UK politics news: Government 'did not want to know' about evidence of Russian interference in Brexit vote as long-awaited report released

Dominic Raab and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are being asked questions about Russia, China and a UK-US trade deal at a press conference in London.

Both Mr Raab and Mr Pompeo deny the US "strong-armed" the UK to drop Huawei from the 5G network.

Mr Pompeo said: "I think the United Kingdom made a good decision, but, I think that decision was made not because the United States said it was a good decision, but because leadership here in the United Kingdom concluded the right thing to do was to make that decision for the people of the United Kingdom."

He added: "We want to see every nation who understands freedom and democracy, and values that and knows that it's important to their own people, their own sovereign country, to be successful, to understand this threat that the Chinese Communist Party is posing to them and to work both themselves and collectively to restore what is rightfully ours."

Here's Dominic Raab at the press conference denying the government deliberately chose not to investigate Russian interference.

Quick US-UK trade deal is 'primary focus', says Pompeo

"A third round (of negotiations) is scheduled for later this month, a primary focus for the United States is to see that we can make progress on this and bring this to a closure just as quickly as possible," the US Secretary of State said during the news conference with his British counterpart Dominic Raab.

"I spoke with the prime minister this morning about this, and I hope that we can get it finalised before too long," said Pompeo.

China hackers 'targeting vaccine research companies'

While the US Secretary of State was urging the world to combat the threat from China, the US Justice Department announced it was charging two Chinese hackers targeting firms developing a coronavirus vaccine and stealing hundreds of millions of dollars of trade secrets from companies around the world.

The indictment says the hackers in recent months had researched vulnerabilities in the computer networks of companies publicly known for their work in developing vaccines and treatments.

More details are due to be given at a press conference at 4.30pm UK time.

Hancock says UK Covid-19 death figures will be revised 'very, very shortly'

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said Public Health England (PHE) will "very, very shortly" publish a "revised methodology" on accurately measuring Covid-19 deaths.

It follows the decision to "pause" the daily death statistics after it emerged deaths were being counted as Covid-19 even if the patient recovered from coronavirus and then died of other causes.

"At the start it was perfectly reasonable to say that if somebody had ever registered positive with Covid and died, they died from Covid," he told the Commons Science and Technology Committee.

"For the first few weeks of the crisis and indeed in the peak, that was a perfectly reasonable thing to do. However, that is no longer reasonable.

"Because if you have Covid in March and fully recovered, or even were asymptomatic and now die of something completely different, then the way it was being measured until last week counted that as a death with Covid, that clearly is no longer appropriate and PHE are currently reviewing that time series."

Asked if the review by PHE was in place already, Mr Hancock said: "They'll publish very, very shortly a revised methodology for how to get an accurate measure of deaths with Covid."

According to today's update to the government's coronavirus dashboard, the UK death toll rose by 110 to 45,422.

Watch: UK government 'did not seek' evidence of Russian interference

Government criticised over low pay for care workers

Ministers have been accused of “sidestepping” the issue of low pay for care workers while providing 900,000 professionals in the public sector an above inflation pay rise.

Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, announced on Tuesday hundreds of thousands of public sector workers in England will benefit from the one-off above-inflation pay rise, including teachers, doctors and police officers.

The measures, includes armed forces, soldiers, dentists and senior civil servants, but not nurses and healthcare assistants, who are covered by the three-year pay deal agreed in 2018.

Tory MP's behaviour 'completely unacceptable', says party

Tory MP Rob Roberts has been referred to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards to investigate WhatsApp messages he allegedly sent to a young female intern and a male worker at Parliament.

A Conservative Party spokeswoman said: "An investigation into Rob Roberts MP's conduct is ongoing.

"While Mr Roberts has apologised for his behaviour and has been undertaking safeguarding and social media protection training, we are clear such conduct is completely unacceptable."

The married MP, who came out as gay in May, recently apologised for his behaviour and was rebuked by the Tory Party chairman and asked to undertake safeguarding and social media protection training.

Trial by jury 'will not be compromised', says AG

The Attorney General has said "the right to trial by jury is not going to be compromised" by the government's efforts to clear the backlog of criminal cases waiting to be heard.

Suella Braverman told the Justice Committee: "There are a lot of options on the table but I think it is clear that the right to trial by jury is not going to be compromised."

She was asked how the 10 emergency 'Nightingale' courts will be able to make up for the almost 300 courts that have been closed in the last 10 years.

Ms Braverman: "I think (Nightingale Courts) are a big step forward in terms of increasing court capacity as we deal with the backlog going forward, and there's been a lot of progress that has been made to ensure cases can flow through the system despite the Covid prevention measures."

She added: "You have got to also mention the digital capabilities that have been announced in thousands of cases that have made a real inroads."

Ms Braverman said money was being spent on updating court rooms, building more courts cells and ensuring more courtrooms have digital capabilities.

"That represents the biggest investment in our courts for 20 years," she said, adding: "I think there is some really good news in terms of Government commitment to increasing capacity and rebuilding our ability to deal with this backlog."

Tories target Labour MPs with anti-immigration campaign

The Conservatives are running an under-the-radar online advertising campaign targeting Labour MPs in marginal seats over immigration.

The adverts, shown to Facebook users in 19 marginal constituencies, highlight Labour's decision to vote against the government's immigration bill at the start of the month – which it opposed over visa restrictions on care workers.