The Liberal Democrats say they would pay cash rewards of up to £5,000 for tip-offs that lead to successful prosecutions of criminals illegally dumping waste.

The party says the payouts would help council enforcement officers tackle the “environmental emergency” posed by fly-tipping.

It also says it would “encourage” local authorities to charge only £5 for bulky waste collections, to incentivise households to dispose of waste responsibly.

The Lib Dems say the reduced charges could be paid for by increasing fines for fly-tippers, with the minimum sanction raised to £2,500.

The party has made tackling fly-tipping a key campaign issue ahead of local elections in England next month, arguing that tougher action is required to tackle an “epidemic” of illegal waste dumping across the country.

The number of fly-tipping incidents dealt with by local councils in England increased by 9% to 1.26m last year, according to government statistics, with the cost of large-scale clear-ups standing at £19.3m.

The Environment Agency, which is responsible for dealing with the largest and most hazardous waste dumps, said it dealt with 98 incidents last year.

High-profile cases have hit the headlines in recent months, including giant 21,000 tonne waste tip in Oxfordshire that is costing taxpayers £7.3m to clear.

Under the party’s plans, people would be paid “cash rewards” of up to £5,000 for information that leads to the successful prosecution of criminals dumping waste.

A number of councils in England have introduced tip-off schemes, although the rewards are much lower than those being proposed by the Lib Dems.

Labour-run Merton council in London pays residents £100 for witness reports that result in a fine, rising to £200 if a case proceeds to court. Conservative-run East Hampshire District Council offers rewards of up to £500.

Labour-run Greenwich offers £100 on a prepaid card for photos or video footage of suspected fly-tippers, dubbed “People of Binterest” by the council.

The Lib Dems say they would encourage local authorities to set bulky waste collection fees at £5, which it said would reduce fly-tipping by lowering the costs and inconvenience of properly disposing of household waste.

Councils in England and Wales typically charge around £30 to £40 to pick up items big items, although some do collections for free.

The party also wants the National Crime Agency to take over the most serious incidents from the Environment Agency, and would set the minimum fine at £2,500, five times the current average of £539.

The Labour government recently announced it would give councils new powers to force fly tippers to clean up waste they have dumped, and would give the Environment Agency police-style powers to investigate major waste sites.

The Conservatives say they want harsher penalties for fly-tippers, and have pushed for offenders to face points on their driving licence – something Labour ministers say they are now considering.

Reform UK councillors have promised urgent clear-ups of illegally dumped waste, CCTV in fly-tipping hot spots, and heavy penalties for offenders.

The Green Party of England and Wales says it wants to make waste disposal more accessible for people, with leader Zack Polanksi arguing “decades of austerity” has left residents without suitable ways to dispose of waste.

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People in the UK could face higher energy, food, and flight ticket prices for at least eight months after the end of the US-Israel war with Iran, a senior minister has said.

Darren Jones, Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister, told the BBC the government was “looking at all of those things” as it steps up plans to offset potential food and fuel shortages caused by the war.

Energy production and transportation across the Middle East has slowed or stopped entirely due to the conflict, causing supply chain issues and price rises globally.

Earlier this month, government officials drew up a worst case scenario of food shortages by the summer, including chicken and pork, should the war continue.

The government has also been seeking to calm the public, urging drivers to keep filling up with petrol and using cars as usual and not to change their travel plans amid fears over potential jet fuel shortages.

Speaking on the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg, Jones said he was looking at the economic impact of the war “very closely”, but said that “price pressure” was more likely than gaps on supermarket shelves.

“Our best guess is eight plus months from the point of resolution that you’ll see economic impacts coming through the system,” he said.

“So people will see higher energy prices, food prices […] flight ticket prices as a consequence of what Donald Trump has done in the Middle East.”

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer will chair another meeting of a Cabinet committee on Tuesday set up to deal with any shortfalls, while a group of ministers is meeting twice a week to monitor stock levels and any disruptions to the supply chain.

Twice weekly meetings of the contingency planning group of ministers are being led by Jones.

He has previously said:”This is not our war. The government made the right call to stay out of the conflict and only take defensive action to protect Britain’s interests.

“We’re acting now to prepare for, and mitigate where possible, the impact on our economy and domestic security as a result of the conflict.”

Last week, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) predicted the energy shock from the war would hit the UK the hardest of the world’s advanced economies, and cut its estimate for UK growth this year from to 0.8% from its previous prediction of 1.3%.

Jones has previously said that while the government would do everything in its power to find a permanent solution to the crisis and offset its impact, “what happens abroad will still affect us here at home”.

A government source previously told the BBC it was planning for a scenario which would involve breakdowns in the supply of carbon dioxide (CO2), which is used in the slaughter of some animals and in food preservation, should the strait remain closed.

The government has provided funding to reactivate the Ensus bioethanol plant, which makes CO2 as a by-product, in order to shore up supplies of the gas.

A spokesperson for the plant told the BBC they were “confident we can continue to produce CO2 for the country’s needs for the foreseeable future”.

Jones told the BBC on Sunday he had raised the issue of UK pubs potentially running out of draught beer during the Men’s Football World Cup in the summer due to a shortage of CO2.

“We are doing everything we can to make sure that is not the case,” he said.

The majority of the UK’s CO2 is imported from Europe but it is often produced as a by-product when companies make fertiliser, which needs natural gas.

Supermarkets have said they are working with the government to help plan for a worst-case scenario.

And, last month, the National Farmers’ Union said cucumber and tomato prices could rise over the next six weeks, with the cost of other crops and milk increasing in the next three to six months.

UK airlines have insisted they are “not currently seeing a shortage of jet fuel” as they buy it in advance and airports maintain stocks.

The Liberal Democrats have urged the government to include a bill in the next King’s Speech which puts food security at the top of the government’s agenda.

The party’s Cabinet Office spokeswoman Lisa Smart said “the government also needs to wake up and provide more support to people who simply cannot afford the sky-high cost of getting around”.

She added that the Lib Dems have proposed a 10p cut on fuel duty as well as reducing public transport costs.

Iran’s top negotiator said earlier this week that reopening the Strait of Hormuz was “impossible” if the US continues its naval blockade of Iranian ports.

US President Donald Trump hopes to put pressure on Iran by targeting two economic drivers – the tolls the country was demanding ships pay to pass through the Strait of Hormuz, and Iran’s oil revenue.

Iran has responded by calling the blockade “piracy”. Negotiators from the country were in Islamabad, Pakistan, on Saturday for talks on ending the conflict.

King Charles III’s state visit to the US will have “appropriate security in place in relation to the risk”, a minister told the BBC after shots were fired at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in Washington.

Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister Darren Jones said the government and Buckingham Palace had been in “close co-operation” with US officials before the trip, which begins on Monday.

“Further discussions will be taking place today ahead of next week,” Jones told BBC One’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme.

US President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump were evacuated from the dinner in Washington DC on Saturday night after a man rushed past a checkpoint and shots were fired.

Speaking later on the same programme as Jones, shadow home secretary Chris Philp said it was “vital” to ensure the King is properly protected and urged US and UK teams to review the monarch’s security overnight.

He said security arrangements on such visits were ordinarily very tight but they should be reviewed afresh “to make sure there are no loopholes at all”.

But Philp said the trip should “absolutely go ahead” as violence should not be allowed to stop diplomatic relations and politics from continuing as normal.

Videos from the event at showed US Vice-President JD Vance and Trump being evacuated off the stage by armed officers.

Trump later told reporters that one Secret Service agent was shot at very close range, but was saved by his bullet-proof vest.

The Secret Service, which protects the president and other key officials, confirmed no one else had been injured and said one person had been taken into custody.

The 31-year-old suspect is from Torrance in the Los Angeles region, California, police said.

Sir Keir Starmer wrote on X that he was shocked by the incident said it was a relief everyone attending the event, including Trump and the first lady Melania, was safe.

“Any attack on democratic institutions or on the freedom of the press must be condemned in the strongest possible terms” the prime minister added.

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey likewise condemned the “really shocking scenes”.

He wrote on X: “Political violence is wrong. We must all condemn this attack and be thankful no lives were lost.”

King Charles III and Queen Camilla will be hosted by the president on the four-day trip – the first UK state visit to the US since Elizabeth II’s in 2007.

The King is expected to address both houses of Congress, visit the 9/11 memorial in New York, and attend a wreath laying to honour fallen US and UK soldiers in Virginia.

Broadcaster and historian Jonathan Dimbleby, who is a close friend of the King, told the BBC the trip should be postponed because of the “uncertainty of the president” – whom he said had “systematically mocked” the UK.

“Sound judgement is to deploy that asset, that soft power, at the right time,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Broadcasting House. “I think this is not the right time.”

“The problem is the uncertainty of the president… he will be very effusive about the King, the Royal Family, as he always is, one day. Next day, he rubbishes the prime minister, he goes back again into the feebleness, as he sees it, of the British Navy.”

Prime Minister Sir Keir Stamer has insisted the “vast majority” of Labour MPs support him and want him to continue doing his job as prime minister.

He was speaking to the Sunday Times at the end of a week in which speculation has grown that the possibility of him facing a challenge to his leadership from within his own party was rising.

Sir Keir told the paper “in politics, you get this sort of thing all of the time, there is always talk”.

Conservative shadow home secretary Chris Philp said the prime minister should resign over his decision to appoint Lord Mandelson as the UK’s ambassador to the US, adding that if he didn’t step down Labour MPs should “develop a backbone and get rid of him”.

Speaking to the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme, Philp said some ministers were “equivocating” over Sir Keir’s future and a couple of MPs were publicly calling on him to go.

He said it was in “the national interest” for MPs to remove the prime minister.

In his interview with the Sunday Times, Sir Keir said “what you never hear from are all the people who are supportive, loyal and just want to get on with the job. And that is the vast majority of people in the Parliamentary Labour Party.”

“They’re pleased to be in power,” said Sir Keir, speaking about what he said was most Labour MPs.

“They’ve waited a long time to be in power. And they just want to get on with their job. They don’t make a lot of noise about it. They don’t talk to journalists about it. It’s really important that is reflected in these debates.”

The prime minister has faced calls from across opposition parties to resign, and criticism from within his own party, after it emerged that UK security officials had flagged concerns about giving vetting clearance to Lord Mandelson.

Sir Keir told MPs this week that the security officials had recommended against vetting approval being granted but that had not been passed on to him.

Speaking to the Sunday Times he said he did not regret his decision last week to sack the most senior civil servant in the Foreign Office, Sir Olly Robbins, who had not informed him about the security vetting concerns.

“When there’s a double red flag not to give clearance and [showing] high concern, then I’m sorry. I’m sorry. But I do not accept the argument that that is something which should not be told to the prime minister,” Sir Keir said.

Sir Olly Robbins told MPs this week that he had not been told that there was a recommendation to deny Lord Mandelson security clearance, only that officials were “leaning against” it. Sir Olly decided to approve the vetting subject to mitigation being put in place.

Sir Keir dismissed the suggestion he should have done more to inquire about the outcome of Lord Mandelson’s vetting process.

“When I’m told there’s security clearance, should I go back and quiz officials and say, ‘Are you telling me the truth?'”

“If I questioned every bit of information put in front of me I would never get anything done. The number of decisions that have to be made each day is huge.”

The prime minister told the paper he wanted to focus on the wars in Ukraine and Iran rather than speculation about possible challenges to his leadership, as the implications for the UK of those conflicts was the most important issue facing the country.

“This is the urgent issue of our time,” Sir Keir told the paper, “this is going to reshape our country.”

“The conflict with Iran has not just been fought out in Iran. There are increasingly the use of proxies in this country. Of course there’s lots of discussion in parliament about who’s up, who’s down and all the rest of it. But this is the serious work of being the prime minister.”

Darren Jones, the chief secretary to the prime minister, told the BBC the government had “nothing to hide” over the appointment of Lord Mandelson and added it was “frustrating that so much time is being spent on this”.

He said the upcoming elections in May were “going to be difficult” for Labour and that the “latest round of issues has made this slightly harder”.

However, he said that, during his time campaigning, “not one person” had raised the subject of Lord Mandelson.

A key figure in the row over Lord Mandelson’s vetting will not appear before a parliamentary committee of MPs to give evidence.

The Foreign Affairs Committee had asked the Foreign Office if Ian Collard, a civil servant who ran the security team within the department, could attend next week.

But the committee’s chair Dame Emily Thornberry said the department made the “decision to decline” the request and Collard will only be giving evidence in writing.

She added, on X: “To be clear, I am satisfied by the reasons behind Ian Collard not giving oral evidence.

“If we have further questions, we will consider at that point whether we need to ask him to give evidence orally, or whether a further written statement is sufficient”.

Collard was the official who briefed the then-Foreign Office boss Sir Olly Robbins about UK Security Vetting’s (UKSV) recommendation not to give clearance to Mandelson.

Sir Olly was sacked last week after it emerged that he had granted clearance against the recommendation and had not informed No 10.

The government says UKSV gave an explicit recommendation to the Foreign Office not to approve vetting for Lord Mandelson ahead of his confirmation as ambassador to the US.

But speaking to MPs on Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee this week, Sir Olly said he had never seen that explicit recommendation and only received a verbal briefing which described UKSV’s view as “borderline” and “leaning towards recommending that clearance be denied”.

The government is investigating whether Sir Olly was given the correct information before he approved security clearance for the peer.

Sir Adrian Fulford, a retired judge, is conducting a review into the process and it is understood he will look at whether the briefing given by Collard correctly summed up the vetting team’s view.

That information could be crucial to determine whether Sir Keir Starmer was right to sack Sir Olly last week.

In a letter to the interim Foreign Office boss, Dame Emily set out some questions for Collard to answer in writing, including: “How often did his team make a different recommendation on vetting to that contained in the UKSV report?”

The Foreign Office has not commented on Collard not appearing in front of the committee.

Sir Keir’s former chief of staff Morgan McSweeney will give evidence to the committee on Tuesday.

McSweeney, who advised the prime minister to appoint Lord Mandelson as the UK’s ambassador to the US, is likely to face questions about whether he put pressure on civil servants to speed up the vetting.

It comes after Sir Olly accused No 10 of a “dismissive” attitude towards the process – a claim Downing Street has denied.

The row over Lord Mandelson’s vetting has reignited questions among Labour MPs about Sir Keir’s judgement and leadership.

In an interview with the Sunday Times, Sir Keir said Sir Olly faced only the “everyday pressure of government” during the process.

“There are different types of pressure,” he said. “There’s pressure, ‘Can we get this done quickly,’ which is not an unusual pressure.”

And asked whether he regretted sacking Sir Olly so quickly, Sir Keir said: “I do not accept the argument that that is something which should not be told to the prime minister.”