Young people wanted in UK forestry amid critical shortage of tree surgeons

Institute of Chartered Foresters says 70% more staff must be recruited to meet current tree planting targets

When Kevin Martin was a child he spent days beneath the canopy of Hampshire woodlands while his father, a tree surgeon, scaled the heights of oak and ash above him.

Twenty years later, with a degree and with research for a master’s under way, Martin is in charge of tending to the 14,000 trees at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew. With trees at the forefront of UK strategies to reach net zero by 2050, Martin and others like him are key professionals on the frontline of the fight to mitigate the impact of climate change and adapt to the changing conditions.

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Boris Johnson stands to make £5m a year after No 10, say experts

PM could join lecture circuit and rejoin paper where he complained of ‘chicken feed’ £250,000 salary

Boris Johnson could make more than £5m a year after he leaves Downing Street, experts have estimated.

The figure will be welcome news to a prime minister who is said to regularly complain to friends that he is hard up, citing his second divorce, several children and his reduced income since entering No 10.

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Hopes fade of finding missing men as Brazilian police report finding ‘apparently human’ material

Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira, missing for more than five days, had failed to show up in Atalaia do Norte at the end of a reporting trip

Hopes of finding a British journalist and a Brazilian guide faded on Friday as police announced an unsettling development in the search for the two men last seen five days ago on a remote river in Amazonia.

“Search teams found on the river, near to Atalaia do Norte, apparently human organic material,” Brazil’s federal police said in a statement.

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Man, 44, arrested after 15-year-old boy stabbed to death in Manchester

Man arrested in Kent after teenager was killed and his mother injured on Thursday night

A 44-year-old man has been arrested in Kent on suspicion of murder after a teenage boy was stabbed to death and his mother was injured at a Manchester home, Greater Manchester police said.

Police said the man, from Manchester, is believed to be known to the victims. Officers were called by colleagues from North West ambulance service at about 9.30pm on Thursday after the domestic incident in Miles Platting.

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Justin Bieber cancels shows after half of face left paralysed by virus

Popstar posted video showing inability to move his face muscles due to Ramsay Hunt syndrome

Justin Bieber has cancelled a series of shows on his latest tour after a virus caused “full paralysis” on one side of his face.

The Canadian popstar said he had been diagnosed with Ramsay Hunt syndrome after a virus had damaged the nerves in his ear. He said he was suffering a “pretty serious” case in a video he posted to his Instagram page.

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Prince Charles criticises ‘appalling’ Rwanda migrant scheme – reports

Source says Prince of Wales was ‘more than disappointed’ with deportation plans

Prince Charles has privately criticised the government’s policy of deporting migrants to Rwanda, calling the practice “appalling”.

The heir to the throne has been heard opposing the policy behind closed doors, a source has told the Times and the Daily Mail.

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Tory MP apologises for calling Birmingham and Blackpool ‘godawful’

Heather Wheeler, a minister in the Cabinet Office, made comments at technology event in London

A UK government minister has apologised after calling England’s second city and one of the country’s best-known seaside resorts as “godawful”.

Heather Wheeler referred to Birmingham and Blackpool during a launch of the government’s new digital strategy on Thursday. According to Chris Middleton, a technology journalist who was at the launch, the junior minister in the Cabinet Office said: “I was just at a conference in Blackpool or Birmingham or somewhere godawful.”

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Majority of UK’s 366 monkeypox cases are in London, says health agency

Almost 99% of people infected are men and the average age is 38 according to UK Health Security Agency data

Four-fifths of the people in England who have been infected with monkeypox live in London, an investigation by the UK Health Security Agency has found.

Of the cases interviewed, 99% of those infected are men and their average age is 38, the agency added after analysing 336 of the 366 confirmed cases found in the UK since the outbreak began last month.

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Sarah Panitzke: UK’s ‘most wanted woman’ jailed over VAT fraud

After nine years on the run in Spain, Panitzke has been jailed for eight years for her ‘pivotal role’ in a £1bn mobile phone tax scam

A woman once described as “one of Britain’s most-wanted” fugitives has been jailed for eight years for her part in a £1bn money laundering scam.

Sarah Panitzke spent nine years on the run when she fled during her trial in May 2013 for a £1bn mobile phone tax scam. She became the only woman on the National Crime Agency’s list of most-wanted fugitives after fleeing the country to Spain.

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UK deportation flight to Rwanda can go ahead, high court judge rules

Judge refuses to grant interim relief after lawyers for asylum seekers argued policy was unlawful

A high court judge has ruled that a controversial deportation flight to Rwanda that was due to take off early next week can go ahead.

Mr Justice Swift refused to grant interim relief – urgent action in response to an injunction application made by several asylum seekers facing offshoring to Rwanda.

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Draft legislation on overriding Northern Ireland protocol to be published next week

Draft legislation to be issued Monday, as Keir Starmer promises a Labour government would repeal law if it passes

Legislation to disapply parts of the Northern Ireland protocol will be published next week, but senior government sources acknowledge it is going to be a “difficult” process to get it through parliament.

The new laws are aimed at unilaterally changing parts of the protocol to make trade easier between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK, but critics say overriding the post-Brexit treaty could contravene international law.

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Home Office misled refugees about UN involvement in Rwanda plans, court told

Letters to asylum seekers assured them UNHCR was ‘closely involved’ in deportation scheme, high court hears

The United Nations refugee agency has made a dramatic intervention to try to halt Priti Patel’s plan to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda.

In a late submission of evidence, the UNHCR claimed the home secretary misled refugees over the organisation’s support for the plan. The agency has also said the scheme failed to meet the required standards of “legality and appropriateness” for transferring asylum seekers from one country to another.

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UK employers take on workers at slower rate after fall in applicants

Shortage of candidates since January means thousands of vacancies unfilled

UK employers increased the number of new staff in May at the slowest pace since early 2021 after a steep fall in the number of workers responding to job adverts.

After an increase in job switching by workers last year, often to secure higher pay, employers said the shortage of candidates since January meant they were unable to fill thousands of vacancies.

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Wreck of Royal Navy warship sunk in 1682 identified off Norfolk coast

HMS Gloucester could be the ‘most historic maritime discovery since the raising of the Marie Rose’

The wreck of a Royal Navy warship which sank in 1682 while carrying the future king James Stuart has been identified off the coast of Norfolk.

The wreckage of HMS Gloucester was actually found in 2007 by two brothers, Julian and Lincoln Barnwell, alongside their late father and two friends, following a four-year search which covered an area of more than 5,000 nautical miles.

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Grenfell Tower legal costs on course to top £250m

As five-year anniversary approaches, figures reveal public inquiry into the fire has spent £149m so far

Legal bills relating to the Grenfell Tower fire are on course to top a quarter of a billion pounds, according to figures obtained by the Guardian on the eve of the fifth anniversary of the disaster.

The public inquiry into the causes of the fire that killed 72 people in the west London tower block has spent £149m so far with more than £60m going to lawyers working for the core participants, the inquiry revealed on Thursday.

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Former head of ‘British FBI’ fears impact of Whitehall cuts on fight against crime

Former National Crime Agency chief worries civil service reductions could have devastating effect

The former head of Britain’s equivalent of the FBI has said she fears ministers’ plans to cut civil servant posts could have a “devastating” impact on tackling serious and organised crime.

Speaking to Policing TV, Dame Lynne Owens, the former director general of the National Crime Agency (NCA), said she was keeping a “keen eye” on discussions about proposals to axe 90,000 jobs and how they may affect the agency she led for five years.

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Home Office tried to ‘sanitise’ staff education module on colonialism

Disagreements have led to delay in course rollout as civil servants think empire material ‘too controversial’

Civil servants have attempted to “sanitise” a Home Office teaching module on race, empire and colonialism, according to those involved in devising a mandatory course on British history for the department’s 36,000 employees.

Disagreements have led to a year-long delay in the rollout of the project, which was due to be launched in June 2021. Home Office civil servants are understood to be nervous that some of the proposed material addressing issues of race, colonialism and empire is “too controversial” and have urged academics to tone down some of the content.

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Rishi Sunak ‘wasted £11bn by paying too much interest’ on UK debt

Labour accuse chancellor of wastefulness for failing to insure against interest rate rises

Rishi Sunak has been accused of wasting £11bn of taxpayers’ money by paying too much in interest servicing the government’s debt.

The National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) said the losses were the result of the chancellor’s failure to insure against interest rate rises on £900bn of reserves created through the quantitative easing (QE) programme.

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Rail managers could join strikes across network in Britain

TSSA union ballots could lead to complete national shutdown by time of Commonwealth Games in July

Managers and train drivers could join the strikes across the railway, potentially setting up a complete national shutdown by the time of the Commonwealth Games in July.

The Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association (TSSA) union, whose members manage control rooms, signalling and power for train operators and Network Rail, has launched its first strike ballot, while the Associated Society of Locomotive Engineers and Firemen (Aslef) union has called the first regional walkouts by drivers.

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A greener greenhouse: solar panels trialled on Wimbledon berries farm

Energy crisis has made Kent scheme aimed at unobtrusively building up solar output more timely

Tennis fans tucking into strawberries at Wimbledon this month may find their fruit has an unusual origin – a solar-powered greenhouse.

Transparent panels have been attached to the sides of glasshouses in Kent as part of a trial to build up solar power supplies without using more land.

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