Arise, Sir Cav: Mark Cavendish awarded knighthood in king’s birthday honours

  • Chris Boardman gets CBE as does Graeme Souness
  • Katherine Sciver-Brunt and Sandy Lyle earn OBEs

The British cyclist Mark Cavendish, whose fearlessness, raw power, and insatiable thirst for success has earned him 164 professional victories in a glittering career, has been knighted in the king’s birthday honours.

The 39-year-old, who is known as the Manx Missile because of his speed and aggressiveness in sprint finishes, has also won 34 Tour de France stages, putting him joint first on the all-time list together with Eddy Merckx.

Continue reading...

Sunak praises ‘fantastic’ Meloni as G7 launches bid to halt people-smuggling

UK prime minister says he sees ‘eye-to-eye’ with his Italian counterpart on issue of migration

Rishi Sunak has praised his “fantastic” Italian counterpart, Giorgia Meloni, as he announced the launch of a G7 coalition to tackle people-smuggling.

The prime minister, who is in Puglia in Italy for the G7 summit, said he and Meloni saw “eye-to-eye” on the issue and had spearheaded efforts to tackle it since they were elected.

Continue reading...

General election live: Farage claims he is ‘leader of the opposition’ and demands one-to-one debate with Starmer

Reform UK leader says he should also take part in planned leaders’ debate on BBC

Introducing a cap on adult social care costs by October next year is part of Labour’s plan if they win the election, Wes Streeting has insisted, although the pledge did not appear in the party’s manifesto.

Asked whether he could make a firm commitment to bringing in the cap in October 2025, PA Media reports he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “That’s the plan, as things stand. We don’t have any plans to change that situation and that’s the certainty and stability I want to give the system at this stage.”

It’s going to take 10 years to build the kind of national care service that I think will last this country the best part of the next century. And that’s the scale of ambition that I have, that a Labour government would have. Change takes time, especially when the public finances are in the state they are and the catastrophic damage the Conservatives have done.

It’s been put to me repeatedly and to other Labour colleagues in recent days about the importance of honesty. And as we have said repeatedly, you know, our manifesto is a manifesto that’s fully costed and fully funded.

Continue reading...

‘Absolute outrage’: arts in state schools must be a priority for next government, say theatre leaders

Sir Nicholas Hytner, Nancy Medina and Theresa Heskins stress importance of sidelined drama, dance and music studies and say the arts are a ‘necessity for all’

Addressing the erosion and devaluation of the arts in state schools must be a priority for the next government, leading theatre figures in England have urged.

Sir Nicholas Hytner, who ran the National Theatre in London for 12 years, said that state schools “have been robbed” and that restoring arts education was a matter of urgency to ensure that there is “not just a new generation of artists but a new generation of audiences”. Nancy Medina, the artistic director of Bristol Old Vic, said the arts should be a “necessity for all pupils” and not just the “preserve” of independent schools. Theresa Heskins, artistic director of Staffordshire’s New Vic, suggested that the next government commit to providing every schoolchild a theatre trip.

Continue reading...

Portrayal of character in Steve Coogan’s film The Lost King is defamatory, judge rules

Coogan, production company Baby Cow and Pathe, the distributors of the 2022 film, will now face a full trial

The portrayal of a former university official in Steve Coogan’s film about the discovery of the remains of Richard III is defamatory, a high court judge has ruled.

Richard Taylor, a former deputy registrar at the University of Leicester, is suing Coogan, the production company Baby Cow, and the distributors Pathe.

Continue reading...

Tories face new questions over Sunak aide who placed bet on July election

Labour has asked what role Craig Williams played in election date discussions and when party knew about bet

The Conservative party is facing new questions over the role Rishi Sunak’s closest parliamentary aide played in pre-election discussions before he placed a bet on the poll date days before it was announced.

Labour has written to Richard Holden, the Tory party chair, demanding more answers on the scandal that has further marred the party’s bruised election campaign.

Continue reading...

Runaway horses set to steal show at trooping the colour on Saturday

Cameras expected to be trained on three Household Cavalry steeds that galloped through London in April

The bearskins, marching bands and palace balcony appearances that ensure trooping the colour is an annual crowd-puller will face competition when this year’s military spectacle takes place on Saturday.

King Charles and Queen Camilla will be there, though in a small concession to his cancer treatment, Charles will review the King’s Birthday Parade from an Ascot landau carriage rather than on horseback.

Continue reading...

UK general election opinion polls tracker: Labour significantly ahead of Tories as campaign continues

Find out who’s up and who’s down in the latest polls – and how many seats each party is likely to win in the 2024 general election

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has called the next UK general election for 4 July 2024.

After 14 years of Conservative rule, Keir Starmer’s Labour has been consistently ahead in the polls since the start of 2022.

Continue reading...

Children near Amsterdam airport use inhalers more, study finds

Results show increase in symptoms such as wheeziness in presence of high aviation-related ultrafine particles

As the public hearings for London Gatwick airport’s northern runway resume, researchers from the Netherlands have found greater inhaler use in children living near Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport.

Stand close to a large airport and, if the wind is in the wrong direction, each cubic centimetre of air that you breathe will contain tens of thousands of ultrafine particles (UFP).

Continue reading...

Rayner, Mordaunt, Farage and others quizzed on NHS in general election debate clash – politics live

Party representatives asked how they would fix a health service that is ‘on its knees’

In more disappointing news for the Tories, the Times is publishing an opinion poll that says that Reform have now overtaken them. Its political editor, Steven Swinford, has recently tweeted the story.

According to Savanta, the Labour manifesto featured 34 pictures of Keir Starmer while the Conservative manifesto had no pictures of Rishi Sunak.

Continue reading...

Bookmakers told to find all substantial bets on July poll after Sunak aide’s ‘flutter’

Craig Williams’s £100 bet prompted inquiry by the Gambling Commission and fury within Conservatives

Bookmakers have been asked by the Gambling Commission to trawl through all substantial bets placed on a July election after one of Rishi Sunak’s closest aides put a wager on the poll date just days before it was announced.

The prime minister said he was “disappointed” with the behaviour of Craig Williams, which was revealed in the Guardian, but neither would be drawn on whether they had discussed the date of the election prior to the bet being placed.

Continue reading...

Rishi Sunak denies he is being snubbed after awkward start to G7 summit

Giorgia Meloni appears to recoil from UK PM, who has no formal bilateral meetings with other G7 leaders on day one

Rishi Sunak has insisted he was not being snubbed by other leaders after his first day at the G7 summit ended without any bilateral meetings with his counterparts and he had an awkward encounter with Giorgia Meloni.

Meloni, the Italian prime minister who is one of Sunak’s closest international allies, appeared to recoil from him after they embraced on his arrival in Puglia for the G7 leaders’ summit on Thursday.

Continue reading...

Bomb squad called to Tory candidate’s West Sussex office

Disposal team attends after former defence minister Jeremy Quin was sent suspicious package

A bomb squad had to be called in to a Conservative candidate’s constituency office after he said he received a suspicious package.

Sir Jeremy Quin, a former defence minister and the Tory candidate for the Horsham constituency, received the package at his West Sussex office. Bomb disposal experts were called in to investigate after a decision by Sussex police.

Continue reading...

Keir Starmer faces questions over cost of Labour manifesto

Leader accused of being part of a ‘conspiracy of silence’ over economic challenges ahead as he launches wealth creation plan for government

Keir Starmer faced new questions over how Labour would pay to fix Britain’s broken public services as he vowed to “turn the page for ever” on held-back potential and to end political “pantomime” during the party’s manifesto launch.

The Labour leader said he saw “potential held back” everywhere he went as a result of a lack of housing, the cost of living crisis, low wages and inadequate healthcare for children.

Continue reading...

Woman stalked by ex-partner loses bid to have restraining order extended

Exclusive: Rhianon Bragg, of north Wales, says judge’s refusal leaves her facing ‘ticking clock’

A woman who was stalked and held hostage at gunpoint by her ex-partner has warned that she and her family are in danger after a judge refused to strengthen a restraining order against her abuser, despite hearing evidence that her life was under threat.

Rhianon Bragg had asked for the restraining order on Gareth Wyn Jones, who was freed from prison earlier this year, to be extended to cover the whole of Gwynedd in north Wales rather than a limited area around her remote smallholding in the foothills of Eryri (Snowdonia).

Continue reading...

Woman arrested on suspicion of 1982 baby murder in Northampton

Arrest of 57-year-old follows new evidence surfacing during cold case review by Northamptonshire police

A woman has been arrested on suspicion of murdering a newborn baby girl who was found in Northampton more than 40 years ago, police said.

The 57-year-old suspect was arrested in Northampton on Tuesday morning and taken to a location in the county for questioning by detectives.

Continue reading...

Harry Dunn’s family say US ‘obstructing’ inquest into his death

Relatives of motorcyclist killed in 2019 are looking forward to ‘working with next government’ on public inquiry

The parents of Harry Dunn, a teenage motorcyclist killed in a road collision, have accused the US of “obstructing” their son’s inquest, as they said they were looking forward to working with the next Westminster government to establish a public inquiry.

No representative of the US embassy nor the driver responsible, Anne Sacoolas, attended the four-day inquest, which concluded on Thursday, prompting the Dunn family’s spokesperson, Radd Seiger, to say Washington’s position was that “lives of UK citizens like Harry ultimately do not matter”.

Continue reading...

Tory welfare reform cost working-age families thousands while pensioners benefited – report

Retirees or those on disability benefit are biggest annual winners, while large families are £4,600 worse off, says Resolution Foundation

Pensioners and people on disability benefits are the winners from radical changes to the welfare system made by the Tories over the last decade, while working-age families are losing out by thousands of pounds every year, according to a report by the Resolution Foundation.

The Conservatives’ 14-year overhaul of social security has shifted spending away from children and housing to supporting elderly people, and broken the link between entitlement and need for some of the poorest households in the country, the report says.

Continue reading...

Conservative grassroots campaign in ‘disarray’, say insiders and opponents

Tories struggling in some areas from chronic lack of supporters to canvass and deliver leaflets, say sources

The Conservative on-the-ground election campaign is descending into “disarray” amid a chronic lack of volunteers and strategy and an increasing sense of panic in formerly ultra-safe seats, insiders and opponents have told the Guardian.

Some areas have struggled to muster people to knock on doors and deliver leaflets due to a combination of a shrinking and ageing membership, a calamitous fall in the number of Conservative councillors and disillusionment with the election campaign.

Continue reading...

More than half of UK students working long hours in paid jobs

Lack of maintenance support is creating two-tier higher education system, say experts

More than half of full-time students are working long hours in jobs to support themselves at university, spending nearly two days a week in paid employment during term time, owing to the cost of living crisis.

A survey of 10,000 full-time UK undergraduates by the Higher Education Policy Institute (Hepi) found a record 56% had paid employment while they were studying, working an average of 14.5 hours each week.

Continue reading...