More than 60 children have been infected by a measles outbreak in north London, it has been reported.

Seven schools and a nursery in Enfield reported the cases, with some children treated in hospital, according to the Sunday Times.

There are concerns the outbreak is linked to low levels of MMR vaccination in the capital. For every one infected person, measles can spread to up to 18 unvaccinated people.

Dudu Sher-Arami, Enfield’s director of public health who is writing to every parent in the area, said the outbreak posed a serious threat to the wider capital and there was the potential to cause a “much greater and bigger pan-London outbreak” because residents travel across the city.

She told the Sunday Times London has “one of the lowest, if not the lowest, vaccination uptake rates” in the country.

Sher-Arami said: “It is possible for it to grow. We know that measles has got some very nasty complications. It can cause deafness. It can cause brain damage and one in five children can need hospital treatment.”

Temporary vaccination clinics are being held in schools and throughout Enfield, an area in which more than a fifth of children are not inoculated against measles, mumps or rubella by the age of five.

A government campaign promoting childhood vaccination is expected to be launched next week with adverts on social media, YouTube and radio to counter vaccine scepticism. Measles usually starts with cold-like symptoms followed by a rash a few days later, according to the NHS. Some people may also get small spots in their mouths.

Last month, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the UK is no longer considered to have eliminated measles, as transmission was re-established in 2024.

It comes after a plateau in vaccination coverage and a surge in cases, with 3,681 cases recorded in the UK in 2024.

From 2021 to 2023, the UK was considered to have “eliminated” the disease.

WHO recommends at least 95% of children should receive vaccine doses for each illness to achieve herd immunity.

According to UK Health Security Agency figures 91.9% of five-year-olds had received one dose of the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine in 2024-25, unchanged from 2023-24 and the lowest level since 2010-11.

The data also showed 83.7% of five-year-olds had received both MMR doses, the lowest level since 2009-10.

Union leaders and 25 Labour MPs have urged Keir Starmer to end a “narrow, factional agenda” within the Labour party.

A letter signed by the MPs, by the leaders of several Labour-affiliated trade unions and by campaign groupings within the party, claimed the approach from the top was “increasingly unpopular with the public”.

A number of serial Labour rebel MPs are among the signatories, including Clive Lewis and Brian Leishman, as well as senior figures such as John McDonnell.

They suggested the approach by the party’s leadership could undermine the ability to win elections.

The letter comes after Starmer has faced a turbulent few weeks in his premiership, with his judgment coming into question over the decision to appoint Peter Mandelson as ambassador to Washington DC, despite his links with the child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

The prime minister’s top adviser Morgan McSweeney quit over his part in Lord Mandelson’s appointment, while Labour’s Scottish leader Anas Sarwar said Starmer should resign as a result of the scandal.

Further questions about the PM’s judgment were thrown up later in the week in a row over the appointment of his former spin doctor Matthew Doyle to the House of Lords after the aide campaigned for a sex offender.

Dubbed the Restore Labour Democracy statement, the letter hit out at the culture within Downing Street and Labour’s ruling team.

It said: “It’s increasingly clear that a narrow, factional agenda is being imposed upon the party and that this is increasingly unpopular with the public.

“This approach is wrong in principle and damaging in practice. When the Labour party sidelines its members, it weakens Labour’s roots in our communities, alienates voters and undermines Labour’s ability to win both people’s trust and elections.”

The signatories pointed to the candidate selection for the upcoming Gorton and Denton byelection, which Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham was blocked from standing in.

“Denying local members in Gorton and Denton the right to choose their candidate looks like part of a pattern, alongside the widespread barring of hard-working councillors and the withdrawal of the whip from MPs standing up for their constituents,” the letter said.

Labour MP for Leeds East, Richard Burgon, who helped to coordinate the statement, said: “Under Keir Starmer and Morgan McSweeney, there has been a clampdown on the democratic rights of Labour members.

“This has led to a small clique making out-of-touch decisions that have left the prime minister and the government deeply unpopular – from the mess over winter fuel payments to the appalling decision to make Peter Mandelson the US ambassador.

“We need an urgent end to this nasty factionalism coming from the top of the party where the views of Labour members and trade unionists are treated with contempt.

“Restoring democracy in the Labour party is essential if we are to reconnect with voters and prevent the election of a Trump-style Reform government.”

The general secretaries of Unison, Unite, the CWU, the FBU and Aslef, all Labour-affiliated unions, had signed the letter, as had the groups Campaign for Labour Party Democracy, Momentum, the Labour Muslim Network, and Labour Assembly Against Austerity.

Labour members and trade unionists will be able to add their names to the letter from 15 February.

This date has been chosen as it is the 120th anniversary of the formal adoption of the name “The Labour Party” in 1906, according to the letter’s coordinators.

A Labour party spokesperson said: “The Labour party is proud to be powered by our brilliant party members as we work to bring about the vital change we were elected to deliver.

“Our Labour government is delivering for families across the country, including tackling the cost of living, cutting NHS waiting lists and restoring pride in local communities.”

People in Australia’s most populous state have been granted an Anzac Day long weekend for the next two years, and could be in line for more public holidays.

The New South Wales premier, Chris Minns, has announced the state would have an extra public holiday in 2026 and 2027, when Anzac Day falls on a Saturday and Sunday.

Remembrance services are held nationwide on 25 April, but only people in Western Australia and ACT had previously been granted an additional public holiday on the following Monday.

But others said they won’t do likewise, with the governments of Victoria and Queensland declaring no such public holiday would be created.

Unlike New Year’s Day, Christmas Day and Boxing Day, there had been no additional public holidays declared in NSW when Anzac Day fell on a weekend.

Adding a public holiday in these circumstances won’t diminish the tradition, Minns said.

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“It is probably the most important national day that we have,” Minn said on Sunday.

“[It’s when] we recognise servicemen and women’s contribution to our country, what our country has as a result of their determination, their courage, their professionalism, their dedication to our state.

“And I think that New South Wales residents can be, of course, trusted with this public holiday in the sense that it won’t detract from the solemnity and importance of the 25th of April.”

Minns said the new holiday offered people more time to spend with families, friends and away from work, but recognised small businesses might not welcome the news.

“I think that’s important that we recognise that we know that it’s somewhat of an additional burden for small businesses, in particular. But this is, we believe, an important thing to do for the state,” he said.

The Returned and Services League (RSL) NSW’s acting president, Vince Williams, said it did not oppose the introduction of an additional public holiday after consulting with members.

“Additionally, a public holiday on Monday will also provide many serving Australian defence force personnel who are required to work on Anzac Day itself with an opportunity to spend quality time with their loved ones,” Williams said.

Anzac Day is one of 10 public holidays that is recognised nationwide.

NSW has fewer public holidays than all other mainland states and territories. Most Australians get another three or four on top of the nationwide holidays, including in Victoria, Queensland, the ACT and South Australia.

But NSW enjoys just two extra: the King’s Birthday in June and Labour Day in October.

Christmas Island celebrates an extra six, including two for lunar new year in mid-February.

The Minns government will consider making the Anzac Day change permanent and decide if the number of statewide public holidays is enough.

It would look at economic and social impacts of the extra public holiday in 2026 and 2027, and be subject to feedback from community, business and veteran groups.

Speaking in parliament this week, Queensland’s premier, David Crisafulli, said the state would not follow suit.

On Sunday, a spokesperson for the Victorian government said “there are no current plans to amend Victoria’s existing public holiday arrangements”.

“Victorians, along with residents of the Australian Capital Territory, enjoy the highest number of public holidays among other Australians, with a total of 13 each year,” the spokesperson said.

Liberal women are “incredibly worried” by a potential voter backlash to the ousting of the party’s first female leader, with the high-profile figure Charlotte Mortlock giving up her membership altogether.

Just days after Sussan Ley lost the leadership, Mortlock announced on Sunday she was leaving the party and quitting Hilma’s Network – a grassroots group she established to bring “Liberal-minded women” together.

A former Coalition staffer to Andrew Bragg, Mortlock has been outspoken in pushing the party to adopt a more progressive stance on the climate crisis, and called for gender quotas to increase female representation to 50% in the party.

“I have decided the time has come for me to step down as executive director of Hilma’s Network and I have also relinquished my Liberal party membership,” Mortlock said.

“Due to recent events I have decided there are other ways I can support women and Australia.”

Mortlock said she was proud of the women Hilma’s Network had been able to support through preselections and elections, hosting events that “challenged the party to evolve”.

She was also part of a small group who brought a gender quota proposal to the New South Wales Liberal executive, to have 40% of federal seats reserved for women-only preselections. That proposal was due to be presented at the state council on 7 March but Liberal sources told Guardian Australia it had been dropped from the agenda by the management committee.

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Ley has announced she will leave parliament. Without her, just five of the 27 MPs in the Liberal party room will be women. In the Senate, 11 of 23 Liberal senators are female.

The 2022 election review, co-authored by the Liberals’ new deputy leader, Jane Hume, found the party had not addressed the concerns of female voters. It recommended a 50% “target” for female candidates and MPs over a binding quota.

One Liberal woman, who spoke to Guardian Australia on the condition of anonymity, said: “The boys are back in charge.”

She added: “We went to elections in 2022 and there were three key issues – women, the environment and integrity, and we didn’t do anything to address those issues between 2022 and 2025.

“I’m incredibly worried … here we are in 2026, and so far we’ve blown up net zero and now we think it’s a really good idea to blow up the first female leader of the party.”

Another Liberal woman, who also asked not to be identified, said: “I think the feminist faction are pretty down in the dumps.”

She told Guardian Australia that while Ley had made “some pretty big fumbles”, the former leader had not been “afforded much grace”.

“Female voters had already switched off in 2022, so I felt that they were already not listening to us,” the Liberal said.

“But anecdotally, I heard when Sussan was elected, people were a little more receptive to [her].”

The former Liberal cabinet minister Karen Andrews, who has spoken out on the lack of women and the treatment of women in the party, said there could be public backlash.

“I think it’s possible there will be some pushback from the female supporters of the party who are concerned that maybe Sussan didn’t get a fair go at the leadership,” Andrews said.

But Andrews agreed with the backers of new leader, Angus Taylor, that Ley had had enough time to prove herself.

She remained hopeful that Hume, as the co-author of the 2022 review, was “fully aware of the issues that the Liberal party has with female voters”.

“I think women will be looking to make sure that there are other women on the senior frontbench.”

In response to Mortlock’s decision to quit the party, Hume on Sunday said it was “a really sad moment”.

“Charlotte has been a great contributor and a great voice for women that hold Liberal values,” she told the ABC Insiders program.

“I think that there is real opportunity for women’s voices in the Liberal party, and it’s on us to make sure that we demonstrate to Australian women that the Liberal party is the place for them.”