Category Archives: UK news

Tory leadership: Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak clash in heated BBC debate – as it happened

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Latest updates: final two candidates exchange blows over plans for cost of living, levelling up and China

Starmer says Labour’s approach to levelling up will be based on a practical plan, unlike the government’s.

And he says he was impressed by the approach of Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, whom he met in Berlin recently. Starmer suggests Britain could learn from the way new battery factories are located in poor regions in Germany.

There will be no magic money tree economics with us.

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UK factory growth slows to weakest in 18 months as business optimism falls

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Supply bottlenecks, cost pressures and softer demand hit British industry

Growth in UK factories’ order books and output has slowed to its weakest in 18 months as cost pressures, supply bottlenecks and softer demand hit British industry.

The latest update on manufacturing from the CBI found business optimism fell for a third quarter running amid signs that the strong expansion of the past year has come to an end.

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UK to host Eurovision song contest in 2023 on behalf of Ukraine

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BBC says programme will have ‘glorious Ukraine at its heart’, with cities invited to bid to host event

The Eurovision song contest will be hosted in the UK next year after Ukraine’s public broadcaster dropped its objections and agreed to work with the BBC on the event.

Ukraine won this year’s Eurovision with the song Stefania by Kalush Orchestra, earning the right to host the 2023 edition. However, organisers concluded this could not be done safely while the country was at war with Russia – angering the Ukrainian government, which said it had submitted a workable safety plan.

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English pottery a hit in Asia thanks to Squid Game

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Denby’s star is on the rise since its Halo teacup featured in Netflix’s South Korean blockbuster

A 200-year-old English pottery has seen its brand enhanced in South Korea thanks to the lockdown hit Squid Game.

Denby Pottery, named after the Derbyshire village where it was set up by Joseph Bourne in 1809, has been steadily increasing its business in Asia. It is now on sale with a reported £50m valuation, and seeking new investors to expand ever further.

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Archie Battersbee: judges deny appeal over decision to stop life support

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Parents have been fighting for son with ‘catastrophic’ brain injury to continue receiving treatment

The parents of a 12-year-old boy who suffered a “catastrophic” brain injury have been refused permission to appeal against a decision to end his life support treatment.

Hollie Dance and Paul Battersbee, from Southend in Essex, have been fighting for their son Archie to continue receiving treatment for as long as his heart is beating. But on Monday the court of appeal ruled there were no grounds for them to challenge the decision by a high court judge 10 days ago that continuing Archie’s treatment was “futile”.

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Aldi gives second pay rise in year amid high demand for UK workers

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Supermarket chain’s move comes as employers face fierce competition for staff after Covid and Brexit

Aldi has raised pay for shop workers for the second time in a year in the latest sign of the intense competition for workers in the UK.

From September, the grocery discounter is to put up hourly pay by 40p to a minimum of £10.50 outside the M25 and to £11.95 in London, an increase of at least 3.5%.

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Fears island of Ireland faces ‘new carve-up’ by mining companies

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Campaigners warn of damage as concessions now cover over a quarter of land on both sides of border

Environmentalists on the island of Ireland say they fear a “new carve-up of the island” over coming decades, with mining concessions now covering more than a quarter of all land on both sides of the border.

More than 25% of the total land area of Northern Ireland is covered by mining concessions, according to government statistics, while the figure for the Irish republic has in the past couple of years been even higher at 27%. The prospecting licences covering these areas grant mining companies permission to survey and assess sites, as well as carry out exploratory work that includes digging tunnels, pits, taking rock samples and carrying out chemical analyses.

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KPMG partner banned from accounting after misleading regulator over Carillion

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Peter Meehan, who led audit of failed outsourcer, will also have to pay fine of £250,000

The KPMG partner who led the audit of failed outsourcer Carillion has been banned from the accounting profession for a decade for providing false and misleading information to regulators.

Peter Meehan will also have to pay a fine of £250,000 after a Financial Reporting Council (FRC) tribunal found that he and other KPMG managers had misled the regulator using forged documents.

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Beijing urges British politicians not to ‘hype the China threat’

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Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson asks for restraint after Rishi Sunak labels country UK’s ‘biggest long-term threat’

Beijing has urged British politicians to exercise restraint in their comments on China, saying “hyping the China threat” would not help solve the UK’s own problems.

Asked about Rishi Sunak’s comments, where he labelled China as Britain’s biggest long-term threat and pledged to close all UK-based Confucius Institutes, Zhao Lijian, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson, declined to offer specific comments, saying the election of the next Tory leader is the UK’s internal affair.

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Dover ferry passengers advised to arrive early amid fears of summer-long disruption

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Cross-Channel ferry passengers told to arrive in good time for border checks after weekend of delays

Cross-Channel ferry passengers were being told to arrive in good time at Dover as queues built at the Port of Dover amid fears the severe disruption of recent days could return to Kent throughout the summer.

The ferry operator DFDS told passengers there were queues of about an hour for French border checks on Monday morning and to “allow a minimum of 120 minutes before your departure to complete all controls”.

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Sunak to promise curbs on China as UK’s ‘biggest long-term threat’

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Leadership contender says he will close 30 Mandarin teaching programmes to restrain Beijing’s soft power

China is the biggest long-term threat to Britain, Rishi Sunak will say on Monday as he unveils plans to curb the country’s soft power by closing all of its 30 Confucius Institutes, which promote the teaching of Chinese language and culture, in the UK.

He will take on Liz Truss, his rival in the Conservative leadership race, by effectively accusing the foreign secretary and western leaders of having “turned a blind eye to China’s nefarious activity and ambitions” and call for a new Nato-alliance to be set up to counter it.

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Major fire incident declared in Surrey and Londoners urged not to barbecue

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Firefighters continue to tackle ‘significant’ weather-related blazes, with several fire engines sent to large blaze on Hankley Common

Fire services have declared a major incident in Surrey and urged Londoners to cancel barbecues in the capital as firefighters continue to tackle “significant” weather-related blazes.

Several fire engines were sent to Hankley Common, a beauty spot in Surrey, on Sunday after a large fire estimated to affect at least eight hectares of land broke out, according to Surrey fire and rescue.

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Tamara Ecclestone offers £6m reward for recovery of stolen jewels

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Cash and gems worth £25m were stolen from her Kensington mansion in 2019

Tamara Ecclestone, the daughter of ex-Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone, has offered a reward of up to £6m for information that may lead to the recovery of some of her “most precious” belongings stolen in 2019.

The 38-year-old was on holiday in Lapland with her husband, their daughter and their dog, when the £25m jewel heist occurred in their 57-room Kensington mansion, on 13 December 2019.

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British man feared drowned in Italy’s Lake Garda after diving in to save son

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Aran Chada, 51, believed to have had seizure after leaping from boat into water

A British man is feared to have drowned in Lake Garda in Italy after diving in to save his teenage son.

Aran Chada, a 51-year-old sales director from Leicestershire, is believed to have had a seizure when he leapt from a boat into the water, the Times reports.

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Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss accused of cruelty over Rwanda-style deal promises

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Amnesty International leads criticism of immigration plans announced by Tory leadership candidates

Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss have been accused of “cruelty and immorality” for promising more Rwanda-style deals to remove asylum seekers from the UK, as charities claimed the pair were pandering to party members’ hardline views.

Amnesty International led criticism of immigration plans announced over the weekend by the Tory leadership candidates, saying the “dreadful” pledges would come at “great human and financial cost”.

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UK needs urgent vaccine drive to curb monkeypox, campaigners say

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Terrence Higgins Trust says action must be stepped up to prevent disease becoming endemic

Health authorities are underestimating the scale of the response required to stop monkeypox becoming endemic in the UK, sexual health campaigners have warned, as a new vaccination drive is launched.

The Terrence Higgins Trust urged the NHS and the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) to urgently pump cash into the system to pay more healthcare workers to administer vaccines. It also wants the number of doses ordered to be doubled to protect against a virus that has infected at least 2,208 people in the UK, according to the latest official figures.

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Satellite firm bailed out by UK to be taken over by French rival

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OneWeb, touted by Boris Johnson as a potential rival to Elon Musk’s Starlink, provides communications services

A satellite company part-owned by the British government is due to be taken over by an EU rival this week, dashing hopes of fostering a UK firm to rival Elon Musk’s Starlink following its taxpayer bailout at the height of the pandemic.

OneWeb, which provides services including broadband from its low-orbit satellites, will be taken over by one of its shareholders – the Paris-listed Eutelsat- in a deal that could be announced as early as Monday.

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Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss serve up ‘red meat’ policies to tempt Tory members

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Analysis: Leadership contenders compete on hardline approach to Rwanda immigration policy in appeal to the right of the party

It’s not just barbecues that red meat is being tossed on to in the sweltering summer temperatures.

As the Tory leadership contest hots up, a platter of hardline policies is being offered to party members by Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak, in a bid to whet appetites and boost support in the race to become Britain’s prime minister.

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Just one in 100 Tory MPs came from a working-class job, new study shows

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Institute for Public Policy Research study also shows proportion of working-class Labour MPs has halved since 1980s

Only about 1% of the current crop of Tory MPs entered parliament from a working-class job, according to new research that suggests a growing “representation gap” in parliament.

Just 7% of all MPs can be considered “working class”, compared with 34% of all UK working-age adults. While 13% of Labour MPs joined parliament from a working-class occupation, the proportion has halved since the 1980s.

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Boris Johnson’s plan to create large number of new peers comes under fire

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Lord Speaker raises concerns about public loss of confidence in parliament due to huge quantity of new and planned peers

Boris Johnson’s plans for a major list of peerages has come under criticism, with the Lord Speaker saying it could erode “public confidence in our parliamentary system”.

The House of Lords Appointment Commission (Holac), the body responsible for vetting peerages, is holding up the outgoing prime minister’s plans, Whitehall sources told the Sunday Times, who also reported that such moves could be restricted in future.

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