Category Archives: UK news

Archbishop of Canterbury warns Christians against membership of far-right groups

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Exclusive: Justin Welby condemns violent disorder of recent days as ‘unchristian’

The archbishop of Canterbury has warned Christians they should not be part of any far-right groups, criticising the use of Christian imagery in this summer’s riots as “an offence to our faith”.

Writing in the Guardian, Justin Welby condemned the violent unrest, which he described as “racist”, “anti-Muslim, anti-refugee and anti-asylum seeker”. His intervention follows a week of disorder that began after a mass stabbing of children at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport last month.

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Family whose daughter died in Channel say they will attempt crossing again

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Amira Al Shammari says they have no other options as she describes horror of 21-year-old Dina’s death

A mother from a stateless Arab minority say she and her family have no choice but to try to cross the Channel again despite the death last month of her eldest daughter on a previous attempt.

Dina Al Shammari, 21, was travelling with her parents and three teenage siblings when she was crushed to death in an overcrowded dinghy off the coast of Calais on 28 July.

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UK riots expose double standards on far-right and Islamist violence

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Severe cases of far-right violence need to be recognised as terrorism and not ‘thuggery’, write Rusi researchers

The recent riots in the UK, sparked by the Southport stabbings, have exposed troubling double standards in how society perceives and responds to far-right violence compared to Islamist extremism. This disparity calls for a serious redefinition of how we address far-right extremism, recognising it as the grave threat it truly represents.

Far-right motivated violence is often classified as mere “thuggery” or hooliganism, while similar acts motivated by Islamist extremism would is likely to be swiftly labeled as terrorism. This inconsistency undermines the perceived severity of far-right threats and hinders the political will to take equivalent action.

Emily Winterbotham, Claudia Wallner and Jessica White are researchers at the Royal United Services Institute.

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‘Two-tier’: UK treats far-right attacks less harshly than Islamist violence, says thinktank

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Exclusive: Defence thinktank Rusi says rightwing violence ‘often classified as mere thuggery’ by politicians and prosecutors

The UK has a “two-tier approach” to extremism that fails to treat far-right attacks as seriously as Islamist ones, a leading thinktank has said.

The Royal United Services Institute (Rusi) says rightwing violence “is often classified as mere thuggery” by politicians, prosecutors and the security services. Equivalent acts by Islamists would “swiftly be labelled as terrorism”, it says in an article in the Guardian.

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Two people die attempting to cross Channel in dinghy

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Fifty-three people were rescued by helicopter on Sunday morning, French authorities have said

Two people have died attempting to cross the Channel in a dinghy, according to the French authorities, bringing the death toll since mid-July to at least nine.

Fifty-three people were rescued by a helicopter and several ships sent to the scene by Gris-Nez Regional operation and surveillance centre. HM Coastguard also provided assistance, but two people were declared dead after being found unconscious onboard.

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Startling genome discovery in butterfly project reveals impact of climate change in Europe

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Project to study all 11,000 species of butterflies and moths finds ‘two species in the act of being created from one’

The chalkhill blue has some surprising claims to fame. For a start, it is one of the UK’s most beautiful butterflies, as can be seen as they flutter above the grasslands of southern England in summer.

Then there is their close and unusual relationship with ants. Caterpillars of Lysandra coridon – found across Europe – exude a type of honeydew that is milked by ants and provides them with energy. In return, they are given protection in cells below ground especially created for them by the ants. Chalkhill blues thrive as a result, though their numbers are now coming under threat.

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Banksy’s billboard cat removed as meaning of his London animals revealed

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Exclusive: secretive artist trying to raise a smile with pelicans, elephants, monkeys, wolf, goat and cat

A big cat by Banksy appeared briefly, ­stretching in the morning sun, on a bare advertising hoarding on Edgware Road in Cricklewood, north-west London, on Saturday. A few hours later it had gone, removed by contractors who feared it would be ripped down.

The anonymous artist known as Banksy, who confirmed the image was his at lunchtime on Saturday, also promised a little more summer fun to come.

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Jess Phillips calls X a ‘place of misery’ as she vows to scale back use

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Labour minister says she removed social media platform’s app from her mobile phone when Elon Musk took over

A government minister said she has scaled back her use of social media platform X, arguing it had become “a bit despotic” and was “a place of misery now”.

Jess Phillips, the minister for safeguarding and violence against women and girls, said although she had previously been “massively addicted to Twitter”, referencing the former name of X, she had removed the app from her phone after Elon Musk took over the company in October 2022.

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About 15,000 join Belfast anti-racism rally as trouble flares in Derry

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More than 120 groups take part in demonstration after week of rioting and disorder

Up to 15,000 people took part in a peaceful anti-racism rally in Belfast on Saturday, after a week of rioting and disorder in the city.

But there was an outbreak of trouble on Saturday night in Derry, 70 miles from Belfast. Ten officers were injured during the disorder in Nailors Row, said the Police Service of Northern Ireland, with fireworks, petrol bombs and other missiles used to attack officers. Derry City and Strabane Supt William Calderwood said one person was arrested and “a robust investigation is under way to bring all those responsible for this violence to justice”.

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Messages of welcome to be delivered to refugees and asylum seekers

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Brighton organisation is inviting UK public to hand write notes of ‘solidarity’ after far-right violence

A Brighton-based organisation has promised to deliver handwritten messages welcoming refugees and asylum seekers who have recently arrived in the UK in the wake of far-right violence and anti-immigrant unrest.

Conversation Over Borders has invited the public to submit messages of “solidarity” online, which they plan to write by hand and deliver to people in accommodation hotels across the country.

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Top Tories fuelled riots with ‘divisive language’ on immigration, say party grandees

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Veteran Conservatives on the party’s liberal wing have criticised the rightwards shift by some senior figures

• Tim Kirkhope: The Conservative party has shifted too far to the right. We must fight for the centre ground

Tory grandees have accused senior figures in their own party of using divisive language that inflamed anger over immigration before the recent rioting, amid warnings that too many Conservatives have “turned a blind eye” to a shift to the right.

The criticisms come as fears grow on the party’s liberal wing that the leadership election risks pulling the party further into populist polices designed to take on Reform UK.

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Video doorbells, CCTV, facial recognition: how the police tracked UK rioters

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Using an array of technology and intelligence tools, police are hopeful of tracking down key perpetrators, even those who were masked

The hunt to find the rioters and the people who incited them began the moment the first brick was thrown. But the efforts to catch them will last weeks or months, and involve super-recognisers, specialist software, video doorbells and, in a few cases, criminal stupidity.

A dizzying number of newly convicted rioters and online agitators were this weekend waking up in a prison cell on the first day of their sentence. Of the more than 700 arrests made so far, about 300 people had been charged by Friday night, with more arrests and court appearances on Saturday.

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Pret a Manger deploys body-worn cameras for some staff

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Coffee and bakery chain says devices to be worn by managers will ‘only be turned on in specific circumstances’

Pret a Manger has become the latest high street staple to deploy body-worn cameras for some of its staff.

The coffee and bakery chain began trialling body-worn cameras in a select number of shops in London last month. A Pret spokesperson said this was done as a new safety measure. “These are only being worn by team leaders or managers, and are only turned on in specific circumstances,” the spokesperson said.

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Priti Patel’s ‘laughable’ claims of two-tier policing putting officers at risks

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Neil Basu, ex-head of counter-terrorism, says former home secretary’s remarks are divisive and untrue

The former head of UK counter-terrorism has accused Priti Patel of putting officers at risk after the Tory leadership hopeful made “divisive” comments about two-tier policing.

Since far-right riots erupted across England and Northern Ireland last week, there have been false claims on social media that police are treating white people taking part in the disorder more harshly than minority groups.

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Man charged over London shooting that left girl seriously injured

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Javon Reily, 32, charged with four counts of attempted murder over Dalston shooting in which girl, nine, and three men were hurt

A man has been charged in connection with a shooting that left a nine-year-old girl seriously injured.

The girl was eating dinner with her family at a restaurant in Kingsland High Street, in Dalston, east London, on 29 May when a lone motorcyclist fired shots towards the building.

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UK has once-in-a-generation chance to allow assisted dying, says Labour peer

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Lord Falconer reveals that Keir Starmer will not block Commons vote on giving terminally ill people choice of ending their lives

Parliament is facing a once-in-a-generation chance to hand the terminally ill a choice over ending their life, the Labour peer championing a change in the law has said.

Charlie Falconer, the former lord chancellor whose bill was introduced into the House of Lords last month, revealed he had been reassured by Downing Street that it would not stand in the way of a historic Commons vote on assisted dying should its advocates secure one.

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More UK students set to get into first-choice university than in previous years

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As international intake dwindles, leading institutions become less cautious about offers post-Covid

School leavers collecting their A-level results on Thursday will have an easier time getting into their chosen university than their predecessors in the past two years, experts are predicting.

A record number of 18-year-olds are competing for university places this year, but experts said that many universities hope to fill accommodation and lecture theatres with more UK students, due to anxiety about falling numbers of lucrative international students.

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Family and friends pay tribute to Jay Slater at funeral in Lancashire

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Hundreds of people attend service for 19-year-old who died after going missing in Tenerife mountains

The family and friends of Jay Slater have paid tribute to the teenager who died while on holiday in Tenerife at a funeral service attended by about 500 people.

Mourners packed into the chapel at the Accrington crematorium for the funeral of the 19-year-old from Oswaldtwistle, Lancashire, who is believed to have fallen to his death after getting lost in a mountainous area of the Spanish island on 17 June.

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Lammy plans China visit for September to kick-start high-level engagement

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Exclusive: Move highlights ambition to reconnect with Beijing but minister will face pressure over human rights

David Lammy is planning a visit to China in September that would fall within the first 100 days of him taking office.

The foreign secretary is in talks over a trip to Beijing next month that would signal the UK wants to resume high-level engagement with the country.

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