Andrew Bowie, a shadow energy minster, responded for the Conseratives – not Claire Coutinho, the shadow energy secretary.

He said it was “ridiculous” for Miliband to suggest in his Guardian interview that opponents of net zero were unpatriotic. He went on

We need to bring back a sense of rationality, of proportion to this debate, because … language like this is alienating more and more people from the important cause of ensuring that the planet we pass on to our children.

Bowie suggested Miliband was not telling the truth about the impact of net zero policies.

Lindsay Hoyle, the Speaker, intervened, to object, saying MPs should not accuse each other of being dishonest. Bowie withdrew that suggestion.

But he said it was “shameful” of Miliband to use the Met Office report as cover to attack the opposition.

Labour’s climate policies would make Britain poorer, he said.

In response, Miliband said:

We’re in a situation now where the shadow secretary of state goes into hiding when there’s a statement about the climate crisis, because it’s just too embarrassing to try and articulate the opposition’s position.

And look at the central chasm. At the heart of [Bowie’s] response is that he and his colleagues have taken the decision to abandon 20 years of bipartisanship when it comes to climate.

One of the great strides forward was Theresa May’s net zero by 2050 – now he’s trashing it and saying it was a disaster.

Miliband said Bowie was wrong to claim net zero policies would have a net cost. “All the evidence is delaying action costs more, not less,” he said.

He said it was not clear if the Tories have any net zero target at all now.

And he said Bowie was wrong to claim, as he did in a recent interview, that the net zero target was not based on science.

The point is net zero was a target that Theresa May adopted, driven by the science.

So what are they [the Conservatives]? They are anti-science. They are anti-jobs. They are anti-energy security, and they are anti-future generations.

He said he agreed with May, who described opponents of her net zero policies when she was PM as “ideologues at the political extremes” or “populists who offer only easy answers to complex questions”.

Miliband said he could not have put it better himself.

Miliband said that the lesson of history was that people can do something about the climate crisis.

Before the Paris climate agreement was negotiated 10 years ago, the world was on course for four degrees centigrade of global warming. Now, national commitments imply 2.6 degrees of warming, or global warming below two degrees, if countries meet their full climate targets.

We remain way off track from where we need to be as a world, but we in this country have helped make a difference.

He said parties came together in 2008 to pass the first Climate Change Act,

And when the Tories, under Theresa May, legislated for net zero by 2050, Labour supported that, he said.

And he said when the UK hosted Cop under Boris Johnson, there was global agreement on a biodiversity framework.

The lesson is clear. The choices we make as a country have influenced the course of global action, and in doing so, reduced the impact of the climate and nature crisis on future generations in Britain.

To those who say Britain cannot make a difference. I say you are wrong. Stop talking our country down. British leadership matters.

Miliband says these facts are sobering.

He goes on:

Unfortunately, all the evidence suggests this is just the start of the threat we face.

As I say this, I want to particularly acknowledge today the anxieties many young people feel about these issues.

My candid message to them is this, yes, there are real reasons to worry about the world you will inherit, but my message is also that we can do something about it.

Every fraction of a degree of warming we prevent, and every step we take to preserve nature helps limit the severity of impacts and protect our country from irreparable harm.

It is our generation today which have a unique opportunity to act, because unlike previous generations, we can see the evidence of the climate and nature crisis all around us, and yet we still have time to limit the worst effects.

Miliband says extreme weather is already having an impact.

The impacts of extreme weather and nature loss aren’t simply a future threat to our country. They are already here and having impacts on our way of life.

We know heavy rainfall made last year’s harvest the second worst in at least four decades, costing farmers hundreds of millions of pounds.

More than half our best agricultural land, and over 6 million properties in England, are already at risk of flooding, according to the Environment Agency.

According to the UK Health Security Agency, there were more than 10,000 excess deaths, 10,000 people losing their lives, during English heat waves between 2020 and 2024.

And as we know recently, rising temperatures place pressures on every aspect of our national life. We have seen this again over the last few days, with incidents of wildfires from Surrey to Scotland, disruption due to trains overheating and hosepipe bans announced in Yorkshire, Kent and Sussex.

The climate crisis is also a massive threat to our economy. The OBR fiscal risks report published last week says the damage caused by climate impacts in a near three Celsius world is forecast to cut our GDP by 8% by the early 2070s, which will be roughly £200bn pounds based on current GDP.

Miliband says the “the science is unequivocal about why this is happening”.

He goes on:

As the Met Office said this morning, and I quote, ‘This is not a natural variation in our climate. Human emissions of greenhouse gases are warming the atmosphere and changing the weather we experience.’

We know climate change and nature loss are fundamentally linked and contribute to each other.

Globally, we’re losing species at a much faster rate than at any time in human history. Here in Britain, a quarter of our mammals, nearly half of our bird species, are currently at risk of extinction, with birds like starlings, turtle doves and grape cartridges under threat.

The abundance of species in England has fallen by an estimated third since 1970 and Britain has become one of the most nature depleted countries in the world.

Ed Miliband starts by saying the Met Office’s report has been published today. The government intends this to be an annual event, he says.

He says the last decade as seen the 10 hottest years on record globally.

Long-term global warming, assessed by a range of methods, is estimated to be 1.34 and 1.41 celsius above pre-industrial levels. And last year was the first time we saw an individual year above 1.5 degrees.

Today’s Met Office report shows that, in line with what is happening globally, the UK climate is getting hotter and wetter, with more extreme events.

The central England temperature series shows recent warmth has far exceeded any temperatures observed in at least 300 years.

Over the last 50 years, the number of days above 28 degrees centigrade have doubled, and above 30 degrees have trebled.

This spring was the UK’s warmest on record, beating the record broken last year.

Meanwhile, warming oceans and melting ice sheets have contributed to sea levels around the UK rising by 13.4 centimetres over the past three decades, and this is accelerating.

Ed Miliband, energy secretary, is about to make a statement to MPs about the state of the climate. He wants this to become an annual event.

The WWF environmental charity says this is a good idea. Its chief executive, Tanya Steele, says:

The government is right to make an annual ‘state of climate and nature address’ to parliament and the public. The science is clear and is confirms what we are already experiencing: it’s getting hotter, and we need to do something now, not tomorrow.

MPs must act now for a healthier, fairer, safer, future. That’s why we’re calling for a new law – a Living Planet Act – to ensure that across everything the government does, it is acting to restore nature, tackle climate change, and provide a safe future for our children and grandchildren.

Nature can be our greatest ally in the fight against climate change, but only if we choose to protect and restore it.

Ed Miliband, energy secretary, will be making a statement to MPs soon after 3.30pm on the state of the climate report. (See 10.21am.)

In a recent Bagehot column, the Economist complained that Britian has been a bit useless at adjusting to the fact that the planet is getting warmer. As an example, it cited rules on heat pump subsidies. Bagehot said:

If there is a conspiracy against air-conditioning in Britain, it goes right to the top. The government offers subsidies worth £7,500 to people replacing a gas boiler with an electric heat pump, but only if it produces solely heat. A system that can heat in winter and cool in summer receives nothing. Mercifully, Labour is considering extending the subsidies, yet that is not guaranteed to happen. A puritanical streak in British policymaking runs deep. Only the most banal conspiracies turn out to be true: the Deep State exists and it tries to keep you warm on summer nights.

But there was good news for the Economist at the No 10 lobby briefing this morning. Asked about this issue, the No 10 spokesperson hinted the rules will change. He said:

Keeping homes cool in hot weather is just as important as heating them in the winter. That’s why we’ve consulted on including air to air heat pumps, which also cool air, under the boiler upgrade scheme. Our response to that will be published in due course.

At the health committee, in response to a question from Alex McIntyre (Lab), Wes Streeting, the health secretary, says he is pleased that the BMA has agreed to a meeting this week to discuss how the resident doctors’ strike could be averted.

He says:

I have to be clear with the committee, as I was with the House last week, that there is no more room for manoeuvre on pay, but there are lots of other things that we can do and should do that would lead to material improvements.

He says, if the BMA goes ahead with the strike, that will be a “catastrophic mistake”.

He says he hopes he and the BMA can find a way of avoiding “the misery that will be inflicted” by the strike.

Q: What impact would it have on waiting lists?

Streeting says the government can mitigate against the impact of strikes. But it cannot stop them have consequences, he says.

He says appointments would be delayed. He says he has a relative waiting for an appointment, and he says they are “dreading what I fear is an inevitable phone call”.

He goes on:

The other thing that I have found actually shockingly irresponsible about the BMA’s position is their leaders seem to be telling their members not to inform their trusts or their employers if they’re going out on strike.

Now, I might not agree with the BMA strike action, but I do accept they have a right to strike. I do accept they’ve followed the rules in order to go on strike.

What I cannot fathom is how any doctor in good conscience would make it harder for managers to make sure we have safe staffing levels, would make it harder for other staff who are going to be turning up to work that day, not least the staff who have not had a higher percentage pay rise, many of whom are paid less than resident doctors.

So I just think the sort of the BMA’s approach to this from start to finish has been completely wrong.

Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, is saying that parliament should be recalled so Donald Trump can address MPs and peers during his state visit. (See 11.36am.) Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, seems to think the opposite. No fan of Trump’s, Davey says the Canadian PM Mark Carney should be invited for an official visit first, and that Carney should get a speaking slot in parliament. Davey posted this on social media.

The PM should invite Mark Carney for an official visit and address to Parliament before Trump’s visit.

It would show Britain backs Canada against Trump’s damaging trade war. Now is the time to stand with the Commonwealth, not stand in Trump’s shadow like Nigel Farage.

At the Downing Street lobby briefing the PM’s spokesperson ducked questions about whether or not Keir Starmer wanted to see Trump address parliament.

Asked whether Starmer would like to see Trump address parliament, the spokesperson said:

That’s a matter for the palace and the president, in relation to the dates on the visit.

Asked again if having Trump address parliament was something the PM would welcome, the spokesperson said this was “also a matter for parliament, in relation to invites”.

The spokesperson said he would “firmly steer” reporters away from suggestions that the timing of Trump’s visit was related to parliament being in recess at the time.

Asked again what Starmer thought of the principle of Trump addressing parliament, the spokesperson said the PM was focused on welcoming Trump to the UK for a second state visit.

As Kevin Schofield reports at HuffPost UK, government sources have confirmed that parliament will not be recalled for Trump’s visit, as Farage proposed.

Wes Streeting, the health secretary, is giving evidence to the Commons health committee about the 10-year health plan the week before last. There is a live feed here.

Streeting starts by saying responses to the plan have been “extremely positive”.

Downing Street has claimed that the “principles” that government how civil servants can engage with the media have not changed.

Asked to respond to the letter in the Times today from experts criticising the ways officials have been gagged from speaking at events where journalists are present (see 12.09pm), the No 10 spokesperson said he would not discuss “internal guidance”.

But he went on:

Civil service rules around media engagement are long standing. They’ve been set out previously in the civil servant management code and in the civil service code.

It’s always been the case that ministers are ultimately accountable for decisions to parliament, and to the public, and it’s obviously right that ministers primarily are scrutinised by the media and members [of parliament]. The guidance simply seeks to implement [that].

Asked if he was saying nothing had changed, the spokesperson replied:

The principles around civil servants’ engagement with the media are unchanged …. Clearly it is the case that … senior officials do engage with stakeholders and members of the media, but always with in line with the civil service code.

The experts who have signed the Times letter say the new guidance does amount to a change in approach. They say:

Effective government relies on public servants, whose salaries are paid by the taxpayer, hearing directly from businesses, charities, academics and citizens to help them make better policy. They should be able to explain government activity to those same groups. Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent, speaking for the government about the guidance, recognised this when she said that there was a “a responsibility on our civil servants to engage every day”.

The unpublished guidance contradicts this, saying that “officials speaking at a sector-facing event with Q&A and/or media expected to be in the audience … should not go ahead”. It is causing confusion and a chilling effect on public discussion. It should be withdrawn.

Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, has refused to comment on potential tax changes in the budget, beyond saying the government remains committed to its manifesto commitments. Speaking to reporters, she said:

We haven’t even set the date for the budget yet, so please forgive me if I’m not going to speculate about what might happen at an event that we haven’t even decided a date on yet.

But we’ve been really clear in our manifesto about the taxes that we won’t increase, and we’re not going to increase the taxes that working people pay, their income tax, their national insurance and their VAT, because I do recognise the struggle that ordinary working people have faced these last few years with the cost of living.

And so those manifesto commitments around income tax, national insurance and VAT, they absolutely stand.

Downing Street has played down hints that the government might freeze income tax thresholds in the autumn budget.

Darren Jones, chief secretary to the Treasury, hinted as much in an interviews this moning when he suggested that the Labour manifesto commitment not to raise income tax only applied to the “headline” rate. (See 9.31am.)

At the lobby briefing, asked if the reference to the “headline” rate meant the government was “moving the goalposts” in relation to its tax pledge, the PM’s spokersperson denied that and said Jones was just setting out the manifesto commitment.

But, when asked if the wording of the manifesto commitment would allow a government to freeze thresholds without the ‘no tax increases for working people’ pledge being broken, the spokesperson just said “you’ve got the manifesto language”. And he said Rachel Reeves, chancellor, and Jones have spoken about tax policy. But he would not “get ahead” of the budget, he said.

Asked if the government still stood by what Reeves said in the budget last year, when she said she would not be extending the income tax threshold freeze, the spokesperson replied:

You’ve got the chancellor’s language on that. It’s up to the chancellor to set out fiscal policy, as she did at the last budget.

The government’s approach is clear. We want to support working people. We want to support living standards. We want to keep taxes down. We want to increase real wages, and that’s the approach we’ve taken today, and the approach we’ll continue to take.

When asked if he accepted that freezing thresholds would amount to a tax rise for working people, the spokesperson said reporters had “the chancellor’s language” and he did not have any changes to that. The government wanted to keep taxes down for working people, he said. But he said tax policy changes would be announced in the budget.

At the Downing Street lobby briefing, the PM’s spokesperson confirmed that Keir Starmer is expected to meet Donald Trump when he goes to Scotland for a private visit later this month. The spokesperson said:

There will not be a formal bilateral but the prime minister is pleased to take up the president’s invite to meet during his stay.

President Trump’s state visit to the UK is more than two months away. But the Stop Trump Coalition has already started planning a demonstration against him for Wednesday 17 September, the day he arrives.

As Rowena Mason revealed recently, No 10 has issued guidance that in effect bans civil servants from any level of speaking at events where journalists are present.

Today the Times has published a letter signed by almost 30 experts – including former senior officials, thinktank leaders, academics and union leader – saying this policy is a mistake because it is having “a chilling effect on public discussion” and that it should be withdrawn. They say:

The government’s new guidance that prevents public officials from participating properly in public or stakeholder events is a mistake. Effective government relies on public servants, whose salaries are paid by the taxpayer, hearing directly from businesses, charities, academics and citizens to help them make better policy. They should be able to explain government activity to those same groups.

The signatories include Hannah White, head of the Institute for Government thinktank, Simon Clarke, the former Tory levelling up secretary who is now director of the Onward thinktank, Dave Penman, head of the FDA union for senior civil servants, John Kingman, a former second permanent secretary at the Treasury, and Alastair Campbell, former director of communications in No 10 for Tony Blair.

Wes Streeting, the health secretary, has said he is “really pleased” the BMA has agreed to meet him for talks which he hopes might avert the five-day strike by resident doctors due to start on Friday week.

Streeting told Sky News:

I’m really pleased that the BMA have responded to my offer to sit down and talk to try and avert these strikes.

I’m very clear we can’t go further on pay – we’ve already given them a 28.9% pay increase, they had the largest pay award [of] the entire public sector this year.

So offering more would be unaffordable, but also unfair to other NHS staff and other public sector workers …

What we can do is look to improve the conditions that resident doctors are working under, to look at their longer term career progression and also to look to the future more generally, that’s the conversation that we want to have.

I hope it will lead to everyone being able to walk away with real progress, and the situation where everyone wins. If these strikes go ahead, that’s a scenario in which everyone loses.

King Charles has invited Donald Trump for an unprecedented second state visit in September, scheduling the trip for three days when parliament is not sitting and removing the possibility of the US president addressing parliament, Kiran Stacey reports.

Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader and Trump ally, has told GB News that he would like to see parliament recalled so that the US president can address MPs and peers.

A new mandatory duty to report child sex abuse could end up having “little or no consequence”, parliamentarians have warned.

As PA Media reports, a mandatory duty to report child sexual abuse will be established by the crime and policing bill, which is currently making its way through the House of Lords.

In a report published today, the joint committee on human rights says such a duty – which was one of the key recommendations to come from the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse (IICSA)– is welcome. It describes this as “an important step forward for protection of children’s human rights”.

But it also hightlights what it describes as two flaws with the version of the mandatory reporting duty set out in the bill.

First, it says that adults involved in looking after children would only have a duty to report chiild abuse if they witness a sex offence. They would not be obliged to report anything that created a reasonable suspicion that a child was being abused.

And, second, the bill does not make failure to comply a criminal offence. The government argued that doing this might “inadvertently create a chilling effect on those who wish to volunteer with children or enter certain professions”. Instead, anyone failing to report abuse would would risk being barred from working with children.

In its report, the committee says:

We are concerned that the scope of the duty and particularly the consequences of breach may not do enough to provide effective protection against child sexual abuse.

While concerns about making a failure to comply with the duty to report a criminal offence are understandable, the alternative proposed in the bill risks a failure to comply having little or no consequence. This could undermine the efficacy of the duty to report.

David Alton, the peer and former Lib Dem MP who chair the committee, said:

Without repercussions for those who fail to do their duty and report these horrific crimes [this law] may prove ineffective. If it fails to deliver the necessary change, the government must review its impact and toughen its penalties.

In a response, the Home Office said the mandatory reporting law was “a significant step in strengthening our child protection and safeguarding systems” and that, although failing to report abuse won’t be a criminal offence, obstructing someone else from reporting abuse will be a criminal offence, punishable by up to seven years in jail.

But committee report only backs up what campaigners have been saying about the legislation for some time.

Mandate Now, a group campaigning for a mandatory reporting law, said in a thread on social media today that ministers know the law is “useless”.

And Richard Scorer, who as head of abuse law and public inquiries at lawyers Slater and Gordon represented many victims and survivors at IICSA, argued in a recent article for the Critic that the law will allow professionals to carry on turning a “blind eye” to abuse. He said:

A core problem with the grooming gang cases is professionals having good grounds to suspect abuse is going on, but doing nothing. This proposal invites those very professionals to carry on exactly as before.

Investigations into the deaths of more than 200 British soldiers were halted by the Conservatives’ Northern Ireland Legacy Act, Labour will announce today, as a justification for its intention to repeal the legislation. As Dan Sabbagh reports, Hilary Benn, the Northern Ireland secretary, is expected to tell MPs on Monday afternoon that 202 live inquiries into the Troubles-related killings of members of the armed forces were brought to a stop in May 2024 and a further 23 involving veterans.

Record-breaking extreme weather is the new norm in the UK, a report by the Met Office says. Damian Carrington has the story.

Here is the Met Office summary. And here is the full report.

The Met summary says:

The number of days with temperatures 5°C above the 1961-1990 average has doubled for the most recent decade 2015-2024 compared to 1961-1990. For 8°C above average the number has trebled and for 10°C it has quadrupled. This shows how the hottest days we experience in the UK have increased in frequency dramatically in just a few decades.

Ed Miliband is expected to make a statement to MPs on this later.

The government is considering changing the Post Office’s ownership structure to a mutual model, as it hopes to avoid further miscarriages of justice following the Horizon IT scandal, PA Media reports.

A new green paper published by the Department for Business and Trade sets out the first major review of the organisation in 15 years and launched a three-month consultation over the future of the Post Office. Ministers also announced plans to award a new subsidy package worth £118m to fund a transformation plan and further investment, PA says.

DBT said:

Working hand in hand with postmasters and the public the government will ensure the network is put on a path to a strong and sustainable future with Post Office branches remaining at the heart of communities across the UK.

This includes on the Post Office’s ownership model, with concepts including mutualisation on the table for consideration following the publication of the final Horizon Inquiry report later this year.

Post Office minister Gareth Thomas said:

Post Offices continue to be a central part of our high streets and communities across the country.

However, after 15 years without a proper review, and in the aftermath of the Horizon scandal, it’s clear we need a fresh vision for its future.

This green paper marks the start of an honest conversation about what people want and need from their Post Office in the years ahead.

Clearer legal obligations on the British government to prevent genocides, and to determine if one is occurring rather than leaving such judgments to international courts, are to be considered by a cross-party group of lawyers, politicians and academics under the chairmanship of Helena Kennedy, Patrick Wintour reports.

In an interview with the Times, Andrew Bailey, governor of the Bank of England, says firms are “adjusting employment and hours” in the light of last year’s rise in employer NICs. That sounds like a euphemism for cutting jobs. But he says, if the labour market slow down, the Bank may respond by cutting interest rates more aggressively.

Asked about this comment in an interview on the Today programme, Darren Jones, chief secretary to the Treasury, played down the impact of the budget. He said:

There’ve also been hundreds of thousands of new jobs created across the economy, and in the first quarter of the year [we had] the fastest growing economy in the G7, so we’re doing everything we can to create conditions for businesses to be profitable and to be able to grow.

Of course, we had that particular tax decision in the budget last year, because our commitment was to protect working people in their pay slips. And I recognise the independence of the bank governor.

Graeme Wearden has more on the Bailey interview in his business live blog.

Good morning. This is the last full week the Commons is sitting before the summer recess starts (on Tuesday next week) and, although there is a fair amount coming up (see below), there is no big story dominating the news agenda. The national newspapers are all splashing on different items – which is normally a sign that it was a slow news day yesterday.

The government wants to talk about its new £500m “better futures fund”.

And Darren Jones, chief secretary to the Treasury, has been in the broadcast studios this morning to promote it – as well as giving an interview to my colleague Heather Stewart.

But, as is often the case, in search of stronger news, broadcasters have been trying to tease out details of what might be in the budget in the autumn. And they may have made a tiny bit of progress.

At PMQs last week Keir Starmer said that he remained committed to the tax pledges that Labour made in its manifesto. That might sound straightforward, but it isn’t, because there is some ambiguity as to what they mean.

People thought Labour promised not to raise income tax, VAT or national insurance contributions (NICs) – which are levied on employers and employees. But in the budget last year Rachel Reeves did put up employer NICs and, when accused of breaking a manifesto promise, she highlighted the eight-word preamble to the pledge, which in retrospect could be read as a hint that employer NICs were not exempt. The manifesto said:

Labour will not increase taxes on working people, which is why we will not increase National Insurance, the basic, higher, or additional rates of Income Tax, or VAT.

The person who wrote the manifesto clearly knew what was coming – but the clue was hidden so well that almost no one managed to decypher it.

In an interview on ITV’s Good Morning Britain Jones said:

The thing I can tell you is that our manifesto commitment coming into this election was that we were not going to increase the headline rate of income tax or employee national insurance on working people in the pay slips that people get when they go to work or on VAT because we know that that disproportionately affects people on lower incomes because they spend more of their money on the day to day shop, essentially.

In fact, the manifesto does not mention the “headline” rate of income tax. But the fact that Jones sees this as relevant can be seen as yet another hint that Rachel Reeves is considering extending the freeze on income tax thresholds in the autumn. This is seen by economists as very likely, and was not ruled out by Starmer at PMQs last week.

Ed Balls, the former Labour shadow chancellor who is now a broadcaster and podcaster, regularly argues on his Political Currency podcast that freezing tax thresholds would in practice be a breach of the manifesto, because it would amount to a tax increase for working people. Jones’s comment can be seen as Treasury rebuttal to this allegation.

In his interviews Jones declined to rule out a wealth tax, as other ministers have done. But he also suggested that people were “getting a bit carried away” in interpreting what Heidi Alexander, the transport secretary, said about tax yesterday. Alexander told Sky News:

We made a commitment in our manifesto not to be putting up taxes on people on modest incomes, working people.

The Telegraph has interpreted this as meaning that taxes will rise for middle-class workers. But, in his Good Morning Britain interview, Jones said Alexander was just referring to the manifesto promise. Asked what “modest incomes” meant, he went on:

Modest income means different things to different people. But it’s not entirely relevant, because the thing that is relevant is our manifesto commitment not to increase national insurance or employee national or income tax in the payslips that people receive every month.

Jack Maidment from the Telegraph argues that the mixed messaging is a bit of a mess.

Treasury minister Darren Jones says Labour’s “working people” tax pledge refers to “anyone that gets a payslip, basically”.

Significantly broader than Transport Sec Heidi Alexander’s definition yesterday of “people on modest incomes”.

What a mess, and not for the first time.

Here is the agenda for the day.

10.30am: Sajid Javid, the former Tory health secretary, gives evidence to the Covid inquiry about the impact of the pandemic on the care sector.

Morning: Rachel Reeves, chancellor, speaks to broadcasters on a visit in Wigan where she is promoting plans for a £500m “beter futures fund”.

11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.

2pm: Wes Streeting, health secretary, gives evidence to the health committee.

2.30pm: Angela Rayner, deputy PM and housing secretary, takes questions in the Commons.

After 3.30pm: Ed Miliband, energy secretary, is expected to make a statement to MPs about the state of the climate report.

Afternoon: Keir Starmer hosts Petr Fiala, prime minister of the Czech Republic, at Downing Street.

5pm: Pat McFadden, Cabinet Office minister, gives evidence to the joint national security strategy committee.

And at some point today the Department for Business and Trade publishes a green paper on the Post Office.

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