The question is not simply how much we spend on defence, but what we understand defence and security to mean, says SIMON BRIGNELL
FLINT-FACED Keir Starmer with his Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall proclaimed in the Commons this week how they will cut benefits that help disabled people live in dignity.
Down the corridor and up the stairs sits a committee considering Kim Leadbeater’s assisted dying Bill. Its handpicked majority has seized upon people’s fears of living out their last time, alone and lacking human dignity, in order to ram through ill-considered and fatally flawed legislation.
Fear of being unable to clean yourself is cited as reason for an assisted death, while the government sees it as no reason to provide the social care that can give people a good quality of life.
The government’s Pip review looks like a carefully managed exercise in legitimising future cuts to disability support, argues Dr DYLAN MURPHY
Evidence to peers from medical leaders, patient safety officials and the children’s commissioner has intensified fears that the Bill’s safeguards are inadequate, writes ADAM JAMES POLLOCK



