From public service relief to tax hikes, Labour’s first budget signals a shift—but can it truly mend what’s broken? The Lead UK’s editors give their verdict

The Lead UK’s policy panel react to Reeves' tax and spend plans

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There is no excuse to retain Osborne's performative cruelty. Even electorally, keeping it can only alienate any Tories who might yet vote Labour—and it makes no social, moral or economic sense either.

The Chancellor's eyeing up changing the financial rules of play for the government. Economist Phil Tomlinson breaks down what it means and how it could boost the country's future.
 

Ignore a minority of self-serving voices. Rachel Reeves should abolish BADR - and use the money gained to remove the shameful two-child benefit cap.

As The Lead, we're calling on our readers to sign our petition to Rachel Reeves to scrap the cap in the budget next week.

Plus: The Teesside Lead relaunches with Leigh Jones as editor

Residents on waiting lists are being shunted between privately owned B&Bs, hotels and hostels. We filed Freedom of Information requests to two councils to find out the costs.

Deficit or not, the UK is spending far too little to get our engines going. What major player would look at our Victorian railways and say—this looks like a reliable, efficient economy to invest in?

Our new series - by Westminster Editor Zoë Grünewald - will push for the government to go far beyond its promise of 1.5 million new homes, and to revolutionise how we see housing in the UK.

Despite several unforced errors, Keir Starmer's start is a vast improvement on his predecessors. "Worst in living memory"? Maybe if you're a toddler. The Lead's editors weigh in.

Academies were meant to ensure greater investments in pupils, curricula and teachers. But in many, the most direct beneficiaries have been the senior leaders.

True, Tories will now have to choose between nearly unelectable leaders. But elections aren't the only game in town—and there's one front on which Labour, and even Britain, are especially vulnerable.

The woman had her PTSD likened to a broken leg by Superintendent Chris Hardy, one of the force’s most senior officers, documents say.

Even if each excuse was factually correct, the picture Labour projects does not bode well for the party - or for British democracy.

Aberporth might only have a couple of thousands residents, but its also home to two defence companies and a private airport that hosts and tests aircrafts potentially implicated in war crimes.

The Migration Museum sits in one of London's most diverse neighbourhoods, once the scene of fierce clashes with the Far Right. A new, timely installation opened last week - we went to take a look.
 

Introducing The Drift, our new column tracking the rise and rise of the extreme right in the UK.

In just ten days, Israel wiped out most of the leadership of Hezbollah, including its iconic chairman, at an enormous cost to civilians. But the path to wider conflict now seems murkier; here's why.
 

As drivers petition the government to reverse deregulation of private hire, Uber is given licence to operate in the town despite new safety fears emerging

Adults and children in urgent need of mental health treatment face hundreds of hours waits in "environments that will make their symptoms worse," senior NHS source says.

The Lead is now on Substack! Become a Member, and get our most groundbreaking content first. Become a Founder, and join the newsroom's internal conversation - meet the writers, the editors and more.

From swathes of new housing to Talbot Gateway there's billions being pumped into the town - we look at where and what impact it is having

The initial response service was set up so that people don't need doctor referral to receive help.

Poet and spoke word artist Nathan Parker teams up with Streetlife to bring stories from the streets to life.

Coun Williams said the allowance was “poorly targeted in terms of getting support to those in need”.

Eight cases of staff-on-patient “sexual safety incidents” were noted at the Whinney Heys Road hospital in 2023/24. 

Blackpool charity share how they've organised trips out for those within the hotel - as one of the town's two MPs calls for the government to stop using the Metropole Hotel. 

Bought by Blackpool Council as part of a private collection, the new Showtown museum collection includes a photograph and flyer from the 1920s showing the offensive practice of 'blacking up'

It was one of a number of failings found during a High Court hearing into the care of the child - known as ABJ - and his mother in a case dating back to 2008

Claremont Park Community Centre has seen £200,000 invested in the building which was converted from being a library in 2004. 

Some, but not all, in Blackpool chose to respond to a wicked act in Southport with violence instead of support. But the search for answers as to why isn't straightforward. 

The Lead speaks to three asylum seeking and refugee women about their experiences of the violence seen across the country in the past week.

Can you spare a moment to sign this letter and show your solidarity with the people of Southport?

Anti-immigrant rhetoric isn’t acceptable in any form. Ceding ground on this issue sets a ticking time bomb.

For years, the extreme right and its legitimisers picked off minorities one by one. Now they're unveiling a wider war. 

The former actor was seen on a Ryanair flight to Cork on Saturday, 3 August.

It is vital we don’t give an inch to xenophobia - that we don’t let these riots, based entirely on lies, push Labour’s already lamentably trepidatious approach to immigration even further rightward.

From rioters to ministers, the far right has long wooed British Jews for its own ends. It’s time to see it for what it really is.

"This morning, my neighbours and I are working to put our streets back together. The far-right scum who inflicted this damage and misery are long gone, without a thought for the impact of what they did." 

Kamala Harris is changing American rhetoric on the Gaza war - and Keir Starmer is actually taking action.

The UK’s first drug checking service will prove invaluable in protecting people from drug-related harms.

Hundreds of thousands of adoptees and their family members lack vital health history - as even NHS numbers are changed after adoption. 

A Nepalese mother was arrested in an NHS hospital because staff mistook a common birthmark for child abuse. Structural racism in medicine needs to end, and only structural upheaval can end it.

A few years back, the narrative was that we didn’t have enough doctors; now, we have doctors out of work. Meanwhile, there is a plan to boost the physician associate workforce from 1,000 to 10,000 in a matter of years.

Labour's first King's Speech in 14 years is a swell of sensible policy, with two glaring exceptions: the retention of the two-child benefit cap and yet another criminalisation rush.

The Conservative government leaves behind a shocking legacy of river pollution. Between warming waters, bacteria and sewage discharges, it's not clear if the communities on the waterways have a future.

Newly-election MP on what Westminster is like for working mothers. 

The numbers are in: more than 400,000 were BANNED from taking part in this historic, era-defining election because they lacked voter ID.

How the nation’s long love affair with police stories continues to shape our relationship with policing today.