Restaurants and pubs such as Nando’s and Fuller’s will create placements for 18- to 24-year-olds under DWP-backed scheme

Bars, clubs and restaurants will offer up to 100,000 jobs to young people not in employment, education or training (Neet) over the next three years in an effort to give them a first step on the ladder into work.

The move comes before the publication of a report on Neets by the former health secretary Alan Milburn, who has warned that the number of young people not in work or education in the UK could rise to 1.25 million over the next five years unless ministers intervene.

Treasury spokesperson Charlie Maynard reportedly resigned in attempt to unseat leader as party slips in polls

Ed Davey is facing a growing revolt against his leadership of the Liberal Democrats, after the resignation of a senior frontbench figure on Friday.

Charlie Maynard, the Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesperson, has resigned in an attempt to unseat Davey after months of frustration over concerns that the party is failing to cut through with voters, the Guardian understands.

Pressure is building on the party leader after byelection defeat, a damaging row over Zionism and polls that show him less popular than Nigel Farage

When Zack Polanski addressed his campaigners flush with victory after the Gorton and Denton byelection in February, he declared: “Labour’s electoral stranglehold is over.” The election of Hannah Spencer as the new Green MP for the Greater Manchester seat was a seismic victory, he continued: “I said we were here to replace Labour and this is what replacing looks like.”

But in the wake of Polanski’s defeat in the Holborn and St Pancras byelection on Thursday, and a calamitous row over the party’s stance on Zionism, the debate around what, or who, could be replaced has shifted to Polanski himself.

While the Labour and Conservative leaders will be delighted with their showing, Nigel Farage, Ed Davey and Zack Polanski have less reason for cheer

Andy Burnham

Reminders of banished Reform UK defector were all around the Conservative party conference in Birmingham

As Kemi Badenoch basked in the applause of the Tory faithful at the close of her pivotal speech at Conservative party conference last year, one member of her shadow cabinet looked less than enthused.

Robert Jenrick, bested by Badenoch in the leadership contest a year earlier, looked on, and – as one shadow cabinet member now recalls – had to be prodded by Lord Ashcroft to applaud. “If you’re plotting against someone, then you at least pretend to like them,” they say. “The thing about Robert is he’s not even a good machiavellian.”