{"id":439,"date":"2026-05-13T16:31:34","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T16:31:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/05\/13\/state-opening-of-parliament-2026-experts-on-plans-for-cost-of-living-eu-ties-tourist-tax-and-more\/"},"modified":"2026-05-13T16:31:34","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T16:31:34","slug":"state-opening-of-parliament-2026-experts-on-plans-for-cost-of-living-eu-ties-tourist-tax-and-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/05\/13\/state-opening-of-parliament-2026-experts-on-plans-for-cost-of-living-eu-ties-tourist-tax-and-more\/","title":{"rendered":"State opening of parliament 2026: experts on plans for cost of living, EU ties, tourist tax and more"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/span> \u00a9House of Lords\/Roger Harris<\/a>, CC BY-NC<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The government has set out its legislative agenda for the new parliamentary session in the king\u2019s speech. Our panel of experts reveals the key points.<\/em><\/p>\n

Measures to ease high living costs<\/h2>\n

Jonquil Lowe, Visiting Academic, The Open University<\/em><\/p>\n

Surveys suggest that the cost of living is still a major concern<\/a> for UK households, with energy and food prices topping the list of worries. In response, some campaigners<\/a> have called on the government to use the energy independence bill announced in the king\u2019s speech to break the link between electricity and gas prices and volatile global gas prices. And they want it to provide support, especially for low-income households, to switch away from heating homes with fossil fuels.<\/p>\n

Among other measures, the bill aims to ensure landlords upgrade their properties to reduce tenants\u2019 energy bills. These kinds of measure need to be introduced urgently if they are to save households from heftier energy bills<\/a> expected this winter.<\/p>\n

Other cost-of-living reliefs are welcome, although their impact may be small. For example, a move to \u201cstrengthen ties with Europe\u201d may ease food inflation by reducing red tape and border checks on some imported foods.<\/p>\n

The leasehold and commonhold reform bill (carried over from the previous parliamentary session) will help owners of leasehold flats and houses by capping ground rents at \u00a3250 a year, and then reducing them to a negligible amount after 40 years. Meanwhile, the social housing renewal bill aims to increase the stock of affordable social homes.<\/p>\n

A \u2018Bresignation\u2019 bill: options for UK-EU closer relationship remain limited<\/h2>\n

Miriam Sorace, Associate Professor in Comparative Politics, University of Reading<\/em><\/p>\n

The government clearly recognises that to improve the UK\u2019s economic and trade security, strengthening ties with the European Union is paramount. But public attitudes are still characterised by \u201cbresignation\u201d<\/a> rather than wholehearted \u201cbregret\u201d. <\/p>\n

While support for rejoining the EU<\/a> sits at around 55%, this obscures deep polarisation and strong conditionality. Support drops sharply in rejoining scenarios that require the UK to relinquish its previous opt\u2011outs<\/a>, notably euro adoption and participation in the Schengen agreement on free movement. These would probably be among the concessions demanded by the EU, given public opinion across member states. Support for rejoining the single market (48%) or the customs union (50%) lags behind support for rejoining the EU and remains highly polarised.<\/p>\n

The least polarising and most popular option is a broadly defined \u201ccloser relationship\u201d with the EU, supported by around 63% of the public and even attracting a sizable minority (40%) of Reform UK voters (and 56% of previous Leave voters). Yet this plea reflects a degree of wishful thinking. Given the UK\u2019s and EU\u2019s red lines, marginal adjustments to the Trade and Cooperation Agreement<\/a> are the only real options short of the various rejoin alternatives. <\/p>\n

The status quo is widely disliked (only 33% prefer the current UK-EU relationship), but there is no other politically viable alternative to tinkering around the edges. \u201cCloser relations\u201d is not a concrete policy: it\u2019s the default expression of living under sub-optimal constrained choice. In other words: \u201cbresignation\u201d. The UK is likely to remain locked into a status quo of continual negotiation with the EU for the foreseeable future, unless public opinion shifts towards accepting the significant concessions required to initiate rejoining negotiations.<\/p>\n

Tourist taxes \u2013 England plays catch-up<\/h2>\n

Rhys Ap Gwilym, Senior Lecturer in Economics at Bangor University\u2019s Business School<\/em> <\/p>\n

England is set to become the 26th country in Europe<\/a> to introduce a tourist tax. The overnight visitor levy bill, announced in the king\u2019s speech, follows recent moves in Scotland and Wales allowing local authorities to tax overnight stays.<\/p>\n

In Scotland, Edinburgh<\/a> will lead the way, adding a 5% levy to accommodation bills from July 24 this year. In Wales, Cardiff<\/a> intends to introduce charges from April 2027: \u00a31.30 per person per night in hotels and Airbnbs, and 75 pence in campsites and hostels. Such measures have proved controversial<\/a>, with strong opposition from parts of the tourism industry.<\/p>\n

The UK government has framed this as \u201cthe first step in a new era of fiscal devolution in England\u201d. In practice, it is a modest one. Revenues are likely to be small relative to existing local taxes and mayors may place greater weight on reforms to council tax caps or business rate retention.<\/p>\n

That said, international evidence<\/a> suggests well-designed tourist taxes can work. Even modest revenues can help fund destination management, ease pressures on local communities and improve the visitor experience. The detail of the legislation will ultimately determine whether England achieves these gains.<\/p>\n

Plans to make it easier to align UK law with EU agreements<\/h2>\n

Simon Usherwood, Professor of Politics & International Studies, The Open University<\/em><\/p>\n

For all the talk from Prime Minister Keir Starmer of putting the UK at \u201cthe heart of Europe\u201d, the proposed European Partnership Bill is a relatively modest and technical move. It would give the government powers to make adjustments to domestic legislation to ensure it complies with agreements being made with the EU. This would apply to those currently under negotiation (like youth mobility, food and veterinary standards, or emissions trading) or those that might be considered in future. <\/p>\n

This streamlines a process that would have been necessary in any case, and remains reliant on those EU deals actually being struck. So there\u2019s nothing particularly remarkable about the content. However, the repeated mention of \u201cwhere it benefits the national interest\u201d highlights how the government is trying to package this as something more. <\/p>\n

Decisions about when to align are necessarily attached to decisions to sign up to deals with the EU, not to whether to make the domestic adjustments (which international law would consider to be an obligation). Much like Starmer\u2019s flowery rhetoric in his speech on Monday, the substance doesn\u2019t really match up.<\/p>\n

Nationalising steel for security \u2013 but debts could burden the taxpayer<\/h2>\n

Phil Tomlinson, Professor of Industrial Strategy and Regional Development, University of Bath<\/em><\/p>\n

Plans to nationalise British Steel offer some comfort to UK steel workers in the form of preserving jobs and providing stability. More pertinently, the move represents a renewed willingness for the state to intervene in a strategically important industry facing financial difficulties, high energy costs, fierce global competition and the challenges of the green transition.<\/p>\n

Steel is a critical element in UK sectors such as car manufacturing and defence, infrastructure projects like railways, and low-carbon technologies including wind turbines. Nationalisation should offer the UK a degree of security over steel supply in an increasingly uncertain geopolitical climate<\/a>.
\nThe risk is that British Steel continues to lose out in global markets and makes substantial losses. This will impose a huge financial burden on the UK taxpayer, at a time when public finances are tight. But public ownership could align steel production with the UK\u2019s broader industrial strategy goals<\/a>, such as infrastructure development and net-zero targets. <\/p>\n

And state financing could allow for long-term investment in new electric steel furnaces and decarbonisation. In the future, the government could use other levers to ensure a market for British Steel<\/a>, such as strategies which favour UK-sourced, low-carbon steel for green infrastructure projects. <\/p>\n

Plans to clean up our rivers and seas could be watered down<\/h2>\n

Alex Ford, Professor of Biology, University of Portsmouth<\/em><\/p>\n

Water bills are rising, public anger over sewage pollution has not abated, and the government has now set out a major overhaul of water regulation in England and Wales in the king\u2019s speech.<\/p>\n

The proposed water reform bill signals a shift in emphasis. Rather than focusing solely on water companies, the legislation aims to address pollution<\/a> more broadly, including contributions from agriculture and industry. This is a welcome change. The bill also promises a more unified regulatory system to end the fragmented oversight that has characterised the sector for decades.<\/p>\n

Yet despite the language of reform, the vision looks less like a radical reset and more like a reboot of privatisation. This focus will worry campaigners, as it suggests continuity with an economic model widely blamed for under-investment, rising bills and environmental harm.<\/p>\n

Immigration bill to tighten rules on right to family life<\/h2>\n

Joelle Grogan, Senior Visiting Research Fellow, University College Dublin<\/em><\/p>\n

The government says the new immigration and asylum bill will \u201ctighten the application\u201d of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The Article 8 right to family life is inherently restricted<\/a>, and both national courts and the European Court of Human Rights generally defer to government migration policy<\/a>. So more detail of the bill in future will be welcome.<\/p>\n

The background briefing notes state that Article 8 is stopping the removal of those living illegally in the UK, saying that 86% of people from January to September 2022 who raised rights-based applications in detention were released. However, this highlights the lack of data<\/a> \u2013 both on how many removals have been stopped by the ECHR and its connection with the number of illegal arrivals. Research on available data on the ECHR and foreign national offenders indicate that numbers are very low<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The bill will define family life to ensure that it is limited to the core family unit of spouse, parents and children. But the European Court of Human Rights emphasises the \u201cdependence\u201d of one family member on another (for example by providing sole financial support) in migration cases as the trigger for Article 8. So by defining \u201cfamily unit\u201d without the condition of \u201cdependence\u201d, the government may unintentionally widen<\/a> the definition rather than narrow it.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

Simon Usherwood has received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council, as a Senior Fellow of the UK in a Changing Europe initiative.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Alex Ford has received funding from UKRI research councils, EU, charities and industrial partners including the water industry.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Joelle Grogan, Jonquil Lowe, Miriam Sorace, and Phil Tomlinson do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a9House of Lords\/Roger Harris, CC BY-NC The government has set out its legislative agenda for the new parliamentary session in the king\u2019s speech. Our panel of experts reveals the key points. Measures to ease high living costs Jonquil Lowe, Visiting Academic, The Open University Surveys suggest that the cost of living is still a major […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=439"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}