A look ahead at the key events leading the news agenda next week, from the team at Foresight News. Delivered to your inbox on Fridays.
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Leading the week
Parliament returns next week after a conference season which saw the UK’s main parties trying to cement their post-election identities: the Lib Dems and Reform vying for the role of alternative opposition, the Conservatives waiting to discover who’ll lead them into the next election, and Labour struggling to focus on the business of governing amid the background noise of scandals, policy disputes, and unhappy MPs. But party politics may need to take a back seat when MPs return to Westminster on Monday (October 7) as escalating tensions in the Middle East threaten to overshadow the scheduled business.
Monday’s agenda in the House of Commons (DWP questions and a debate on Lord Darzi’s review of the NHS) is likely to be superseded by post-recess ministerial statements, with Keir Starmer’s relationship reset in Brussels, David Lammy’s diplomatic discussions on Ukraine and the Middle East, and efforts to remove British citizens from Lebanon likely to merit an update to MPs.
Starmer will be hoping to tout his early achievements ahead of Labour’s 100th day in office on Saturday (October 12), so we may be treated to some orchestrated cheering from the backbenches during PMQs on Wednesday (October 9) as the prime minister talks up policy work on energy and business investment. The party’s most significant 100-day pledge, an overhaul of employment rights, is still pending, so look out for details on those plans before the week is out.
The identity of Starmer’s future PMQs sparring partner will be a little clearer next week after votes on Wednesday and Thursday (October 10) to whittle down the four Tory contenders to a final two. Kemi Badenoch, James Cleverly, Tom Tugendhat and Robert Jenrick spent conference attempting to woo the Conservative faithful, and will spend the next few days trying to secure the backing of enough MPs to make it through to the membership vote which will decide the winner of the contest.
Helpfully for the final pair, members will get a reminder of what they could have won with the release of Boris Johnson’s memoirs on Thursday. Extracts from the former prime minister’s modestly-titled Unleashed have already revealed some surprising anecdotes from his time in office – a mooted invasion of the Netherlands foremost among them – but the former journalist in Johnson will surely have kept back the choicest morsels for publication day.
Looking abroad
Amid a series of recent developments ratcheting up already sky-high tensions in the Middle East, Israel and the world will on Monday (October 7) mark the anniversary of Hamas’s devastating attack, which saw some 1,200 people killed and 250 people kidnapped and taken to Gaza, with over 100 still held hostage.
Events marking the anniversary, which falls just days ahead of the start of Yom Kippur on Friday (October 11), include an event organized by victims’ families in Tel Aviv’s Yarkon Park that aims to honour victims in a depoliticised fashion, as well a broadcast of a pre-recorded state-organised event in the southern town of Ofakim, which was attacked on October 7. A state memorial is scheduled to take place at Mount Herzl in Jerusalem on October 27, though at least one of the Kibbutz communities attacked last year, Yad Mordechai, is planning to commemorate the Jewish calendar anniversary of the attacks on Tishrei 22 (October 24), coinciding with the start of the holiday of Simchat Torah.
The anniversary also means it’s the one year mark for Israel’s operations in Gaza, with protests planned this weekend to commemorate the over 40,000 Palestinians believed to have been killed since the war began. Israeli airstrikes on Gaza began in the immediate aftermath of the October 7 attack, and the Israeli government formally declared war on October 8. Sunday (October 13) marks the anniversary of the first evacuation warning, which saw tens of thousands of Gazans flee south amid rumours of an impending Israeli ground invasion.
US President Joe Biden heads to Germany on Thursday (October 10) as part of a trip that will also see him visit Angola. In addition to bilateral talks with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, likely to take place on Friday (October 11), the conflict in Ukraine is set to be a major focus of the visit. On Saturday (October 12), Biden hosts a meeting of the Ukraine Defence Contact Group at Ramstein Air Force Base, with some 50 leaders expected to attend. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who attended a defence ministers’ gathering of the grouping last month, is likely to take part as he seeks to ensure support for his country’s fight against Russia regardless of the outcome of the US election in November.
The winner of this year’s Nobel Peace Prize is announced on Friday (October 11) to round off Nobel Week, which sees daily announcements of the big prizes in science, economics and literature. The deliberative process is extremely secretive, though we do know that there are 285 candidates for this year’s peace prize, of which 196 are individuals and 89 are organisations – slightly down on last year’s numbers. Henrik Urdal, the head of the Peace Research Institute Oslo who puts together an annual list of potential winners, has this year included UNRWA and its Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini. If this does turn out to be the Norwegian Nobel Committee’s pick, it would provoke quite the reaction from leaders in Israel.