Rwanda bill - latest: Rishi Sunak pleads with House of Lords to back deportation plan

Defiant peers have rejected Rishi Sunak’s warning not to frustrate “the will of the people” by opposing his flagship Rwanda legislation as the prime minister heads for a showdown with the House of Lords:

How bad is it for the party supported by a mere 20 per cent of voters, asks Sean O’Grady:

Voters will be more concerned about the state of the economy than immigration at the next election, top polling guru Sir John Curtice says:

HS2 has been accused of intimidating landowners who raised compensation cases against the high speed rail company with their Tory MP:

Almost 6,000 asylum-seekers whose claims have been withdrawn have gone missing in the UK, ministers have admitted:

Plans to ban Islamist political group Hizb ut-Tahrir as a terrorist organisation have been approved by Parliament.

Hizb ut-Tahrir has organised rallies that took place in London alongside pro-Palestinian marches in recent months, following the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas conflict.

It has already been banned in Germany, as well as in several Arab and Asian countries because of what the Home Office has described as its “long-term goal of establishing a caliphate ruled under Islamic law”.

With headquarters in Lebanon, the group also operates in at least 32 countries including the United States, Canada and Australia.

Both the Commons and Lords backed plans to proscribe the group as a terror organisation on Thursday.

It paved the way for the ban to come into force on Friday.

It will mean belonging to, inviting support for and displaying symbols of the group in public will be a criminal offence.

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has said he has “no skeletons in the closet” from his time in charge of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) ahead of the general election:

Labour’s Let’s Get Britain’s Future Back document might be best thought of as a pilot for the manifesto. Sean O’Grady looks at what it means – and what there is in it to worry about:

Farmers have been given the go-ahead for the fourth year in a row to use a banned pesticide that kills bees – prompting anger among nature lovers:

Downing Street said it would consider a letter by UK Statistics Authority chairman Sir Robert Chote, concerning the accuracy of a claim by Rishi Sunak that ministers had cleared the asylum legacy backlog, to “ensure we can be as clear and transparent as possible”.

The Prime Minister previously pledged to abolish a portion of older asylum applications awaiting an initial decision by the end of last year, tasking the Home Office with tackling 92,601 so-called legacy claims made before the end of June 2022.

But figures showed 4,537 applications were still outstanding as of December 28. Sir Robert said some people “may feel misled” by the Government claims the backlog had been cleared.

Asked whether there was a problem in No 10 with not being able to represent statistics accurately, a spokeswoman for the Prime Minister said: “I don’t think that is right. We publish a wide range of statistical information and continue to do so.

“We also linked through to the full story on Gov.uk with the details of our update on the legacy backlog and the PM was referring to a commitment he himself made and spoke about. But of course we will note the letter and consider it to ensure we can be as clear and transparent as possible.”