The former international development secretary, Justine Greening, has been responding to the claims from Oxfam’s former head of safeguarding, Helen Evans.
The whistleblower told Channel 4 News on Monday that her concerns about abuse within the charity were raised with DfID and the Home Office in 2015, but insufficient was done.
Greening has told Sky News:
I don’t recall being aware of those allegations but I certainly know that, whenever I had any instances raised with me, they would always have been followed up. I am not, obviously, the kind of person who would’ve ignored anything like that; why would anyone?
And, in the first half of 2016, I had kicked off some work in the department to look at safeguarding in the context of how we could make sure when people were identified in the NGO sector who were not behaving appropriately that there possibly could have been put together a register to track those people and make sure that they were never allowed to circulate around the system.
That’s something I think the NGO sector themselves should have been taking a lead on. They weren’t. But it’s certainly a question I raised with them.
After the departure of Theresa May and her Irish counterpart, Leo Varadkar, from Northern Ireland last night, the talking resumes today at Stormont aimed at securing a power sharing restoration deal that the two premiers thought might be achievable on Monday.
But sources from inside the Democratic Unionist Party indicate that there are now serious difficulties ahead for its leadership to sell any package that could be perceived as containing a stand-alone Irish Language Act.
One DUP source said there was “internal uproar” overnight regarding the outline of a deal. Some of the party’s councillors took to social media on Tuesday to express their disquiet over the proposed compromise regarding languages and culture.
It will not affect my Britishness in any way, should my neighbour decide to speak Irish. It is not something I personally feel strongly about, no more than someone speaking Latin for instance.
But it would be wrong to impose any structure or any language act, that would adversely affect the rest of the community who choose not to avail of this hobby. “I wish to...” is fine. “You must...” is not.
Given that Kells is not from what could be described as the party’s traditionalist wing, his tweets appear to reflect the growing unease across the DUP base over a stand-alone Irish Language Act.
And, given this level of nervousness and doubt within the DUP, it has to be asked to why, exactly Downing Street, the Northern Ireland Office and Dublin’s Department of Foreign Affairs thought a deal was so close that they advised two prime minister to fly into Belfast on Monday – who then had to leave empty handed.
The government must order a full inquiry into illegal sexual behaviour, not just within Oxfam, but across the aid sector, the Liberal Democrats have said. The party’s international development spokesperson, Baroness Sheehan, said:
The government must now accept that nothing short of a full and far-reaching inquiry into illegal sexual behaviour within Oxfam and across the wider aid sector, will do.
The public have a right to know what the extent of the problem is and whether what has been exposed to date is only the tip of the iceberg.
This information is vital if those of us who are proud of Britain’s record of delivering aid to the poorest people on our planet are to successfully defend it.
The saddest outcome of this whole sorry saga would be to throw the baby out with the bathwater and desert the 0.7% of GNI devoted to alleviate extreme poverty.
The first woman to hold the title of Black Rod in the House of Lords in its 650-year history is due to be formally introduced to the Queen today.
Sarah Clarke has previously held roles at four Olympic Games, the London Marathon and most recently worked as championships director at the All-England Lawn Tennis Club.
She will meet the monarch at Buckingham Palace ahead of her formal introduction into the Lords next Tuesday.
Black Rod’s best-known duty is the banging on the door of the House of Commons to summon MPs to hear the Queen’s Speech at the State Opening of Parliament. Speaking at the time of her appointment last November, she said
The House of Lords is a place where the smallest detail is as important as the big picture and the depth of heritage and tradition is second to none. I am truly looking forward to starting work.
She will formally be known as Lady Usher of the Black Rod and will be the senior official responsible for maintaining order at the House of Lords. Clarke succeeds David Leakey in the role.
Police have been called in after a series of prominent Brexit supporters were sent death threats signed “the real 48%” - an apparent reference to the proportion of people who voted to remain in the European Union in 2016.
Four letters were reported to police on Monday. Six leave donors received correspondence last week.
Some more on the fates of Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh: they should be brought to trial in the UK, according to Peter Ricketts, a former national security adviser.
The crossbench peer appears to back the view put forward by the US defence secretary, Jim Mattis, and is at odds with the UK government’s position. Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Ricketts said Britain “had responsibility” for the trials of the two men.
I can absolutely understand that people don’t want these guys back, they sound despicable. On the other hand we do believe in the rule of law and in accountability.
At the current time, they’re in a sort of stateless position; they’re not under anyone’s jurisdiction, they’re being held by an insurgency group. I think, in the end, the UK does have responsibility to take these people back in order to put them on trial.
In terms of showing people that you cannot commit these horrible crimes and be completely unaccountable for them later, I think – despite all the reluctance – I think that probably, if they were British people, we have some responsibility to take them back.
Mystery shrouds the cases of two captured men who are suspected of having been jailers for the Islamic State terrorist group, after the home secretary, Amber Rudd, refused to confirm whether or not they retained British citizenship.
Reports last week (paywall) suggestedAlexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh, suspected of being part of the execution group nicknamed “The Beatles”, had been rendered stateless. But Rudd declined to discuss that during an interview with Sky News on Tuesday.
Speaking to Sky, she said the government would make sure “that we keep everybody safe”. She said:
The important thing is that these two people face justice. We will always make sure that it’s properly co-ordinated and that they face justice.
The issue is at the centre of a potential dispute between the UK and the US. Washington wants militants to face justice in their home countries and intends to raise the issue with allies, including the UK, at a summit in Rome on Tuesday.
But the British defence secretary, Gavin Williamson, has said he does not think Elsheikh and Kotey “should ever set foot in this country again” and the junior defence minister, Tobias Ellwood, has suggested they should be tried at the International Criminal Court in the Hague.
According to the Press Association, a Whitehall source has said:
The day these barbaric terrorists turned their back on this country in pursuit of an evil agenda of bloodshed and slaughter, they forfeited forever their right to return. They are not British subjects and should pay the price for their crimes in Syria.
Hopes were raised on Monday that, after more than a year, a deal could finally be reached to restore the power-sharing government in Northern Ireland. But, on Monday evening, Theresa May left with no such agreement in place.
Paul Oakden, the chair of Ukip, is to step down. The move is a major blow to the party just days before its leader, Henry Bolton, faces a confidence vote. While Oakden insisted his decision was not connected to Saturday’s extraordinary general meeting, he did outline a series of frustrations in his role.
Charity watchdog begins statutory inquiry into Oxfam allegations
The Oxfam scandal continues to dominate the news agenda as the charities watchdog begins its statutory inquiry. There are allegations the aid organisation may not have “fully and frankly disclosed” all details about the Haiti allegations to the authorities. It also faces the prospect of losing £29m in European funding over its handling of them.
Yesterday, the spotlight was fixed firmly on Oxfam as its senior bosses were hauled before the international development secretary and its deputy chief executive resigned in disgrace. Today, it may be shared by Whitehall, after the charity’s former head of safeguarding told Channel 4 News her concerns were reported to the government and to the Charity Commission in 2015.
The former Conservative leader, William Hague, has also been speaking about the scandal, saying that cutting the foreign aid budget in response to it would be a “blunder”.
Once again, the issue dominates many of the morning’s front pages:
There is a burgeoning diplomatic row between the UK and the US over the fates of two British men suspected of being members of an Islamic State execution group nicknamed “The Beatles”. The British defence secretary, Gavin Williamson, disagrees with his US counterpart, Jim Mattis, who believes Isis fighters should be tried in their countries of origin. They two men are attending a meeting of international ministers in Rome today.
Johnson lays out liberal vision for Brexit
A major speech on Brexit by the foreign secretary, Boris Johnson, is trailed this morning. Johnson plans to say the common market was part of a political project when he delivers his speech on Wednesday.
The Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, has said “we shouldn’t have hungry children in Scotland in 2018” ahead of a visit to a council-run scheme to provide meals for children during school holidays. His tour makes the front page of the Scotsman:
An artificial intelligence program that can detect Islamic State propaganda online with a 94% success rate has been developed, the Home Office announced on Monday. Today, the home secretary, Amber Rudd, is in the US, where she will address a Digital Forum event focused on tackling terrorism online.
Energy price cap plans must be introduced urgently to stop millions of loyal and vulnerable customers being ripped off, a powerful committee has told the government. The story is carried on the front of City AM:
The approach to tackling homelessness within the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead has already caused one headache for the government when the Tory leader of the council called for rough sleepers to be cleared ahead of the royal wedding.
It may be about to cause another as it emerges that the council plans to fine rough sleepers up to £100 for begging or leaving their bedding in public places.
Commonwealth succession under discussion, says report
And a “high level group” of Commonwealth officials is set to meet in London to consider who might succeed the Queen as its head, according to the BBC. The agenda for the all-day summit says there will be a discussion of “wider governance considerations”; seen as code for the succession.
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