Simon Case criticises Tory government’s failure to hold regular spending reviews in letter to Jeremy Hunt – who had challenged figure
Simon Case, the head of the civil service, has backed the government’s figures showing that a £22bn shortfall was left by the previous Conservative administration.
The cabinet secretary said the Tories’ failure to hold regular spending reviews had contributed to the financial uncertainty.
Continue reading...£1.5bn auction awards record funding for new windfarms, solar farms and tidal power projects
Great Britain’s renewable energy auction has secured enough new clean electricity projects to power 11m UK homes after the Labour government made record funding available to suppliers.
The £1.5bn auction will support 131 new projects including windfarms, solar farms and tidal power projects after ministers increased the amount of funding available to seven times the sums offered last year.
Continue reading...Tributes paid to writer, actor and presenter, who also worked on Chorlton and the Wheelies and The Wind in the Willows
The Danger Mouse writer Brian Trueman has died at the age of 92, his representative confirmed to the PA news agency.
His son Jonathan announced the death in a Facebook post, saying he died in Stepping Hill hospital in Stockport on Sunday night “after a short illness”.
Continue reading...Lee Child says childhood visits to city’s libraries helped him to create protagonist as he laments proposed closures
It is said that heroes are made, not born.
In the case of the fictional ex-military action man Jack Reacher, it has emerged he was made in a library in Birmingham.
Continue reading...Israeli PM says move will embolden a genocidal Hamas as British government faces growing backlash
Benjamin Netanyahu has condemned the UK government’s decision to suspend some arms export licences to Israel, describing it as a shameful decision that would embolden a genocidal Hamas.
The Israeli prime minister said his country was at war to also protect British hostages and vowed the UK measures would not prevent it from winning the conflict in Gaza.
Continue reading...Greenpeace urges Labour to ‘fulfil international obligations’ as critics question accuracy of official data
The UK’s worst methane hotspots include the last coalmine, livestock farm clusters, landfills, power plants and North Sea oil and gas wells, according to an analysis.
The process has also thrown up serious doubts over the UK’s ability to calculate its methane emissions.
Continue reading...Office attendance in UK capital similar to levels in Toronto and Sydney, thinktank finds
Workers in London have been slower to return to the office than those in other global cities such as Paris and New York, a report has found.
London was near the bottom of the pack, with office attendance similar to levels in Toronto and Sydney, according to research by the Centre for Cities thinktank, which surveyed employees and employers in six big cities.
Continue reading...Singapore Airlines also says it is inspecting aircraft after component failure on rival’s Airbus A350
Cathay Pacific has said it identified 15 Airbus A350 aircraft that need component replacements after a part failed on one of its Rolls-Royce engines minutes after takeoff from Hong Kong on Monday.
A second carrier, Singapore Airlines, said on Tuesday it was also inspecting the engines of its Airbus A350 aircraft “as a precautionary measure”.
Continue reading...Kemi Badenoch and James Cleverly both reject idea of leaving European Court of Human Rights to revive Rwanda plan
Two frontrunners to be Conservative party leader have criticised their rivals’ promises to leave the European court of human rights (ECHR) as the contest turns combative with days to go until the first MP is eliminated.
Kemi Badenoch, the shadow communities secretary, and James Cleverly, the shadow home secretary, both rejected the idea of leaving the ECHR on Monday despite calls from some of their colleagues to do so.
Continue reading...Seabirds are in a precarious position as their breeding areas are threatened by climate breakdown and overfishing
Five seabirds have been added to the UK’s conservation red list, meaning they are at dire risk of local extinction.
The government has been urged to act as the arctic tern, Leach’s storm petrel, common gull, great skua and great black-backed gull join other seabird species such as the puffin on the list after severe population declines.
Continue reading...Foreign Office says review found ‘clear risk’ UK arms may be used in violation of humanitarian law
The UK has broken with the Biden administration on a significant part of their tightly coordinated policy towards Israel by announcing it is suspending some arms export licences to Israel because of a “clear risk” they may be used to commit or facilitate a serious violation of international humanitarian law.
The Foreign Office said a two-month internal review had raised concerns about the way Israel had conducted itself in the conflict in Gaza and that the decision specifically related to concerns around the treatment of Palestinian detainees and the supply of aid to Gaza.
Continue reading...PM says ‘it’s unacceptable’ when asked about Jas Athwal allegations but adds MP is ‘taking action to put it right’
Keir Starmer has criticised a Labour MP who has been accused of renting out flats with black mould and ant infestations, calling the conditions “unacceptable”.
The prime minister addressed the accusations against Jas Athwal, the MP for Ilford South, on Monday after a report by the BBC quoted several of his tenants complaining about the conditions in the properties they rented from him. One said there were ants “everywhere”, adding: “They are on my kid’s body and on their clothes.”
Continue reading...Shares in engineering firm slide as airline cancels flights after finding engine component failure on aircraft
Shares in Rolls-Royce, the leading British engineering company, were the biggest faller on the FTSE 100 on Monday after Cathay Pacific Airways identified an engine component failure on an aircraft and began inspecting its entire Airbus A350 fleet.
The Hong Kong-based airline, which has cancelled 24 return flights so far while it performs the “precautionary” checks, said a number of aircraft would be out of service for several days. Shares in Rolls-Royce closed down 6%.
Continue reading...PM says he will not take lectures from previous government as Kemi Badenoch launches Tory leadership campaign
Kemi Badenoch is speaking now. She says she wants to talk about the future.
She was born in the UK, but “grew up under socialism”, she says (referring to her childhood in Nigeria).
Labour have no ideas. At best, they are announcing things we have already done, and at their worst, they are clueless, irresponsible and dishonest.
They are trying to pull the wool over the eyes of the public about the state of Britain’s finances, placing political donors into civil service jobs, pretending that they have no plans to cut pensioner benefits before the election and then doing exactly that to cover the cost of pay rises for the unions with no promise of reform, But their model of spend, spend, spend is broken, and they don’t know what to do, and this will only lead to even more cynicism in politics.
Continue reading...Tech company says it will follow legal proceedings ‘to their conclusion’ after tycoon’s death last month
Hewlett Packard Enterprise has confirmed it will push ahead with a high court lawsuit against the estate of the deceased tech tycoon Mike Lynch in which it is seeking damages of up to $4bn (£3bn).
The US company said in a statement it would follow the legal proceedings “through to their conclusion” despite Lynch’s death last month when his yacht sank off the coast of Italy.
Continue reading...Programme for respiratory syncytial virus could prevent estimated 5,000 hospitalisations annually in infants
Pregnant women and older people across England will be routinely vaccinated against the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) for the first time, the NHS has said.
From 1 September the NHS will vaccinate pregnant women from 28 weeks onwards and adults turning 75. Adults aged 75 to 79 will be offered a catchup vaccine to make sure they are protected.
Continue reading...It is the first time such notification has been given to a category C prison focusing on training and resettlement
A Kent prison has become the first of its kind to be issued with an urgent notification after a decade of “systemic failure and decline”, the chief inspector of prisons has confirmed.
HMP Rochester is the seventh prison to have received such a notification since November 2022, but has become the first category C prison, which focuses on training and resettlement, to receive one. The urgent notification process was introduced in 2017 and is a means of raising immediate concerns following an inspection and requires a response and action plan from the secretary of state within 28 days.
Continue reading...Shadow minister will launch leadership campaign with call to think afresh and move on from landslide election defeat
Kemi Badenoch will say the Conservatives must do more than criticise Labour in order to win the next general election, as she launches her campaign to lead the party.
Potential dividing lines with her leadership rivals already appear to be forming, after Robert Jenrick said on Sunday he would oppose Labour’s “declaration of war on the middle classes”.
Continue reading...Ipsos poll found 40% of Britons thought there was not enough time to raise all concerns in 10-minute slot
Two-fifths of patients leave their GP appointment without discussing everything that is worrying them about their health, a survey has revealed.
The finding has prompted claims that older people often feel family doctors “want them out the door as soon as possible” rather than listening to all their concerns.
Continue reading...Campaign group says firms such as Uber should reveal data on driver miles to help boost wages
Uber and other ride-hailing apps should be forced to publish data on drivers’ workloads so that regulators can tackle exploitation and cut carbon emissions, campaigners argue.
Analysis by the pressure group Worker Info Exchange suggests drivers for Uber and its smaller rivals may have missed out on more than £1.2bn in wages and costs last year because of the way they are compensated.
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