Category Archives: UK news

English councils urged to install pavement gullies for home charging of electric cars

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Scheme aims to stop cables trailing across pavements and encourage drivers to switch to electric vehicles

Local councils in England will be encouraged to install pavement gullies that link houses to the kerbside so that electric cars owners can charge their cars from home if they do not have a driveway.

The new government scheme hopes to stop cables trailing across pavements, as EV owners in built up areas where off-street parking is scarce, try to charge their cars. The Department for Transport has said it will put £25m towards “cross-pavement” charging – essentially a narrow cable channel with a cover on top.

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Trump’s 10% tariff on most UK goods ‘here to stay’, says Lord Mandelson

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British ambassador to US believes universal levy unlikely to change but there is ‘scope’ for negotiations in some sectors

The 10% tariffs on most UK goods imported into the US are likely “here to stay”, according to Lord Mandelson.

The British ambassador to the US said the “universal 10% tariff” was unlikely to change but that there was “scope” for negotiations in different sectors and industries, such as technology.

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More than 70 protesters across UK arrested for allegedly holding signs supporting Palestine Action

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‘Dozens’ held after campaigners gathered in Parliament Square on Saturday, with demonstrations across the UK prompting police action

More than 70 people have been arrested across the UK in several demonstrations where references to Palestine Action were allegedly made, a week after the group was banned as a terrorist organisation.

Protesters gathered for the second week in a row in central London after police reiterated that showing support for the group was a criminal offence, resulting in the Metropolitan police making 42 arrests.

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Jeff Lynne cancels final live show over health concerns

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Electric Light Orchestra frontman withdraws from BST Hyde Park festival owing to a ‘systemic infection’

Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) frontman Jeff Lynne has cancelled what had been billed as his final ever performance, owing to ill health.

Lynne was due to appear at the BST Hyde Park festival series on Sunday night, closing what had been the band’s farewell “Over and Out” tour, 55 years since the band formed.

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Public support for resident doctors’ strikes collapses ahead of fresh industrial action

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Exclusive: Latest poll comes as Wes Streeting urges medics to call off ‘unnecessary and unfair strikes’

Public support for strikes by resident doctors has collapsed, with barely one in four voters now backing their campaign of industrial action, according to the latest polling, which reveals the deepening unpopularity of further NHS strikes.

Previously strong approval by voters for strikes by junior doctors – as resident doctors were known until last year – has halved from 52% a year ago to just 26%.

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Crunching the data: are resident doctors in England badly paid?

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Resident doctors have voted to strike over pay but how much has their real-terms earnings changed since 2008?

Resident doctors in England have voted to strike for five days from 25 July, reigniting one of the NHS’s most bitter industrial disputes.

At the heart of the row is pay: the British Medical Association (BMA) says resident (formerly known as junior) doctors have seen their real earnings fall by more than a quarter since 2008. The government says the union’s demands are unaffordable, and they’ve already received generous rises in recent years.

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Father given £1,173 refund from nursery in England after ‘top-up’ fees investigation

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Preschool establishment asked for extra compulsory fee for ‘consumables’ – but it should have been free

A nursery has refunded a father almost £1,200 after an investigation found he had been charged mandatory “top-up” fees for hours of childcare that should have been free.

Tiago Gomes’s daughter was eligible for government-funded childcare at the Lake House day nursery and preschool in Bristol but he was told that he must pay an extra compulsory fee for “consumables”.

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Nearly 60 Labour MPs call for UK to immediately recognise Palestinian state

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Exclusive: MPs say in letter Gaza is being ethnically cleansed as Israeli defence minister plans ‘forcible transfer’

Nearly 60 Labour MPs have demanded the UK immediately recognises Palestine as a state, after Israel’s defence minister announced plans to force all residents of Gaza into a camp on the ruins of Rafah.

The MPs, who include centrist and leftwing backbenchers, sent a letter to David Lammy on Thursday warning they believed Gaza was being ethnically cleansed.

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MPs and political candidates face ‘industrial’ levels of abuse, minister says

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Exclusive: Young people deterred from politics, Rushanara Ali warns, as government plans stricter punishments

MPs and political candidates are facing “industrial” levels of intimidation and harassment, a minister has warned, as the government outlines plans for stricter punishments for those found guilty of abuse.

Rushanara Ali, the minister for democracy, said her colleagues were suffering worse harassment than ever before and warned this was deterring many young people from becoming politically active.

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HSBC becomes first UK bank to quit industry’s net zero alliance

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Campaigners condemn ‘troubling’ move that follows departure of six of largest US banks after Trump’s election

HSBC has become the first UK bank to leave the global banking industry’s net zero target-setting group, as campaigners warned it was a “troubling” sign over the lender’s commitment to tackling the climate crisis.

The move risks triggering further departures from the Net Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA) by UK banks, in a fresh blow to international climate coordination efforts.

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Labour should raise national insurance in autumn budget, says Ed Balls – UK politics live

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Former chancellor says employees’ contributions should rise to help address a £6bn shortfall caused by recent U-turns

The Unite union has voted to re-examine its relationship with the Labour party in the light of the government’s failure to support its members in the Birmingham bin strike.

It has also said it was suspending Angela Rayner’s membership, given her role as minister in charge of the department that oversees local government. The union is in dispute with Birmingham city council over proposals to reorganise waste disposal services in the city, and Unite has repeatedly said the government should step in and force the Labour-led council to settle.

Unite is crystal clear it will call out bad employers regardless of the colour of their rosette. Angela Rayner has had every opportunity to intervene and resolve this dispute but has instead backed a rogue council that has peddled lies and smeared its workers fighting huge pay cuts.

The disgraceful actions of the government and a so-called Labour council, is essentially fire and rehire and makes a joke of the Employment Relations Act promises.

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Two residents die after car in police chase crashes into Sunderland care home

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Northumbria police say two men are in custody after death of woman in her 80s and another in her 90s

Two care home residents have died after a car police were chasing crashed into their building in Sunderland.

Ten residents were taken to hospital after the stolen BMW collapsed a large part of a wall and part of the first storey of Highcliffe care home in Witherwack.

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Church must ‘turn back’ public opinion on assisted dying, says archbishop

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Stephen Cottrell tells General Synod assisted dying means assuming ‘authority over death that belongs to God alone’

Members of the Church of England should work to “withstand and even turn back” the forces of public opinion “that risk making … assisted dying a reality in our national life”, the archbishop of York has said.

Speaking to the church’s General Synod on Friday, Stephen Cottrell said permitting assisted dying would change “forever the contract between doctor and patient, pressurising the vulnerable and assuming an authority over death that belongs to God alone”.

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Resident doctors’ 29% pay claim is non-negotiable, BMA chair says

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Exclusive: Tom Dolphin says rise needed to redress real-terms earnings loss since 2008 and strikes could last years

Resident doctors’ 29% pay claim is non-negotiable, reasonable and easily affordable for the NHS, the new leader of the medical profession has said.

Strikes to ensure resident – formerly junior – doctors in England get the full 29% could drag on for years, according to Dr Tom Dolphin, the British Medical Association’s new council chair.

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Government inheriting poor value assets due to bad handling of PFI contracts, watchdog says

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Public accounts committee warns UK infrastructure risked becoming ‘stony ground’ for investors without major overhaul

Bad management of private finance contracts is leading to poor quality assets being handed back to the government, including schools and hospitals, according to parliament’s spending watchdog.

Its report into the use of private finance initiatives (PFI) for infrastructure comes at a time when the government has identified private investment in projects such as power plants and transport outside London as a key part of its growth agenda.

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Minority ethnic and deprived children more likely to die after UK intensive care admission

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Study shows such young people have higher risk of arriving at paediatric ICU severely ill and have worse outcomes

Minority ethnic children and children from deprived backgrounds across the UK are more likely to die following admission to intensive care than their white and more affluent counterparts, a study has found.

These children consistently had worse outcomes following their stay in a paediatric intensive care unit (PICU), the research by academics at Imperial College London discovered.

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Iran’s threat to UK on a par with Russia’s, security report finds

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Parliamentary committee says UK is priority target for cyber and physical attacks as well as assassinations

Iran’s intimidation, including the fear of physical attack and assassination of Iranian dissidents living in the UK, is comparable in scale to the threat posed by Russia, parliament’s intelligence and security committee has found.

In a report published on Thursday, the committee (ISC) adds that the UK is a priority espionage target for Iranian cyber-attacks, ranking just below the US and Saudi Arabia.

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Bob Vylan frontman warns ‘you’ll get me in trouble’ after further IDF chants

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Crowd at sold-out London gig told ‘every other chant is fine’ amid police investigation into Glastonbury performance

The frontman of Bob Vylan warned his fans to stop chanting against the Israeli military during the duo’s first UK gig since the band’s Glastonbury festival performance.

Pascal Robinson-Foster, who goes by the name Bobby Vylan, told fans at a sold-out surprise gig in London on Wednesday night they could get him in “trouble” after police launched an investigation into the group over comments he made at Glastonbury.

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Tories claim ‘one in, one out’ migration deal with France ‘will not deter anyone’ – UK politics live

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Starmer and Macron expected to announce migration deal that will involve the UK accepting some cross-Channel asylum seekers

The waiting list for routine hospital treatment in England has fallen for the second month in a row and is now at its lowest level for more than two years, PA Media reports. PA says:

An estimated 7.36 million treatments were waiting to be carried out at the end of May, relating to just under 6.23 million patients – down from 7.39 million treatments and just over 6.23 million patients at the end of April.

These are the lowest figures since March 2023 for treatments and April 2023 for patients.

Monthly NHS data shows the overall waiting list dropped by nearly 30,000 in May to 7.36 million – the lowest total since March 2023 – with 60.9% waiting 18 weeks or less for planned care (the highest proportion since July 2022).

Staff carried out an average of 75,009 planned treatments each working day in May – the highest number on record – with a total of 1.5 million treatments across the month, which is up on 1.45 million in April and higher than 1,437,914 pre-pandemic (May 2019).

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Royal Mail gets go ahead to axe second-class post on Saturdays

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Deliveries will also alternate on weekdays to reflect changing behaviour of users but critics say regulator has let courier off the hook

Royal Mail has been given the green light to drop Saturday deliveries of second-class letters and provide services only on alternating weekdays from Monday to Friday under new rules announced by the regulator.

Ofcom said that reforms of the universal services obligation (USO) reflected changing behaviour of postal users, with fewer letters being sent across the country. The regulator said it could end up saving the postal delivery service between £250m and £425m each year.

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