While the Labour leader is deeply unpopular, several factors – including the Iran war – seem to be delaying his exit

It still feels improbable that the UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, will face a formal challenge even if, as assumed, his Labour party performs disastrously in next month’s local elections. But for many of his MPs, the latest revelations about Peter Mandelson have emphasised that the question is simply one of when, not if.

“It does seems incredible that he didn’t know, but the problem is that it’s quite possible as well,” was the summary of one backbencher, in response to No 10’s insistence that no one had told the prime minister that his pick to be the UK ambassador to Washington had failed his security vetting.

Lisa Nandy says staff have been strongly affected as some express frustration that high-paid presenters and executives likely to be safe

The BBC’s sudden announcement of 2,000 job cuts has had a “very strong effect” on staff, the UK’s culture secretary, Lisa Nandy, has said, as employees expressed frustration that highly paid presenters and senior staff would not be the prime targets of the cuts.

Nandy, who has been having conversations with BBC staff during discussions about the broadcaster’s charter renewal, is understood to be keen for employees to be involved in making the cost-cutting plan, which will affect as many as 10% of the broadcaster’s 21,000 staff over the next three years.

Joani Reid MP reportedly swapped flirtatious messages with senior officer in charge of nuclear-armed submarine

A Royal Navy captain in charge of one of Britain’s nuclear-armed submarines stepped back from his duties over his relationship with the MP Joani Reid, whose husband faces allegations of spying for China.

The married senior officer was investigated by the navy last year over his contact with Reid after the messages, described as inappropriate, prompted an assessment of a potential blackmail risk, the Financial Times first reported.

Vaccination programme to be launched on Canterbury campus as strain B of disease identified in fatal outbreak

Students in Kent are to be offered a targeted vaccination against meningitis B after two more cases in the deadly outbreak were confirmed and pharmacies ran out of vaccine doses.

Government scientists have said two people who died in the outbreak had bacterial strain B of the disease, for which most people have not been vaccinated.

Action relates to corruption case over allocation of government land in Dhaka to a private company

A court in Bangladesh has ordered officials to request an Interpol red notice for the British Labour MP Tulip Siddiq over a corruption case linked to the allocation of government land in Dhaka.

Bangladesh’s anti-corruption commission has alleged Siddiq used her relationship with her aunt, the former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, to influence the allocation of a plot of state-owned land in Dhaka’s Gulshan district to a private company. Siddiq has rejected the claim as baseless and politically motivated.

Richard Tice echoes Donald Trump with pledge of ‘great repeal act’ and ‘tight quotas and significant tariffs’

Unions and renters’ groups have criticised Reform UK after the party’s business spokesperson, Richard Tice, pledged to introduce a “great repeal act” that would abolish Labour legislation on workers’ rights and protection for tenants.

In his first speech since being appointed by Nigel Farage to a portfolio covering business, trade and energy, Tice promised a bonfire of regulations, including an end to net zero targets and a new push for home-produced shale gas using fracking.