By Bill Heaney
Prime Minister Keir Starmer has abandoned plans to postpone local elections for councils in May in yet another U-turn for the government.
The elections for the Scottish Parliament will still go ahead as planned however.
Labour had initially announced plans to cancel elections in 30 areas this year, impacting 4.5 million people, in order to free up “capacity” to undertake an overhaul of English council structures.
The Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government has rowed back on this citing “legal advice”, according to The Times.
The news was welcomed by Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, who said “we took this Labour government to court and won.”
It comes as Sir Keir has said he “didn’t know anything” about a Labour Together investigation into journalists.
The think tank, which assisted with the prime minister’s campaign to become Labour leader, is reported to have paid £36,000 to investigate a number of reporters, according to The Sunday Times.
But a spokesman for Labour Together said the company employed on the project went far beyond their remit.
Asked about the reports Mr Starmer said: “There will be a Cabinet Office investigation into the allegations….
“I didn’t know anything about this investigation, and it absolutely needs to be looked into, so the Cabinet Office will be establishing the facts.”