Government won’t put together ‘shopping list’ for public to stockpile for emergency – UK politics live

British Army veteran Steve Knighton holds a collection tin as British prime minister Andy Burnham makes a donation to the Poppy Appeal on 22 October. Photograph: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images Andy Burnham has been meeting armed forces veterans and Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal collectors to mark the start of the year’s campaign. Burnham welcomed them to Number 10 North’s office in central Manchester, contrary to the usual convention of making a donation to the cause on the steps of Number 10 in Downing Street.

Good morning from London, where we’re less than a week from Andy Burnham and John Healey’s first budget, and the Government has been telling people to build up 72 hours of supplies in case of a disaster. We’ll be bringing you updates throughout the day. I’m Harry Taylor.

The Government has said that will not be putting together a “shopping list” for the public to buy in anticipation of a disaster, despite launching a campaign on Thursday which told people to stock up on supplies. Treasury minister James Murray has been on the broadcast round this morning where has been asked about the announcement yesterday that people should assemble three days of supplies. It’s come after repeated warnings in the last 18 months about cyber-attacks from overseas that could affect key systems.

It’s also timely as 32 Government services were taken offline yesterday after millions of attempts to exploit a weakness in numerous’ websites coding. However Murray told Times Radio this morning: “This is not about the Government sending out a shopping list to everyone in the country. “This is about putting the right information there on the government website, having an information campaign so that people are aware about it and then people taking the right choices for themselves about what they need to make sure they have supplies of at home.” Meanwhile it’s five days until Healey’s budget, and Murray was asked on BBC Radio 4 whether he would be reducing red tape for business.

He said cutting “pointless bureaucracy” was “at the heart of what the Chancellor is going to be thinking about”. Healey said the Treasury would aim to cut £800m of red tape for businesses at the budget, including reduced reporting requirements.

Source: The Guardian