These are the latest developments in the battle to keep UK governments down

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These are the latest developments in the battle to keep UK governments down

Since the end of World War II, the UK governments have generally been brought down by economic crises 1970, 1974, 1979, 2010 or sleaze ethics crises in 1964, 1997. The current Conservative government is on course to fail on both.

Ambulance staff are on strike again due to pay. The Conservative party chair, Nadhim Zahawi, is under pressure to resign due to revelations that he paid a penalty to settle a tax dispute while he was in cabinet.

Here is my colleague Peter Walker's overnight night story about the pressure he is facing.

Here is an explanation from my colleague Archie Bland.

This is from Archie's daily First Edition briefing. Here are the developments on this story this morning.

I think that Zahawi is in serious trouble. You can't be a Conservative party chairman and not go out and face the media. He is going to have to go out and have a very difficult interview at some point. At the moment, the problem is that it doesn't add up. Why did you take the job as chancellor when you were clearly in dispute with the HMRC? He has yet to come out with an answer that is satisfying or feels comfortable on that point. It is dealing with sums of money that are astronomical for the average voter and it feels deeply uncomfortable. And I suspect that the prime minister's questions this week are very awkward for Rishi Sunak but also the first time that Nadhim Zahawi has to face the media is going to be incredibly awkward. I think he is hanging on by a thread at the moment.

Here is the agenda for the day.

Morning: Rishi Sunak is expected to record a pooled TV interview while on a health visit.

3 pm: Bertie Ahern, the former taoiseach Irish PM, gives evidence to the Commons Northern Ireland affairs committee on the institutions created by the Good Friday agreement.

4 pm: Dehenna Davison, the levelling up minister, gives evidence to the levelling up committee on levelling up funding.

4 pm : Sarah Healey, permanent secretary, at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, gives evidence to the Commons public accounts committee.

I will try to monitor the comments below the BTL line, but it is impossible to read all of them. If you have a direct question, include Andrew somewhere and I'm more likely to find it. I do try to answer questions, but if they are of general interest, I will post the question and reply above the line ATL, although I can't promise to do this for everyone.

If you want to draw my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter.