Keir Starmer has denied that Diane Abbott has been banned from standing as a Labour MP at the next election, as the saga over the potential end to her 40-year career in the party risked descending into chaos. The Labour leader’s comments directly contradicted newspaper briefings that the Hackney North and Stoke Newington MP, who was suspended from the party in April 2023 for comments she made about racism, was being barred from standing again Scotland’s former health secretary has been suspended as an MSP and docked 54 days’ pay for wrongly claiming an £11,000 iPad bill on expenses. MSPs voted by a large margin to suspend Matheson for 27 days, as well as having his pay docked, after SNP ministers and backbenchers abstained on the orders of John Swinney, the first minister and SNP leader The British Medical Association said junior doctors would walk out from 7am on 27 June until 7am on 2 July. Rishi Sunak said it was hard not to draw the conclusion that the timing of the strikes was political. Starmer said he did not want the strikes to go ahead and that the government has effectively kicked resolving the dispute to the other side of the general election when it “should have resolved it and negotiated a settlement” Labour said it has no plans to change rules that bar health and care workers from bringing families on their visas, despite a plummeting number of healthcare staff since the change to the rules this year. Numbers applying for the visa dropped by 76% this year after the change which the government hailed a success in the bid to cut legal migration but which experts warned would have a significant impact on the health service Sunak’s election pledge to introduce mandatory national service would leave the UK’s poorest regions millions of pounds worse off, a thinktank has warned ITV has announced Sunak and Starmer will feature in a head-to-head debate on Tuesday 4 June at 9pm. Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey and Swinney both protested at the exclusion of their partys The Welsh Conservatives are trying to increase pressure on the first minister Vaughan Gething by tabling a motion of no confidence in him. The debate and vote will take place on Wednesday 5 June Vulnerable families across the UK are facing “fear and uncertainty” due to a Home Office backlog in processing their visa fee waiver applications, leaving them in a “perpetual state of limbo”, according to migrant charities Steve Reed, Labour’s shadow environment secretary, has urged Thames Water to “get a grip” and test treatment works “urgently” after it emerged over the weekend that the company had tested the water at only one property after dozens of people in Beckenham reported becoming unwell The Scottish government plans to release more than 500 prisoners early to ease prison overcrowding London’s Evening Standard has announced plans to shut its daily newspaper and replace it with a new weekly publication. The Standard has lost £84.5m in the past six years, according to its accounts, and is reliant on funding from its part-owner Evgeny Lebedev to survive Pat Cullen, the head of the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) has announced she is stepping down to stand in the general election. It is understood she will be standing for Sinn Féin in Fermanagh and South Tyrone Jess Phillips has demanded that Liz Truss be removed as a Conservative candidate after it emerged that the former prime minister will appear on a podcast co-run by a hard right YouTuber who was investigated by police for speculating about whether or not he would rape the Labour MP That is it from me for today. I will be back with you tomorrow. Thank you for all your comments, take care and have a good evening.