5 important things happening in the UK today

Here are 5 important things happening in the UK today – 5 August 2025.

The prison system was days from collapse three times under Sunak: The criminal justice system was within days of collapse on three occasions before being bailed out by “last-minute emergency measures”, an independent review by a former prisons watchdog has found. Dame Anne Owers said the prison system, under pressure from overcrowding, was “in crisis” between autumn 2023 and the summer of 2024, but No 10 under Rishi Sunak refused to cut the numbers in jail until “the next predictable cliff edge”. [Guardian]
UK to detain small-boat migrants within days to return to France: The UK government said it would begin detaining small-boat migrants “within days” to be sent back to France, as the two countries prepared to formalise a “one in, one out” treaty on Tuesday. Prime Minister Keir Starmer reached an agreement with France’s premier Emmanuel Macron last month to send an unspecified number of migrants crossing the English Channel on illegal small boats back to France, in return for accepting the same number of migrants from France who haven’t already tried to make the crossing. [Bloomberg]
UK is being left behind on crypto, warns former Chancellor: Former chancellor George Osborne has launched a withering attack on the Labour government’s approach to cryptocurrency, warning that Britain risks becoming irrelevant in a revolution “reminiscent of Nigel Lawson’s Big Bang in the 1980s”. Osborne, now a member of the global advisory council of US crypto-exchange Coinbase, said Chancellor Rachel Reeves and Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey were leaving Britain in the slow lane. [Financial Times]
£100 million of premium bond prizes remain unclaimed: More than £100 million of premium bond prizes remain unclaimed amid criticism that the government-owned bank, which operates the savings scheme, is not doing enough to find the winners. Among the 2.5 million unclaimed prizes are 11 winners of £100,000 – the second-largest prize available. [BBC]