Category Archives: UK news

Nigel Farage to boycott BBC over ‘biased’ Question Time audience

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Reform also complains to Electoral Commission and Essex police about Channel 4 undercover investigation of party

Nigel Farage has announced he is boycotting the BBC, accusing the broadcaster of bias over his reception on Friday night’s Question Time.

The Reform leader took part in a leaders’ special episode, a half-hour Q&A session with a live audience, in which he was heavily criticised. One audience member called him a racist and another asked why his party attracted extremists.

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Jay Slater: expert volunteers join search for missing teenager in Tenerife

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Volunteers with experience in rough terrain will go over areas previously covered by police in search for 19-year-old

Volunteers with experience navigating tough terrain are in Tenerife to help the Spanish police in the search for a missing British teenager.

Jay Slater, from Oswaldtwistle in Lancashire, was last heard from on 17 June when he called a friend to say he had no water and only 1% battery left on his phone.

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British hiker found dead in Pyrenees mountains after four-day search

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Spanish Guardia Civil says 70-year-old man discovered by rescue team near Aspe peak in western Pyrenees

A 70-year-old British hiker has been found dead in the Pyrenees mountains four days after disappearing.

The man, who was from London, went missing on Monday. He was discovered in the mountain range by a rescue team on Thursday at around 1pm, the Spanish Guardia Civil said.

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General election – as it happened: Farage says he is boycotting BBC as more Reform candidates dropped over past comments

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The Reform leader complained of a ‘dishonest Question Time audience’, while his party also reported Channel 4 to the Electoral Commission

The Conservative party deputy chair Angela Richardson called the sewage crisis a “political football” and claimed opposition parties and activists had put Tory MPs in physical danger by campaigning on the issue.

Richardson, who is standing for re-election in Guildford, where the River Wey was recently found to have 10 times the safe limit of E coli, also suggested the only reason people were talking about the problem was “because the Conservatives let everyone know it was happening”.

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Caroline Lucas: Labour must pursue social justice while tackling climate crisis

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Outgoing Green MP calls for combined strategy to ensure net zero will not be done ‘on the backs of the poor’

Labour must combine tackling the climate crisis with pursuing social justice, if elected, to show that achieving net zero will not be done “on the backs of the poor”, the UK’s outgoing Green party MP has warned.

Caroline Lucas, who has held the seat of Brighton Pavilion since 2010, said: “The biggest priority is to demonstrate that is not the case. We have to make sure that this is a strategy and a policy that is the opposite of being done on the backs of the poor.”

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Britain embraces pond life as aquatic garden plant sales boom

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RHS reports 35% surge in orders, while garden designers note pond trend at Hampton Court Palace flower show

A pond boom is happening in Britain’s gardens as people try to halt wildlife loss by digging water sources for amphibians and other aquatic life.

Data from the Royal Horticultural Society shows a marked increase in sales of pond greenery; their online store had a 35% increase in sales of pond plants for 2023 compared with 2022.

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Unpaid UK carers ‘face financial hit that can last decades’

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Loss of income, curbs on benefits and soaring bills are piling pressure on people caring for family members

People who look after family members free of charge are taking a huge hit to their finances which could continue into their retirement as they find themselves unable to balance paid work with their caring commitments.

Recent analysis of official figures by the financial firm Just Retirement found seven in 10 people who were receiving carer’s allowance were not in paid work, and missing out on earnings and private pension contributions.

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Britons seeking medical treatments overseas ‘should beware low prices’

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Experts warn ‘health tourists’ to do their research, saying savings can lead to higher costs for work to be redone

Patients seeking medical treatments in Turkey and other countries should do their research and not be tempted by low prices, experts have warned.

From Brazilian butt lifts to Hollywood smiles and even organ transplants, the range of procedures offered by overseas providers is staggering, with myriad companies now promoting packages covering flights, accommodation and post-operative hotel accommodation.

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Council tax: final-year students warned they could get surprise bills

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Students are exempt during their course but as soon as they finish their final year they are liable to pay

Final-year university students have been urged to check that they do not owe council tax for the last few weeks of their rented accommodation.

While students are exempt from the tax during the course, they are liable to pay as soon as they finish their final year.

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ICC decision on Netanyahu arrest warrant may be delayed by UK

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Britain to make legal arguments over jurisdiction in case of alleged war crimes by the Israeli PM

An intervention by the UK government at the international criminal court is expected to delay a decision over whether an arrest warrant can be issued against the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, for alleged war crimes in Gaza.

Judges at the ICC ruled on Thursday they would allow the UK to make legal arguments in the case as they consider whether to approve requests made by the ICC’s chief prosecutor for warrants against Netanyahu and his defence minister, Yoav Gallant.

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Court order bans encampments in LSE building after pro-Palestine protest

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University sought order after students slept in building for more than a month in response to report about LSE’s Gaza-linked investments

The London School of Economics has been granted a court order indefinitely barring encampments in one of its buildings after students slept in its atrium for more than a month in support of Palestine.

Several students set up the camp in the atrium of the ground floor of the Marshall Building in central London on 14 May, vowing to remain there until LSE met its demands.

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‘You can expect everything’: what next for Julian Assange and WikiLeaks?

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Site’s edge on whistleblowing is gone and its co-founder must recover, yet their resilience may make revival a possibility

As Julian Assange enjoys his first weekend of freedom in years, there appeared to be no question in the mind of his wife, Stella, about what the family’s priorities were.

The WikiLeaks co-founder would need time to recover, she told reporters after they were reunited in his native Australia, after a deal with US authorities that allowed him to plead guilty to a single criminal count of conspiring to obtain and disclose classified defence documents.

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Grimsby man jailed for sexually assaulting dead bodies in mortuary

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Damon Tingay punched the body of one man twice and performed sex acts on two male bodies, court heard

A Grimsby man who went on a rampage in a hospital mortuary, violently and sexually attacking bodies, was told by a judge there was a “very, very dark side” tohim as he was sentenced to six years in prison.

Damon Tingay, 30, broke into Diana, Princess of Wales hospital in Grimsby in the early hours of 17 March and was caught on CCTV opening a number of fridges and interfering with the bodies.

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Rishi Sunak speaks of ‘hurt and anger’ at daughters having to hear Reform activist’s racist slur about him – UK general election live

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PM responds to comments by Reform activists, who were filmed by Channel 4 reporter while canvassing in Clacton

Here’s the latest in the Guardian’s series on The broken years: Tory Britain 2010-24:

Unless the polls are wildly inaccurate, the Conservative party is heading towards a catastrophic defeat in the coming election.

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Nigel Farage ‘has questions to answer’ over Reform racism, says Rishi Sunak

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Essex police say they are ‘urgently assessing’ racist and homophobic remarks made by party’s volunteers

Rishi Sunak has said he was hurt and angry to hear a Reform UK canvasser calling him a racial slur, saying Nigel Farage “has some questions to answer”.

The prime minister responded after a Channel 4 undercover investigation found a Reform campaigner had called him a “fucking [P-word]”. Sunak repeated the slur and said he had done so because it was important to call it out for what it was.

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Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now: UK radio listeners nominate songs to sum up election campaign

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Exclusive: Boom Radio listeners share in election fatigue but demographic arguably has less to lose than younger voters

Sometimes only a song can sum up the national mood.

When a soggy Rishi Sunak fired the starting gun on the general election in May, D:Ream’s Things Can Only Get Better blared across Downing Street. Five long weeks later and voters are cueing up rather more mordant tracks to capture their political fatigue.

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Election betting scandal revealed the niche market of political gambling in UK

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Though the betting often interests few outside Westminster, leaders must be clear on where opportunity for impropriety really lies

Until the past few weeks, online casinos and bookmakers have made handy villains for an under-pressure government.

Ministers could legitimately claim to be cleaning up Labour’s mess with reforms that partially roll back the permissive regulatory regime ushered in under Tony Blair.

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Post Office scandal: ex-Fujitsu engineer accused of ‘hiding’ IT problems

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Lawyers acting for victims of Horizon IT scandal accuse Gareth Jenkins of protecting ‘out of control monster’

A former Fujitsu engineer has been accused by a lawyer acting for victims of the Post Office scandal of “hiding” problems with the Horizon IT system to protect the “out of control monster”, a public inquiry heard.

Gareth Jenkins, formerly a senior engineer at Fujitsu, which developed the Horizon IT system, faced tough questioning by lawyers acting for post office operators caught up in the scandal, which has been described as one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in recent history.

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Mass search to be held on Saturday for missing Briton Jay Slater in Tenerife

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Police had called for volunteers to help in search of rocky wildness close to where teenager went missing

A “mass search” for the missing teenager Jay Slater is due to begin in Tenerife on Saturday after police called for more volunteers to take part.

Slater, from Oswaldtwistle in Lancashire, was last heard from on the morning of Monday 17 June when he texted a friend to say he had no water and only 1% battery left on his phone.

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Elvis Presley’s blue suede shoes could sell for £120,000 at auction

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Singer wore footwear on and off stage during 1950s before giving them to a friend when called up to US army

Well it’s one for the money … a lot of money actually.

The blue suede shoes worn by Elvis Presley during the early part of his career are expected to fetch £120,000 at auction on Friday.

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