Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Asylum seekers give accounts of injuries, as Priti Patel says many refugees feel France is racist
Asylum seekers in the UK and France have described injuries they have received at the hands of French police, as Priti Patel said many were making the perilous journey across the Channel because they believe France is racist.
The home secretary made her comments in a conference call with Conservative MPs concerned about the recent surge in numbers attempting the voyage in small boats.
Senior doctors, hospital bosses and public health experts have accused ministers of scapegoating Public Health England for their own failings over Covid-19 by planning to axe the agency.
The government’s decision to scrap PHE and merge it into a new body charged with preventing future outbreaks of infectious diseases produced a chorus of criticism on Sunday.
Exclusive: Andrew George calls for urgent reform of system that views black people as ‘criminals or drug dealers’
The police stop of the Labour MP Dawn Butler was rooted in systemic racism that is damaging the legitimacy of policing, the leader of black police officers has said.
Inspector Andrew George, the new interim president of the National Black Police Association, also called for urgent reform of “a biased system that views black people as criminals or drug dealers”.
Despite medical intervention, officer died at scene following incident off coast of Pwllheli
An off-duty police officer has died after falling from a jetski. The alarm was raised shortly after 4.30pm on Saturday following the incident off the coast of Pwllheli, north Wales.
Emergency services, including the Coastguard and RNLI, attended and the officer was retrieved from the water. Despite extensive medical intervention, he died at the scene. His next of kin have been informed, said North Wales police.
The competence embodied in Merkel provokes loathing from the US president
Donald Trump has declared war on Germany. In a manner of speaking. Europe’s most important country, potentially America’s most valuable partner, has in the mind of the president become an adversary. Of all Trump’s many foreign policy disasters, this is perhaps his most significant.
In late July, it was announced that retired army colonel Douglas Macgregor, a decorated combat veteran, would become the next ambassador to Berlin. Macgregor is a regular contributor to Trump’s favourite channel of information, Fox News. He has variously suggested that the US border guard should shoot people if they tried to enter illegally from Mexico; described eastern Ukrainians as “Russians”; defended Serbia’s actions against a “Muslim drug mafia” in Kosovo; and criticised Germany for giving “millions of unwanted Muslim invaders” welfare benefits rather than providing more funding for its armed services.
Priti Patel risks replicating Home Office failings that led to scandal, victims and human rights campaigners warn
Survivors of the Windrush scandal have attacked the home secretary, saying her approach to the Channel migrant crossings is creating “the same set of conditions” that led to the government victimising the children of Commonwealth immigrants.
A letter to Priti Patel from 100 prominent refugee and human rights campaigners, including members of the Windrush generation, warns that the “pattern of ignoring expert advice, failing to engage with civil society and branding migrants as criminal” replicates Home Office failings that caused the 2018 Windrush scandal.
The royal family leads the UK’s commemorations on the 75th anniversary of VJ Day – the day the second world war ended with Japan’s surrender.
Prince Charles led a two-minute silence at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire, as part of a service of remembrance. The prime minister also spoke at the event.
The economic collapse in Britain during the second quarter of 2020 was the most brutal on record. Unemployment is forecast by the Bank of England to soar to 2.5m by Christmas. The Brexit cliff edge approaches. Yet in the City, the FTSE 100 has been on the up.
Never has the disconnect between financial trading and economic fundamentals appeared so extreme. What explains surging asset prices (the FTSE jumped 2% on the same day it was revealed the economy had slumped by 20%) when the outlook for many workers is so grim?
British soldier Bill Norways was captured by the Japanese after the fall of Singapore and forced to work on the infamous Thai-Burma railway. During his time as a PoW he created sketches and artworks under appalling conditions
Russia is not the only country pursuing domestic politics over global cooperation in the fight against coronavirus, writes Stephen Buranyi.
The WHO last week warned against “vaccine nationalism”, noting that unless countries cooperate, an actually successful vaccine could touch off a worldwide frenzy.
Similar to the scramble for PPE gear and testing reagents when governments seized exports, and the US reportedly tried to intercept other nation’s shipments at global ports, demand for vaccine supplies could result in another pitched battle for limited resources – with the added complication that no one knows which project will succeed, so no one is even sure what they’re trying to source yet.
Rule-breaking pub landlords are facing a police crackdown for failing to properly record customers’ details as concerns grow about a rising Covid infection rate in Birmingham.
The latest data showed the second city had a rate of 23.6 cases per 100,000 people in the seven days to 10 August with the trend increasing, according to the NHS Digital progression dashboard.
It looks as though it’s a combination of people socialising and not maintaining social distancing and perhaps hospitality settings or other gatherings of people and this may be the underlying problem.
We are very keen to be working very closely with the police over coming weeks because what we’re noticing across the West Midlands is that as weeks go by the rigour in which pubs in particular are recording names and addresses of customers is dropping off in some locations.
We’d like to encourage the police to re-emphasise to the pubs that they do need to be recording that information.
Pubs and clubs - they also have a very clear responsibility to ensure they’re following the guidelines, that they are getting information on those individuals who attend.
We will work closely with the licensing authorities to crack down on those premises that don’t follow rules and are breaking rules.
Canada is preparing for a “reasonable worst case scenario” in which further surges of coronavirus cases would at times overwhelm the public health system, officials have said.
In this scenario, there would be a large peak later this year followed by a number of smaller peaks and valleys stretching to January 2022. Each of the peaks would exceed the health system’s capacity.
Hello, my name is Clea Skopeliti and I’ll be running the blog for the next few hours. You can get in touch with me on Twitter @cleaskopeliti or by email: clea.skopeliti.casual@theguardian.com. I won’t always have time to reply to everything but will read it all! Thanks in advance.
Travellers left stressed and exhausted as they cut holidays short following new Covid-19 rules
At times on the A1 and A16 motorways in northern France on Friday afternoon, four out of five cars had UK plates: SUVs, estates and vans laden with luggage and children and piled high with surfboards and bikes, Brits barrelling back in a desperate bid to make it home before the 4am quarantine deadline.
Man who was granted injunction due to risk of suicide says he sustained an injury during attempted removal
An asylum seeker who crossed the Channel to the UK on a small boat claims he was forced out of his cell in a detention centre by officers who wanted to put him on a flight even though a judge had halted his removal hours earlier, the Guardian has learned.
He was restrained and sustained an injury during the attempted removal in the early hours of Wednesday morning by officers unaware of the high court decision.
France has been added to the UK coronavirus quarantine list meaning that anyone returning to the UK after 4am on Saturday will have to quarantine for 14 days or face a fine. With some travellers desperately trying to return before the deadline, others have decided to stay in France.
More families arrive in Dunkirk each day and they would rather sleep in woods than seek asylum in France
“They are kids, so they are always playing. Like children in the UK play mums and dads or doctors and nurses, our children will re-enact boat crossings, getting patted down by the police, going to food distributions, meeting smugglers. Because one of the way parents safeguard their children is to present attempted border crossings as an adventure.”
In a nature reserve near Dunkirk, Caia Fallowfield runs a play project for migrant children who live among the trees with no running water or toilets. These are the children who vanish overnight off the French coast and reappear on the front pages of British newspapers, being pulled out of dinghies in Dover, often cold, wet and frightened.
Transport secretary causes confusion on Thursday night when he gives the wrong date for the start of Covid-19 quarantine measures for arrivals from France. During a TV interview Shapps initially, and correctly, says people will have to self-isolate for 14 days from 4am on Saturday, then later incorrectly says the restrictions come in from Sunday
The government has quietly removed 1.3m coronavirus tests from its data because of double counting, raising fresh questions about the accuracy of the testing figures.