The government’s plans to drop unfair dismissal safeguards for new employees on the first day of a new job leads many of Friday’s papers. “Day-one dismissal protection axed” is the lead in the Financial Times, as Labour “caved to pressure from businesses to soften its workers’ rights legislation”.
The Daily Telegraph also leads with Labour “abandoning plans to allow employees to sue for unfair dismissal on day one of their employment”. The paper says it is the “second manifesto breach in as many days”, following the Budget’s “threshold freeze on income tax”.
“Labour U-turn on worker rights” is the i paper’s take on the government’s plan to wind back proposals for day-one dismissal protections. The move is “criticised by Labour MPs but welcomed by business”, according to the paper.
The unfair dismissal threshold will extend to six months, the Guardian reports, under a compromise deal accepted by the TUC. It writes the TUC accepts the arrangement, with general secretary Paul Nowak saying other parts of the workers’ rights bill, such as “day-one sick pay”, are an “absolute priority”.
The Times reports that Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer faces a “revolt from Labour MPs” after scrapping day-one protections, saying the policy was “championed” by former deputy prime minister Angela Rayner.
New ONS migration figures showing a drop in UK arrivals is the Metro lead story. “Only 204,000 more people are living in the UK” reads the headline, noting “asylum arrivals rising” while “fewer coming here to study and work”. The paper quotes Sir Keir who “hails migration fall” as he faces “pressure from Reform UK on migrant arrivals.
Britain faces a “brain drain”, the Daily Mail says, citing migration data revealing “an exodus of young Britons while asylum seekers now make up nearly half of net migration”.
Sir Keir’s defence of the Budget leads the Independent. “Keir Starmer forced to deny he misled public over record £26bn tax rises,” is the paper’s top line, as he denies Labour broke its manifesto pledge “not to hike tax on working people”, citing criticism from the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
Terry Smith, Rachel Reeves’s uncle, tells the Sun: “Britain’s being fleeced by my niece”, compounding other critics who describe the Budget “as a bonanza for benefit claimants”. Reeves’s 73-year-old uncle joins a “long line of detractors”, the paper writes.
Meanwhile, the Daily Express leads with calls from terminally-ill campaigners pushing for the Lords to end delays to passing an assisted dying law. They say peers’ amendments opposing the original bill are “stealing precious time and choice”, the paper writes.
A potential fresh lead in the Jill Dando murder is reported on by the Daily Mirror. The Crimewatch host was shot dead on her doorstop in 1999 and the paper says investigators are probing “a newly unearthed picture” of what the paper claims is “a Serbian assassin”.
“Jack (Osbourne) plots huge comeback”, reads the headline on the Daily Star’s front page, saying the I’m a Celebrity… Get me out of here! contestant has been “secretly filming a paranormal series in a bid to be a huge TV host”.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer is facing a revolt from his MPs after the U-turn on workers being able to claim unfair dismissal from day one, according to The Times. It quotes an unnamed minister describing the climbdown as “total-self destruction” and Unite’s general secretary, Sharon Graham, calling the Employment Rights Bill a “shell of its former self”. The Daily Telegraph’s headline states that “Starmer rips up Rayner’s rights bill” and calls it a “second manifesto breach in as many days”. But the Guardian notes that the TUC is prepared to accept the compromise as it wants to get other rights, like day-one sick pay, onto the statute books.
The Daily Telegraph claims young workers are fleeing “Labour’s high tax Britain” with under-35s leading a “near record exodus”. The paper reports on ONS figures which suggest that those aged between 16 to 34 make up two thirds of departing Britons. Leading with the story, the Daily Mail calls the number of young people leaving the UK a “brain drain”, which threatens to add to the pain of what it describes as a “disastrous Budget” by Rachel Reeves.
The Daily Express highlights the latest stage of the Assisted Dying Bill which is to be debated by the House of Lords early next year. The paper quotes campaigners criticising opponents for tabling dozens of amendments which could cause delays and accusing peers of “stealing precious time and choice” from those who are terminally ill.
The Daily Mirror claims to have an exclusive on the 1999 unsolved fatal shooting of the BBC presenter Jill Dando. With the headline “tied to murder”, the paper alleges a newly unearthed photo of a Serbian assassin is being assessed by detectives as he appears to be wearing a similar tie to a man caught on CCTV near the crime scene.
Archaeologists believe a circle of pits near Stonehenge were created by Neolithic people who were interested in the underworld, reports the Guardian. The 20 pits, which are spread about a mile across, were first revealed in 2020 but the paper says new research has concluded they were made by humans rather than being natural features as some had previously thought.
