Morning Briefing: Thursday 8 October 2026
- Filling up: Brent is up 3.16% this morning to $103.37 after a tanker was hit by projectiles off the north coast of Qatar. Diesel passed £2 a litre last week and a 55-litre tank now costs about £110. From today Google Maps shows live forecourt prices, which reach 77% of British adults.
- If you live in Holborn and St Pancras: polls are open until ten tonight and you will need photo identification — a driving licence or passport. Fifteen candidates are standing for Keir Starmer’s old seat.
- Your mortgage: The ten-year gilt has risen about five basis points to 5.49% and the thirty-year is now above 6%. Fixed mortgage pricing follows swap rates with a lag, so the five-year average that went through 6% this week is not about to unwind. The Budget is on 28 October.
Britain Keeps Its Jerusalem Building and Loses Most of Its Staff
The consulate general in East Jerusalem has not closed. From today it is the UK Mission, Jerusalem, after talks with Israel. But twenty diplomats and the Consul General are ending their assignments and leaving, with a task force of seven p…
Pakistani Forces Are in Saudi Arabia, and Three Die at Two Airports
“The forces of Pakistan are already there,” the chief of the Pakistani military’s media wing has confirmed, declining to give numbers. It follows a mutual defence treaty signed with Saudi Arabia and Turkey. Houthi missile and drone strikes…
The Pensioner Whose Eviction Brought Down Spain’s Housing Truce Has Died
María del Carmen Abascal, known as Maricarmen, has died in hospital at 87, a fortnight after being carried on a stretcher from the Madrid flat she had lived in for more than seventy years while police teargassed protesters outside. Her lan…
Lecornu Offers France’s Schools €64bn and the Students Say No
In his address to the nation, Sébastien Lecornu said parliament would debate a budget on 12 November containing €64bn for education, a slight increase, along with school renovation and better timetables. The main student association says h…
Congress Counts Eighty-One American Aircraft Lost in the Iran War
A Congressional Research Service report released this week puts the number of American aircraft destroyed or damaged at eighty-one, against forty-two in the same service’s count six months ago. Replacing them would cost between $1.9bn and…
Holborn and St Pancras Votes in Starmer’s Old Seat
Polls opened at seven this morning and close at ten tonight, when counting begins. Fifteen candidates are standing for the seat Keir Starmer vacated after being forced out as prime minister by his own MPs in July. Labour’s Sagal Abdi-Wali…
Live Fuel Prices Arrive on Google Maps as Diesel Tops £2
From today Google Maps shows live petrol and diesel prices, drawn from the government’s Fuel Finder feed, which forecourts have been legally required to update within thirty minutes of any change since February. Diesel passed £2 a litre fo…
Badenoch’s Inheritance Tax Pledge Meets Its Costed Critics
Fewer than 5% of families currently pay inheritance tax, and Kemi Badenoch says her plan would cut that number by more than half. The Institute for Fiscal Studies says the biggest beneficiaries “would be those with the highest wealth and t…
Burnham and Merz Ratify a Treaty Against Hybrid Attacks
Andy Burnham makes his first official visit to Germany today and meets Friedrich Merz for the first time, received with military honours at the Chancellery. The two will formally ratify the 2025 Kensington Treaty, which covers science, tec…
Labour’s Special Needs Overhaul Is at Risk of Unravelling
The Institute for Government says the plan to replace most education, health and care plans with mainstream support by 2030 may be too optimistic, because schools and parents have an incentive to secure a plan before they are phased out. S…