Category Archives: UK news

Tens of thousands of teachers prepare to strike in England and Wales

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Teachers in north of England to strike on Tuesday followed by members in other regions over course of three days

Tens of thousands of teachers will strike this week resulting in the closure of some schools as members of the National Education Union (NEU) take part in three days of industrial action.

With little sign of a solution to the dispute on the horizon, teachers in the north of England will strike on Tuesday, followed by members in the Midlands and eastern regions on Wednesday.

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Maths teacher accused of misgendering pupil on religious grounds

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Joshua Sutcliffe denies regulator’s charge of prioritising his convictions over pupil’s interests

A maths teacher “failed to separate the teacher from the preacher” when he allegedly misgendered a transgender pupil repeatedly and inappropriately shared his religious beliefs in the classroom, a misconduct panel heard.

Joshua Sutcliffe, 32, was accused by the Teaching Regulation Agency (TRA) of “conduct that negatively affected pupils” on multiple occasions during his time at schools in Oxford and London. He denies the charges of professional misconduct.

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Sunak sets out Northern Ireland trade deal to MPs as Labour vow to back agreement – as it happened

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Rishi Sunak and Ursula von der Leyen say ‘Windsor framework’ has been reached after four months of negotiations. This blog is now closed

Q: Why do you say you will back the PM’s deal when you have not seen the detail? And would you like to see Northern Ireland within the scope of the European court of justice, or outside it?

Starmer says he knows Northern Ireland well and knows the detail. Any deal will be an improvement on the status quo. That is why he is saying he would back it. He says the deal will not come as a surprise.

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Northern Ireland protocol: key issues revised deal must address

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Trade and governance will be at centre of new post-Brexit pact, but what about other areas of disagreement?

Named the “new Windsor framework”, the revised Northern Ireland protocol has been described as a “decisive breakthrough” by Rishi Sunak and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen.

What does it mean and what are the big breakthroughs?

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News that king will host EU chief sparks fury from DUP and Brexiters

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Rishi Sunak accused of ‘dragging the king into a hugely controversial political issue’

The king will host the EU chief, Ursula von der Leyen, after the signing of the final Northern Ireland protocol agreement with Rishi Sunak, prompting a furious reaction from the Democratic Unionist party and Tory Brexiters, who accused the prime minister of dragging the monarch into politics.

The former DUP first minister Arlene Foster said she “cannot quite believe that No 10 would ask HM the king to become involved in the finalising of a deal as controversial as this one. It’s crass and will go down very badly in NI. We must remember this is not the king’s decision but the government, who it appears is tone deaf.”

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Betty Boothroyd dies aged 93

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First female speaker of the House of Commons was ‘one of a kind’, says Sir Lindsay Hoyle

Betty Boothroyd, the first female speaker of the House of Commons, has died, aged 93.

Lady Boothroyd, a former Labour MP, was speaker from 1992 until her retirement in 2000, and was the first person to be elected to the role after the Commons debates started being permanently televised in 1989. She was later made a life peer in the House of Lords.

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Ambulance call handlers in England tell of anguish over death risk to patients

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Dispatchers tell investigation it is common to worry: ‘How many people are we going to kill today?’

Ambulance call handlers suffer anxiety about how many people will die before they can get help to them each day, researchers looking into the welfare of NHS staff have found.

Officials from the Healthcare Safety Investigation Branch (HSIB) in England asked staff working in urgent and emergency care, including in A&E, NHS 111 call handling centres and ambulance services, for their experiences as part of wider research into NHS care.

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DUP leader faces stark and binary choice over any NI protocol deal

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Jeffrey Donaldson risks internal revolt if he accepts deal but rejecting it will threaten future of power sharing

The Democratic Unionist party has said any Northern Ireland protocol deal must meet its “seven tests” but they omit the one that really matters: the test of Sir Jeffrey Donaldson’s leadership.

The seven conditions concern laws and trading rules, which have room for fudge and ambiguity.

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Selfish or a godsend? Readers share their views on wood-burning stoves

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Demand for wood stoves is soaring in energy crisis despite research showing their harmful effects

Demand for wood-burning stoves, including in urban areas, has soared as households look for more affordable ways to stay warm during the energy crisis.

Campaigners have called for stricter legislation on their use because of their negative impact on air pollution and health, with wood burning in the UK gaining in popularity over the past decade.

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Embrace local solutions to meet UK net-zero targets, MPs and peers urge

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Exclusive: Cross-party group recommends policies such as mortgage penalty for landlords of energy-inefficient homes

The UK will need to embrace innovative, community-based solutions to environmental and energy problems if it is to have any hope of meeting looming net-zero deadlines, a cross-party group of MPs and peers has recommended.

A report by the all-party group on a green new deal argues for a combination of robust, top-down policies on green issues including localised power generation, food and transport schemes. Recommendations include a mortgage penalty for landlords who let energy-inefficient homes, and also real community decision-making, notably on power schemes.

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Body of missing walker Kyle Sambrook recovered in Glencoe

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Police confirm that bodies of man and dog found on mountain are missing Yorkshireman and his dog, Bane

The body of missing hillwalker Kyle Sambrook and his dog have been found in Glencoe, police have confirmed.

The 33-year-old was last seen with his beagle, Bane, in the Lost Valley area last weekend after he travelled from his home in West Yorkshire to go hillwalking.

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‘It’s a bit too castle-y’: plans to turn Cumbrian fortress into eco-attraction

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Young ‘custodian’ hopes to make ancestral home of Muncaster first carbon-zero castle in UK

In 1990, the year Ewan Frost-Pennington was born, the final bears left Muncaster Castle in the westernmost corner of the Lake District. Winnie, an Asiatic black bear, departed Cumbria for Dudley zoo, along with Inca, her daughter, and her sister, Gretel.

Three decades later, the bear pit has now been covered over with a solar farm. It is the brainchild of Frost-Pennington, the heir to the 800-year-old pink granite fortress, as he tries to make Muncaster the first carbon-zero castle in the UK.

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England’s new housing supply likely to fall to lowest level in decades, study says

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Home Builders Federation warns planning policy changes will result in government meeting less than half its annual target

Housebuilding in England is due to fall to its lowest level since the second world war, according to an analysis by the Home Builders Federation (HBF), owing to a range of government policies that threaten to dramatically slow development.

The study says the supply of new housing is likely to fall below 120,000 homes annually over the coming years, less than half of the government’s target, as a result of changes to planning policy and what developers say is over-strict enforcement of environmental regulations.

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Brexit: Ursula von der Leyen to travel to UK for talks with Rishi Sunak

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European Commission chief heading to Britain with Northern Ireland deal expected as soon as Monday

Rishi Sunak is to hold face-to-face talks with the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, with a deal to revise post-Brexit arrangements in Northern Ireland expected as soon as Monday.

“Today, president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen and prime minister of the United Kingdom Rishi Sunak agreed to continue their work in person towards shared, practical solutions for the range of complex challenges around the protocol on Ireland and Northern Ireland,” a joint statement said.

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BP boss could be in line for special bonus of up to £11.4m

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Firm set for clash with investors over possible payout to Bernard Looney from three-year share award plan

BP is set for a clash with investors after it emerged that its chief executive could be in line for a special bonus of up to £11.4m. The payment, in shares, would be on top of his £1.38m salary and annual bonus for 2022.

Strong growth in BP’s share price means Bernard Looney is set for a multimillion-pound payout from a three-year share award plan set up in 2020, when countries around the world were in lockdown and the company was cutting jobs amid a global collapse in demand for oil.

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Sunak grapples with NI protocol puzzle but the stakes are different to 2019

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PM’s toughest political test comes amid plummeting interest in Brexit and elaborate parliamentary intrigue

For a Brexit-minded MP, the parallels may seem striking: an electorally embattled prime minister trying to push through a controversial Northern Ireland deal in the face of Tory and Democratic Unionist party (DUP) scepticism. But one thing has changed: this is 2023, not 2019.

Theresa May’s struggles with Brexit, and her tumbling popularity with voters, led to her being forced out as prime minister by Conservative backbenchers. While no one would dispute that Rishi Sunak faces perhaps his toughest ever political test, the stakes for him are if not necessarily lower then perhaps different.

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Trans violent offenders banned from women’s prisons in England and Wales

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New rules also cover transgender women ‘with their male genitalia intact’, says Dominic Raab

Rules barring some transgender women from female prisons in England and Wales are to come into force on Monday, the justice secretary has announced.

Dominic Raab had already announced in October that trans women with male genitalia or who had committed sexual offences would not be allowed in women’s prisons.

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Bye-bye American pie: high price of visas keeps British musicians off US tours

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Ever since Beatlemania, UK acts have set their sights across the pond. Now spiralling costs are pulling the plug

“Breaking” America has been the goal of young British musicians since the days of Beatlemania, but that dream is being dashed. Hundreds of emerging artists could be affected by plans to hike visa fees by 250% – and music industry executives have criticised ministers for failing to act.

The US immigration service wants to raise visa costs from $460 (£385) to $1,615 (£1,352) alongside other changes that artists and their managers say would make it almost impossible for anyone but the biggest stars to perform in the US.

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Moving back in with parents boosts ‘boomerang’ adults’ mental health

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Returning home was once seen as something shameful but new research finds a benefit

Moving back into the parental home as an adult was once seen by many youngsters as a retrograde step and even something to be ashamed of. Now, a new study suggests that such a move actually improves the mental health of these “boomerang adults”, thanks in no small part to a stressful and increasingly expensive rental market.

The findings of of the first study in the UK to look at the mental health impact of moving home on the adult children surprised demographers at the Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER), who were expecting to find it had the opposite effect on wellbeing.

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UK cuts back on cooking Sunday roasts as energy bills soar

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Cost of living has made more than a third of adults reconsider cooking end of week meal, survey finds

More than a third of people in the UK have cut back on cooking Sunday roasts because of the soaring cost of energy bills, according to a survey.

A total of 36% of UK adults said the cost of living crisis had made them reconsider a homemade roast dinner at the end of the week. The figure was even higher among those aged 16 to 34, with nearly half (47%) saying they have avoided cookingroasts.

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