A Tory mayor has revived plans to hand tax rebates to residents in his region after talks with Treasury officials convinced him the scheme could be possible under Labour’s devolution plans.
The proposal was initially dismissed by Louise Haigh, the Cabinet Office minister responsible for devolution, who said in July that the scheme was “certainly” not possible with current HMRC limitations.
But Ben Houchen, the Conservative Mayor of Tees Valley, says he now believes mayors could have the power to introduce tax rebates under plans to give England’s regions greater control over taxation.
British rapper Yung Filly to face retrial on rape charges in Australia
The rapper and YouTuber who appeared on Celebrity Bake Off will face a retrial after a jury could not reach a verdict during trial.
Yung Filly denied all charges
The Colombian-born rapper, whose real name is Andrés Felipe Valencia Barrientos, was charged with raping and assaulting a 20-year-old fan after his show in Perth 2024. He denied all 10 charges and a jury last month found him not guilty of three charges of rape.
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He was accused of raping a fan
Barrientos was accused of having consensual sex with her until he turned violent and didn’t stop when asked. His lawyer said the evidence was full of “inconsistencies, embellishments and outright lies”.
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Jurors unable to reach verdict
- Last month, a jury found him not guilty on three counts of rape.
- He was cleared of one assault charge and another of strangulation.
- But he was found guilty of two counts of assault. Jurors were unable to make a decision on three counts of sexual penetration without consent.
Could El Niño make next year even hotter?
The naturally occurring phenomenon known as El Niño, which can drive up global temperatures and is brewing in the Pacific, could be the strongest in living memory, the Met Office has warned.
What is El Niño?
It is a climate phenomenon which occurs in the Pacific Ocean every two to seven years.
Normally, trade winds blow east to west across the equator – during and El Niño period, these weaken or reverse.
This pushes up global temperatures as warmth is taken from the ocean into the atmosphere.
El Niño’s impact has already been seen
It has already started to affect weather systems in other parts of the world, with below-average monsoons in India and suppressed hurricane activity in the Atlantic Ocean. In the UK, El Niño is usually felt later in winter.
A particularly strong El Niño coupled with global warming has left scientists worried that 2027 could be even warmer.
El Niño is strongest in living memory
We should be clear that this is an unprecedented event. I have never seen an El Niño signal this intense in our forecasts.
Professor Adam Scaife, head of
long-range forecasting, the Met Office
Risk of most intense El Niño in 1,000 years
- El Niño is declared when the sea temperature in the tropical eastern Pacific rises 0.5 °C above the long-term average.
- But currently it’s over 2°C and could reach 3°C later this year.
- Some have suggested it could go above 4°C – meaning it would be the strongest El Nino in the last 500-1,000 years.
Next year could be hottest ever
The precise effect El Niño has on global weather can be unpredictable. But Met Office climate scientist Dr Nick Dunstone told the BBC average global temperatures could rise next year. This would make 2027 the hottest year on record, after 2024.
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Why children’s eyesight is getting worse – and what parents can do about it
More and more children are becoming
short-sighted, but scientists have discovered it can be reversed through behaviour change.
Rates of short-sightedness are rising across the world – and we now know why
- In the UK, short-sightedness is rising at a rate of 0.7 per cent per year.
- This means that by 2050 about four in 10 British children will be short-sighted and need glasses.
- But contrary to old myths, we are not (exactly) becoming more short-sighted because of too much screentime.
Short-sightedness is linked to the outdoors
Large research studies have found a lack of time outside causes short-sightedness. This could be because children are simply not using their long-distance vision as their eyeballs develop.
The other theory scientists are considering is that our eyes need the brighter light that we are exposed to outdoors to develop properly.
How to combat
short-sightedness
- Randomised trials suggest more outdoor time reduced the development of new short-sightedness.
- For children who were already
short-sighted, using eyedrops with atropine every night until age 16 helped reduce the degree of
short-sightedness. Specialised glasses can also help.
World’s oldest person celebrates 117th birthday
Ethel Caterham, is celebrating her 117th birthday, after a year of “many firsts” in which she held hands with the King and stroked a llama.
A meeting with the King
Caterham became the oldest living person in the world after the death of Brazilian nun Sister Inah Canabarro Lucas in April 2025.
- She was visited by King Charles in September last year and during the meeting, she recollected his 1969 investiture as the Prince of Wales, saying: “All the girls were in love with you and wanted to marry you.”
A wonderful life
Caterham was born on 21 August, 1909 in Shipton Bellinger, Hampshire and is the last surviving subject of Edward VII, who died in May 1910.
In 1927, she travelled to India, working as an au pair to a military family for around three years.
She met her husband Norman, a lieutenant colonel in the British army, in 1931 and later raised two daughters, both of whom have since died.
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How beavers kept fields green despite summer of drought
A new scheme to restore a river to its natural state and reintroduce beavers to create wetlands has shown how landscapes can become more resilient to drought, the National Trust has said.
How beavers helped
Twenty five wild beavers now live across the river catchment and have created wetlands and ponds that hold water in the landscape to protect against flooding.
A beaver and wetland project officer, a ranger and local volunteers monitor the beavers and provide information to those who have concerns about their impact.
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Local farmers have benefited from resilient wetland grazing habitats, with foliage, shade and water helping livestock to cope in the heat.
Wildlife such as water voles, trout and grass snakes are thriving and new species including green sandpiper, common crane and white stork have appeared.
The UK’s longest river could soon run dry. Why this could have been avoided
The River Severn and the reservoir feeding it are running low after this summer’s hot weather, posing a risk to wildlife.
Snake believed to be first in the world to benefit from human cancer treatment
A 40kg python at Chester Zoo is believed to have become the first snake in the world to benefit from a cancer treatment normally used on humans.
What you need to know
The 15ft reticulated python, which is named after Jodie Foster, underwent surgery in 2024 to remove a malignant tumour.
However, last year, the growth returned, and vets put her under the knife, removing the tumour and part of her jawbone before administering electrochemotherapy to target any remaining cancerous cells.
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A successful surgery
- Vets conducted a final check this week and found no signs of the cancer returning.
- The tumour had stopped Jodie from eating properly but now her appetite has returned to normal.
Ian Ashpole, veterinary officer at Chester Zoo, said: “A few months ago, we genuinely didn’t know whether she’d survive. Now she’s behaving exactly as we’d hope.”
The proposal would allow Houchen to turn a slice of the Government’s devolution settlement into a direct tax giveaway – putting him on a collision course with Labour mayors who argue devolved money should be spent on public services and economic investment.
Houchen says the power will be available unless ministers specifically decide to take it away.
He told The i Paper: “We continue to explore a tax rebate scheme for residents if the Prime Minister presses ahead with fiscal devolution. Following discussions with Treasury officials, the likely structure of fiscal devolution will allow for mayor’s to create such a rebate scheme unless the Government specifically carves out the ability for mayor’s to make such decisions.”
Houchen would not say how much residents could receive, or whether a rebate would go to individuals, businesses or both.
It would likely depend on the final shape of fiscal devolution, including whether it covers income tax alone or business rates as well, and how much new money is ultimately transferred to the regions.
The idea has won support from Luke Campbell, the Reform Mayor of Hull and East Yorkshire, and Andrea Jenkyns, the Reform Mayor of Greater Lincolnshire, who are understood to be exploring similar proposals.
The Government is due to spell out the details of its fiscal devolution plans at the Budget on 28 October.
Mayors to get greater financial powers
Mayors are expected to get greater control over business rates revenue first, with income tax revenue sharing due to follow from 2028, although the precise powers and funding arrangements have yet to be set out.
However, ministers have repeatedly stressed that fiscal devolution will not give mayors the ability to create their own tax systems outside the national framework.
Burnham said the plans were not about turning mayors into “a sort of mini-chancellor of the exchequer” or allowing them to rewrite national tax policy.
This was echoed last month by Haigh, who said mayors would not be able to set their own regional or local income tax rates.
She said: “There’s not a system that would currently allow that, and they certainly wouldn’t be able to set tax rates locally or regionally, but we’ll consider what proposals are put forward.”
She was more guarded, however, when asked about the broader question of how devolved revenues could be used. “We’d have to see the details of that, but it certainly isn’t possible at the moment,” she said of Houchen’s proposed rebate.
Haigh added that such schemes would require HMRC to establish entirely new administrative systems, and that this was not currently possible.
However, Caroline Simpson, Burnham’s deputy chief of staff working from his new No 10 North operation in Manchester, appeared this week to leave some room for such flexibility.
She told : “The PM is absolutely right – there’s going to be no ability to sit outside of the tax framework at a local level. That’s not what fiscal devolution is about.
“But flexibility about how that money is spent in a local area is going to be there… the absolutely technical ‘what does that flexibility look like?’ is going to have to be worked through.”