James McMurdock has issued a statement saying that he will continue his parliamentary career as an independent MP, implying that he has given up any intention of returning to Reform UK.

Further to my statement tweeted on 5th July 2025. I have now had a chance to take specialist legal advice from an expert in the relevant field. In light of that advice, which is privileged and which I choose to keep private at this time, I have decided to continue my parliamentary career as an independent MP where I can focus 100% on the interests of my constituents.

McMurdock was one of five Reform UK MPs elected last July (he won South Basildon and East Thurrock with a majority of just 98). Rupert Lowe, another MP elected under the Reform banner at the election, has already left, meaning Nigel Farage has lost 40% of his 2024 intake (although he did gain another MP in a byelection, Sarah Pochin).

McMurdock’s departure was prompted by the publication of a report in the Sunday Timees saying that he took out two government loans, worth £70,000 in total, intended to help companies struggling during the Covid pandemic. McMurdock insisted the loans were lawful and proper, but the paper questioned whether the payments were appropriate given the size of the two companies, which did not have any employees.

On Saturday McMurdock said he was resigning the party whip pending an investigation into the allegations. He said he was doing that to protect the reputation of the party.

Today’s statement, which comes after Nigel Farage failed to defend him while on a visit yesterday, implies McMurdock’s relationship with Reform has now broken down.

Resident doctors, formerly known as junior doctors, in England have voted in favour of strikes that could result in industrial action lasting until January next year, the British Medical Association has announced. Denis Campbell has the story.

Jamie Grierson is a senior Guardian reporter.

The West of England mayor was joined by political leaders at Bristol Temple Meads railway station today after plans to reopen the train line between the city and Portishead were given the green light as part of a wider package of transport investment announced by the government.

Metro mayor Helen Godwin, North Somerset MP Sadik Al-Hassan and council leaders were marking what is promised to be the final hurdle in the long-winded saga to reopen the line. Trains have not run between Portishead, a town of around 27,000, and Bristol for 60 years.

The government has pledged a further £27m towards the £150m project as part of a broader announcement of funding for road and rail projects across England.

The Department of Transport gave the go ahead overnight to more than 50 road and rail upgrades including the long awaited A66 Northern Trans-Pennine route.

Five major road schemes in the north and Midlands are confirmed as funded including the M54 to M6 link road in Staffordshire.

Three new train stations and funding a Midlands Rail Hub, creating brand new rail links for more than 50 locations, was also announced.

Speaking at Bristol Temple Meads, Labour MP for North Somerset, Al-Hassan, said the final investment for the Portishead line emerged from the spending review. He said:

The spending review is good governance for the nation’s finances. That’s money from the taxpayer being looked at, looking what is on what line, how we’re spending it. And that hasn’t been done for over a decade. So this is all possible because we actually looked at the books and looked where the money’s going, and got rid of things that didn’t need to be on there.

You may have noticed, the government has a priority on growth ... And if you’re looking for ways to do that, investments like the Portishead railway, increasing economic growth - an estimated £43m a year - that’s how you do it. So all of these projects that have been announced today is a commitment to growth on a regional and national level.

Williams ended by saying that, when he started work on the inquiry, he was not familiar with the concept of restorative justice.

But, as the inquiry went on, calls for restorative justice became “louder and louder”, he said. He said the Post Office and Fujitsu embraced the concept “with what I might describe as varying degrees of enthusiasm”. He said he thought they would at least consider this approach. But nothing has happened. He urged the government to get involved.

He also said he thought compensation should be paid “to family members who have suffered serious adverse consequences as a result of the treatment meted out to their loved ones”.

Williams says, even if his recommendations are accepted in full, “they will not constitute some magic formula for removing all of the problems from which the [compensation] schemes suffer”.

He says he is critical of the Post Office and the government in relation to these schemes, “not least in relation to some of the egregious delays which have occurred”.

He says having four separate schemes was a mistake.

I cannot say plainly enough that there should not have been four distinct and separate schemes for delivering financial redress.

Williams is now going into more detail about his recommendations on compensation.

Under the Horizon Shortfall Scheme (HSS – one of the four compensation schemes), a “high percentage” of the most modest claims were settled by July 2024, he says. He goes on:

Whether some of those settlements were in reality full and fair can only be a matter of conjecture.

Williams says many of the claims in the £20,000 to £60,000 bracket were not settled on a “full and fair” basis.

And he says many of the larger claims have not been fully settled.

Williams is now talking about compensation.

He quotes his first recommendation.

HM Government and/or the Department and where appropriate the Post Office and Fujitsu shall provide written responses to my recommendations by 10 October 2025.

He says some might see as this as a challenge to government. But it isn’t, he says. It is more of a “plea”.

He says three months should be enough for the government to decide whether or not it is accepting his recommendations.

He says, for the recommendations to have maximum affect, they must be accepted and implemented quickly.

Williams says the picture in his report is “profoundly disturbing”. He goes on:

In summary, what does that picture reveal?

Many thousands of people have suffered serious financial detriment and for a sizeable proportion, that detriment subsists.

Many people have inevitably suffered emotional turmoil and significant stress. In consequence, many businesses and homes have been lost. Bankruptcies have occurred. Marriage and families have been wrecked …

Postmasters and others suffered the trauma of criminal prosecution, conviction and punishment, and for some punishment meant lengthy periods of imprisonment.

I received reports that some people held liable for shortfalls became ill as a consequence. Tragically, I heard too of people of whom it is said that they were driven to take their own lives.

Williams starts by saying it is good to see so many people attending. He has been “extremely grateful” for the interest shown in the inquiry, he says.

He thanks those who participated in the inquiry.

He says he has given two speeches about the inquiry in the past. The first was in September 2022, and the second was in July 2023, when he interim report was published.

He says in those speeches he stressed that the inquiry was looking at two areas – the impact of what happened, and whether the compensation schemes were “full, fair and prompt”.

He says he continues to view these as vital elements. And, when he stopped taking evidence, he considered whether he should deal with the human impact as part of the whole report, or whether he should publish that aspect as soon as it was written.

He decided to adopt the latter approach so he could publish as soon as possible, and comment on the compensation schemes. Some aspects of those schemes “could be improved substantially”, he said. So he decide to say so as soon as possible.

But he also concluded that a report covering compensation, without looking at the human impact, would be '“lacking in context”, he says.

Around 1,000 people were convicted on the basis of Horizon evidence, the report from the inquiry into the Post Office IT scandal says.

Much publicity has surrounded the number of people who were prosecuted and convicted of offences in which data from Horizon played at least a part. Nonetheless, on the evidence available to me I find it difficult to be precise about the actual number. However, it seems to me to be likely that approximately 1,000 persons were prosecuted and convicted throughout the United Kingdom during the period with which the Inquiry is concerned based on Horizon evidence.

It might be thought that very few people who were prosecuted by the Post Office (or by the Prosecuting Authority in Northern Ireland and Scotland) relying upon data from Horizon were acquitted. That would not be correct. I have received evidence which suggests that there were somewhere between 50 and 60 people who were prosecuted, but who were not convicted. It is at least possible that there may have been more. Many of those persons would have been acquitted upon the direction of the presiding judge, but some were acquitted after a trial. However, the fact that persons who were prosecuted were not convicted did not prevent them from suffering many of the adverse impacts which I have already described.

Commenting on the trauma suffered by those prosecuted, Sir Wyn Williams, the inquiry chair, says:

I do not think it is easy to exaggerate the trauma which persons are likely to suffer when they are the subject of criminal investigation, prosecution, conviction and sentence. That is especially so when the persons involved have had no previous experience of these processes. I am sure that the vast majority of persons investigated and prosecuted by the Post Office will have had no such experience. Without exception, in all probability, they will have had no experience of being convicted of offences which render them liable to sentences of imprisonment. In modern times, almost invariably, many months, at best, elapses between the instigation of a criminal investigation and the conclusion of any prosecution consequent upon it. As it happens, the evidence given to this Inquiry has disclosed that in many instances this process has taken years. It is not difficult to imagine the stress and worry which would have consumed many an accused person during such a period of time …

I need not dwell on the suffering of those who were sentenced to immediate terms of imprisonment. Self-evidently, such persons will have suffered greatly. They will have lost their liberty for a specified period of time and they will also have lived for at least part of their sentences under circumstances which, at best, were very restrictive and, at worst, very restrictive and deeply unpleasant. On occasions, life may have seemed close to unbearable.

This is what the report says about the way the Post Office scandal led at least 13 people to take their own lives. It says contemplating suicide was a “common experience” for victims.

Following a formal request from the Inquiry dated 18 March 2025, the Post Office named six former postmasters whom, it is claimed by their families, took their own lives as a consequence of Horizon showing an illusory shortfall in branch accounts.17 This information was known to the Post Office largely because of data it holds under the schemes for financial redress which are the subject of Section 4 of this volume but also from reports in the media …

Following a further formal request from the Inquiry on 27 March 2025, the Post Office specified a further seven persons who, according to their families, had taken their own lives as a consequence of Horizon showing an illusory shortfall in branch accounts. These persons were not postmasters but the information was known to the Post Office in relation to six of the deceased persons because of claims made for financial redress and in relation to one of the deceased persons by virtue of reports in the media.

I have also received evidence from at least 59 persons who contemplated suicide at various points in time and who attributed this to their experiences with Horizon and/or the Post Office. This was a common experience across both those who were and were not prosecuted. Ten of the persons who contemplated suicide attempted to take their lives, some on more than one occasion. One postmaster said: “The impact on me of the treatment the Post Office subjected me to has been immeasurable. The mental stress was so great for me that I had a mental breakdown and turned to alcohol as I sunk further into depression. I attempted suicide on several occasions and was admitted to a mental health institution twice.”

This is what Sir Wyn Williams, the inquiry chair, says in his report about the human impact of the Post Office Horizon IT scandal.

It is almost impossible to ascertain, with any degree of accuracy, the number of persons who have suffered as a result of the misplaced reliance upon data produced by Horizon. I can say, however, with a degree of confidence that there are currently about 10,000 eligible claimants in the schemes providing financial redress and that number is likely to rise at least by hundreds, if not more, over the coming months.

The scale of the suffering endured by those claimants is extremely wide-ranging. At one end of the spectrum, there are claimants who were held liable for small amounts of money allegedly lost to the Post Office – perhaps tens or hundreds of pounds. At the other end of the spectrum, there are claimants who were wrongly convicted and imprisoned, and/or became seriously ill, and/or were declared bankrupt. There are claimants who represent persons who have died. Some of the deceased persons died of natural causes before their convictions were quashed; some have died more recently before their claims for financial redress were determined fully; some are said to have been driven to despair and suicide.

And here is the Guardian report on today’s report from he Post Office Horizon IT inquiry. It is by Julia Kollewe, who was able to read the report under embargo ahead of its publication at noon.

In an interview with BBC News about Norman Tebbit, Kemi Badenoch said she had reflected “many times” on what Tebbit meant when he talked about the “cricket test” (see 11.32am), and she said she agreed with him. She explained:

I think what was trying to say is that people who come to this country should come to it because they love it and they want to be a part of it. And I’ve often said similar things myself, that our country is not a hotel, it’s not a dormitory, it’s our home, and we want people who are here to want to contribute to our way of life, to be a part of us. And that was how he expressed that.

Badenoch, who was only a child and living in Nigeria when Tebbit was active in politics, said she had spoken to Tebbit “quite a bit” while he was active in the House of Lords. She added:

He was always urging party to be more conservative, and I think he would be quite pleased with the direction of travel which we’re taking, trying to make sure that people can see authentic conservative principles in every single thing that we do.

The UK’s public finances are in a “relatively vulnerable position”, with pensions costs, climate change and volatile bond markets all posing significant risks, the independent Office for Budget Responsibility has warned. Heather Stewart has the story here.

Here is the OBR report, Fiscal risks and sustainability.

Graeme Wearden has more coverage on his business live blog.

French police slashing the boats of people smugglers is not “pleasant” but the right tactic, Heidi Alexander, the transport secretary, has said. Jessica Elgot and Peter Walker have the story.

Boris Johnson, the former Tory PM, has issued this tribute to Norman Tebbit.

Norman Tebbit was a hero of modern Conservatism. In the early 1980s he liberated the British workforce from the socialist tyranny of the closed shop. He tamed the union bosses, and in so doing he helped pave the way for this country’s revival in the 1980s and 1990s.

At a time when the Labour government is now disastrously reversing those crucial reforms we need to remember what he did and why. In his single most famous phrase he once said that in the 1930s his unemployed father had got on his bike and looked for work. That wasn’t a heartless thing to say - as the Labour Party claimed. It was because he believed in thrift and energy and self-reliance. It was because he rejected a culture of easy entitlement.

We mourn the passing of a great patriot, a great Conservative - and today more than ever we need to restore the values of Norman Tebbit to our politics.

Eluned Morgan, Welsh first minister, has said said Labour is taking the threat from Reform UK “very seriously” following the publication of a new polling suggesting Nigel Farage’s party will come top in next year’s Senedd elections.

The More in Common poll has Reform on 28%, with Plaid Cymru on 26%, Labour on 23% – and the Conservatives far behind on 10%.

This is the second poll in Wales that has put Reform in first place in voting intention for the Senedd. Last month a Find Out Now poll also had Reform in first place, with 29% support, two points ahead of Plaid.

In an interview with Sky News, Morgan accepted there was “a possibility” that Reform could become the largest party in the Senedd, saying it was “really concerning”, but added it would be “difficult for them to rule by themselves”.

But she ruled out entering a coalition with the party, saying: “I wouldn’t touch Reform with a bargepole.”

She also said Labour had to win voters back by being “authentic” and “clear with people about what we stand for”, rather than trying to “out-Reform Reform”. She said:

I think we’ve got to lead with our values. We’re about bringing communities together, not dividing them, and I do think that what Reform is interested in is dividing people and people do need to make choices on things like that.

So, what I won’t be doing in Wales is chasing Reform down a path where we can try and out-Reform Reform. I’m not interested in that, because those aren’t my values.

Later today the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry is publishing the first volume of its final report. It covers the experience of victims, and how the compensation scheme is working. The inquiry will address who was most to blame in a further report.

This is what PA Media has filed on what to expect today.

The first tranche of the long-awaited final report from an inquiry into the Post Office Horizon scandal is set to be published.

More than 900 subpostmasters were wrongfully prosecuted between 1999 and 2015 in what has been dubbed as the worst miscarriage of justice in British legal history.

Many were wrongly convicted of crimes such as theft and false accounting after faulty Horizon software made it look as though money was missing from their accounts.

Subpostmasters’ lives were destroyed – with some bankrupted by legal action and sent to prison.

Today the first volume of the Horizon IT inquiry’s final report will be published – covering the devastating impact on the lives of the scandal’s victims and the compensation process.

The issue of financial redress has frequently been flagged as an issue by subpostmasters – with many still awaiting full compensation.

The various compensation schemes have been criticised by victims as unfair and difficult to navigate – processes which lead campaigner Sir Alan Bates has previously described as “quasi-kangaroo courts”.

Retired judge Sir Wyn Williams, the chairman of the probe, will make a public statement following the report’s publication.

In an interim report published in July 2023, Sir Wyn described legislative changes made to resolve issues with the redress schemes as “a patchwork quilt of compensation schemes… with some holes in it”.

The inquiry was established in 2020, with a number of witnesses giving evidence on the use of Fujitsu’s Horizon system, Post Office governance and the legal action taken against subpostmasters.

In a previous statement addressing the compensation schemes, the Department for Business and Trade said: “This government has quadrupled the total amount paid to affected postmasters to provide them with full and fair redress, with more than £1bn having now been paid to over 7,300 claimants.”

One of the characteristics that made Norman Tebbit stand out as a minister was his skill as a communicator; he was pithy, direct, original, unpretentious, often quite nasty. But always interesting. He was not the sort of politician interested in regurgitating the bland ‘line to take’. If Twitter had been around in the 1980s, it would have suited him brilliantly.

PA Media has rounded up some of his best known quotes.

It is certainly safe, in view of the movement to the right of intellectuals and political thinkers, to pronounce the brain death of socialism.

Parliament must not be told a direct untruth, but it’s quite possible to allow them to mislead themselves.

He didn’t riot. He got on his bike and looked for work”

This was Tebbit talking about his father, when he fell out of work. Tebbit never actually uttered the much attributed phrase “on yer bike”.

The BBC is another part of the destruction of Great Britain. The truth is that the BBC doesn’t know that it is biased. It thinks that Guardian reading champagne socialists are the norm.

I’ve never bashed a union in my life.

John Major has the mulishness of a weak man with stupidity.

It’s good to remember the unburied dead and the uncollected rubbish. Most of it can now be seen on the Labour benches in the House of Commons.

The poll tax was a classic case of a good idea being entrusted to Chris Patten and becoming a terrible failure.

Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, has issued this tribute to Norman Tebbit.

Our Conservative family mourns the loss of Lord Tebbit today and I send my sincerest condolences to his loved ones.

Norman Tebbit was an icon in British politics and his death will cause sadness across the political spectrum.

He was one of the leading exponents of the philosophy we now know as Thatcherism and his unstinting service in the pursuit of improving our country should be held up as an inspiration to all Conservatives.

As a minister in Mrs Thatcher’s administration he was one of the main agents of the transformation of our country, notably in taming the trade unions.

But to many of us it was the stoicism and courage he showed in the face of terrorism which inspired us as he rebuilt his political career after suffering terrible injuries in the Brighton bomb, and cared selflessly for his wife Margaret, who was gravely disabled in the bombing – a reminder that he was first and foremost a family man who always held true to his principles.

He never buckled under pressure and he never compromised.

Our nation has lost one of its very best today and I speak for all the Conservative family and beyond in recognising Lord Tebbit’s enormous intellect and profound sense of duty to his country.

May he rest in peace.