Rishi Sunak confirms Scotland’s gender recognition bill could be blocked by Westminster – live

Prime minister says ‘lots of people’ have concerns about the reform and it is right for the UK government to ‘have a look at it’

Rishi Sunak insisted he was taking “the right long-term decisions for the country” today as he defended his decision not to make a better pay offer to striking public sector workers.

Speaking during a visit to a homelessness shelter in London, the PM said he was “really sad” and “disappointe” about the disruption being experienced by so many people, especially at Christmas.

When it comes to the difficult question of setting public pay, the government has acted fairly and reasonably in accepting all the recommendations of the public sector pay review bodies.

What I’m trying to do is make the right long-term decisions for the country, for everybody’s benefit.

We all know the major economic challenge we all face now is inflation, it’s inflation eating into everyone’s pay packets.