TODAY’S WEATHER

☔️ Rain in Glasgow all day, while Edinburgh gets some later in the afternoon. It’ll be dry in Aberdeen all day, as it will be in a warm London. (Here’s the UK forecast).

THE BIG STORIES
Starmer u-turns on welfare bill | Ex Dundee Principal admits incompetence | Murray “sorry” for Rangers sale

📣 Keir Starmer is offering “massive concessions” on the welfare bill to his rebellious backbenchers, in a move that’s likely to save the Prime Minister from a damaging Commons defeat next year. The moves are likely to cost “several billion pounds” over the next few years. (Guardian)

• Morgan McSweeney, the Prime Minister’s right hand man (branded “the real deputy PM” by today’s Mail), is in the firing line over the rebellion. Critics say he failed to spot the trouble coming, and is guilty of ignoring Labour MPs more broadly. (Guardian) (Independent) (Times £) (Mail)

• John Rental: Don’t blame McSweeney - this welfare mess is Keir Starmer’s fault (Independent)

• How “Never Here” Keir’s lack of face-time whipped up rebellion (Telegraph £)

• Sketch: Kemi Badenoch digs Starmer out of welfare abyss (Times £)

📣 The former Principal of the University of Dundee admitted he was “incompetent” in his role during a three-hour grilling by MSPs at Holyrood yesterday.

The hearing came in the wake of the University’s £35 million deficit being revealed, which is expected to lead to at least 300 jobs being cut and a multi-million pound bailout from the Scottish Government.

Responding to a damning independent report from Professor Pamela Gillies, and questions from MPSs, he denied he was a liar, a coward or a “good-time Charlie”, saying the official report into the University’s failure was wrong in its conclusions about his character. He said he would “reflect” on handing back a £150,000 payoff, under pressure from MSPs in the room, and later from First Minister John Swinney. (BBC) (Times £)

• The Scotsman runs down Gillespie’s occasionally astonishing responses to questions from MSPs. (Scotsman)

• Today’s Dundee Courier has a striking front page: a picture of Gillespie over the headline “I’m not corrupt… Just incompetent”. (Courier)

• Gillespie “struggled under questioning about both his style of leadership and his personal character, insisting the large number of accounts from those who worked closest with him were mistaken.” (Courier)

• Andrew Learmonth: “In all my years watching Holyrood debates, I’ve never seen a mauling quite like this. It's not just that the MSPs on one of Holyrood's most dysfunctional committees were well briefed and at the top of their game […] I cannot remember a witness more out of their depth and underprepared than Prof Gillespie.” (Herald)

• See the session in full (🎥 Scottish Parliament TV)

📣 Scottish industrialist Sir David Murray - most famous as the former owner of Rangers - has said sorry for selling the club to Craig Whyte, a move which ushered in a calamitous era for the club on and off the pitch. “It was a huge error of judgement in the middle of a financial crisis. Looking back, I had made a huge mistake,” he says.

Murray has his memoirs coming out, serialised in the Daily Record, in which he also talks about his early life and losing his legs in a car crash. (Daily Record)

FROM THE NEWS MAGAZINES
Why it’s all going wrong for Starmer (and Badenoch)… and the brutal way Wimbledon grows the perfect lawn

🗣️ In The New Statesman, Andrew Marr is on edge, and he’d like us all to be too. That’s the only way to explain what follows: a great tumbling-out of angst about the state of the Labour government, the transatlantic relationship, Iran, Keir Starmer’s relationship with his backbenches, grooming gangs, winter fuel payments, oil and gas in the North Sea, Nigel Farage chuckling metaphorically, nuclear bombs and the very future of social democracy.

His thesis is - broadly - it’s all going to hell in a handcart tout suite, and the only way to end it might be to sack Rachel Reeves.

And yet… for all that it appears quite mad, Marr’s cover story does represent a despair in Westminster, and a genuine concern this Government is in deep, deep trouble. Moreover, he’s taxed by the prospect of what might follow. He quotes Nigel Farage: “I’m the moderate. If I don’t succeed, watch what comes after me”.

Marr fears “the next revolution” will be around “borders and race”.

“Liberal Britain hasn’t gone under quite yet,” he writes. “Cabinet ministers have been shown polling that suggests that the higher the stakes, the less voters are likely to trust Reform. But this is a genuinely perilous moment for social democracy. I hope it’s not too much for the struggling government we have, but I worry.”

Indeed. (The New Statesman £)

🗣️The Economist’s Bagehot’s column says the origins of Labour’s feral turn began with its electoral success last summer - after all, there are a lot of backbench MPs, worsening career prospects. Moreover, it says, “Skim the cvs of Labour’s rebellious MPs and you find a collection of do-gooders. It is a party of Oxfam veterans and youth club workers; highly educated and highly ambitious. They are not rabid leftists. But nor are they people who entered politics to cut benefits for the disabled. (The Economist £)

🗣️Tim Shipman’s verdict on Kemi Badenoch in the Spectator is straightforward, and was written before her blunder on Starmer’s attendance at global summits. She’s doing a terrible job - so bad, indeed, that one Conservative peer says: “She’d be an amazing thinktank director”.

Robert Jenrick is gaining “unlikely support as Badenoch’s replacement” as he pushes out a series of engaging social media posts on policy. And Boris Johnson - yes, he - appears to be waiting in the wings, too. (The Spectator £)

🗣️The Economist also goes deep on… lawns. Ahead of Wimbledon fortnight, it looks at how The All England Club manages to come up with such perfect grass for the tournament: it’s just as laser-guided and robotic as you might expect, these days, but also involves a brutal steaming, once the tournament is finished, to kill off every last blade. It’s quite a contrast to the modish rewilding of many public lawns. (The Economist £)

AROUND SCOTLAND

📣 A £35 million revamp of George Street in Edinburgh has been approved by councillors… but there’s no money in place to pay for it. The council plans to use external funding, including the city’s new visitor levy, which is scheduled to take effect next year, and contributions from developers. (Scotsman)

• Critics have said the new designs would reinforce perceptions of Edinburgh having an “anti-car” agenda. (The Times £)

📣 Former MSP Tommy Sheridan has lost his legal challenge to overturn Glasgow City Council’s decision not to employ him as a social worker. (BBC)

📣 The vast and largely empty site of Ravenscraig steelworks could become home to the UK’s largest data centre and battery storage facility, under plans being put forward by a renewable energy developer. (The Scotsman)

AROUND THE UK & WORLD

📣 Police investigating the Post Office scandal have identified seven suspects and more than 45 “persons of interest”. (Sky News)

📣 Iran’s supreme leader has claimed the US “gained no achievements” from its strikes on nuclear facilities last weekend. (BBC)

• US and European intelligence agencies disagreed on the impact of the strikes. (Semafor)

• There’s been a wave of arrests and executions across Iran (BBC)

📣 An Israeli strike at a Gaza market has killed 18 Palestinians, according to multiple sources. (BBC)

📣 The “Twitter killer” who murdered and dismembered nine people in Japan has been executed. (Guardian)

📣 As a starry guest list descends on Venice for the wedding of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and journalist Lauren Sánchez, there are protests from locals and climate activists over the lavish event and climate threat to the city. AP runs the rule on what’s happening, where: estimates on the cost are currently at $56 million. (AP) (📸 Photos from city)

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⚽️ Transfer speculation swirls today: our friends at The Scottish Football Kick-Off (above) are the specialists in it all, so do check them out. But highlights include:

• Swedish attacker Benjamin Nygren has landed in Scotland, ready to complete a £1.7 million move to Celtic. (The Sun)

• PSV Eindhoven’s Luuk de Jong is “open” to a move to Rangers as the 34-year-old’s contract comes to an end. (Daily Record)

• Could former Celtic hero Kyogo Furuhashi be another returnee to Celtic Park? He’s had a terrible time in France. (Daily Record)

🏉 Five Scots have been selected for the British and Irish Lions’ first game in Australia, with Glasgow centre Huw Jones making his debut. They play tomorrow (11am, Sky Sports) against Western Force, in Perth. (The Offside Line)