Sir Keir Starmer has set out his legislative agenda at the King’s Speech. There were 40 bills including a liberalisation of the planning laws, an employment rights bill and plans to increase devolution to metro mayors and combined authorities in England. Rail companies will also be taken into public ownership, and Great British Energy will be launched. The government will definitely legislate to allow votes at 16 before the next general election, Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary, said. Lowering the voting age was not included in the king’s speech, even though it was in the manifesto. In an interview with the News Agents podcast, asked if the government would legislate before the end of this parliament, Phillipson replied: “We are determined to make that happen.” Keir Starmer has drafted into government two leftwing critics of his stance on benefits and green investment, as the prime minister faces pressure to drop Labour’s cautious approach to reviving the economy. Carys Roberts, the influential director of the Institute for Public Policy Research thinktank, has joined Downing Street’s policy unit as a special adviser, while Rachel Statham, who headed the IPPR’s work on public services, has been hired to lead his policy unit’s work on childcare, the early years and education. The more than 15 million people who save into workplace pension schemes in the UK may benefit from a shake-up in the king’s speech designed to add £11,000 to the average retiree’s savings. The government’s plans to introduce the world’s first full smoking ban, halt sales of energy drinks to children and modernise mental health laws are “gamechanging” and will save thousands of lives, health leaders have said The former prime minster Liz Truss has complained that her mini-budget is described as “disastrous” in the Downing Street briefing pack giving details of the bills in the king’s speech. In a letter to Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, she said: “It has been brought to my attention that the king’s speech background briefing notes published today and available online contain repeated references personally to me and actions undertaken by my government in the context of a political attack. “Not only is what is stated in the document untrue, making no reference to the LDI [liability driven investment] crisis precipitated by the Bank of England’s regulatory failures; but I regard it as a flagrant breach of the civil service code, since such personal and political attacks have no place in a document prepared by civil servants – an error made all the more egregious when the attack is allowed to masquerade in the document among ‘key facts’.” Downing Street has announced that Keir Starmer has set up a ministerial taskforce to develop a child poverty strategy. It will be led by Liz Kendall, the work and pensions secretary, and Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary. Stephen Flynn, the SNP leader at Wesminster, later asked in the Commons how many children will remain in place while that taskforce undertakes its work. He said the taskforce will conclude the two-child benefit must be scrapped. Starmer said he thinks all MPs want to address this problem. What matters is the commitment to address the number and to “drive those numbers down”.