Committee says ministers do not have credible strategy to tackle digital exclusion
The government is failing millions of digitally excluded citizens who do not have the means, money or ability to go online, a House of Lords committee has said.
Ministers do not have a credible strategy to tackle digital exclusion and are allowing “millions of citizens to fall behind”, according to a report by the Lords communications and digital committee.
Continue reading...Former chancellor and ex-shadow chancellor will discuss and analyse the state of the British economy
George Osborne is launching an economics podcast with his “frenemy” Ed Balls in an attempt to capitalise on the success of shows such as The Rest is Politics.
Osborne, the architect of the Conservatives’ austerity policies which imposed deep cuts on British public services, spent four years opposite Balls in the House of Commons. But since leaving frontline politics the pair have become a marketable media double act, appearing together on political shows to debate the state of the economy.
Continue reading...Government initiative, which it is hoped will cover 1 million people in first four years, is aimed at saving lives and reducing pressure on NHS
A digital NHS Health Check is to be rolled out across England from next spring, the government has announced, in an attempt to alleviate the pressure on GP surgeries.
The initiative will deliver 1m checks in the first four years, according to the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC).
Continue reading...Three men have been arrested after girl, who travelled to London from Barnsley, Yorkshire, was reported missing on Sunday
Police have begun a kidnap investigation after a 13-year-old girl from Yorkshire disappeared following a house party in London.
Three men have been arrested on suspicion of kidnap as officers from the Metropolitan Police work “around the clock” to find Carmelle Hepi, from Barnsley. The teenager was reported missing by her family in the early hours of Sunday.
Continue reading...Labour leader presses prime minister to admit his party will not meet promised targets over house building
PMQs is coming up soon.
Here is the list of MPs down to ask a question.
We remain seriously concerned about the potential implications of the illegal migration bill on human rights and the safety of individuals.
Careful consideration should continue to be given to the impact of the bill on different groups with protected characteristics – including children, pregnant women, disabled people, torture survivors, and victims of trafficking.
Continue reading...Telecoms firm, which manages 999 phone system, says it will publish findings of own inquiry on Thursday
The communications watchdog has launched an investigation into BT after technical faults hit the 999 emergency call service on Sunday.
Ofcom said it would look into the incident to find out whether the telecoms company failed to comply with its regulatory duties. Police forces, ambulance services and fire and rescue services across the UK asked people not to phone 999 on Sunday morning due to a “technical fault”.
Continue reading...Star of The Wire and Luther says playing 007 would be the pinnacle of an actor’s career, but the discussion became ‘off-putting’
Idris Elba has said that the racist backlash to the prospect of him being cast as James Bond “made the whole thing disgusting and off-putting”.
Elba was speaking on the SmartLess podcast about the continued speculation linking him to the role, saying: “I was super complimented for a long time about this. We’re all actors and we understand that role is one of those coveted [roles] … Being asked to be James Bond [would be] like: ‘OK, you’ve sort of reached the pinnacle’. That’s one of those things the whole world has a vote in.”
Continue reading...Watchdog calls for campaigners to behave responsibly amid fears over potential misuse of generative AI
Time is running out to enact wholesale changes to ensure Britain’s electoral system keeps pace with advances in artificial intelligence before the next general election, regulators fear.
New laws will not come in time for the election, which will take place no later than January 2025, and the watchdog that regulates election finance and sets standards for how elections should be run is appealing to campaigners and political parties to behave responsibly.
Continue reading...Plans drawn up to pay for cost of dealing with sewage crisis and climate emergency
Water companies are reportedly pushing for bills in England to rise by up to 40% under plans being drawn up to pay for the cost of dealing with the sewage crisis and the climate emergency.
The increases are due to be announced next year and could drive annual bills up from an average of £450 to £680 in parts of the country by the end of the decade, according to a Times report citing consultation documents.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Dropping promise to restore Department for International Development would follow series of U-turns
Keir Starmer is considering dropping a promise to reinstate the Department for International Development (DfID), prompting anger from senior Labour figures and high-profile names in the international development world.
The Labour leader promised last year to restore the department, which was scrapped in 2020 by Boris Johnson, who called it a “giant cashpoint in the sky”.
Continue reading...Hope Street scheme in Southampton aims to keep women in criminal justice system out of jail and with their children
It all started when Edwina Grosvenor spent an hour with two heroin addicts at a drug rehabilitation centre in Liverpool, almost 30 years ago.
Her parents – Natalia and Gerald Grosvenor, who was one the richest men in the UK and the sixth Duke of Westminster – decided to take her to the centre at the age of 12 or 13 to show her that there was a world beyond her privileged bubble. “At that moment I learned about empathy,” Lady Grosvenor said.
Continue reading...The lack of response to TV producer Daisy Goodwin’s allegation about a mayoral candidate casts doubt on complaints processes
Two years after the Pestminster scandal about sexual harassment by politicians swept through parliament in 2017, a downbeat speech in the House of Commons summed up how many female MPs and aides felt about its consequences.
The verdict was delivered by Jess Phillips, the Labour MP and women’s rights campaigner. “Nothing has changed since we started the whole Pestminster thing or even the broader #MeToo movement; it feels as if a moment of blood-letting led to no significant material change in the actual working lives of the people we are here to try to protect.”
Continue reading...Exclusive: Sunak regularly pictured using Pilot V fountain pens during time as chancellor and prime minister
Rishi Sunak routinely uses pens with erasable ink to make hand-written notes on official documents and in government meetings, prompting concerns over Downing Street secrecy, the Guardian has learned.
The prime minister has regularly been pictured using the disposable Pilot V fountain pens during his time as chancellor and prime minister, most recently while taking notes during the Cabinet meeting two weeks ago.
Continue reading...Mirror Group Newspapers says it has ‘sympathy’ for royal but he has no ‘hard evidence’, court told
Prince Harry should receive only £500 in damages at the end of his phone-hacking trial, Mirror Group Newspapers has argued at the high court.
The Duke of Sussex wants a judge to award him more than £200,000 over allegations that he was the victim of illegal activity by journalists working for the Mirror, the Sunday Mirror and the People.
Continue reading...UK economy became reliant on cheap money due to the Bank’s actions, warns former permanent secretary to the Treasury
The Bank of England’s quantitative easing money-printing programme enabled high inflation to take root in Britain, while creating “windfall gains” for the rich, a former Treasury mandarin has warned.
Nick Macpherson, who was permanent secretary to the Treasury under the last Labour government and during David Cameron’s premiership, said the central bank’s £895bn bond-buying stimulus programme had gone “too far” and made the inflation shock hitting Britain worse.
Continue reading...University says about 20% of final year students will be unable to graduate if industrial action continues
More than 1,000 final year students at Durham University could be left without a degree this summer because of the marking boycott disrupting universities across the UK.
Durham, one of 145 universities affected by the industrial action over pay and working conditions called by the University and College Union (UCU), said about 20% of its 5,300 final year students would be unable to graduate.
Continue reading...Ernest Moret had devices seized after arrest by counter-terrorism police on arrival in London in April
The Metropolitan police have admitted downloading the sim card from the phone of a radical French publisher who was arrested by counter-terrorism police at St Pancras station in April, his lawyer has claimed.
Officers returned the iPhone and laptop it had seized from Ernest Moret, 28, to his London lawyer on Tuesday after the Met announced late on Friday that no further action would be taken against him. He had been arrested on his way to the London book fair and held for almost 24 hours under schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000.
Continue reading...Nature Restoration Law vote tied at 44 in favour and 44 against amid claims of lies and fake news
The future of the EU’s flagship environment laws are again hanging by a thread with a cliffhanger vote, flared tempers and accusations of lies, fake news and manipulation of voting in the European parliament.
Emotions were running high after voting on the European parliament committee steering through the Nature Restoration Law (NRL) ended in a dead heat on Tuesday, with 44 votes in favour and 44 against. It can now progress to a vote of the full parliament in a plenary session in July.
Continue reading...Under online safety bill, maximum sentence where intent to cause distress is proved will be two years
Sharing deepfake intimate images is to be criminalised in England and Wales. Amendments to the online safety bill will make it illegal to share explicit images or videos that have been digitally manipulated to look like someone else without their consent.
The Ministry of Justice said the use of deepfakes had been increasing in recent years, with a website that virtually strips women naked receiving 38m hits in the first eight months of 2021.
Continue reading...British Retail Consortium says figure eased to 8.4% in June from 9% in May
Britain’s biggest retailers have said shop price inflation is easing ahead of a crunch meeting with MPs on Tuesday over the soaring cost of groceries, but warned food prices were continuing to rise at near record rates.
The British Retail Consortium (BRC) said annual inflation in overall shop prices eased to 8.4% in June, down from 9% in May, as retailers cut the price of many staples including milk, cheese and eggs. Clothing and electrical goods prices also fell ahead of the summer holidays.
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