King’s speech live: Starmer set to unveil mandatory housing targets and railway reform among 35 bills

King Charles III will officially open the new session of parliament today donning his ceremonial robes and the crown of state to deliver a speech laying out the legislative program of the new Labour government.

• 11.20am – The King is expected to arrive at parliament.

• 11.30am – He will head through the House of Lords and take up his throne.

What can we expect from the King’s Speech?

• After his arrival, the monarch will summon parliament and the Black Rod will go to knock on the Common’s door.

• As part of the tradition, the door will be slammed in their face to demonstrate the Parliament’s sovereignty and MPs will head to the Lords to watch the King deliver the speech.

• The King will then leave the chamber and parliament will start to debate the announced policies in a process which could until next week.

The State Opening of Parliament involves a lot of pomp and centenary ceremonies – including a tradition dating back to the 17th century of taking a person hostage.

A chosen MP will ceremonially be taken hostage in Buckingham Palace while the monarch attends Parliament. This is designed to ensure the King’s safe return from Parliament.

Traditionally a Government whip known as the vice-chamberlain of the household performs this task and this position is currently held by Labour’s Samantha Dixon.

Shadow House of Commons leader Chris Philp told Times Radio that the government’s plans to find what it calls “grey belt” land to build on is “grey belt”

The Conservative MP said: “Obviously we accept and agree that more houses need to be built, but they need to be built in the right places.

“For example, in my view, they should be built on brownfield sites in city centres, those kinds of places first looking at maybe new towns, but what we should not be doing is ripping up the green belt.”

He said housing should be built on brownfield sites and by building high in town and city centres – for example in Canary Wharf or the Greenwich Peninsula in London.

He said: “They are talking about huge chunks of the green belt, not the odd car park. You can’t just suddenly claim that a whole load of green belt is now called the grey belt and it’s okay to build on it. I mean, that’s just obviously a piece of nonsensical and shameless spin.”

There will always be some developments that people do not like despite the Labour Party’s focus on building, Pat McFadden has said.

As the Government is expected to unveil major planning reforms to build houses and infrastructure in the King’s Speech today, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster told Times Radio: “People are going to have their view on individual development, they’re entitled to have their view.

“But local authorities will be asked to identify land for housing, or for development, and they’ve got a choice about whether it’s here or whether it’s there. But overall, we have to get stuff built.

“So you can have lots of fun in the next couple of years saying, here’s a Labour MP who doesn’t want this particular development. I know that will happen.”

As part of the housebuilding bill Sir Keir Starmer promised to overhaul the planning system to reintroduce mandatory housing targets, but some MPs opposed plans to build on the green belt.

Asked about whether it was hypocritical to preach house building as a national government and then have MPs argue against it in their local areas, he said: “I’m not predicting that everything we do is going to be opposed by MPs. But what I’m saying is in the real world, there’ll be some developments that some people don’t like, that’s always going to be the case.”

Opponents of Brexit have warned that the latest figures from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), confirm that leaving the EU “has drained the life out of the British economy”.

But the urgency of the problem appears to have been highlighted in the latest IMF projections.

According to the IMF the UK only grew 0.1 per cent in 2023 and will only grow by 0.7 per cent by the end of this year. While growth is set to double next year, according to the IMF, it will still only grow by 1.5 per cent.

Our political editor David Maddox has the full story:

The Labour government has welcomed the predicted fall in inflation after nearly three years of it being above target.

Darren Jones, chief secretary to the Treasury, said: “It is welcome that inflation is at target, but we know that for families across Britain prices remain high.

“We face the legacy of 14 years of chaos and economic irresponsibility.

“That is why this Government is taking the tough decisions now to fix the foundations so we can rebuild Britain and make every part of Britain better off.”

But experts said it will be the finer details of the inflation data that could come under greater scrutiny.

In particular, economists will be looking at services inflation, which tracks categories such as hospitality, culture and housing, and has put more pressure on the overall rate in recent months.

Sanjay Raja, a senior economist for Deutsche Bank, said he expects live music inflation to nearly double to around 10% in June from 5.7% in May.

Britain’s new Labour Party government campaigned on a promise to bring bold change at modest cost. Prime Minister Keir Starmer gets a chance to show how he aims to reconcile those two aims on Wednesday when the government announces its plans for the coming year.

Starmer said the measures announced in the King’s Speech to Parliament would “take the brakes off Britain” and “create wealth for people up and down the country” by spurring economic growth.

The King’s Speech is the centerpiece of the State Opening of Parliament, an occasion where royal pomp meets hard-nosed politics, as King Charles III dons a diamond-studded crown, sits on a gilded throne and announces the government’s legislative agenda.

Starmer said the speech would be a “down payment on our plans for the next five years,” which center on getting the U.K.’s stuttering economy growing strongly.

Labour won a landslide election victory on July 4 as voters turned on the Conservatives after years of high inflation, ethics scandals and a revolving door of prime ministers. Starmer has promised to patch up the country’s aging infrastructure and frayed public services, but says he won’t raise personal taxes and insists change must be bound by “unbreakable fiscal rules.”

The government said Wednesday’s speech will include more than 35 bills – the Conservatives’ last speech had just 21 – ranging from housebuilding to nationalizing Britain’s railways and decarbonizing the nation’s power supply with a publicly owned green energy firm.

The fight against inflation in the UK could see it fall below the Bank of England’s target level for the first time in more than three years, economists have predicted.

New data released from the Office for National Statistics on Wednesday will reveal how fast prices were rising across the UK last month.

It comes after inflation returned to the Bank’s 2% target in May, after nearly three years of it being above target largely as a result of soaring food and energy prices.

But analysts think the rate of Consumer Prices Index (CPI) inflation might have undershot the target in June, with it coming in at 1.9% for the month, according to a consensus compiled by Pantheon Macroeconomics.

The last time it was below target was in April 2021, when CPI was recorded at 1.5%.

“After nearly three years of running above target, in May, UK CPI inflation returned to the Bank of England’s target of 2%. This is indisputably good news,” said Sandra Horsfield, an economist for Investec.

“Yet jubilation about this must be tempered: the ‘cost-of-living crisis’ is far from over for some.”

“The new Labour government will need to factor ongoing cost-of-living pressures in for some time yet, even if CPI inflation stays broadly on target,” she said.

With 35 bills set to be contained in Labour’s first legislative programme in 14 years which will be read out by King Charles on Wednesday, there are fears in the trade union movement that Sir Keir may deprioritise his pledges on workers rights.

Speaking exclusively to The Independent, Trades Union Congress (TUC) president Matt Wrack, who is also general secretary of the Fire Brigades Union (FBU), warned that “words will not be enough” from the new Labour prime minister and rapid action is expected.

Our politics editor David Maddox has the full story:

Prime minister Keir Starmer’s review of Britain’s defences comes as the West faces a “dangerous quartet” of Russia, China, North Korea and Iran, according to Nato chief Lord Robertson.

Our data correspondent Alicja Hagopian has the full analysis: