Morning Briefing: Tuesday 29 September 2026
- Your pension: Three cabinet ministers declined yesterday to guarantee the triple lock beyond the next election. Earnings are the highest measure this year at 3.9%, worth nearly £500 more from April 2027, enough to make the state pension taxable for some.
- Energy bills: The Prime Minister will promise a publicly owned Great British Grid today and a goal of matching European energy costs within a decade. The price cap still rises 4% to £1,723 on Thursday.
- Borrowing: The ten-year gilt yield is above 5.40% and the American thirty-year reached its highest since 2004. Gilt yields set the benchmark for fixed mortgage pricing.
Iran Awaits Washington's Answer as Trump Denies Offering Anything
Abbas Araghchi met Qatari mediators in New York and expects a formal American reply today. “We talked about ideas and how to find solutions to fulfil Iran’s conditions,” he said, adding that he would fly home once it arrives: “Whenever the…
Russia Strikes Kyiv Again After Hitting the Academy of Sciences
Nine people were killed and more than eighty wounded across Ukraine on Monday, two of them at the National Academy of Sciences in central Kyiv, and Russia struck the capital again overnight. “We are not connected with the military,” said t…
The $60bn Tariff Deal Has No Rate and No Start Date
Washington and Beijing published the actual product lists on Monday and neither named a tariff rate nor a date on which cuts would begin. The lists cover 1,619 American items entering China and 77 Chinese categories entering the United Sta…
Myanmar Air Strike on a Rakhine Market Kills at Least 33
A fighter jet dropped two bombs near a market in the town of Kyauktaw at midday, killing at least thirty-three people and wounding thirty-six, according to the rebel group that controls the town and a rescue official. The dead included ven…
Gulf Oil Exports Recover as Washington Weighs a Diesel Export Ban
Middle East crude exports rebounded this month to just under 80% of their level before the war, the highest since fighting began in February. The physical toll on the oil market is easing even as the diplomacy stalls. At home, American ret…
Burnham to Promise an End to 'Politics as Usual'
The Prime Minister uses his first conference speech as leader to argue that the country cannot continue as it is. “Politics-as-usual has taken Britain backwards,” he will say. “More of the same isn’t good enough and isn’t going to get us w…
Ministers Refuse to Guarantee the Triple Lock Beyond 2029
Asked whether the pensions triple lock would survive into the 2030s, Wes Streeting would say only that Labour would “stand by our manifesto” until the next election. Pressed again on radio, he answered: “I’m not going to write the next man…
Mahmood Signals Retreat on Care-Worker Settlement Rules
The Home Secretary is considering softening her plan to make permanent residence harder to obtain, amid demands for a reversal from cabinet colleagues and unions. “I know that, throughout our consultation process, some have said elements o…
Fairford Five Bailed Under Strict Conditions as Trump Objects
All five men arrested near the airbase were released on police bail on Monday afternoon. “To be very clear, this does not mean the investigation is over,” said Assistant Commissioner Laurence Taylor. “They are subject to stringent conditio…
Bryant's Drumcree Talks End Without a Solution
The Northern Ireland Secretary left the conference to hold talks at Hillsborough Castle, urging both sides to “double down on compromise” and warning that “nobody should be attending an unlawful protest”. Afterwards he conceded the obvious…