2 Monday December 6 2021 | the timesNews
DAB RADIO l ONLINE l SMART SPEAKER l APPTo day’s highlights
7.20am
11am2pm5pm
8.30pmKit Malthouse, policing minister
Adrian O’Neill, Irish ambassador to the UK,
on 100 years of the Anglo-Irish treaty
The doctor-turned-bestselling author
Adam Kay on his show
’Twas The Nightshift Before Christmas
David Nabarro, WHO Covid-19 envoy
The singer-songwriter Kathryn Williams,
right, and the poet Dame Carol Ann Duffy
on their Christmas album, Midnight Choruscalls from Labour last week to reintro-
duce pre-departure tests because they
would “kill off the travel sector again”.
However, allies of Sajid Javid, the
health secretary, insisted the that pre-
departure tests “will make a difference
as it gives us another layer of defence
at the border”, adding: “A lot of the
incursion of this variant is related to
foreign travel. We’re trying to slow
down the variant so people get their
booster jab as well as giving us more
time to understand the variant.”
Another government source said
Raab was wrong to claim that pre-
departure tests would make only a
marginal difference. “It’s not the case,”
the source said. “The Sage [Scientific
Advisory Group for Emergencies]
papers and UKHSA have over-
whelmingly said it’s the most important
measure and is hugely important in
identifying infectious people as other
countries have detected this variant on
or before flights. It’s a very important
tool to stop the spread of Omicron to
the UK.”
Priti Patel, the home secretary,
strongly supported the reintroduction
of the pre-departure tests. “She believes
the right call has been made on this
one,” a source said.
There is also frustration at the
Department for Transport that the
Department of Health and Social CareRaab said that they would be included
in legislation next year.
Braverman gave a significant hint
about the measures in a speech last
month to the Public Law Project
Conference. “What we have seen is a
huge increase in political litigation —
that is to say, litigation seeking to use
the court system, and judicial review, to
achieve political ends,” she said. “If we
keep asking judges to answer inherently
political questions, we are ignoring the
single most important decision-maker
in our system: the British people.”
She also attacked the Supreme Court
for its judgment on prorogation, saying
that the case was “a stark warning of
how far jurisprudence has moved”.
The plan for an Interpretation
Bill was met with incredulity amongTODAY’S EDITION
COMMENT 25
LEADING ARTICLES 29
WORLD 30BUSINESS 35
REGISTER 47
LAW REPORT 49SPORT 53
CROSSWORD 62
TV & RADIO TIMESFOLLOW US
thetimes timesandsundaytimes thetimesCOMMENT
Women’s lives were transformed for the better by
the pill but we have paid a price for that freedom
LIBBY PURVES, PAGE 27OFFER
Save up to 33% with a subscription to
The Times and The Sunday Times
THETIMES.CO.UK/SUBSCRIBE‘Shooter duped
counsellors’
A 15-year-old boy
accused of a mass
shooting at a Michigan
school convinced
counsellors that his
drawings of bullets and
bloodshed hours
earlier were designs for
a video game. Page 33Dashcam plea
after fatal crash
The police are
appealing for dashcam
footage after a woman
was killed when the
car in which she was a
passenger collided
with an ambulance in
Chatham, Kent, on
November 23. Page 19Europe faces
hacking threat
Europe must wean
itself off the Chinese
and US technology
that underpins its
societies or it will be
vulnerable to
cyberattacks, Finland’s
prime minister has
warned. Page 32NEWS SPORT TIMES
COLD CASE
Ice trek gives clue to
whether humans
could live on Mars
PA G E 1 3JACK WHITEHALL
‘Before the
culture wars,
I’d say anything’
PAGES 4-FIRST BLOOD
Ralf Rangnick began
at Old Trafford
with a victory
THE GAME, PULLOUTlawyers. Edward Garnier QC, solicitor-
general in David Cameron’s adminis-
tration, said: “This government seems
to forget that like all of us it, too, is
subject to the law. And I should have
thought that No 10 would have learnt
the lesson of the prorogation battle,
when the Supreme Court reminded
the government that this is a country
under the rule of law and not under a
dictatorship.”
Garnier added: “If the prime minister
does not like a lawful ruling of the court
that has been a legitimate interpretation
of statute passed by parliament, it is
open to the government to attempt to
change the law by an act of parliament.
But it is not for some here-today-
gone-tomorrow minister to change
permanently existing statute law by
ministerial fiat.”
David Gauke, a former lord chan-
cellor and justice secretary, said: “If thegovernment is contemplating getting
parliament to retrospectively change
the law as it has been interpreted by
judges, then that would be an extremely
worrying step and a departure from the
rule of law and the traditions of this
country.”
Jolyon Maugham QC, director of the
Good Law Project, which brought a se-
ries of legal challenges over Brexit, said:
“It is clear to me that the real aim of this
government is a more compliant judici-
ary. It’s very important the government
doesn’t do anything more to weaken
the delicate constitutional balance we
have. This executive can and does bully
its MPs to get what it wants... All judges
do is uphold the will of parliament.”
The Ministry of Justice declined to
comment.
Privacy overhaul, page 4
Judge-made law endangers free speech,
leading article, page 29continued from page 1
Plan to curb judges’ powershas taken over the travel traffic-light
system, announcing additions to the
UK’s red list, and the testing policy.
Previous red-list decisions have
been announced by the transport
department.
Government scientific advisers
appeared yesterday to question the
travel restrictions. Woolhouse told The
Andrew Marr Show on BBC1: “I think
that may be a case of shutting the stable
door after the horse has bolted. If
Omicron is here in the UK it certainly is.
If it’s community transmission in the
UK, and it certainly looks that way, then
it’s community transmission that will
drive the next wave.
“The cases that are being imported
are important — we want to detect
those and isolate any positive cases that
we find, as we would for any case any-
where. But I think it’s too late to make a
material difference to the course of the
Omicron wave if we’re going to have
one.”
Sir Graham Brady, who chairs the
1922 Committee of Tory MPs, said:
“The travel industry is desperate for
certainty but instead is faced with con-
stantly changing cycle of tests and other
restrictions. As it becomes increasingly
clear that the Omicron variant is
already widely dispersed, it must be
deeply questionable whether these new
requirements will serve any purpose.”
Coronavirus reports, pages 6-
Don’t make martyrs of ignorant
antivaxers, Clare Foges, page 25Minister to
seek end of
Trump tariffs
Matt Dathan Home Affairs EditorThe international trade secretary is fly-
ing to the US to persuade her American
counterparts to drop Trump-era tariffs
on British steel and aluminium.
Anne-Marie Trevelyan has said that
there are “huge opportunities to deep-
en the trading links benefiting commu-
nities on both sides of the Atlantic”
before the three-day visit, which begins
today. Trevelyan’s meetings will seek to
build on the recent lifting of the US ban
on British beef and lamb, to push for re-
form of the World Trade Organisation,
seek closer trade ties with individual
states and further work towards a
future free trade agreement.
Nick Thomas-Symonds, shadow
international trade secretary, said:
“The government has long promised
that a free trade agreement with the US
would be top of the priority list. We are
two years on from the general election
and no deal is even in place.”
Biden’s administration scrapped the
25 per cent tariffs on EU steel and alu-
minium exports in October, but they
remain in place in the UK.Labour has accused the government of
being in “disarray” over levelling up
plans, after ministers delayed the re-
lease of a flagship paper until next year.
The delay will mean that Boris John-
son’s flagship “levelling up” plan to
narrow the UK’s regional inequalities
will not be fleshed out until the release
of the government white paper in 2022.
Lisa Nandy MP, Labour’s shadow
secretary for levelling up, housing and
communities, said: “The government’s
commitment to level up our commun-
ities is in complete disarray.
“After two years of empty slogans
and broken promises it is now crystal
clear ministers haven’t been able to
come up with a single new idea to make
good on the promises they made to
level up our communities beyond more
boards, bureaucracy and quangos.
“Far too many parts of our country
are held back for lack of power and in-
vestment. We were promised a serious
plan to meet that challenge. Nothing
less will do.”
According to the Financial TimesJohnson’s levelling up plans
are in disarray, claim Labour
Charlie Moloney Michael Gove, the levelling up secre-
tary, who is in charge of the plan, had
been expected to produce the blueprint
before Christmas.
Government officials have since said
that the political calendar was busy and
that it was “important to get it right”.
The proposals are now likely to be
introduced in the new year.
Under Gove’s plans, devolution will
be at the centre of his attempts to flesh
out Boris Johnson’s domestic slogan.
Swathes of the countryside could elect
powerful American-style governors,
with an ambition for every part of Eng-
land to have a local leader with equiv-
alent powers to those of the mayor of
London by the end of the decade.
The proposal was contained in a draft
of the levelling up white paper being
written by Gove’s new department.
Plans to “extend, deepen and simp-
lify” devolution are fundamental to
Gove’s aims. He has identified absence
of local empowerment as a core reason
for regional disparities, with the UK
one of the most centralised major econ-
omies. Top-down government, White-
hall sources believe, has failed to utiliselocal knowledge and meant that policy
can often benefit commuters or new
arrivals in a local area rather than its
longstanding residents.
London has had mayors since 2000
but a new generation of Conservative
mayors, such as Ben Houchen in Tees
Valley and Andy Street in the West
Midlands, has helped some in govern-
ment to warm to extending devolution.
Gove wants the devolution deals to
cover areas with a strong identity and
community, which means that many
will be county deals. Any area negotiat-
ing devolved powers will have to have a
population of at least 500,000. The
deals will mean counties or other areas
being given more powers over areas
such as transport, housing or health,
and money to deliver the services that
would otherwise be run from London.
Not every area will be forced to have
a directly elected mayor, or governor,
but those that agree to do so will be
given the most powers.
Another idea being considered is a
statutory levelling-up quango to moni-
tor every aspect of government policy
for its impact on regional inequalities.continued from page 1
‘Too late to stop Omicron’Rain and hill snow spreading
eastwards followed by scattered
showers. Full forecast, page 51
THE WEATHER
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