Humza Yousaf’s proposal in event of a victory in Scotland falls short of strategy backed by Nicola Sturgeon
Humza Yousaf has said a win in Scotland for the Scottish National party in the next general election would be a mandate to apply further pressure on Westminster for Scottish independence.
The proposal, made by the SNP leader as he addressed party members gathered in Dundee, falls short of the de facto referendum strategy favoured by his predecessor, Nicola Sturgeon.
Continue reading...Referral unit providers warn of overwhelming demand from unprecedented poor behaviour after pandemic lull
Referral units for children who have been excluded from mainstream schools are warning that they are full to bursting because of unprecedented levels of disruptive behaviour across the country.
Providers that take children excluded from mainstream schools say that after a lull during the pandemic, the situation has deteriorated, and they have seen permanent exclusions rising across the country in the past year. The situation had appeared to be improving with the latest government data on permanent exclusions in England showing that they fell in the spring term last year to 2,200 from 2,800 in 2019.
Continue reading...The cost of living is falling in Europe and the US but is still rising in Britain. We look at the major culprits
The Bank of England has struggled to understand why inflation remains high in the UK. It has fallen in France, Germany, the US and especially Spain, where inflation dropped to 2.9% in May compared with the UK figure of 8.7%. Here we look at the many reasons for the current crisis.
Continue reading...Shoppers for consumer group Which? ordered 1,800 items to test the average shelf life at six retailers
From out-of-date frankfurters to bashed brie, online food shopping can be a lottery, especially when it comes to the groceries’ shelf life, according to an investigation by the consumer group Which?.
Groceries delivered by Sainsbury’s were found to have the shortest average time left before their use-by dates, according to the items received by a team of 12 mystery shoppers located around the UK.
Continue reading...Foreign secretary describes newspaper report of frustration with Tory party rows with as ‘nonsense’
The foreign secretary, James Cleverly, has described suggestions that he was considering standing down from parliament at the next general election as “nonsense”.
Cleverly declared he was “standing at the next election” after newspaper reports claimed he was considering whether to stand.
Continue reading...Utility’s head says demand for drinking water has risen 20% since pandemic, outpacing supply
A water company has blamed more people working from home post-pandemic for a new hosepipe ban.
South East Water, which supplies more than 2m homes and businesses, will impose the first hosepipe ban of the summer on Monday, affecting households across Kent and Sussex.
Continue reading...Jury finds Louis De Zoysa shot Matt Ratana in Croydon with revolver he probably hid under armpit
A man has been found guilty of murdering a police custody sergeant with a gun he had smuggled into a cell.
A jury at Northampton crown court convicted Louis De Zoysa, 25, of murdering Sgt Matt Ratana, 54, with a gunshot to the chest at a custody block in Croydon, south London, in September 2020.
Continue reading...The man was taken into custody in London after failing to provide the pin to his phone when asked to by officers
No further action will be taken against a French publisher who was arrested after being stopped at St Pancras station on suspicion of terror offences, the Metropolitan police have said.
The 28-year-old man, who was previously named by his employer as Ernest Moret, was stopped by border officers as he arrived at the north London station at about 7.30pm on 17 April.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Unknown artwork was barred from leaving the UK after surfacing at an auction in 2021
A painting has been saved for the UK in recognition of its “outstanding significance” for the study of race and gender in 17th-century Britain, it will be announced on Friday.
The anonymous artist’s portrait of two women – one black and one white, depicted as companions and equals with similar dress, hair and jewellery – has been bought by Compton Verney, an award-winning gallery in Warwickshire.
Continue reading...The site, set up as a standard asylum seeker hotel, has no care workers or nurses there as part of the contract
The Home Office has been accused of abandoning 55 asylum seekers with a range of severe disabilities and life-limiting conditions at a former care home in an Essex seaside town.
The asylum seekers, who fled various conflict zones including Sudan and Afghanistan, are struggling with a range of health conditions they have suffered from since childhood or life-changing injuries suffered in war zones.
Continue reading...Canadian transport watchdog to launch safety investigation; Stockton Rush reportedly emailed deep-sea expert saying concerns were ‘baseless cries’
William Kohnen, chairman of the Manned Underwater Vehicles Committee, said the regulations for building submersible vessels were “written in blood”.
Kohnen’s organisation, based in Los Angeles in the US, raised safety concerns in 2018 about OceanGate’s development of Titan.
We’re only smart because we remember what we wrote and what we did wrong last time.
The rules are written in blood – it is in there because it caused trouble before, and to say: ‘Well I think we’re just going to ignore that and go on our own way,’ suggests there might be a bit of input of wisdom that this might not be the best decision.
It’s too early to tell, there’s data that’s going to have to be collected over the coming days, weeks and months, and I’m sure the team will work with whoever is conducting the investigations to cooperate and provide as much information as possible.
At that point, we’ll be in a better position to tell (what went wrong).
There are regulations in place but as you can imagine there aren’t many subs that go that deep, so the regulations are pretty sparse and many of them are antiquated and designed for specific instances.
It’s tricky to navigate those regulatory schemes.
Continue reading...Tories are likely to bear the brunt of homeowning voters’ anger in marginal constituencies in next year’s election
As the former chancellor who warned presciently during last summer’s leadership contest that Liz Truss would crash the economy, Rishi Sunak’s calm competence was meant to be his key electoral selling point.
But after Thursday’s half-point rate rise by the Bank of England left thousands of voters facing eye-watering mortgage hikes, a shirt-sleeved Sunak was reduced to insisting he was “totally, 100% on it” when it comes to fighting inflation.
Continue reading...Families, friends and colleagues remember Stockton Rush, Hamish Harding, Shahzada and Suleman Dawood and Paul-Henri Nargeolet
Tributes have been paid to the five people who are now believed to have been instantly killed in a “catastrophic implosion” of the Titan submersible during its dive to the Titanic.
On Thursday, after days of aerial and underwater searches, a robotic diving vehicle deployed from a Canadian ship discovered a debris field from the submersible Titan on the seabed 1,600 feet (488 metres) from the bow of the Titanic.
Continue reading...Exclusive: A change in planning rules has stopped the EU flag from being raised, say City Hall sources
Ministers have been accused of criminalising the flying of the European Union flag on government buildings in England after London’s City Hall was told it could be prosecuted for displaying it on the anniversary of the Brexit referendum.
Seven years after the referendum on leaving the EU, the Greater London authority (GLA) had planned to fly the flag on Friday but officials were advised that under the latest regulations they would need to secure permission from the local authority.
Continue reading...Chonhar Bridge is one of a handful of infrastructures linking Crimea with the mainland
Russian-backed officials in southern Ukraine have accused Kyiv of using British-supplied long-range missiles to strike a bridge connecting Kherson province with the Crimean peninsula.
The strike on the Chonhar Bridge, one of the few links between mainland Ukraine and Crimea, came two days after Moscow threatened to attack Kyiv’s “decision-making centres” if western-supplied missiles were used against Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014.
Continue reading...Church pension and endowment funds shed holdings after U-turns by BP and Shell
The Church of England is divesting from fossil fuels in its multibillion pound endowment and pension funds over climate concerns and recent U-turns by oil and gas companies.
The church said it was abandoning oil and gas companies and all firms primarily engaged in the exploration, production and refining of oil or gas by the end of 2023, unless they were in genuine alignment with a 1.5C reduction pathway.
Continue reading...Prime minister says he knows people will be anxious about rate rise but ‘it is going to be OK’
Rishi Sunak has posted a thread on Twitter setting out what the government is doing to help people with the cost of living. It starts here.
He ends by saying “if we can hold our nerve” he is confident the plan will deliver.
Continue reading...This blog is now closed
A popular Mexican travel Youtuber, Alan Estrada has recalled his trip down to visit the wreck of the Titanic aboard the Titan submersible.
Estrada told the BBC that everyone who joined on the trip “were fully aware of the risks we were taking”.
But I never felt unsafe. I was fully aware of the risks and I knew that if something happened, if there was a failure in those depths and the submersible imploded, we probably wouldn’t even notice.
We continue to come together for our friends, their families and the ideals of The Explorers Club, and the cause of safe scientific exploration of extreme environments.
There is good cause for hope, and we are making it more hopeful.
Continue reading...Suleman Dawood, who joined voyage with his billionaire father Shahzada, had just finished his first year
Suleman Dawood, one of the five men missing on the submersible dive to visit the Titanic, is a student at a university in Glasgow.
The University of Strathclyde confirmed that Dawood, 19, was one of its students with Strathclyde business school, and had just completed his first year.
Continue reading...England’s chief medical officer tells Covid inquiry focus was more on dealing with consequences of pandemic
England’s chief medical officer, Sir Chris Whitty, said the UK “did not give sufficient thought” to stopping Covid in its tracks as he listed multiple problems with preparedness in his first cross-examination at the pandemic public inquiry.
Whitty said the “big weakness” was a lack of “radicalism” in thinking before the crisis took hold, and he said government scientific advisers would not have thought to have considered national lockdowns without it being requested by a senior politician.
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