Johnson and Truss ‘lobbied Trump to block Starmer’s Chagos deal’

Boris Johnson and Liz Truss both lobbied Donald Trump to block the UK’s plan to hand over the Chagos Islands to Mauritius, it has been reported, after the US president threw the deal into fresh doubt this week.

Mr Trump earlier this week urged Sir Keir Starmer not to “give away Diego Garcia” – an island on the archipelago which is home to a joint UK-US military base – despite Washington signalling its official backing for the deal on Tuesday.

The two former UK prime ministers are both said to have raised concerns over the deal with the US president before he launched renewed attacks on the agreement.

Mr Johnson, who has previously dubbed the agreement a “terrible, terrible idea”, has raised the Chagos issue with Mr Trump on a “number of occasions”, one senior Conservative told Politico.

Meanwhile, another source told the outlet that Ms Truss had also raised the issue with Mr Trump when she met with him at his Mar-a-Lago resort last weekend.

A third source claimed the former prime minister was given a briefing note outlining the arguments against the agreement before she sat down with him.

Mr Trump’s position on the agreement has been volatile, with the US president changing his stance from week to week and throwing the UK’s foreign policy position into chaos.

In his latest intervention, he described the UK’s agreement to hand sovereignty to Mauritius and lease back the Diego Garcia joint UK-US military base as “a big mistake”.

The U-turn on his previous support for the agreement is said to have come as a result of Britain’s refusal to let the White House use the base, or RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire, for a potential military campaign against Iran.

The government’s position is due to concerns over a breach of international law, The Times reported, which does not distinguish between a nation carrying out an attack and one that provides support with “knowledge of the circumstances of the internationally wrongful act”.

The bases can only be used for military operations with prior consent from the government and would need to comply with UK law and the country’s interpretation of relevant international law.

The US president is weighing fresh military action against the Islamic Republic, with a second American warship moving into the region amid warnings that he could go ahead if no deal on its nuclear programme is reached.

Posting on his Truth Social platform, Mr Trump said that “it may be necessary” for the US to use Diego Garcia “and the airfield located in Fairford” in order to “eradicate a potential attack by a highly unstable and dangerous regime”.

The latest revelations about Mr Johnson’s and Ms Truss’ reported involvement in the saga comes as Yvette Cooper meets with her US counterpart Marco Rubio, where she’s expected to raise the matter of the agreement.

The talks, held in Washington, are to discuss UK-US cooperation on a range of areas, including defence, security and trade. But the Chagos Islands deal was thought to be high on the agenda.

A representative for Ms Truss declined to comment. Boris Johnson’s office has been contacted.

Puberty blockers clinical trial paused after concerns from regulator

A clinical trial into puberty blockers for children has been paused.

It comes after the medicines regulator warned the trial should have a minimum age limit of 14.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) gave this age limit because of the “unquantified risk” of “long-term biological harms”.

The MHRA will now discuss the concerns, related to the wellbeing of children and young people with gender dysphoria, with trial sponsor King’s College London next week.

Recruitment to the trial will not start until the issues have been resolved.

The pause comes after legal action was launched against the government after politicians and public figures including Harry Potter author JK Rowling expressed their opposition.

The writer, who has campaigned to repeal transgender rights in the UK, described the trial as “an unethical experiment on children who can’t give meaningful consent”.

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “We have always been clear about the red lines regarding this trial – ensuring the safety and wellbeing of the children and young people involved and always being led by the clinical evidence.

“The MHRA has now raised new concerns – directly related to the wellbeing of children and young people – and scientific dialogue will now follow with the trial sponsor.

“As the evidence is now being interrogated by clinicians, preparations for the trial have been paused while the MHRA and clinical leaders work through these concerns.

“This trial will only be allowed to go ahead if the expert scientific and clinical evidence and advice conclude it is both safe and necessary.

“The safety and wellbeing of children and young people have always been the driving consideration in every decision we have made regarding this trial and always will be.”

The trial, led by researchers at King’s College London, was to be undertaken following a recommendation by the Cass Review into children’s gender care, which concluded that the quality of research claiming to show the benefits of such medication for youngsters with gender dysphoria was “poor”.

Baroness Hilary Cass, who led that review, has previously said her report “uncovered a very weak evidence base” for the benefits of puberty blockers for children and young people with gender dysphoria, but that “given that there are clinicians, children and families who believe passionately in the beneficial effects, a trial was the only way forward to make sense of this”.

In November researchers said they were aiming to recruit around 226 young people aged between 10 and almost 16.

The senior paediatrician said a supervised puberty blocker trial is “better” than children buying drugs on the dark web.

In a letter from the MHRA, they express concern about the current age limit of the trial, asking for it to be raised to 14 from 10.

The letter reads: “Since potentially significant and, as yet, unquantified risk of long-term biological harms is present to participants and biological safety has not been definitively demonstrated in this proposed cohort, at the very least, there should be a graded/stepwise approach starting with those aged 14 as the lower limit of eligibility.

“Future trials may consider lowering the threshold depending on the findings of the initial trial.”

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch previously wrote to health secretary Wes Streeting saying the medical trial must be stopped “before more damage is done to children”.

On Friday, Claire Coutinho, shadow equalities minister, said the health secretary has “ignored warnings” and called the pause a “huge win”.

Mr Streeting has, in the past, admitted to feeling “uncomfortable” with puberty-suppressing hormones being used on young people, but added it is his responsibility to follow expert advice and said going ahead with a trial is the “right thing to do”.

A spokesperson for King’s College London said: “The wellbeing and health of young people with gender incongruence and their families has been, and will remain, our priority, and we will continue to work with the MHRA to support their further review of the trial, which has been designed by world-leading academics with scientific rigour at its core.

“That rigour and ongoing scientific discussion is important for any clinical trial, particularly one as complex as Pathways, which aims to build an evidence base that can help young people and clinicians to make better-informed decisions in the future.”

Could Labour lose Gorton and Denton? New polling puts Greens ahead

There is less than a week to go until the crunch by-election in Greater Manchester’s Gorton and Denton constituency, which looks set to be one of Labour’s biggest tests to date.

All the candidates for the major parties continue to work on their intense short-notice campaigns in the southeast Manchester neighbourhood in the run-up to polling day.

Labour has named Manchester city councillor Angeliki Stogia as its candidate for the seat as the party attempts to defend its place and avoid a damaging defeat.

Meanwhile, Reform has announced GB News presenter Matt Goodwin as its choice, going against the Green Party’s Hannah Spencer, a plumber and local councillor.

These were the three leading parties in the constituency in 2024, with the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats trailing behind George Galloway’s Workers Party of Britain.

Remaining a Labour stronghold in some form since 1974, it would be a historic loss for Labour to cede Gorton and Denton to either Reform or the Greens on 26 February.

Here’s what the polls suggest:

Current polling is a mixed picture, but does reveal one definite thing: Labour will have a harder fight on their hands in the constituency than ever before.

While most MRP polls put Reform ahead of the incumbent party, these are worked out based on factors like the national polling picture, demographics and previous results.

The first constituency poll for the area, undertaken by Omnisis, puts the Green Party ahead slightly in the seat. The results put voting intention for the Green’s Hannah Spencer at 20 per cent overall, just up from Reform’s 17 per cent and Labour’s 15 per cent.

Crucially, the poll of 452 locals also found that 27 per cent remain undecided, while 13 per cent said they would not vote. This means that candidates still have a fight on their hands to win over these voters.

Two of the current main MRP polls put Reform ahead of Labour: Electoral Calculus, at 31.7 per cent to Labour’s 22.9, and Britain Predicts, at 32 per cent to Labour’s much higher 26.

Meanwhile, Polling Report predicts that Labour will hold the seat with 33.95 per cent of the vote, while Reform gets 27.98.

Here is a breakdown of each:

None of these three currently put the Greens ahead, however, they do not take factors like tactical voting into account.

This could be a major factor for Zack Polanski’s party, with Labour MPs recently briefing The Independent privately that they expect the Greens to benefit from Labour’s poor national popularity and a tactical anti-Reform vote at the ballot box.

Reorganised as Denton and Reddish in 1983 (and becoming Gorton and Denton in 2024), the seat has only been represented by two MPs since then, both Labour. This was first, Andrew Bennett, and – since 2005 – the outgoing Andrew Gwynne.

Labour retained a sizeable 13,413 majority in at the 2024 general election, with 50.8 per cent of the vote. However, this was down substantially from the 2019 result, when the party held a 22,175 majority and 67.2 per cent vote share.

Reform came second, with 14.1 per cent of the vote – a 9.2 point increase on 2019 – while the Greens came third, with 13.2 per cent (up 10.7 points). The turnout was also down from 61.7 per cent to 46.8.

This may explain Labour’s 16.4 point reduction, and indicates a trend many Labour MPs are concerned will continue in February.

The current polling for the seat confirms that it has become a much harder contest for Labour, vying with rising support for Reform while the Green Party also digs deeper into the incumbent party’s voter base.

Measles warning as dozens of schools block vaccine teams

Children starting school are the “sitting ducks” of the latest measles outbreak, experts have warned, as new research shows dozens of schools have denied access to vaccination teams.

This week, more than 50 suspected cases of measles have been reported by seven schools and a nursery in Enfield, in north central London, prompting Sir Keir Starmer to issue a warning to parents to get their children vaccinated.

Now, The Independent can reveal that the government was warned two years ago that schools in neighbouring north east London were refusing access to NHS vaccination teams, who target children who missed their routine jab at around 12 months of age.

A 2023 study of vaccine uptake by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) published in January 2026, found 32 out of 450 schools in northeast London, which included areas of Hackney and Barking, “did not allow access” to NHS school-age immunisation services.

Researchers, led by assistant professor Ben Kasstan-Dabush, also found that information on children who needed vaccination in at least 15 of those schools was not shared with the immunisation teams.

The latest figures from the UK Health Security Agency show that just 65 per cent of children in the neighbouring Haringey area and 58.3 per cent in Hackney had received both doses of the jab in 2024-25 – well below the 95 per cent target to ensure herd immunity.

Prof Kasstan-Dabush said: “In Hackney, [almost] one in three children has no protection. So it means that, as measles is circulating anyway, there are a lot of children who are sitting ducks, waiting to get very poorly, unfortunately.

“What we’re seeing in Enfield has every potential to spread elsewhere. Like it very much did, you know, if we go back to 2024 and 2025.”

He added: “It is so important to catch children up on the vaccination schedule because they’re already of school age. That’s where it becomes really, really contagious. Because kids are mixing in classrooms and playgrounds. But we also know that not all schools support immunisation teams, and not all schools have immunisation teams to vaccinate on site. There’s no requirement for schools to allow access to immunisation teams, and it’s a huge problem.”

Data from the World Health Organisation (WHO) for 2025 reinforces the importance of vaccines, showing that more than 1,000 unvaccinated children aged five to 15 caught measles in 2024 and 2025 in the UK, compared to 183 who had only one dose of the vaccine, and 123 who were fully vaccinated.

“It illustrates how important vaccines are because more than half of those children that became ill were not vaccinated and another quarter had only received one jab and were not yet fully immune,” Professor Ian Jones, a virologist at Reading University, told The Independent.

Although they make up a minority of cases, Prof Jones said he was surprised that even those who were double vaccinated still got infected.

“We do not know the severity of the infection, whether they were a bit late getting vaccinated, it’s perfectly feasible to be vaccinated but then get infected the next day,” he explained.

Following the findings by the LSHTM, researchers alerted the Department for Education to the school refusals in 2024 and called for a change in policy, which would require schools to give vaccine teams access.

Researchers received a response from the then-education minister, Gillian Keegan, but it is not clear if any guidance or policy was changed.

Prof Kasstan-Dabush said schools might not allow access because they’re worried about disruption to the school routine, or capacity to support vaccination teams, while some may be unclear on whether they’re able to share information with the NHS.

However, he added: “Another one is that schools might just not play ball, and often we do see that, particularly with independent faith schools. So what we see is there is inequity in catch-up programmes.”

Prof Kasstan-Dabush said wider issues linked to austerity have impacted vaccination coverage, with the number of health visitors for under-fives having been “slashed” and services such as Sure Start centres, which provided health, early learning and parenting support for those with children under five, having been cut.

“With numbers of health visitors slashed and Sure Start centres closed or scaled back under austerity, we have since seen a greater burden on primary care, but they cannot address the challenge of declining vaccination coverage alone. They need support from across the health and social care system. I hope that the Labour government’s child poverty strategy can help to undo the implications of austerity,” he said.

Following the latest outbreak in Enfield, Enfield Council warned in a letter to parents that unvaccinated pupils identified as close contacts of people with measles could be excluded from school for 21 days, in accordance with national guidelines.

Some experts believe there is a balance to strike between stopping the spread of measles and education.

Professor Paul Hunter, epidemiologist at the University of East Anglia, compared the issue to the Covid pandemic, when children were forced to learn at home.

“During Covid, closing schools had some important role in reducing spread, but also they damaged children’s educations, which can have ongoing life implications,” he told The Independent.

“If you’ve got an unvaccinated child and you know there’s measles circulating in the school, then your child is clearly at increased risk of catching measles,” he added. “If that child remains unvaccinated, then at some point, they are likely to pick it up.”

But he warned “parents won’t necessarily follow advice” and cannot always “afford” to take time off work to look after their child.

Keith Neal, emeritus professor of the epidemiology of infectious disease at the University of Nottingham, believes the 21-day rule would be a “serious issue for some parents” but encouraged them to get their children vaccinated.

He warned that measles will “spread anywhere” there are susceptible, unvaccinated people and will continue to do so until vaccination rates increase.

A spokesperson for the Department for Education said: “Schools and immunisation services should be collaborating to keep children protected from serious and dangerous illnesses.

“We are working to improve vaccine uptake in schools, including by engaging with local leaders, providing guidance on delivery, and by making sure everyone understands the importance of vaccines.”

British passport issued 37 years ago could get dual nationals into UK

Dual citizens of the UK and another country have been handed a lifeline that could allow them travel to Britain without either of the officially required documents.

From next Wednesday, 25 February 2026, the electronic travel authorisation (ETA) will be mandatory for all travellers arriving in the United Kingdom – except British and Irish citizens.

UK citizens are not allowed to apply for an ETA. Until now, the government has insisted that only a valid British passport or a “Certificate of Entitlement” costing £589 will allow a dual citizen to be admitted.

These new rules are to be policed by airlines and ferry companies, who stand to be fined if they take someone to Britain without proper documentation.

But The Independent has learnt the carriers have been told they can accept “at their discretion” an expired British passport issued as long ago as 1989 – as long as it is accompanied by a valid passport issued by a nation whose citizens do not require a visa to travel to the UK.

The biographic details on each passport – name plus place and date of birth – must match.

Officials stress it is an “operational decision” for airlines and ferry companies to take.

They will not be penalised for accepting the passport combination, but conversely there is no obligation for them to do so.

Anyone living abroad who has had a UK passport issued since 2006 and who needs to travel urgently can obtain an Emergency Travel Document, price £125.

Many people who have UK citizenship by birth or descent, but who live abroad, have faced hurdles trying to obtain British passports ahead of travel to the UK.

The burden of proof for a new British passport is high – leading one prospective visitor, Australian author Carol Richards, to write: “My problem is that my dad, born apparently in England in 1921, does not have a birth certificate as he was abandoned. He was adopted before adoption was a legal thing, and so does not have any papers.”

The Home Office says HM Passport Office phone lines are always open.

Read more: Dual citizen passport rules you need to know

WIN: a £2,500 Crystal Ski Holidays voucher

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Prize Draw T&Cs

18+. UK, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man residents only. Promotion closes at 23:59 GMT on 31st March 2026. Winner will be drawn at random from all entries received by the closing date. The prize is non-transferable and no cash alternative is available. Standard Comps & Offers rules apply, see here.

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Details of available holidays can be found at www.crystalski.co.uk. All holidays are subject to availability. The prize must be redeemed by 31 December 2026. The voucher will be in the form of a unique code which will be e-mailed to the winner once the prize has been accepted and this can be redeemed either online, through a Crystal Hub or via phone direct with a Crystal holiday Advisor. The Promoter reserves the right to substitute prizes of equal or greater value. The prize is not transferable, is not redeemable for cash and no alternative will be offered. The code must be treated as cash and the balance cannot be refunded if the code is lost, stolen or destroyed. The prize is valid on new bookings only, cannot be combined with any promotional offers and can only be used against one package holiday including ski essentials. The winner will be required to pay any remaining balance exceeding the prize value of £2500. It is the winner’s responsibility to check all visa and passport requirements are fulfilled prior to making any booking. Booking terms and conditions apply to any holiday purchased in part or full using the code. Booking terms and conditions apply to the holiday; see https://www.crystalski.co.uk/ for details.

Two charged with murder after death of three-year-old boy

Two people have been charged with murder following the death of a three year old boy from south-east London in January, the Met Police have said.

Isiayah Henry, from Woolwich, died on 19 January after he was admitted to the hospital with serious injuries earlier in the month.

Following an appearance at Woolwich Crown Court on Friday, Tanisha Henry, 28, and Mikael Williams, 30, were charged with murder and causing/allowing the death of a child.

The Met Police said: “Isiayah’s family have been informed and continue to receive support from specialist officers.”

According to court documents, the pair faced counts of causing Isiayah grievous bodily harm with intent and causing or allowing him to suffer serious physical harm.

Henry of St Mary Street, Woolwich, and Williams, of Beaconsfield Rd, will reappear at Woolwich Crown Court on 22 April.

The Met Police said they were called to the hospital on 3 January after receiving concerns around Isiayah’s injuries. “Despite best efforts of medical staff, the child sadly died on Monday, 19 January,” the force added.

Following initial enquiries, a safeguarding and criminal investigation was launched by officers, and enquiries have been ongoing within the Met’s Specialist Crime Command.

Zelensky optimistic about ‘real opportunities to end war’ as anniversary looms

President Volodymyr Zelensky has expressed optimism about talks to end Ukraine’s war with Russia ahead of the four-year anniversary of the conflict.

The Ukrainian leader provided an update following trilateral negotiations in Geneva this week saying that discussions “have not always been easy or reasonable”.

“We believe that real opportunities to end the war with dignity still exist, and the world’s ability to pressure the aggressor could significantly help ensure that a dignified peace replaces the war,” he wrote in a post on X on Friday.

But it follows reports that he the country was preparing for “three more years of war” after losing faith in US security guarantees, according to Wall Street Journal correspondent Bojan Panczevski in a discussion on the Ronzheimer podcast.

It comes as Zelensky pushed back on Donald Trump’s demands Kyiv make concessions this week, saying it was “not fair” to only ask Kyiv to give ground to Russia.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Friday that he could not say when the next round of talks would happen, after discussions in Geneva were left open but concluded without clear progress. Zelensky the next round of discussions could be “as early as this February”.