Lisa Nandy defends Yvette Cooper’s decision to order urgent review following pressure driven by Elon Musk

Lisa Nandy has claimed “we’re not a government that governs by social media” despite it appearing that home secretary Yvette Cooper yesterday announced an urgent national review of the scale of grooming gangs after pressure on internet platforms driven by US-based tech billionaire Elon Musk.

Speaking on BBC Breakfast, the culture secretary said:

We’re not a government that governs by social media. We govern for the real world.

Victims have been warning over and over again, telling the same story about the systems that were supposed to protect them, protecting themselves, and young women who weren’t believed because they were young, they were female, and they were working-class.

Culture secretary Lisa Nandy has defended the government decision to call a three-month review into what was known about the scale and extent of grooming and rape gangs, and said “We’re not a government that governs by social media”

On the BBC’s Political Thinking with Nick Robinson podcast the chancellor Rachel Reeves has said she is not going to let her critics get her down

Opposition Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch, who has criticised the Labour government decision to remove the winter fuel payment in favour of a means-tested benefit, has said the Tories will consider means testing the triple-lock on pensions

Retailers in Great Britain experienced a surprise fall in sales last month, as supermarkets and food stores had their worst Christmas since 2013, according to official figures