week would have ‘devastating impact’ as smoking ban faces backlash

The UK’s largest Jewish community organisation has lambasted Tory MP Esther McVey over her “repugnant” use of a famed Holocaust poem warning of the horrors of Nazi persecution to criticise plans to ban smoking in pub gardens.

It emerged on Wednesday night that the government is considering a ban on outdoor smoking which would affect pub gardens, areas outside nightclubs, and locations such as hospitals and children’s play areas.

Read the full story below:

Business groups have called for caution over potential Labour plans to open up a “compressed hours” four-day work week to more of the workforce.

Ben Willmott, head of public policy for the CIPD, the professional body for human resources, said the government should “take stock” of recent rule changes around employment, which allow people to request flexible working when they start new jobs, before making more changes.

He said: “Flexible working arrangements such as compressed hours, job sharing and term-time working can help people balance their work and home life commitments, while also supporting employer efforts to recruit and retain staff.

“However, flexible working has to work for both the business and workers if it’s to be sustainable and this needs to be recognised in any changes to regulation.

“It would make sense for the government to take stock of the impact of recent changes introduced only in April to enable people to request flexible working from day one of employment, before seeking to make further changes.”

Earlier on Friday, the government denied it will force businesses to allow staff to work a four-day week but said it supports flexible working.

Education minister Baroness Jacqui Smith dismissed a report in The Telegraph that Labour’s Make Work Pay plans could force businesses to accept employees’ demands for a four-day week.

Priti Patel has warned Labour’s four-day week plan would be “devastating” for businesses.

Responding to the proposal for “compressed hours” the former home secretary argued: “In terms of the four day week, this absolutely sums up this Labour government, it really does, at every single level.

“Imposing more burdens and bureaucracy and red tape, regulation, onto businesses, the very people that employ people.”

She added: “This will have devastating impacts for those businesses but importantly for our economy. Labour claim to talk about growth. It is obvious that they do not have a growth plan.”

An education minister has warned it will be “an enormously big job” for the Government to meet its commitments on free childcare.

From Monday the Government will fund 15 hours per week of free childcare for eligible working parents whose children are between nine months and two years old – in addition to an existing offer to parents of two-year-olds and 30 hours of free childcare already offered to parents of children aged three and four.

From September 2025, the Department for Education has committed to funding 30 hours of free childcare for most working parents of children between nine months and school age, in line with commitments made by the former Conservative government.

Education minister Baroness Jacqui Smith described the 2025 expansion as “an enormous increase in capacity” which will be over double the increase in places seen in the past five years.

She told Times Radio: “What we’ve had to really buckle down and do is start the detailed planning about how that’s going to be delivered. So we’ll be making more announcements, for example, about our ideas to create 3,000 more nurseries in unused primary school places.

“We’re working hard on getting the staff in that are going to be needed with our Do Something Big campaign, so that we’re encouraging more people into the labour force, better training opportunities for young people, for example, to do early years apprenticeships, to do the new T-level for early years in education.

“So we recognise that this is going to be an enormously big job.”

Conservative leadership candidate Dame Priti Patel has described this summer’s general election campaign as the “most gruelling” she has fought.

Answering questions about how the Tories can combat the challenge from Reform UK, she paid tribute to party campaigners as she said: “It was the most gruelling election campaign I have certainly fought in my lifetime as a Conservative activist.”

She went on: “Reform are just one factor, there’s no doubt about that. The reality is… we have to go back to being the true Conservative Party that we stopped being, effectively.

“We were trying to be all things to all people, and the key thing to all of this is that we do have to ensure that we always stand up for public values, the values of the country, the British people, and show that they’re our compass.”

Dame Priti added: “I am absolutely determined to ensure that we become that election-winning machine all over again, regardless who our political opponents are across the political spectrum, whether it’s Reform, the Lib Dems, the Greens, because it varies across the country.”

The government is “deeply worried” by the “methods” employed by Israel in the West Bank, a Foreign Office statement has said.

The statement condemns “settler violence”, which has surged in the West Bank since the Hamas attack on 7 October ignited Israel’s war against Gaza.

At least 652 Palestinians in the West Bank have been killed by Israeli fire since the war began over 10 months ago, according to the Palestinian health ministry.

Most have died during Israeli raids, which often trigger gun battles with militants.

Israel says the operations are required to dismantle Hamas and other militant groups and to prevent attacks on Israelis, which have also risen since the start of the war.

This week, Israel’s national security minister Ben-Gvir was criticised for saying he would build a Jewish synagogue at the Al-Aqsa Mosque – a holy site for Muslims and Palestinian national symbol – compound in occupied East Jerusalem.

A Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) spokesperson said: “The UK is deeply concerned by the ongoing IDF military operation in the occupied West Bank.

“We recognise Israel’s need to defend itself against security threats, but we are deeply worried by the methods Israel has employed and by reports of civilian casualties and the destruction of civilian infrastructure.

Environmental protesters – including John Swinney’s former teacher – have declared the Scottish First Minister must “try harder to protect the climate”.

Caro Wilkinson, who taught Mr Swinney German when he was a pupil at Forrester High in Edinburgh, was among a group of campaigners from the Edinburgh Climate Coalition to stage a demonstration as the SNP conference got under way.

She recalled her former student as being “intelligent and caring”, adding: “His kindness was clear when he organised a class whip-round when I was pregnant to buy me a teddy bear for my new baby.”

However, she also insisted the First Minister was “clever enough to know how urgent the threat of climate change is”, adding that she hoped he “cares enough for the planet to take the action that’s needed”.

Ms Wilkinson said: “If he does, he’ll speak out against the huge Rosebank oil field, reject the proposed Peterhead gas-fired power station and do what he can to put the Scottish government back on course to fight climate change.”

Dame Priti Patel told Tory activists at her leadership campaign event in central London that on immigration “Keir Starmer, Yvette Cooper, the Labour government, simply do not have a plan, and one of the most damaging things that they have done is effectively tear up the operational delivery plans that I put in place.”

The former home secretary added if she was prime minister, she would implement the Nationality and Borders Act, and would keep the immigration plans from the last Conservative government, including the Rwanda scheme.

“We would have strong laws and deterrence in place, and we should be looking at a third country,” she said.

“The sad thing is, we will never know now whether that Rwanda policy will work, because the government has just torn it up.”