The Labour government has plans to end their ‘outdated and indefensible’ lawmaking position in the upper house
For centuries in Britain, the country’s noblemen have sat in parliament by virtue of their bloodline – but not for much longer.
The last dukes, earls, viscounts and barons are to be removed from the UK’s unelected upper house, the House of Lords, by the newly elected Labour government – which has declared their presence “outdated and indefensible”.
Continue reading...NHS figures show underdiagnosis of Lewy bodies and frontotemporal dementias
Up to 100,000 people in England may be living with undiagnosed forms of dementia that present with symptoms such as depression and hallucinations, according to government figures.
Dementia is an umbrella term for many different conditions, affecting more than 55 million people worldwide. In England, about 7,000 people are diagnosed every month. While the health service has made progress in headline diagnosis rates, latest figures show that underdiagnosis of specific dementias remain a problem.
Continue reading...UK government adviser’s report says claims not supported by data and could prompt under-18s to take own life
A government-ordered review has dismissed claims that suicide rates in young people with gender dysphoria have risen sharply since the NHS restricted access to puberty-blocking drugs.
A report by the government’s adviser on suicide prevention also found that the claims – made by the campaign group the Good Law Project – were not supported by data and could prompt children under the age of 18 to take their own life.
Continue reading...Police say Serbian man detained near Paris after 74-year-old Ian Cameron was stabbed to death at home in Germany
The alleged killer of a British former Rolls-Royce designer who was stabbed to death at his home in Bavaria last week has been arrested outside Paris after a Europe-wide search, German police said. A motive was not immediately established.
Ian Cameron, 74, was attacked with a knife on 12 July and fatally wounded. A Serbian citizen, 22, was identified as the prime suspect based on tips from the public, the Fürstenfeldbruck police department said.
Continue reading...Previous UK government had built up backlog of 90,000 people whose claims it deemed ‘inadmissible’
Thousands of asylum seekers left in limbo for more than two years as they awaited a decision on the Rwanda scheme will now have their cases decided in the UK.
The decision, revealed during a high court challenge on Friday, is a sharp shift in position from the previous government, which had passed various laws declaring that the claims of those who arrived after January 2022 were “inadmissible” – and so could not be processed in the UK.
Continue reading...Tourist hotspots including Ullapool and Fort William badly hit as biting insects enjoy damp, humid conditions
Scotland’s wet summer is providing perfect conditions for surges of midges, with experts saying worse is yet to come.
This week the Scottish Midge Forecast predicted high numbers of the biting insects, reaching peaks of four and five on a scale of one to five.
Continue reading...More than 3,000 flights cancelled worldwide after problem affecting Microsoft Windows
Passengers have described “bedlam” at UK airport check-ins after a global IT outage on what was due to be the busiest day for flying since the start of the Covid pandemic, while train networks have also been disrupted.
More than 3,000 flights have been cancelled worldwide after Microsoft Windows operating systems used by airlines, airports and some air traffic systems were affected.
Continue reading...Lengthy prison sentences seen by many as heavy-handed and prompt comparisons with other offences
The lengthy jail terms handed to five supporters of the Just Stop Oil (JSO) climate campaign on Thursday – believed to be the longest ever meted out in the UK for non-violent protest – have sent shock waves through the protest community an d beyond.
The five-year sentence for Roger Hallam and four-year terms imposed on Daniel Shaw, Louise Lancaster, Lucia Whittaker De Abreu and Cressida Gethin are being seen by many as the latest heavy-handed response to protesters, particularly those urging action on the climate crisis.
Continue reading...Former postal affairs minister says conduct of some civil servants was ‘Orwellian’ and raises questions of objectivity
The former postal affairs minister Jo Swinson has railed against the “Orwellian” and “duplicitous” behaviour of some civil servants who kept her in the dark about goings on at the Post Office, as she made a tearful apology for failing to expose the Horizon IT scandal.
The former Liberal Democrat leader, who held the postal brief in 2012-13 and again in 2014-15 in the coalition government, also said she deeply regretted turning down a meeting with Sir Alan Bates.
Continue reading...St James’s Park in central London records highest reading, with health alerts in place across the Midlands, eastern and southern England
UK temperatures have reached their highest point of the year so far, the Met Office has confirmed, with 31.9C recorded at St James’s Park in central London.
The high temperatures, which were recorded largely along the eastern half of the country, came as the majority of schools in England and Wales closed for the summer.
Continue reading...John Healey says any use of British weapons in Russia for defence reasons must be carried out by Ukrainians
Britain will not help Ukraine hit targets in Russia, the defence secretary has said, as Volodymyr Zelenskiy appealed directly to the cabinet to use British-made weapons more freely.
John Healey did not rule out accepting the Ukrainian president’s request to use British-made missiles against Russian territory, but added that Britain would not be involved in any such attacks.
Continue reading...Fault in CrowdStrike caused airports, businesses and healthcare services to languish in ‘largest outage in history’
Services began to come back online on Friday evening after an IT failure that wreaked havoc worldwide. But full recovery could take weeks, experts have said, after airports, healthcare services and businesses were hit by the “largest outage in history”.
Flights and hospital appointments were cancelled, payroll systems seized up and TV channels went off air after a botched software upgrade hit Microsoft’s Windows operating system.
Continue reading...People told to stay at home due to unrest in Harehills area of West Yorkshire city
A police car was flipped on to its side after unrest broke out in Leeds on Thursday evening, and local people were advised to stay at home.
Footage on social media appeared to show people throwing objects at the police vehicle before it was pushed over in Harehills, just east of the city centre.
Continue reading...Northumbrian village was named as nation’s favourite, just ahead of Portmeirion and St Andrews
Bamburgh, the Northumbrian village known for its sprawling sand dunes and imposing castle, has retained its title as the UK’s best seaside destination for the fourth consecutive year.
A survey of 4,700 people by the consumer group Which? placed the Northumberland coastal village as the nation’s favourite, ahead of Portmeirion in Gwynedd and St Andrews in Fife.
Continue reading...Funding and staffing shortages mean plan to introduce cap in October 2025 impossible to deliver, councils say
Long-awaited changes designed to protect individuals from having to sell their homes to meet large social care bills must be further delayed because of funding and staffing shortages, the leaders of England’s largest councils have said.
Plans to introduce a cap on social care costs – which would limit people’s lifetime care cost contributions to a maximum of £86,000 – in October 2025 will be impossible to deliver, the County Councils Network (CCN) said.
Continue reading...Jesmin Akter left aluminium phosphide around Tower Hamlets flat to deal with infestation, killing Fatiha Sabrin
A woman has been given a suspended sentence for accidentally killing her neighbour, a child on her 11th birthday, with poisonous gas she brought from Italy to exterminate bedbugs in her flat in London.
Jesmin Akter, 34, had illegally imported aluminium phosphide without a licence to deal with an infestation in her flat in Tower Hamlets, east London.
Continue reading...Ukraine’s president will ask for more help to block Putin’s growing ‘shadow fleet’ of tankers carrying sanctioned crude to buyers
The Ukrainian president, Volodmyr Zelenskiy, will attend an extraordinary meeting of the British cabinet on Friday to bring fresh impetus to efforts to stop Russia evading sanctions on its oil exports.
Zelenskiy will be the first foreign leader to visit Downing Street since Keir Starmer was elected prime minister two weeks ago and the first foreign leader to address cabinet in person since the US president Bill Clinton in 1997.
Continue reading...Those close to Criminal Cases Review Commission’s work hope review will pave way for change in leadership and purpose
Andrew Malkinson had only just stepped outside the court of appeal last summer when he received a message of apology from Greater Manchester police. It was the force’s work that ultimately led to his wrongful conviction for rape, leaving him incarcerated for 17 years.
Malkinson was unimpressed by their late contrition, but there was another body that refused to apologise at all that day. Yet their work – or lack of it – prolonged his time behind bars by a decade.
Continue reading...Spokesperson for Graziano Di Prima says he accepts he ‘crossed the line’ in the incident with Zara McDermott
Graziano Di Prima was removed from Strictly Come Dancing after he kicked his celebrity partner Zara McDermott during rehearsals, his spokesperson has said.
Di Prima, who joined the Strictly lineup in 2018, announced last weekend he was leaving the programme.
Continue reading...PM wants to rethink UK’s immigration policies but did not make progress on returns deal at summit with EU leaders
Keir Starmer is looking into plans to process asylum seekers outside the UK as part of a rethink of the government’s immigration policies, even as a returns agreement with the EU appears more distant than ever.
The prime minister said on Thursday he was open to the idea of Britain processing claims offshore, after a day spent discussing illegal migration with fellow European leaders at Blenheim Palace. Those talks, as part of the European Political Community summit, included a meeting with Edi Rama, the Albanian prime minister, whose country processes asylum claims on behalf of Italy.
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