Police notified after former trustees and current chief executive of Actors’ Benevolent Fund were sent notes
A bitter feud that tore apart an illustrious actors’ charity has been reignited by the emergence of poison pen letters threatening former trustees.
The annual meeting of the Actors’ Benevolent Fund (ABF) takes place on Tuesday after at least three years of turmoil with little prospect that it will pass off uneventfully.
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A Lebanese soldier has been killed, with three wounded after Israel attacked an army post in a Lebanese town.
The Lebanese Army posted on X that one of those injured was in a critical condition after the attack on Sunday.
Continue reading...Ed Davey says Jane Dodds should reflect on her position after failing to take action over allegations of abuse by late bishop of Chester
Ed Davey has said the leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats should reflect on her position because of her failure to take action over an abuse case when she was a manager in the Church of England.
Jane Dodds, who was briefly the MP for Brecon and Radnorshire and is now the only Lib Dem member of the Senedd, was criticised in a C of E report about abuse carried out by the late bishop of Chester, Hubert Victor Whitsey.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Senior managers say they are forced to press ahead with orders for vital items without approval
When Sarah Bentley and Sarah Albon met at Beckton sewage treatment works in east London, the choice of location was designed to underline Thames Water’s predicament.
The site is Europe’s largest sewage treatment operation, with Grade II-listed parts of the site dating to the 1860s. It is now connected with the new Thames Tideway super-sewer, but insiders say several parts of the site are simply crumbling. The site is also riddled with asbestos.
Continue reading...Shabna Begum says racist riots will return if Islamophobia continues to be ‘an acceptable currency’ in politics
Islamophobia has become “brutally divisive” in the UK and failure to challenge its root causes will lead to more racist riots, the head of the UK’s leading race equality thinktank has said.
Shabna Begum, who became the chief executive of the Runnymede Trust earlier this year, said the country was entering a new phase in how it talks about Muslims.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Company has failed to tackle serious safety concerns or upgrade vital IT systems, Guardian investigation reveals
Thames Water has £23bn of assets that are in urgent need of repair and the supply of water to its 16 million customers is “on a knife-edge”, a Guardian investigation can reveal.
Britain’s biggest water company has failed to tackle adequately serious safety concerns, has not upgraded essential IT systems and has tolerated a culture of intimidation among staff, according to insiders and an analysis of documents.
Continue reading...Claims management company expects claims over collapsed Neil Woodford fund to exceed £200m
More than 5,000 people who invested in Neil Woodford’s collapsed equity fund are suing Hargreaves Lansdown, claiming that the investment platform was still promoting the fund even when it was aware of its problems.
The number of people suing Hargreaves Lansdown, the UK’s largest investment site, has almost doubled in the past two years, according to the claims management firm RGL Management. Two years ago the number of people taking part stood at 2,750.
Continue reading...Attorneys and lawmakers who oppose pardons for Capitol rioters would not be able to stop him, legal analysts warn
lf Donald Trump follows through on his promise to pardon people who participated in the January 6 riot at the US Capitol, attorneys and lawmakers who oppose such moves would not be able to stop him, according to legal experts.
If Trump does issue the pardons, it could indicate to many of his supporters that there was nothing illegal about the riot to prevent the peaceful transfer of power, and would undermine the US constitution, the experts said.
Continue reading...Incoming first lady is planning to split her time between New York and Florida during her husband’s presidency
Melania Trump will probably not be returning to the White House for the next four years with her husband, multiple sources told CNN this week, but rather will be splitting her time between Palm Beach, Florida, and New York City, where Barron is going to college.
For many observers it is unclear who might be more relieved by that decision: Melania, who famously did not love her life in DC the first time around, or the White House itself, where Trump’s wife once expressed her discontent by filling the halls with blood-red Christmas trees and destroying the historically beloved Rose Garden.
Continue reading...Pro-business party internally referred to its plans as ‘D-day’
Germany’s pro-business Free Democrats, who collapsed Olaf Scholz’s governing coalition earlier this month in a dispute over the budget, reportedly plotted their exit weeks before the final split, referring to their plans internally as “D-day”.
Newspapers Die Zeit and Süddeutsche Zeitung reported that the FDP had intended from at least September to force a situation that would provoke the German chancellor into pulling the plug on his tripartite coalition.
Continue reading...Minor party’s offer, which includes ban on native-forest logging, represents its second concession on stalled legislation in less than a week
The Greens have dropped their demand for a climate trigger to be incorporated in the government’s stalled Nature Positive legislation, indicating they are now prepared to pass the bills in return for a Australia-wide ban on native-forest logging alone.
The party has previously refused to support Labor’s legislation, insisting that both a climate trigger and forest-logging ban must be included.
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Continue reading...Treasury confirms cheques will stay in circulation until 2029 but then cease to be accepted as legal tender
Businesses selling essential goods and services such as groceries, medicines and fuel will be forced to accept cash from their customers unless granted a special exemption, under a government mandate to take effect from 1 January 2026.
In a move designed to taper the phase-out of cash and ensure those who rely on it can still use it for the near future, the federal government will require certain businesses to take cash payments. But others, including many small businesses, will be exempt from the measure.
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