The comments made on 29 May 2026 in response to Yusuf referring to politicians as “traitors”.
I didn’t vote for either of the winners of the last two General Elections but “traitors” for whom a “reckoning is coming”? Really? This very excitable, angry & hyperbolic man should be nowhere near a position of responsibility in a political party that aspires to power.
The comments made by Kemi Badenoch on 28 May 2026.
If the Conservatives were in power, these strikes simply wouldn’t be happening.
That’s because we’ll add doctors to the list of professions banned from striking. Just like police officers and members of the Armed Forces.
Our health should never be held ransom by unions.
The comments made by Ed Davey, the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, on 30 May 2026.
As the Champions League final kicks off today, football fans are being priced out by TNT Sports locking it behind a paywall.
While the PM has politely asked TNT to make it free, I’m calling on the government to change the law and guarantee these games are always free-to-air!
The speech made by Liz Lloyd, the Telecoms Minister, on 28 May 2026.
Hello everyone.
It is a pleasure to be with you here this afternoon.
It is tempting to think of our subject matter today – the security and resilience of subsea cables – as something utterly modern.
After all, it seems like every day we are reminded of just how fundamentally reliant we’ve become on this extraordinary technology.
But history tells a longer story. Exactly 126 years ago to the day a naval officer named
Carlyon Bellairs stood in this very institute and asked this question:
how can Britain make its subsea cables more secure and resilient?
Even at the dawn of the twentieth century, those early telegraph cables were laying the foundations for global connectivity – carrying financial transactions, business communications, and military signals across continents in near real time.
Bellairs recognised that this was transforming both global commerce and global power.
But he also warned that it was creating profound new vulnerabilities beneath the sea.
More than a century later, the technology has advanced radically, but the core strategic challenge remains the same.
Just as Bellairs made clear in 1900:
Our task is not to eliminate risk – that would be impossible given the vast ocean floor.
Instead, we must build resilient systems able to withstand disruption.
So today, I want to lay out the three core pillars which this Government will use as the foundations for this work:
Let me begin with our first pillar: Resilience through growth.
True resilience does not come from hiding from the world or trying to encase our infrastructure in concrete.
It comes from economic vitality.
And it depends, more than anything else, on ensuring we have a healthy, thriving, and expanding cable sector – an engine of the UK’s broader economic success story to date.
Today, subsea fibre-optic cables are the silent workhorses of our economy.
Without them the UK would be functionally cut off from the outside world.
Much of our modern digital lives would simply cease to function.
Every international payment, every cross-border trade executed in milliseconds, every flow of data between businesses here in the UK and markets overseas – all travel along the seabed.
And demand is skyrocketing.
Artificial intelligence is driving a massive wave of infrastructure investment.
Just last month, my Secretary of State in DSIT spoke here at RUSI about the Government’s ambition for Sovereign AI.
Thanks to this Government’s efforts, the private sector will invest tens of billions of pounds in the UK’s AI infrastructure over the coming years:
Powering our AI Growth Zones, boosting productivity, and securing the high-quality jobs of the future.
But that compute power relies on data, and that data is carried by subsea cables.
That is why we must support the next generation of investment.
Many of the cables landing on our shores were laid twenty years ago during the initial data centre boom.
To replace and expand them, government must play an active role in creating the conditions for commercial success.
First, that means common-sense regulation.
We are reviewing our legislative framework to ensure regulation supports growth rather than holds it back.
To give you just one example, we are taking a pragmatic approach to environmental red tape – exempting, wherever possible, the laying, maintenance, and removal of subsea cables from unnecessary requirements.
This is particularly true in deep waters, where we know the impact on marine life is extremely limited.
Second, we are ensuring we have the domestic capability to keep this network running.
Right now, if a cable breaks in UK waters, a repair vessel is usually on site – ready to fix it – in eight days.
That is a world-leading response time.
But we cannot take it for granted.
So this Government is now completing a detailed piece of market engagement to ensure we can retain a UK-based UK flagged sovereign repair capability long into the future.
We will make a final decision towards achieving this important aim by the end of the year. Investments like this drive resilience.
And when we look at the core mission of our newly expanded National Wealth Fund –
to crowd in private finance, upgrade critical infrastructure, and anchor the supply chains of the future – this is precisely where government can step up to make the difference.
We are already putting this approach into practice.
Just two months ago, we announced a massive £600m deal to unlock the Eastern Green Link 4 project.
A 530km subsea energy superhighway running beneath the North Sea.
An investment that will not only upgrade our national grid – but also strengthen our domestic supply chain, and anchor high-skilled jobs right here in the UK.
By building strong domestic industries we don’t just protect infrastructure; we strengthen Britain’s position in its most strategically vital sectors.
We ensure that our resilience is powered – by our growth.
But economic growth must also be defended, which brings me to our second pillar: Deterrence.
There is a persistent myth that our subsea cables are completely defenceless, and that adversaries can operate over them in total secrecy.
Let me be absolutely clear: that is completely false.
We are – at all times – watching, tracking, and actively deterring threats to this critical infrastructure.
Just last month, the Defence Secretary revealed that our Armed Forces – in partnership with our allies – tracked Russian submarines operating in UK waters.
Their mission was to survey our cables in peacetime;
So they could more easily sabotage them in conflict.
They wanted this operation to be secret.
But they failed.
Our Royal Navy followed their submarines throughout and made its presence clearly felt.
Our message to President Putin was simple: we can see what you’re doing and any interference will have serious consequences.
That military shield can easily be taken for granted –
Defending our island is a relentless task that is rarely made public.
But it is exactly what gives the market the stability and the confidence to build, and to lead the global AI revolution from British shores.
Though, alone it is not enough.
Deterrence in the twenty-first century requires also a collaborative effort between government and industry – to shine a light on what is happening on the seabed.
By embracing advances in sensing technology, we can transform subsea cables from passive transmitters into intelligent systems.
These next-generation systems won’t just carry data; they will actively monitor environmental changes, improve our understanding of seabed activity, and detect hazards or interference before disruption even happens.
When we can see a threat coming, we can deter it.
But true deterrence requires a robust, credible legal framework too.
For acts of sabotage clearly linked to a hostile state, our laws already carry life imprisonment for the most serious cases.
But malicious activity below the ocean surface doesn’t always present itself so clearly.
As you all know, it frequently operates in the “grey zone” – ambiguous in intent;
hard to prove; and
difficult to prosecute.
Right now, the legal system is simply not keeping pace with the threat.
Some of the core legislation we rely on dates back to when even Lieutenant Bellairs was a child!
Needless to say, it was written for a different world.
So we are changing that.
Today I’m announcing that this Government will bring forward new legislative proposals for consultation that will modernise and strengthen our criminal framework in this domain.
We will make the law clearer, tougher, and much harder to evade.
Sending a clear message that if you act recklessly, or if you deliberately target our cables, there will be serious consequences.
Because deterrence only works if it is credible.
And we cannot let anyone operate in the shadows of our seas with impunity.
Our final pillar is Security – reducing the physical and systemic vulnerabilities in our network so that we can withstand and rapidly recover from disruption.
Now – just as in the past – the vast majority of cable breaks are not from deliberate sabotage.
They are accidental, caused by natural seabed movements or anchors being dragged across the seabed.
Security, therefore, requires practical, everyday risk reduction.
And so to prevent accidental damage, I am proud today to formally endorse the European Subsea Cables Association’s new Fishing Liaison Guidelines.
Developed in close partnership between government, industry, and the fishing sector, these guidelines offer a practical blueprint for how two of our vital maritime industries can operate safely alongside one another – sharing information and protecting the ocean floor.
Of course, we must also secure the vital nodes where these cables come ashore.
Cable landing stations are critical bottlenecks; they house the data management and power systems that keep the entire network alive.
And so to protect them, we are working hand-in-hand with the National Protective Security Authority and the National Cyber Security Centre to deliver detailed, up-to-date physical and cyber-security guidance for cable operators.
Building on the Telecommunications Security Act, we also intend to consult on new legislative measures to ensure a robust baseline level of security across our entire cable network.
This means clearer duties to manage risk, maintain rigorous response plans, and report incidents rapidly.
Finally, security means looking ahead at how we use our waters.
Our analysis with The Crown Estate shows that by 2035 the UK will rely on a significantly higher capacity of cables to match skyrocketing digital demand.
To manage this crowded environment, this Government is looking carefully at how we prioritise the seabed.
We have worked across departments to map out and actively protect the space needed for future cable routes.
Because by managing seabed congestion we can reduce single choke points where multiple cables converge and protect them from accidents while still achieving our green energy ambitions for much more offshore wind.
And because data does not stop at national boundaries, our security strategy cannot stop there either.
Which is why we are deepening our international cooperation, particularly with our near neighbours.
To give just one example – we are working closely with the Irish Government to align our incident response plans.
In fact, later this year, the UK and Ireland will conduct a joint exercise to rehearse how we would respond to major subsea cable disruption.
And this will not be a one-off.
It sits within a broader programme of sustained cooperation and regular exercises – designed to build, strengthen and reinforce our shared resilience over the years ahead.
But our ambition extends beyond our immediate waters too.
Through our leadership in the International Advisory Body for Submarine Cable
Resilience, we are actively exporting these high security standards globally – ensuring British companies can compete, innovate, and operate effectively anywhere in the world.
Because when British industry succeeds on the global stage, our entire nation becomes more secure.
And so let me finish right where I began.
With the timeless strategic reality that Bellairs identified in this building all those years ago.
He reminded his audience that for a great maritime nation, economic prosperity and national security are not two separate competing interests.
They are two sides of the same coin.
True resilience is won not only when a country is well-defended.
But also when it has the confidence to build, to grow, and to lead.
And so while the challenges we face are substantial.
The UK is approaching this era from a position of strength.
We have always been a nation whose prosperity and security depend on our courage to reach out across the seas and to connect with the wider world.
Achieving that future is a responsibility that neither government nor industry can carry alone.
It requires us to walk in lockstep.
So let’s leave today:
Thank you very much.
The comments made by Liz Lloyd, the Telecoms Minister, on 29 May 2026.
The UK already has strong protections in place for our subsea cables, but in a more uncertain world we cannot stand still.
As hostile activity by Russia and others grows, protecting these cables matters more than ever for our economy, security and daily lives. That is why we plan to go further with tougher penalties for reckless damage, stronger security obligations and new powers to respond quickly when incidents happen.
True resilience depends on having a healthy thriving telecoms sector, and government must play an active role in creating the conditions for commercial success. By building a strong domestic industry we don’t just protect infrastructure, we strengthen the UK’s position as a global centre for digital trade.
The statement made by Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, on 29 May 2026.
Last night a Russian drone entered Romanian airspace and hit a residential building, injuring civilians. This is a serious violation of NATO airspace. Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure threatens the security of our entire continent. The UK unreservedly condemns such strikes.
Time and again, Russia has shown it has no regard for civilian life, for international law, or for the sovereignty of its neighbours. That must not be allowed to stand.
We stand shoulder to shoulder with Ukraine, with Romania, and with all our NATO allies in the face of continued Russian aggression.
The comments made by Kemi Badenoch, the Leader of the Opposition, on 28 May 2026.
Ed Miliband’s ideological shut-down of Scotland’s North Sea Oil & Gas Industry is going to hand Vladimir Putin £1 billion in oil revenue. Our own oil is right there, under the North Sea. All we need to do is drill it. Only the Conservatives will get Britain drilling.
The comments made by Nigel Farage on 28 May 2026.
Sweden has just banned cousin marriage.
It causes serious health problems in certain communities, and it’s inherently un-British.
We must have a serious conversation about a ban in Britain, too.
The statement made by Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, on 28 May 2026.
With characteristic lucidity, Tony Blair has set out his own contribution to the debate about the future of our country and the Labour Party. This is welcome, not least because I respect his opinion. He is one of few people in this country who knows what it is like to serve as Prime Minister and the only other living person to have secured a Labour majority. When he speaks on politics, I find it usually pays to listen.
There is much in his essay to agree with. He is right to point out, as he always has, that ideas and policy are the determining factors in long-term political success. Clearly, we have a very different view about the conflict in Iran and more generally about how to balance our long-standing alliance with the United States alongside a strong and sovereign British foreign policy. But at the strategic level, we also agree that Britain must resist the growing clamour to break with the US. The security partnership is simply too deep and too valuable to our national interest to throw away in a fit of gesture politics. Besides, the current President’s central demand of Europe – that we take more responsibility for our own defence – is not unique to him. It was the position of America before he was President and it will be the position of America after he ceases to be President. There is a good reason for this. It is right: it is long past time for Europe to strengthen its hard power and Britain must play a leading role. That is why we are introducing the highest sustained increase in defence spending since the Cold War. It is why we are building up a distinctively European pillar of NATO. And it is why, amongst many other reasons, we will seek a much closer relationship with our European allies at the upcoming summit with the European Union.
Moreover, now is a good moment to reflect on the Government’s course. As I said when the results came through, I am not in the business of ignoring a message from the voters as stark as the one Labour received at the recent local elections. And the signal is that my Government needs not just to be better, but also to be bolder. On growth, defence, Europe, energy and opportunity, we do now need a bigger response than we anticipated in 2024. In a world that has become even more volatile, that is what our ‘change’ mandate demands.
Nonetheless, it will come as no surprise to hear that I do not agree with everything Tony says about Britain or the Government. And to explain why, it is instructive to return to the 2024 context and the despairing commentary about Britain’s perceived decline. It was a running theme of the campaign. Britain was in an unbreakable trap. A “doom-loop” so fiendish that escape was utterly inconceivable. Higher investment in public services, we were told, could not be achieved without risking the health of the public finances or throttling economic growth. Significantly reducing immigration was equally impossible without much the same effect. The loudly proclaimed truth was simple: any new Government would have to choose between rebuilding the economy, improving public services, or reducing immigration. At best, it was a trilemma.
Today, that hand-wringing commentary continues unabated. But the facts about Britain have changed dramatically. After a decade of austerity, a Labour Government has delivered record public service investment and performance is improving. We are on track to deliver the fastest reduction in NHS waiting times since the service’s creation in 1948. Net migration has fallen from a high of nearly 1 million towards the end of the Tory period of rule, to just 171,000 now. Knife crime is significantly down. The asylum backlog has been slashed by 46% with hotel use also falling. Childcare investment has saved working families an average of £8000 a year. And child poverty is set to fall by over half a million children. That is the biggest reduction in a single term of any British government, ever.
Meanwhile, in challenging global circumstances, the British economy is clearly outperforming our peers. We were the fastest growing economy in the G7 at the start of this year (a situation I was repeatedly told in opposition could simply never occur). Borrowing is on track to come down quicker than any other major economy. There have been six interest rate cuts since the election. Despite the conflict in Iran, inflation fell last month, showing that the fundamentals of our efforts to tackle the cost-of-living are sound. And in every single month that we have been in power, wages have gone up. That is not just lines on a graph. That is not just a ‘doom-loop’ finally escaped. That is more money in the pockets of working people.
Now, I am the first to admit that this ‘escape’ was not cost-free. Along the way we made mistakes – most obviously when setting the level at which to means test the winter fuel payment. We also asked a lot of the British people, particularly businesses who now pay higher national insurance contributions. And while we were right to be clear – both during the campaign and since – that it would take a while to turn the British oil tanker around, I do believe that the mood music in the early part of the Government was too negative. We should have shown the underlying hope of our direction much more clearly.
Yet in the context of where Britain finds itself now, I remain confident we got the big political choices right. And that ultimately is why I disagree with picking out this or that individual policy and saying it shows a lack of coherence. I’ll be blunt – it is simply not a credible depiction of how Government works. Government is not a to-do list. You cannot just tick off the issues, one by one. No, Government is about acting on every major problem simultaneously, balancing them against each other, and trying to get to the best situation for Britain overall. A growing economy needs a supply-side reform agenda, of course it does. But it also needs sound public finances. It needs strong public services. It needs infrastructure investment. It needs a high standing amongst our international peers and the respect of global investors. It needs an immigration system that retains confidence. It needs a robust policy for our national security. You cannot simply pick one priority and ignore all the other ‘action needed now’ crises that cross a Prime Minister’s desk every single day. I expect that was true in 1997 and it was certainly true in 2024 when we inherited a situation as bad as any incoming Government since at least the 1979 Thatcher Government. The question should not be about individual policies. It should be whether or not we have taken Britain forward in a coherent direction, consistent with our mandate? I firmly believe that the evidence suggests we have. Including on economic growth.
However, I also have a deeper, less technocratic disagreement with Tony’s argument. Because he explicitly says that the rise of political populism can be traced back to Labour “moving to the left” after he departed office in 2007. In contrast, the Global Financial Crisis of 2008 is not mentioned at all. I have to disagree with him on this. The first embers of the populist fire are surely economic and I have long believed 2008 to be the moment they were first lit. Yes, Tory austerity then douses them in petrol and makes everything immeasurably worse. But even before that, Britain’s economic model was struggling to deliver higher living standards for enough people or places in our country. And the financial crisis itself, including the necessary bank bailouts, clearly called into question the fairness of the entire economic bargain.
In fact, I would go further: this is the central truth throughout all the years of Tory chaos and crisis. The fundamental problem was not that they simply failed to deliver the right policy mix to get back to a basically sound model. It is that they should never have been trying to do that in the first place, because the status quo was broken. The Great Moderation was done. Too many communities, particularly those still reeling from deindustrialisation, were locked out of wealth creation. And too many people – working class people, especially – were ignored as people who could make a valuable contribution to the success of our country. Carers, drivers, builders, shopworkers, cleaners, technicians – workers who did not belong to the so-called “knowledge economy” were left out of our collective story of aspiration. That is why the pandemic touched such a raw nerve. It exposed, in defiance of that story, just how central those workers were to the real functioning of our country. And yet even then – nothing. The Tory Government just carried on trying to limp back to the broken status quo.
This is what any account of the British economy or the rise in populism must acknowledge. Populism cannot be “bought off” with higher growth and old school redistribution, though the absence of both, as the Tory era shows, will only make things worse. Nor is it just about living standards or economic inequality, though both clearly matter deeply. No, it is a more profound and subtle crisis – its roots are economic, but it also about dignity and respect. Working people and working-class communities want an economy that they have a stake in, a state that respects the value they contribute, and a Government that can help them achieve greater control over an increasingly insecure world. Any economic plan that does not wrestle with this is on a political hiding to nothing. Not just in Britain, anywhere in the western world.
You can try and ignore that. You can double-down on the old ways. But the spasms of political chaos it unleashes, the chilling effect that has on long-term investment, the opportunities it gives to grifters and grievance – that is the surest way to making our country poorer that I can think of. And frankly, we don’t need to think about it. We just have to look around Britain at what the Tories did. The evidence is all around us. The world has changed.
Take, as just one example, the issue rightly dominating headlines over the past few days: Alan Milburn’s interim report on the economic fortunes of our young people. Because his findings bear all the hallmarks of the old status quo’s collapse. Systemic institutional failure. Economic stagnation. Persistent low investment. But also, a story that is fundamentally about dignity and respect. About millions of young people – often poor, working class or disabled – who are so ignored by the established way of doing things in this country, that they do not feel success could ever belong to them.
I saw this first hand with my late brother. He had difficulties learning and I will never forget the way he had to fight, every day, just to be seen. But there are so many others who have similarly seemed invisible to the status quo. I think of children living in poverty arriving at school too hungry to learn. Teenagers without a place to go in their community. And the millions of young people who are still, even in 2026, looked down upon by some people because they didn’t or don’t want to go to university. Amazingly talented and dedicated people who have not been treated with the respect they deserve. This is their Government.
It is why so many of the investments we have made are targeted on young people – in childcare, in new school-based nurseries, in family hubs, in tackling child poverty, in apprenticeships, in technical excellence colleges, in special educational needs education, and in a youth guarantee that will support every young person who can’t find work with a new opportunity to earn or learn. Because it goes back to those three demands: an economy that gives working class communities a stake. A state that recognises everyone’s value. And a Government that uses its power to give people agency and control. They are not just principles that serve as guide to fixing our problems or defeating populism. They are the building blocks of an entirely different Britain. A stronger Britain. A fairer Britain. But crucially, a Britain that is truly built for all. A country where everyone, no matter their background, feels they are respected for who they are. That their children will be backed to go as far as their talent will take them. And that, with hard work, this is what will define their success. Not their class, their race, or the community they grew up in. Not the educational institution they went to. Their talent and their effort.
Personally, I believe that is the most New Labour cause of all – the most Labour cause of all. But it is one that each generation must renew to face the economic and geopolitical conditions of the moment. That is what this Government is doing.
You can see it in our Pride in Place Programme. Yes, on the surface it is investment in communities and the local public realm. But it is also about respect, control and unlocking untapped potential. About giving communities the power to decide what is spent in their area, not bureaucrats in Whitehall or politicians in Westminster.
You can see it in our supply-side reforms to the economy – in planning reform, infrastructure investment, judicial review and in stripping out the regulation that stops us becoming a civil nuclear powerhouse. Yes, it’s about economic growth and getting Britain building. But it is also about making sure the state can unlock opportunity everywhere in the country. That it is strong enough to overcome vested interests and demonstrate control to a public sceptical that Government can deliver for them.
It’s there too in our energy security strategy. Of course, I recognise that Britain cannot unilaterally tackle climate change on its own. But we are a leading G7 economy, our voice, our example and our leadership matters. Moreover, while North Sea oil and gas should and will remain part of our energy mix for generations, it is also clearly a depleting source that has no discernible impact on the global price of oil and gas. Even with our own resources, we are now a net importer of fossil fuels and that is the single biggest driver of soaring energy bills bar none. And so, investing in clean British energy strengthens our agency over those markets. It takes control of our bills on behalf of working people.
Indeed, wherever you look across the Government’s agenda – our NHS reforms, our immigration and asylum reforms, our industrial policy, our radical devolution agenda, our transformative power shifts in favour of workers and renters – it is the same story on repeat. Greater security as the basis for aspiration and growth. No contribution or community ignored. Strengthening Britain’s control over the forces that shape our world.
In fact, even on the issue that Tony Blair most attends to in his essay, you can see those principles in action. Because far from being left behind on artificial intelligence, Britain is at the front of the pack. This isn’t rhetoric. Britain is widely recognised by the leading lights of that sector as being a growing and sovereign AI player. No less an authority than Jensen Huang, the CEO of Nvidia, has said we are on the cusp of becoming an AI superpower. Investment is flowing into the country and not just into London, also into building datacentres in places like Loughton in Essex, Blyth in Northumberland, and former industrial sites on the Castleford side of Leeds. It is improving our public services, particularly the NHS. And as we build this future, we are taking measures that strengthen our sovereignty; making sure we are an AI rule-maker, not a rule-taker. It is our principles in action, once again. Not just passively accepting our economic fate, but actively shaping the future. Taking control. Unlocking the potential of the whole country.
Is there more to do? Yes. Much, much more. Is our welfare system in need of reform? Yes. Is our economy in need of even more growth? Definitely. Do we need bolder policies on everything from the European Union, to protecting our children online, and the difference we can make now in preparation for higher global energy prices in the winter? Yes, and that is all coming.
Are there are difficult choices and constraints? Yes, of course there are. Most of all, the unignorable constraint of economic stability. That can never be taken for granted and never will be with my leadership. Because at the end of the day, strong public finances are also a source of agency, arguably the ultimate source. If we lost control now, after everything the Tories put the country through, not only would working people pay a very heavy price, but the Labour Party would never be forgiven.
One final disagreement with Tony. He argues that this not about a stronger assertion of Labour values. I know what he means. On their own, absent of a plan, values take you nowhere. But Britain does need Labour values, it has needed Labour values for a while. Our plan is guided by them. Our vision is shaped by them. And the future we are building – a country that feels like it truly belongs to us all – must use them as its bricks and mortar.
That is what we are doing.
Keir.
The comments made by Ed Davey on 27 May 2026.
The fact that the government is still trying to hide the truth when it comes to Mandelson is an utter disgrace. Responsibility for hiring him lies at the door of the PM.
Glaring warning signs were ignored, due to a desperate desire to pander to the bully in the White House.