Who’s to blame when climate change turns the lights off?

TUE CONVERSATION
Published: September 23, 2024 

Deadly Storm Boris has flooded large areas of central Europe and the UK, destroying homes and displacing thousands of people.

With the flooding of sub-stations, the scouring of the foundations of pylons and river embankment failures, the rainstorm has also caused power outages many miles away. This will create yet more disruption as sewage pumping stations stall, train and tram services halt and vehicle charging points fail.

The UK saw this ripple of infrastructure failure in the 2007 summer floods. The compound failures caused by flooding in Gloucestershire alone, a county in south-west England, left 350,000 people without mains water for over two weeks and 42,000 people without power.

Commuters were stranded on the railway network and the M5 motorway. The floods also made thousands of people homeless. Similar floods struck the UK again in 2013 and 2020.

All systems fail occasionally. But infrastructure is increasingly vulnerable to disruptions caused by extreme weather, which is being made more severe and frequent as a result of climate change. The UK’s national risk register lists nine impacts of climate change (including storms, heatwaves and wildfires) that could seriously damage infrastructure that is increasingly complex and interconnected. A single failure can create a cascade of them.

Risky business

Your home may not be in the path of the next storm but the infrastructure it relies on might be. So who is responsible for making sure that the power stays on, the toilets can still flush and water keeps running from taps? Whose job is it to ensure infrastructure is resilient to climate change?

People are responsible for their own resilience and that of their homes and private companies are responsible for the resilience of their operations. However, companies that operate services such as public transport, communications networks or utilities are overseen by regulators such as Ofgem (energy) and Ofwat (water).

The resilience of the networks owned by companies is not subject to regulation directly, there is no minimum standard of resilience that must be maintained and no fines for failure. Instead, people affected by power outages, for example, can claim compensation after a certain degree of disruption.

Installations were, generally, designed and built in an earlier climate. David Calvert

/Shutterstock

Within the government, the Cabinet Office takes the lead on planning the country’s resilience and is responsible for the government’s response to emergencies and for producing the national security risk assessment and the national risk register. Each risk is designated a lead government department, which works with agencies and public bodies that fall under its jurisdiction.

For example, flood risk is considered by the Environment Agency which reports to the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (or Defra). Advisory bodies like the Climate Change Committee and the National Infrastructure Commission make recommendations to the government and assess its performance but have no powers to enforce action.

There are 427 public bodies and agencies working under the legal frameworks set by the 24 government departments – none have a minimum standard for infrastructure resilience.

The previous government committed to publishing resilience standards by 2025. Such standards would instruct utility companies and infrastructure operators on what measures were needed to prevent power cuts and other failures in the future. Discussions are happening in Whitehall that will shape the quality of life of millions of people for many years to come.

Three futures

Without taking all infrastructure into public ownership, or without all homes generating their own power and somehow meeting their own needs, what does the future look like? Is it down to homeowners to fend for themselves while landlords assume responsibility for the power and water of their tenants? In the worst-case scenario, will people be left to their own devices in a world reminiscent of Mad Max?

There are three possibilities. The first is that society simply accepts more frequent failures and a lower standard of living for most. The second option includes the electricity grid, roads and railways, sewage treatment plants and other national infrastructure being updated and improved, with all the attendant costs.

The third option would see people take direct action by adapting homes and communities to make them less dependent on national infrastructure. In this scenario, services are more localised such that communities or households become self-sufficient to varying degrees, perhaps establishing autonomous off-grid settlements.

Renewable energy technology offers its generators a degree of autonomy. Hazel Plater/Shutterstock

No government would be elected promising to preside over falling living standards. The other options come with many challenges. Option two assumes a great degree of government intervention and a high level of investment in new and improved infrastructure: flood defences, additional power cables, new railway lines. Option three implies less involvement from central government and more power to local authority and community bodies to generate electricity and treat water for example.

The future may well be a combination of these scenarios, but doing nothing isn’t an option. It’s not a question of if serious floods will happen again, but when.

Author

Chris Medland
PhD Candidate in Climate Change Resilience, University of Surrey

 CBS POLL

What voters think about climate change ahead of Election Day 2024

Sep 23, 2024

Climate change affects several aspects of American life — health, economics, the weather and possibly this fall: politics. According to a recent survey from the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, 62% of registered voters across parties prefer a candidate who supports action on global warming. Anthony Leiserowitz, who co-authored the study, joins CBS News to unpack the findings.

 

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One-third of former NFL players in Harvard study believe they have brain damage

By Susan Kreimer
Health News
Sept. 23, 2024 

 It is not unusual for players to land on their heads, like this play in which Los Angeles Chargers safety Derwin James Jr. pulls down Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver George Pickens after a reception in the first quarter at Acrisure Stadium on Sunday in Pittsburgh. Photo by Archie Carpenter/UPI | License Photo

NEW YORK, Sept. 23 (UPI) -- A Harvard study of almost 2,000 former National Football League players revealed that about one-third believe they have chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a degenerative brain disorder linked to repeated head impacts.

The study, published Monday in JAMA Neurology, draws attention to the injuries transpiring over a livelihood of training and playing on the field. A definitive diagnosis of CTE is possible only by performing an autopsy of the brain after death.

Researchers who surveyed former players found a strong connection between perceived CTE (34%) and mental well-being. One-fourth of the players who believe they have CTE reported experiencing thoughts and behaviors related to committing suicide, compared to only 5% of players who don't think they have CTE.

Knowing the share of retired players with perceived CTE and the associated increase in thoughts of self-harm is a major step in helping them pursue mental health treatment, researchers said.

"Until we have a way to diagnose CTE and treat it, going after conditions that cause cognitive problems that add to their CTE anxieties represents the best way to give these guys hope and more good years," said the study's lead author, Rachel Grashow, director of epidemiological research initiatives at the Football Players Health Study at Harvard University.

"We may be able to reduce the burden of these symptoms and improve the health and outlook of former players," said Grashow, who has a doctorate in computational neuroscience.

Players who thought they had CTE often reported cognitive symptoms, low testosterone, depression, pain and other treatable conditions that can affect thinking, learning and understanding.

"Low testosterone also impacts the brain and could be contributing to their depression and absentmindedness," she said.

The study used electronic and paper surveys to query players who played professionally from 1960 to 2020.

Collected data included demographics and football-related exposures, such as position and career duration. It also listed current health problems, such as anxiety, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, diabetes, headache, high cholesterol, elevated blood pressure, pain and sleep apnea.

"This study is one of the largest surveys attempting to address CTE symptoms in former American-style football players," said Dr. Ray Chu, clinical chief of neurosurgery at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center is Los Angeles. He was not involved in the study.

"It is important to have physicians on the sidelines helping players recognize concussion symptoms and sitting out while they are symptomatic to try and reduce the odds of brain injury," said Chu, a concussion specialist who works with the Los Angeles Rams at home games.

Medical professionals and family members should be aware if a patient or loved one has perceived CTE. "Screening for suicidality and providing mental health resources could be life-saving," said Dr. Chris Miles, a sports medicine specialist at Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem, N.C.

However, it's wise to exercise caution in making a diagnosis. Attributing symptoms to CTE may miss other possibly reversible causes, Miles said.

Significant changes have made football safer, especially for high school players and younger athletes. For instance, Chu noted that the kickoff is no longer one of the most dangerous portions of the game, with two teams running at each other head on with significant speed.

"Most games now have changed the kickoff so that is not the case, or even for young players, eliminated the kickoff entirely," he said. "For the NFL this year, there is an alteration in the kickoff such that the teams are standing in place until the receiver catches the ball, which hopefully will decrease the chance of that player being hit at high speeds while relatively unprepared."

It's critical to investigate how frequent suicidality is among former players to implement appropriate screening and treatment, said Jeffrey Schaffert, an assistant professor of psychiatry at UT Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas who has published research evaluating cognitive outcomes in former NFL players.

Social media platforms feature comments from people who attribute depression and suicidal thoughts to playing football or contact sports years ago, Schaffert said.

While they may suffer from a mental health problem rather than an uncurable neurodegenerative disease, he stressed the importance of seeking treatment for depression, irritability, anxiety, suicidality or any related symptoms.

A proper geography conference


The Royal Geographical Society’s yearly conference highlights the discipline’s expanding horizons

By Andrew Brooks
Royal Geographical Society

23 September 2024

Afew years back, midway through the first term of teaching, a new undergraduate approached me after a lecture. As I collected my notes and rucksack, he asked ‘When will we start learning proper geography?’ The question took me back. What does he mean? What is proper geography? I had started the module lecturing on how agriculture spread around the world in the neolithic period, later given classes on the ways in which colonialism had made an uneven world, and recently been teaching about the geographies of financial crisis in the 2000s. For this fresher, use to a more traditional and conservative school syllabus focused on topics like gentrification and the climate change, these subjects were alien. He struggled to see the relevance of these historical processes to today’s global challenges. Yet for me these themes, while looking back at the past, were important dynamic moments, that shaped contemporary global inequality and are at the cutting edge of conversation in academic geography. I thought about this encounter as I was walking in the late summer sun through Hyde Park to the Royal Geographical Society’s 2024 Conference. What new ideas would I hear about and how would these shape and change what I thought of as proper geography?

The three-day RGS-IBG Annual International Conference attracts 2,000 geographers from around the world. It alternates between the society’s base in West London and cities around the UK. This year the conference had the overarching theme of mapping – surely a proper geographical verb – but this served as a point of departure for an impressively wide range of sessions: Mapping Fuel Poverty Around the World, Mapping the Future of Political Geography in the UK, Thick Mapping for Socio-Ecological Transitioning, and More-than-Human Cartographies: animals as map-makers and the mapping of animal worlds. And many other mapping acts filled the conference program, as well as sessions with titles that were further from the traditional heartlands of geography such as Digital Black Dance Ecologies and (Un)writing the Earth: genre, story and inscription in the Anthropocene. That said, despite breadth in topic areas on societal questions, the conference does not cover the full depth of the discipline as there are fewer sessions devoted to physical geography. Researchers from that side of geography tend to meet in more multi-disciplinary environmental science forums.

Royal Geographical Society


The first session I attended was for the launch of a new academic journal: Finance and Space. The lecture introduced how the publication would interrogate new fiscal relationships between businesses, cities and regions. For example, London is in relative decline as a financial hub, whereas former UK colonies and protectorates like Hong Kong and Dubai, that retain an understanding of British economic systems and English Common Law, are becoming increasing important. In a geopolitically complex world, flows of funds from places like Russia and Iran pass easily through these increasingly important spaces of finance. During this session the presenters used cartographic techniques to animate the ways in which different economic systems interact, this included the brilliant The Waterworks of Money presented by Dutch researchers Carlijn Kingma and Thomas Bollen. Visualization brings difficult to follow processes to life. New maps can chart the stormy waters of finance and well-trained geographers have a leading role to play in helping everyone understand the world economy.



Later that day I was in a very different type of session ‘Spatial Contestations: Dispossession, Dissent, and Development in Africa and the Levant’. A very academic sounding title, but a session that was less heavy in theory and more about telling stories of under-represented people. This included a pair of papers on Lebanon. One by a historian, Zeead Yaghi, from Beirut, who was drawn towards geography to progress his understanding of the interactions between cities and countryside. Yaghi showed how plans to irrigate land across Lebanon for agricultural development accompanied political change alongside new vision for farming. Ecological, political and sectarian obstacles to this plan were a microcosm of the challenges the state faced. Government aimed to reanimate rural life but had the exact opposite effect and propelled people towards the cities, and centralized power. The other paper by Diala Lteif focused on protest around a slaughterhouse in Beirut. It was an icon of modernity, that mechanized butchery, but with it came job losses, and created a moment of territorial contestation as there was a struggle to change a traditional place into a modern one. Other papers in the session came from Cameroon and Palestine. All of them opened questions about the ways in which geographers can understand movements for resistance and change.

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Keynote lectures are often a highlight of the conference program, and this year included one sponsored by the radical geography journal Antipode, hosted in the Society’s historic Ondaatje Theatre (a handsome wood-paneled space familiar to anyone that has attended a Monday night lecture). This was delivered by Laleh Khalili a scholar who writes with passion and beauty. Here, her talk, titled ‘Where is Palestine? Singapore on the Med, Spaceships, and the mount of Olives’, considered the interrelationships between struggles for Palestinian spaces, and the way Palestine is built by artists as a site of memory, desire and dream. Against the backdrop of the unfolding tragedy in the Middle East her lecture moved some audience members to tears. One of my own interventions in the conference was in a panel on Geographical responsibility and scholasticide in Palestine. Scholasticide is this context is a term which describes the ways in which Israel’s violence in Gaza extends to universities and represents a systematic assault on Palestinian education and knowledge production.


My other highlights of the conference were two ‘author meets the critics’ sessions. The first was on the new book Decolonising Geography? Disciplinary Histories and the End of the British Empire in Africa, 1948-1998 by Ruth Craggs. Much of the history of the discipline is associated with colonialism and that is very present in the past culture of the Society. As a rejoinder to all that, this book talk showed the way in which geography departments in the world’s poorest continent evolved through the decolonial process. The critics introduced us to the books many strengths and provoked both the author and the audience to think about what still needs to be done to decolonise the discipline. There was an interesting exchange around the provocation ‘What topics are Black geographers allowed to write on?’ In the 1970s when Black PhD students came to the UK they had to change what they wanted to study when their white supervisors were unable to support their projects. Yet these experiences are familiar in the present and oftentimes topic areas are bent away from the new ideas of young BAME scholars and towards the established practices of ‘proper’ geography. Secondly, I was the other side of the lectern for the critics’ review of my own Bullsh*t Comparisons: A field guide to thinking critically in a world of difference. Despite a few butterflies before the session, I was pleased to have a really engaged and colorful discussion, and flattered by my fellow geographers considered and thoughtful comments, which were (mostly) complimentary.

I

Away from the heavier conference sessions the event is also a great opportunity to showcase the vibrancy of the Royal Geographical Society’s work and there were exhibits, film screenings and examples of recent publications. At break times the grounds of 1 Kensington Gore were overflowing with conference guests, and as is often the way, the really networking happened beyond the confines of the formal sessions. Here I enjoyed meeting with an early career researcher and helped them develop a new project idea, and in turn bumped in to my own undergraduate tutor of two decades ago, who wanted to learn about what I had been up to. Feeling part of a community of geographical scholars which is bigger than a single workplace, is a real strength of the discipline. Sadly though in multiple sessions we had to hear from international geographers speaking online because their visas to attend the conference had been denied, but it was a small grace that the technology enabled their partial participation in the gathering. The geographical community present at the conference extended far beyond academics and I enjoyed talking with teachers, consultants, publishers, government officials and journalists. When I speak about the RGS to lecturers from other disciplines they are often envious of this unique and valuable learned society which does not have a direct equivalent in many other fields.



Returning to the question of what is proper geography? This summer’s conference opened my eyes to many new and exciting ideas and a few strange ones. Some of the topics like Dance Ecologies, Scholasticide and More-than-Human Cartographies, might not sound like geography as you know it, but that is one of the purposes of academic geography – to push forward the frontiers of the discipline. In previous years terms like the Anthropocene and decolonization where debated and contested in conference sessions, but now are moving towards the mainstream of the discipline. Even established ideas like climate change and gentrification got their first airings in forums like the RGS-IBG conference many decades ago. I will certainly be taking ideas from the conference back to my lecture theatre, and sharing some in future columns, even though it might take longer for them to percolate to, and change, the familiar, proper school syllabi.

 

UK research into poppers highlights problematic proposed drug policy

by University of Liverpool

Adjusted odds ratios of self-reported poppers use across gender–sexuality combinations (full sample, left; sub-sample, right). Credit: The British Journal of Criminology (2024). DOI: 10.1093/bjc/azae055

New research into the use of the drug poppers (alkyl nitrites) has highlighted inconsistencies in proposed changes to drug policy in the UK and how exemptions to the law impact on minority groups

The study, published in the British Journal of Criminology, today (Monday 23 September), is the first of its kind to examine who uses poppers in the UK and why.

Poppers provide a cheap, short lasting headrush when used for non-medical purposes and are used as a sex aid to reduce risk of injury from anal sex and as a recreational drug.

Analysis of poppers was conducted through data collected over 10 years from the independent annual English Festival Study (EFS), which includes questions on demographic characteristics, past and current alcohol and other drug use.

Statistics from the EFS highlighted that respondents who had engaged in anal sex in the last year were more than twice as likely to have taken poppers. The study showed that gay men participating in anal sex were found to be 14 times more likely to have used poppers in the past year than straight women not participating in anal sex, proving that poppers are a drug commonly used by gay men.

The legal status of poppers is currently ambiguous. This year, the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) recommended a unique exemption for poppers from the Psychoactive Substances Act 2016 because they are used by gay and bisexual men to reduce risk of injury during anal sexual intercourse.

The research in the new paper has shown that poppers are more likely to be used by gay men, meaning that the proposed exemption would alleviate harm faced by this minority group.

However, the authors of the research highlight the flaws of this approach. By granting a proposed exemption for one minority group the authors state that this risks exacerbating inequalities when other drugs used by different minority groups are not given equal consideration regarding the harms resulting to them from drug controls.

The government is obliged to respond to the recommendations of AMCD reports in a timely manner, meaning that a decision will need to be made soon regarding whether or not to allow poppers to be sold as a sex aid.

Professor Fiona Measham, chair in criminology at the University of Liverpool, who led the study said, "We welcome consideration being given to how the Psychoactive Substances Act disproportionately affects groups with protected characteristics but are calling for that same logic to be applied to all affected groups, including by race, gender, age and class.

"While poppers have long been presumed to be used by gay men, this study now shows there is a clear association. To exempt poppers sales from legislative control because of an impact on gay and bisexual men contrasts with the vastly disproportionate impact of criminalization of drugs on marginalized minority ethnic groups, youth and the working class.

"We hope that the government considers the broader issue of social justice when responding to the recommendations and takes this opportunity to review current drug policy more comprehensively.

"Our research indicates that the government can be more ambitious in its approach to drug policy and reorient toward a social justice approach which addresses structural inequalities across society linked to the current outdated Misuse of Drugs Act."

Professor Mark McCormack, Professor of Sociology at Aston University, added, "It's not right that a policy of exemptions should benefit one group while ignoring the harms to other groups also with protected characteristics."

More information: Fiona Measham et al, Poppers, the Politics of Exemption and the Characteristics of Poppers Users in the annual English Festival Study, 2014–23, The British Journal of Criminology (2024). DOI: 10.1093/bjc/azae055

Provided by University of Liverpool New research backs Australian regulatory decision on poppers

Card Factory shares plummet as wage increases hit profits

Card Factory shares dropped 18.4% after revealing a 43% decline in half-year profits, pressured by rising living wage costs despite a revenue increase.

Mark Rogers
September 24, 2024


Card Factory (LSE: CARD) shares have taken a heavy hit today, plunging 18.4% to 116.60 pence after the company revealed a 43% drop in half-year profits. For the six months ending June 30, revenue ticked up 5.9% to £233.8 million, but pretax profit took a nosedive from £24.7 million to £14.0 million.

The culprit? The substantial increase in the national living wage, which has exerted pressure on margins. In April, the national living wage surged 9.8% to £11.44 per hour for workers aged 21 and above, a significant jump from £10.42 last year.

Despite the profit downturn, the firm declared an interim dividend of 1.20 pence, a step up from the previous year. Chief Executive Officer Darcy Willson-Rymer noted that strong performance in their expanding store estate, particularly in gifts and celebration essentials, remains a core driver of revenue growth.

Looking ahead, Card Factory is eyeing the critical Christmas trading period with an unchanged outlook for the full year. The focus remains on navigating inflationary pressures while capitalising on its robust balance sheet and strong cash flow. With a commitment to efficiency and productivity, Card Factory is determined to deliver quality and value to a broad customer base.

UNGA

Taoiseach to meet Palestinian Authority president

It will be the first meeting between Simon Harris and Mahmoud Abbas since Ireland recognised the state of Palestine in May.


Simon Harris is to hold a bilateral meeting with Mahmoud Abbas 

(Brian Lawless/PA)

PA Wire
Jonathan McCambridge

Irish premier Simon Harris is to hold a bilateral meeting with the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas.


It will be the first meeting between the Taoiseach and Mr Abbas since Ireland recognised the state of Palestine in May.

They will discuss efforts for a ceasefire in the Middle East, efforts to release Israeli hostages and the urgent need for aid to flow into Gaza.

Ireland recognised the State of Palestine to help keep alive the hope of a two-state solution with Palestine and Israel living peacefully side-by-side

Simon Harris

Mr Harris said: “Ireland recognised the state of Palestine to help keep alive the hope of a two-state solution with Palestine and Israel living peacefully side-by-side.

“Today I will be asking President Abbas how we can support him and the Palestinian Authority in making that hope a reality.

“Ireland knows how important it is for a country to take its place on the global stage.”

Also on Tuesday, following the official opening of the United Nations General Assembly, the Taoiseach will hold bilateral meetings with King Abdullah of Jordan and the secretary-general of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres.

Labour Conference 2024

Miliband pledges to lift one million renters out of fuel poverty


Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero Ed Miliband speaks during the Labour Party Conference at the Liverpool Arena, September 23, 2024

MORNONG STAR
Monday, September 23, 2024

ED MILIBAND pledged to lift one million renters out of fuel poverty at the Labour Party conference yesterday.

The Energy Secretary said that “we all know that the poorest people in our country often live in cold, drafty homes,” calling it a “Tory legacy.”

He vowed to “end this injustice” and lift one million out of fuel poverty, boosting the minimum energy efficiency standard of all rented homes.

Currently, private homes can be rented out if they have energy performance certificate E, while social homes have no minimum standards.

Under the plans, both will need to meet a minimum rating of C by 2030.

While welcoming the news, Simon Francis from End Fuel Poverty Coalition warned that the government “shouldn’t drag its heels with more consultations.

“There is no time to waste as improvements will take months or years to be felt by tenants and the longer it takes, the more support households will need to stay warm in the winter.”

He called on the government to revoke cuts to the winter fuel payment and commit to more support for vulnerable households.

Mr Miliband also pledged to deliver “clean power” by 2030 through onshore wind, solar power, offshore wind, nuclear, tidal, hydrogen, and carbon capture.

Ahead of his speech, climate activists protested outside the conference demanding no new subsidies for the wood-burning Drax power station.

Katy Brown, from campaign group Biofuelwatch, said: “There’s no point in us saying, come 2030, we’re nearly at net zero on paper, but actually, the temperature has gone up by another degree because Drax is continuing to pump millions of tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

“They need to do their homework before putting investments down blind alleys, dangerous distractions, that are in some cases, going to make the climate crisis worse.”

Labour MP urges pro-Palestine protesters to keep marching as battle intensifies

Bell Ribeiro-Addy was speaking during a fringe event at the Labour conference in Liverpool.


A demonstration for Gaza (Jeff Moore/PA)

PA Wire

Rhiannon Jame

A Labour MP has urged pro-Palestine protesters to continue marching, as she was heckled at the Labour conference.

Bell Ribeiro-Addy told a fringe event called Justice for Palestine that “the conflict is intensifying, so our political lobbying must intensify as a result

During her speech in Liverpool, a heckler called on the MP for Clapham and Brixton Hill to resign from Labour, before accusing the party of being “racist”.

All the marches and the lobbying must continue, all the local meetings must continue, so must the letter writing, take to your local radio station phone-in, write to your local newspaper, canvas outside your local supermarket on a Saturday morning

Bell Ribeiro-Addy

On Monday, Ms Ribeiro-Addy said: “We represent the majority, both the global majority, and the clear majority in this country – the question is how to turn that majority into action and into a change of policy.

“The conflict is intensifying, so our political lobbying must intensify as a result.

“All the marches and the lobbying must continue, all the local meetings must continue, so must the letter writing, take to your local radio station phone-in, write to your local newspaper, canvas outside your local supermarket on a Saturday morning.”

Intervening, the heckler shouted: “And resign from the Labour Party, resign.”

This was met with shouts of “shut up” and “nonsense” from other members of the audience.

Ms Riberio-Addy continued: “Horrific things have been happening since 1948, and unfortunately even this phase of the conflict looks like it will be a prolonged one. So we have to be prepared for both an intense struggle and a prolonged one.”

Bell Ribeiro-Addy (BBC/PA)PA Media

Later in the session, the heckler shouted: “The Labour Party is a racist party.”

Speakers at the event also called on the Labour Government to do more to protect Palestinians and ban arms sales to Israel.

Sara Husseini, director of the British Palestinian Committee, said: “If you think about what it means to continue to supply arms to Israel … last week the Gaza Ministry of Health published a list of all the Palestinian bodies, the people that had been killed that they’ve managed so far to identify – only the ones they’ve managed to identify.

“The first 14 pages were babies under the age of one.

“So a partial suspension is absolutely inadequate, it’s inconsistent with international law, and it really confirms the Government and the UK’s repeated failures to fulfil basic obligation of international law.”

Ben Jamal, director of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, said: “A Labour Government should be sanctioning Israel, not promising it an enhanced trade deal.

“A Labour Government should be imposing a two-wave arms embargo on Israel, not purchasing weapons.”