Nurses in England and Wales announce two further strike dates in February – UK politics live | Politics

Rishi Sunak has decided to block legislation passed by the Scottish parliament making it easier for transgender people to self-identify using a constitutional order under the Scotland Act for the first time.

The secretary of state for Scotland, Alister Jack, announced that he would use provisions of the Scotland Act 1998 to halt the gender recognition bill after a review by UK government lawyers.

It comes after ministers met on Monday to consider how to approach the legislation, which would make it easier for transgender people to obtain official gender recognition certificates, including by reducing waiting times, removing the need for a medical diagnosis and bringing the minimum age down to 16 from 18.

Meanwhile, Nicola Sturgeon has described Westminster’s move to block the gender bill as “a full-frontal attack” on the Scottish parliament.

In a tweet posted in response to Alister Jack’s Section 35 announcement, the first minister said: “This is a full-frontal attack on our democratically elected Scottish parliament and its ability to make its own decisions on devolved matters.

“The Scottish government will defend the legislation and stand up for Scotland’s parliament.

“If this Westminster veto succeeds, it will be first of many.”

Nurses will stage two more strikes next month as a row with the government over pay shows no clear sign of reaching a resolution.

In an escalation of industrial action, the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said nurses will strike on 6 and 7 February, with more NHS trusts taking part than during two days of strikes in December.

NHS Providers interim chief executive, Saffron Cordery, said the announcement was “very worrying”, PA reported.

She added:

The health service is already stretched far too thin as trust leaders try to cope with ongoing industrial action alongside other mounting pressures bearing down on the NHS.

We’ve seen how disruptive these strikes can be, and more extensive industrial action is likely to have an even greater impact. Nobody wants this to continue happening.

We understand how frustrated nurses feel, and how they have got into this point; below-inflation pay awards, the cost-of-living crisis, severe staff shortages and increasing workloads have created near-impossible conditions.

There are three weeks between now and these newly announced dates in February.

This is more than enough time for the government and the unions to open negotiations on pay for 2022-23 and avert more strikes.

Nurses at 55 NHS trusts in England are already scheduled to strike on Wednesday and Thursday this week, but the February action from the RCN will grow bigger and cover 73 trusts.

Twelve health boards and organisations in Wales will also take part in the two consecutive days of strikes.

More reaction on this story to follow.

Andrew Sparrow

The Scottish government is likely to challenge the UK government’s decision to block the gender recognition reform bill in the courts, Glenn Campbell, the BBC Scotland’s political editor, reports. A constitutional dispute like this would have to be resolved by the supreme court.

That’s all from me for tonight. My colleague Tom Ambrose is taking over now.

Alister Jack, the Scottish secretary, has confirmed that the government is using article 35 to block the Scottish government gender recognition reform bill.

He says the UK government is willing to work with the Scottish government on an amended bill that would not affect UK-wide equalities law in the way he claims the Scottish bill would.

Here is his statement in full.

I have decided to make an order under section 35 of the Scotland Act 1998, preventing the Scottish parliament’s gender recognition reform (Scotland) bill from proceeding to royal assent.

After thorough and careful consideration of all the relevant advice and the policy implications, I am concerned that this legislation would have an adverse impact on the operation of Great Britain-wide equalities legislation.

Transgender people who are going through the process to change their legal sex deserve our respect, support and understanding. My decision today is about the legislation’s consequences for the operation of GB-wide equalities protections and other reserved matters.

I have not taken this decision lightly. The bill would have a significant impact on, amongst other things, GB-wide equalities matters in Scotland, England and Wales. I have concluded, therefore, that this is the necessary and correct course of action.

If the Scottish government chooses to bring an amended bill back for reconsideration in the Scottish parliament, I hope we can work together to find a constructive way forward that both respects devolution and the operation of UK parliament legislation.

I have written today to the first minister and the Scottish parliament’s presiding officer informing them of my decision.

The National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) has said it will consider rerunning its industrial action ballot in England due to postal disruption, PA Media reports. PA says:

In England, 87% of NAHT members taking part in the union’s pay ballot voted in favour of action short of strikes, while 64% supported strikes.

However, the turnout was 42%, which is below the threshold required by law.

Paul Whiteman, NAHT general secretary, said:

It is incredibly frustrating that anti-trade union and anti-democratic legislation compelled us to conduct the ballot by post during a period in which the management of the Royal Mail refused to take action to ameliorate the disruption to the postal service.

We have to conclude that our democratic process has been compromised by factors outside of our control.

It sounds like we might have to wait quite a while for Boris Johnson’s memoirs. (See 3.30pm.) But Matt Hancock published his Pandemic Diaries before Christmas and, although they scored highly on the vanity scale, they were also more interesting than some of the reviews suggested they would be.

They were also in places quite critical of Johnson, which was not always apparent from the serialisation in the (pro-Johnson) Mail. So here are six revelations about Johnson from Hancock’s book that you probably won’t read in Johnson’s.

1) Hancock thought the failure to lock down earlier in the autumn of 2020 cost lives. Hancock describes how Johnson resisted a lockdown for weeks, despite Hancock and the scientific advisers pressing for one, and he describes Prof Chris Whitty, the chief medical officer, telling him on the day a lockdown was agreed: “Secretary of state, you’ve saved many lives with what you’ve done today.” And in an entry from March 2021, Hancock recalls sending a text message saying he had “mixed feelings” about what he had achieved over the past year. “Wish I’d won the argument sooner in the autumn. Could have saved a lot of lives,” Hancock wrote in the text message to Michael Gove. Hancock does not say directly in this passage whom he was arguing against, but he does not need to.

2) Hancock says officials felt they were under pressure not to put India on the red list for travel in the spring of 2021 because Boris Johnson was due to go there on a visit. In an entry for 18 April, he says:

There’s a major row brewing about putting India on the red list. My clinical advisers are very nervous of perceived pressure on the system on such a major decision because of an upcoming VVIP visit.

Hancock also says that at the end of March Priti Patel, the home secretary, was asking why India was not already on the red list. But at the time the government rejected claims that the delay in putting India on the red list was connected to the fact that Johnson was due to visit.

3) Johnson wanted everyone in the UK to be tested for Covid on the same day. Hancock says Johnson was excited when he learned Slovakia was planning to test its entire population on the same day and in November 2020 Hancock was asked to get a ministerial committee to agree. But colleagues thought the plan was “crazy” and Hancock had to tell No 10 it had “run into a brick wall”.

4) Johnson did not realise how long it would take for the government to build the 40 “new’ hospitals he promised at the 2019 election. In an entry from October 2020, Hancock says: “Boris has belatedly woken up to the fact that it’s now going to take ages to build the 40 new hospitals – including the one in his constituency.”

5) Johnson personally chose UK Health Security Agency as the name for the body set up during the pandemic to succeed Public Health England. Hancock himself did not like the name. He says he found it “boring and creepy at the same time”.

6) Johnson asked Whitty if he could get his dog, Dilyn, to have a blood test to see if he had Covid antibodies. Johnson said he thought Dilyn had had the virus. Hancock says Whitty “diplomatically” told Johnson he was not sure if there would be any point because the human antibody test might not work.

In the Commons Grant Shapps, the business secretary, is now opening the debate on the strikes (minimum service levels) bill.