Key events
NHS hospitals will do all they can to “minimise harm to patients” if nurses go on strike, a national health leader has said.
As PA Media reports, Matthew Taylor, the chief executive of the NHS Confederation, which represents most NHS organisations, told BBC Breakfast there were national and regional plans to minimise the impact on patients, but admitted operations and appointments will have to be cancelled or postponed. He said:
Clearly industrial action is a challenge for the health service and NHS leaders.
We’re already coping with the gap that exists between the demand that is currently on the health service from the public. We’ve got to meet that demand, and we all know that we are heading into what already is a very difficult winter.
Then we add industrial action into that and it’s going to be an extremely difficult job.
The priority will be to try to minimise patient harm.
7.1m people in England on hospital waiting list, a record high, NHS figures show
The number of people in England waiting to start routine hospital treatment has risen to a new record high, PA Media reports. PA says:
A total of 7.1 million people were waiting to start treatment at the end of September, NHS England said.
This is up from 7 million in August and is the highest number since records began in August 2007.
A total of 401,537 people in England had been waiting more than 52 weeks to start hospital treatment at the end of September, NHS England said.
This is up from 387,257 at the end of August, and is the equivalent of around one in 18 people on the entire waiting list.
The government and NHS England have set the ambition of eliminating all waits of more than a year by March 2025.
Mark Drakeford, the Welsh first minister, will not be at the summit in Blackpool today in person (see 9.28am) because he has Covid, Adrian Masters from ITV Cymru reports.
First Minister Mark Drakeford will be joining today’s British Irish Council remotely because he still has covid. He’ll have a video meeting with Rishi Sunak this afternoon.
— Adrian Masters (@adrianmasters84) November 10, 2022
Brexit-backing Next boss Simon Wolfson calls for immigration rules to be relaxed, saying this is ‘not Brexit I wanted’
Simon Wolfson, chief executive of Next, was one of the most prominent business figures to support Brexit. But he has now told the BBC that the Brexit we have got is “definitely not the Brexit that I wanted, or indeed, many of people who voted Brexit, but more importantly, the vast majority of the country”.
As Graeme Wearden reports on his business live blog, Wolfson is now calling for immigration rules to be relaxed, to make it easier for companies to hire foreign workers if they need them.
Rishi Sunak seeks to fix relations with Nicola Sturgeon and Mark Drakeford at summit with devolved governments
Good morning. On Monday Rishi Sunak attended his first foreign summit as prime minister (Cop27). Next week he has another international debut, when he represents the UK at the G20 in Bali. And today he has got another diplomatic engagement in his diary – which could be just as challenging.
Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s first minister, and Mark Drakeford, the first minister of Wales, are not foreign leaders. But they might just as well be judging by the way recent UK prime ministers have treated them. Boris Johnson found it hard to conceal his belief that devolution had been a “disaster”, and Liz Truss would not even find time for a courtesy call with Sturgeon and Drakeford in her brief time as prime minister.
We don’t know much about Sunak’s thinking on Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland or devolution. He has never shown much interest in the topic. But as prime minister he does seem keen to avoid some of the mistakes of his predecessors, and to treat Sturgeon and Drakeford with respect. He is meeting them today face to face and this is what he said in a statement released ahead of those meetings overnight.
We face huge challenges from global economic headwinds to war in Europe.
So let’s be pragmatic. Let’s work together in our shared interests.
Let’s deliver for all our people across these great islands – and build a future defined not by division, but by unity and hope.
Sunak will also be meeting the taoiseach (Irish PM), Micheál Martin. Again, he has not said much about the politics of Ireland in the past, but London and Dublin are desperate to resolve the Northern Ireland protocol problem, which is preventing the resumption of power sharing in Northern Ireland, before the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday agreement next year.
All these meetings are taking place in Blackpool, where Sunak is attending a meeting of the British-Irish Council summit. This is a talking shop for the UK, Irish and devolved governments, plus the Isle of Man, Jersey and Guernsey. Meetings take place once or twice a year, and they normally never generate much news. But there are two significant features of this shindig.
First, Sunak is the first prime minister to attend one of these summits since Gordon Brown in 2007. Normally someone like Michael Gove represents the UK government. (Sunak is only there for the opening today; Gove will chair the main plenary tomorrow.)
And, second, Sunak will also chair a meeting of the Prime Minister and Heads of Devolved Governments Council. This is a new body, set up as a result of reforms to UK intergovernmental relations announced by Gove in January, but it has never met before. When Johnson did sit down for meetings with the heads of the devolved governments, it was normally at Cobra meetings, discussing Covid.
Morning: Ben Wallace, the defence secretary, is due to hold a meeting of Joint Expeditionary Force defence ministers in Edinburgh.
11.10am: Huw Merriman, the rail minister, gives a speech at the Rail Industry Association annual conference.
11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.
Afternoon: Rishi Sunak is due to meet Nicola Sturgeon and Mark Drakeford in Blackpool. His meeting with Micheál Martin, the taoiseach, is due later.
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