Johanita Kossiwa Dogbey is believed to have been attacked by a stranger in daylight in south London
The family of a woman stabbed to death in south-west London in a daylight attack have paid tribute to the “smart, dedicated and loving girl”.
The Metropolitan police confirmed the 31-year-old victim of the attack in Stockwell Park Walk, Brixton, just after 4pm on Monday was Johanita Kossiwa Dogbey.
Continue reading...Camped outside Foreign Office, Beheshti is demanding Iran’s Revolutionary Guards be proscribed
Vahid Beheshti’s hunger strike outside the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office took a surreal turn on Wednesday – its 70th day – when he attended a royal coronation tea party at Buckingham Palace, arriving by wheelchair and wearing a suit and red tie.
He has lost more than 17kg (37lb), or a quarter of his body weight, and he told the Guardian that “my body and joints are now racked in intense pain”. As he left his tent, draped in the Iranian flag and surrounded by flowers, he clutched an envelope containing a letter for the king. After carefully smartening himself up, he was wheeled to a taxi by his wife, Mattie Heaven, a Conservative councillor.
Continue reading...Foreign Office accused of creating ‘confusion’ during evacuation, with some struggling to get visas or prove citizenship
British people trapped in Sudan have described being forced to make impossible choices about whether to fly home without family members the UK government will not allow on flights.
Suleiman, a British national who asked to withhold his family name, said a British official had called him to say he could be evacuated with his two children only if he left his pregnant wife behind. His children are also British nationals, and their mother is a Sudanese citizen.
Continue reading...Hāmiora Bailey says wall to wall Charles III coverage is unappealing to Indigenous people and has devised a solution
A Māori artist has designed a way for the masses to tune out of royal coverage, with a web browser plugin that replaces all monarchy and coronation stories with Indigenous news.
Despite a distance of more that 18,000kms from the palace, New Zealand news headlines have featured a steady flow of royal family gossip: the latest potential snubbing, deep-dive analysis of the new king’s conduct, invitation list scandals and features on the coronation quiche.
Continue reading...Labour leader’s spokesperson says Gray will become chief of staff even if watchdog recommends long delay to start date
The former senior civil servant Sue Gray will take up her new role as Keir Starmer’s chief of staff even if the government’s appointments watchdog recommends a long delay to her start date, Labour has said.
Labour insiders believe the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments (Acoba) will suggest that Gray should wait for a significantly shorter period than the maximum two years it could recommend for senior officials taking up a job outside government.
Continue reading...Philip Davies lobbied culture minister to include measure after being entertained at Mayfair casino
The Conservative MP Philip Davies lobbied the government on behalf of a casino to introduce a measure that was then included in last week’s gambling white paper, it has emerged.
The MP for Shipley, in West Yorkshire, wrote in February to the culture secretary, Lucy Frazer, after being entertained at Les Ambassadeurs luxury casino in Mayfair, central London.
Continue reading...Surrey coroner considering whether failures in care to mother contributed to baby’s death
A teenage mother who gave birth alone in a prison cell to a baby who did not survive was a suspected victim of county lines exploitation, an inquest into the baby’s death heard on Wednesday.
The inquest before the senior coroner for Surrey, Richard Travers, is considering whether any failures in the care provided to Aisha Cleary’s mother or to Aisha herself contributed to her death. It has not yet been determined whether Aisha was born alive and died shortly after or was stillborn.
Continue reading...Met says technology will not be used to target protesters or activists, but campaigners say use is ‘extremely worrying’
The Metropolitan police has been accused of using the coronation to stage the biggest live facial recognition operation in British history.
The force said on Wednesday it intended to use the controversial technology, which scans faces and matches them against a list of people police want for alleged crimes and could identify convicted terrorists mingling in the crowds.
Continue reading...Campaigners say defeat of amendment to close loopholes on party funding leaves UK open to ‘malign influences’
UK elections remain at risk from interference by hostile states after the government voted down a move to close loopholes on foreign donations to parties, campaigners have warned.
The chair of parliament’s security committee was among those who backed an amendment to the national security bill that would have obliged political parties to carry out due diligence on the true source of donations from companies and individuals.
Continue reading...Lyrics of Stop changed to ‘stop right now, no more oil and gas’ because of bank’s fossil fuel funding
Barclays’ annual general meeting has been disrupted by climate activists condemning the bank’s role as one of Europe’s largest funders of fossil fuels – including a choir singing a Spice Girls hit with reworked lyrics.
Dozens of activists from groups including Fossil Free London and Extinction Rebellion UK began their action less than five minutes into the meeting where its chair, Nigel Higgins, was addressing shareholders at the QEII Centre in Westminster, central London.
Continue reading...Latest updates: PM and Labour leader face off in final prime minister’s questions before voters head to the polls
George Osborne, the Conservative former chancellor, has come out in favour of banning smoking over the long term, and taxing orange juice, to promote public health.
He proposed the ideas – neither of which have much chance of featuring in the next Conservative manifesto – in evidence to the the Times Health Commission, a year-long project to investigate ideas that would improve health and social care.
Since the dawn of states, [the government] has regulated certain products and medicines, and made certain things illegal. I don’t see why you can’t do that in a space such as food. Food’s been heavily regulated since the 19th century.
Of course you’re going to have lots of problems with illegal smoking, but you have lots of problems with other illegal activities. It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try and ban them and police them and make it less readily available. I thought that was a compelling public health intervention.
We’re making sure that we stop those sort of cold calls and those spoof text messages that pretend to be from somebody else, that’s the first thing.
The second thing we’re doing is we’re making sure there’s more ability for the police to pursue fraudsters and that’s where the national fraud squad with 400 new investigators and a new national fraud intelligence unit comes in. That’s a huge development.
Continue reading...Department is worst for publishing spending data, records show, with ministers apparently in breach of guidelines
Treasury ministers appear to have broken government guidelines by failing to publish details of their department’s spending for several months, and in some cases more than two years.
Public records show the Treasury is the worst department in Whitehall for publishing key data on what its officials are spending public funds on, despite its role overseeing spending across government.
Continue reading...Party, which has been without accountants since October, risks losing £1.2m funding if it misses deadline
The SNP has signed a contract with a new auditor more than six months after the previous company quit, the party has said.
The party has been without auditors for its accounts since October, with the Westminster group left with only weeks to file with the Electoral Commission or risk losing £1.2m in funding from UK parliament authorities to support its work.
Continue reading...Merseyside police say people who use guns on streets should be treated like pariahs
Police have condemned the “pariahs” using guns on Britain’s streets after a man was chased into a residential garden and shot near where Olivia Pratt-Korbel was murdered.
Merseyside police said officers were called to reports of gunshots and screaming in the Huyton area of Liverpool at 9.45pm on Tuesday.
Continue reading...David Egan quits UK electronics distributor after ‘some shortcomings of judgment on my part’
The finance director of a leading UK electronics company has resigned with immediate effect, after recognising that a personal relationship with a colleague showed “some shortcomings of judgment”.
David Egan, who had been at the electronic products distributor RS Group for seven years, quit as chief financial officer and director.
Continue reading...Passenger numbers rose to 16 million last month amid pent-up demand for air travel
Ryanair has recorded its third busiest month for traffic, having flown 16 million passengers in April as it continued to benefit from pent-up demand for air travel.
The budget airline said the figure marked a 13% increase in passenger numbers compared with the same month a year earlier, when it carried just over 14 million people, as customers sought to jet off on spring getaways including during the Easter holidays.
Continue reading...Foreign secretary says there will be no further British evacuation flights from wartorn Port Sudan
The final UK rescue flight from Sudan is expected to take off on Wednesday, the government has said.
The foreign secretary, James Cleverly, said British nationals who wanted to leave the country need to make their way to the Coral hotel in Port Sudan by 10am local time (9am BST), adding that there would be no further British evacuation flights from the city.
Continue reading...Remains of once vast riverside structure granted legal protection against unauthorised change
Three sections of a huge but little-known Roman wall, discovered under the City of London, have been given protected status as scheduled national monuments.
The riverside wall was a once vast stone structure that formed part of the defences of Roman London. Built in the third century AD along the Thames, it connected to the city’s landward fortifications, large sections of which still exist.
Continue reading...This blog is now closed.
Asked whether he would swear allegiance, Albanese replied he “will do what is entirely appropriate as the representative of Australia” promising to “engage in that spirit” by swearing the oath – as he has done 10 times when sworn in to parliament and as a minister.
Albanese noted that Australians had voted at the 1999 referendum to remain a monarchy, but acknowledged that Australians have a “wide range of views” on whether to become a republic.
I think that Australia should have an Australian as our head of state, I don’t shy away from that. I haven’t changed my views.
But my priority is constitutional recognition – I can’t imagine going forward, for example, going forward as was suggested by some legitimately that we should be having another referendum on the republic before that occurs.
All Australians wish King Charles well regardless of the different views of people will have about our constitutional arrangements.
Continue reading...Investments in Bristol and Santo Tomas in the Philippines will be worth £100m and £166m respectively
Dyson has revealed plans to build a new battery factory in Singapore, alongside investments by the maker of vacuum cleaners and dryers in technology centres in the UK and the Philippines.
The company, run by the billionaire Sir James Dyson, said the investments in Bristol in the UK and Santo Tomas in the Philippines would be worth £100m and £166m respectively. The Singapore investment will be significantly larger.
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