Day one of Chinese President Xi's state visit has loomed large in the news today, as he addressed Parliament, met Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and joined the Queen for a banquet in Buckingham Palace. As he was speaking to Parliament, MPs inside the Commons were debating the Conservatives' tax credit cuts. No Tories rebelled but some, including Heidi Allen, were critical of the government's plans.

In other news, over 1,000 more job losses in the steel industry have been announced, and The Women's Equality Party has called for quotas for female MPs.

Alex Forsyth
Political correspondent

A €2.2bn programme to train farmers and rural workers across the European Union has been “poorly managed” with public funds being used for “excessively” expensive courses with little oversight, according to auditors.

Training courses – aimed at developing skills and knowledge of people working in rural industries – often duplicated existing schemes and were up to 10 times more expensive, auditors found.

In England authorities paid “excessively high prices” for several courses, with a provider making 92% gross profit in one case , according to a report by the European Court of Auditors.

It found individual governments had failed to properly manage the scheme and there was insufficient oversight by the European Commission.

The EU put €1.3bn into the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development between 2007 and 2013, with further funding from individual member states bringing the total public funding to €2.2bn.

Over the next six years the cost could exceed € 4bn, according to the audit report which made a series of recommendations to improve the use of funds.

In response the European Commission said implementation of the scheme was the responsibility of individual member states, but auditors’ recommendations which were specifically addressed to the Commission were already being implemented.

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The government has seen off a Labour motion attacking plans to cut tax credits. Labour was defeated by 317 votes to 295, a government majority of 22.

Here's what's happened in the world of politics so far today:

• Conservative MP Heidi Allen has used her maiden speech to attack her party's planned tax credit cuts
• MPs are debating the reforms in the House of Commons
• Chinese President Xi Jinping has addressed Parliament on the first day of his state visit
• Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond told the BBC the UK and China had a "mature" relationship that was a "win-win" for both countries
• Ex-minister Lord Warner has been explaining his reasons for quitting Labour, saying the party doesn't have a "hope in hell" of winning power

A Tory MP has said her party risks betraying its values as she voiced her opposition to tax credit cuts.

Heidi Allen suggested ministers were losing sight of the difficulties of working people in their "single-minded determination to achieve a surplus".

Urging help for affected families, she said "true Conservatives had compassion running through their veins".

The government is standing by the changes, saying these and other reforms will save taxpayers £15bn a year.

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House of Commons
Parliament

Heidi Allen, Conservative MP for South Cambridgeshire, uses her maiden speech to criticise George Osborne's tax credits plans. "I can sit on my hands no longer," she tells MPs - saying she has refrained from making a maiden speech so far.

While she believes tax credits shouldn't be used to subsidise low wages, she worries that "our single-minded determination to read a budget surplus is betraying who we are".

She says Conservatives "have compassion running through their veins" and are "the party of the working person". Tax credits are "not a spreadsheet exercise... we are talking about real people. Working people", the MPs adds.

She says the tax credit changes do not pass the "family test", warning that the pace of the reforms is "too hard and too fast".

Earlier in the tax credits debate, Work and Pensions Committee chairman Frank Field, a Labour MP, said the tax credit changes go against the Conservatives' argument that they are the party of the strivers.

He urged the government to publish the data showing how many of the 3.2 million tax credit recipients "will still be worse off" by 2020 despite changes - such as the increased National Living Wage - being introduced.

Adam Fleming
Reporter, Daily Politics

Leaders from more than 30 cities around the world have been in London for a three-day summit about urban innovation called City Lab.  And even though they come from very different places, the problems are all the same.

“How do we avoid traffic jams? How do we ensure there’s no pollution in the city? How do we provide services to our citizens and how do we engage them? And how do we get feedback from them about how well we are serving them?” asks Dr Evans Kidera, the governor of the Kenyan capital Nairobi.

Around two-thirds of the world’s population will live in urban areas by 2050, according to the United Nations. The mayors see this as a massive opportunity.

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House of Commons
Parliament

Back in the House of Commons, MPs are continuing with the debate on the government's plans to cut tax credits. The time limit on backbench speeches has been dropped to three minutes, owing to the number of people wishing to take part.

Peter Aldous, Conservative MP for Waveney, backs reform of the tax credits system but he urges the government to "think carefully" about how it implements the policy to protect low earners.