Met Office says dust may fall during showers in southern Britain and potentially most visible at sunset
Saharan dust moving across Europe could hit the UK on Wednesday, forecasters have said.
The Met Office said the dust cloud, which is 2km above ground level, may fall during showers in southern parts of the country in the afternoon.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Andy Cook is said to have pledged to improve forces’ focus on detecting crime
The new head of the policing inspectorate will be Andy Cooke, the former chief constable of Merseyside, the Guardian understands.
Cooke is said to have impressed in interviews for the post of Her Majesty’s chief inspector of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS) by pledging to get forces better focused on detecting more crime and locking up more criminals.
Continue reading...Pension board and investment fund managers urge French energy company to cut ties with Russia
The Church of England is pressuring the French energy giant TotalEnergies over its decision not to cut ties with Russia after Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
The Church’s pensions board and the manager of its investment fund said they would reconsider their shareholding in the company.
Continue reading...The Restaurant Group mindful of impact of Russia-Ukraine war, while drinks maker lowers profit guidance
The drinks maker Fever-Tree and the owner of the Wagamama and Frankie & Benny’s restaurant chains have warned of dramatic cost increases as the price of commodities and gas and electricity soars and the war in Ukraine adds pressure to their businesses.
Fever-Tree has lowered its profit guidance, blaming a “dramatic increase” in commodity prices after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The company, which had forecast adjusted profits of £69m to £72m this year, has downgraded its outlook to between £63m and £69m.
Continue reading...From Harry Styles in a dress to gender-neutral dressing and ‘dad bods’, Fashioning Masculinities embraces past and present trends
From the death of the suit during the pandemic to Harry Styles appearing on the cover of US Vogue in a dress, the conversations around masculinity and fashion appear to be contemporary, however a new exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum aims to link modern men’s fashion to its storied past.
Fashioning Masculinities: The Art of Menswear, which opens on 19 March, will feature a host of contemporary fashion designers (Versace, Calvin Klein, Martine Rose) alongside historical examples of the way men dressed (from Bowie to Beau Brummell). There are more than 100 pieces which the curators hope will illustrate how glacial the trends around men’s fashion actually are.
Continue reading...Two journalists spoke to MPs on the Foreign Affairs Committee about the tactics firms typically use
Prestigious British law firms have been complicit in helping oligarchs prevent legitimate media scrutiny of their activities, MPs have been told.
Two journalists, who have recently been on the receiving end of legal action over their reporting on oligarchs, told MPs on the Foreign Affairs Committee of the tactics typically used by law firms acting for powerful interests. They said this had pushed up insurance premiums to provide legal cover and many publishers had taken fright over the issue.
Tom Burgis, a Financial Times journalist, named a number of firms, including Carter-Ruck and Schillings, and told MPs of the type of letters which were often sent.
“In my experience they are often written in a tone of righteous indignation where the journalist is said to have behaved appallingly,” he said, in answer to a question from MP Tom Tugendhat, the chair of the committee hearing a session into the “use of strategic lawsuits against public participation”, also known as SLAPPs.
“What you are threatened with – and I have spent a long time trying to work out why journalists recoil [from covering some of these issues] – and it’s because you risk humiliation in the public square. It works on that basis, as well as the massive threat of costs.”
Catherine Belton, another journalist who appeared alongside Burgis, agreed with Tugendhat when he asked if British courts were being used “as tools of intimidation”.
However, she said that the invasion of Ukraine had led to a sea-change.
“The coverage of oligarchs is as different as night from day. Before, it was almost as if there was a reign of terror. The oligarchs were deploying all these reputation managers,” she said, adding that it was “never heard” how Roman Abramovich had been “an enabler of Putin.”
Promise of ‘light touch’ checks prompts fears traffickers could see arrival of mostly women and children as opportunity
More than 120,000 Britons have expressed interest in hosting Ukrainian refugees, amid concerns that the new government scheme could lead to exploitation of vulnerable women and children.
The figure was released by the government on Tuesday evening, little more than 24 hours after Homes for Ukraine programme was launched to take in those fleeing Russia’s invasion, most of whom are women and children.
Continue reading...Possible deal to release pair involves agreement by UK to repay £400m debt, according to Iranian sources
British Iranian dual nationals Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Anoosheh Ashoori could be freed and allowed to return to London within days under a deal in which the UK agrees to repay a £400m debt and release an Iranian prisoner.
Zaghari-Ratcliffe has for months been at her parent’s home in Tehran awaiting news of whether she would have to serve a further one-year sentence in Iran handed down on top of the five years she had already served.
Continue reading...British-Iranian woman has endured almost unbearable psychological stress since her arrest at Tehran airport in April 2016
In White Torture, a book about the horror of solitary confinement in Iranian jails, Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe recalled her first night in jail following her arrest at Tehran airport on 3 April 2016.
“The first night of detention I did not know where I was,” she explained. “I don’t remember what happened or what I did. I was shocked. I didn’t know why it had happened. No one gave me any explanations. Nobody told me why they were treating me like that, why they took my child away from me or where I was. The interrogation began.”
Continue reading...Timeframe last chance to agree peace deal with Russia before conflict escalates, former UK PM says
Tony Blair believes that the next fortnight could be the last chance for the west to agree a peace deal with Russia to end the Ukraine invasion before the conflict escalates.
The former prime minister said that Nato should not rule out intervening in the war but has also called on the west to not give up on the prospect of negotiating a peace deal with Vladimir Putin.
Continue reading...Former management for Sami Chokri allegedly made ‘huge effort’ to bring song Oh Why to singer’s notice, court hears
Ed Sheeran was targeted with a “concerted plan” to secure his interest in a songwriter who later accused him of copying one of his songs, the high court has been told.
The former management company for Sami Chokri, a grime artist who performs under the name Sami Switch, allegedly made a “huge effort” to bring the 2015 song Oh Why to Sheeran’s notice, the copyright trial heard on Tuesday.
Continue reading...Black child’s ordeal, which involved exposure of intimate body parts, took place without parental consent, review finds
A black child was subjected by police to a strip search at her London school that involved exposure of intimate body parts, according to an official investigation which found racism was likely to have been an “influencing factor” in the officers’ actions.
No appropriate adult was present during the 15-year-old girl’s ordeal, described by a senior local authority figure as “humiliating, traumatising and utterly shocking” and which took place without parental consent and in the knowledge that she was menstruating.
Continue reading...British PM hopes to persuade Gulf state to raise oil and gas production to reduce reliance on Moscow
Boris Johnson has compared Vladimir Putin to a drug dealer who managed to hook western nations on Russian supplies of oil and gas, ahead of a trip to the Middle East in an attempt to diversify the sources of Britain’s energy imports.
The UK prime minister urged European countries to “get ourselves off that addiction” and said he wanted support from “the widest possible coalition” to help offset the pressures caused by spiralling oil and gas prices.
Continue reading...Drop in price comes as Covid-19 infections rise in China, which could hit demand for energy supplies
Global oil prices have fallen back below $100 (£77) a barrel amid ceasefire talks between Russia and Ukraine and concerns over the rapid growth in Covid infections in China.
The price of a barrel of oil slid to $99 on energy markets on Tuesday, before rising back to just above $100 in early afternoon trading. It comes amid a decline from a 14-year high of close to $130 reached earlier this month after Vladimir Putin ordered troops into Ukraine.
Continue reading...Tariffs to be increased on Russian vodka while export ban is said to affect luxury vehicles, fashion and art
UK ministers have imposed a series of new export bans and tariffs on Russian products, the morning after the passage of the economic crime bill, intended to make it swifter and easier to target oligarchs and Russian interests.
The UK will deny Russia and Belarus access to WTO most-favoured nation tariffs for hundreds of their exports, a statement from the trade department and Treasury said, with an initial list of goods now facing additional 35% tariffs.
Continue reading...Latest updates: prime minister says government will set out revised policy on energy security to try to end ‘addiction’ to Russian oil and gas
Good morning. One of the key skills of political leadership is the ability to respond and adapt to changing circumstances; to recognise that as events change (even for the worse), opportunities can open up. Since Russia invaded Ukraine, Boris Johnson and his government have focused on supporting President Zelenskiy (which they’ve done well, according to consensus opinion) and responding to the refugee crisis (which they’ve done very badly, judging by the same benchmark). But Johnson has also identified the crisis as an opportunity to recast energy policy, and today he has set out, in the clearest terms yet, his thinking.
Johnson has said the government will soon publish a new document setting out its revised policy on energy security. But in a long article published in the Daily Telegraph (paywall) he has today set out what will probably turn out to be the key pillars of the strategy. Here they are.
When Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine the first time round, in 2014, the West made a terrible mistake. The Russian leader had committed an act of violent aggression and taken a huge chunk out of a sovereign country – and we let him get away with it.
Putin’s strength – his vast resource of hydrocarbons – is also his weakness. He has virtually nothing else. Putin’s Russia makes little that the rest of the world wants to buy. If the world can end its dependence on Russian oil and gas, we can starve him of cash, destroy his strategy and cut him down to size.
Because this strategy will not truly work unless everyone does it. The only way to force Putin to cease his aggression, and to respect international law, is for the world to stop mainlining Russian hydrocarbons – and we have to accept that such a move will be painful.
I don’t doubt that there will be tough times ahead. The process of weaning the world off Russian oil and gas, and hydrocarbons in general, will be difficult.
We need permanently to reduce the cost of energy at source – and that will only happen if our supply is more secure, more sustainable and less vulnerable to manipulation by others.
We need to take back control. Later this month, I will set out a British energy security strategy – how the UK will become more self-sufficient and no longer at the mercy of bullies like Putin.
At the heart of the strategy is green energy of all kinds.
Green electricity isn’t just better for the environment, it’s better for your bank balance. A kilowatt from a North Sea wind turbine costs less than one produced by a power station running on gas shipped to the UK from overseas. And if a quarter of our power wasn’t already coming from renewables, your bills today would be even higher than they already are.
So now is the time to make a series of big new bets on nuclear power. The 1997, the Labour manifesto said there was “no economic case” for more nuclear – even though nuclear is in fact safe, clean and reliable.
It is time to reverse that historic mistake, with a strategy that includes small modular reactors as well as the larger power stations. It was the UK that first split the atom. It was the UK that had the world’s first civilian nuclear power plant. It is time we recovered our lead.
It is crazy that we are importing oil and gas from Putin’s Russia when we have our own resources in the North Sea. It is time to give investors more confidence in British hydrocarbons. That way, we will have more domestic energy resilience as we make the transition to a zero carbon future.
Continue reading...Temporary measures introduced during Covid crisis will be made made permanent from April
Outdoor weddings and civil partnerships are to be legalised permanently in England and Wales, ministers have announced.
Since last summer, couples have been able to hold their civil wedding or ceremony outside under temporary measures introduced during the coronavirus pandemic.
Continue reading...The UN says it expects the number of Ukrainian refugees to reach at least four million, while Poland’s PM announced he and his counterparts from the Czech Republic and Slovenia are now in Kyiv
More explosions have been heard in Kyiv on Tuesday morning as Russian bombardment continues.
An apartment bulding was reportedly hit and set on fire, according to the state emergency service. The fire was put out and one person has been hospitalised.
Continue reading...Man in his 40s pronounced dead at scene in Old Swan area and woman discovered nearby with knife injuries
A murder investigation is under way in Liverpool after a man was found stabbed to death in the street and a woman was found with knife injuries nearby.
Merseyside police said they were called to reports of a man with “significant injuries” in the Old Swan area at 8.55pm on Monday. Officers administered CPR but the man, in his 40s, was pronounced dead at the scene.
Continue reading...Unemployment rate falls below pre-Covid level but rising prices and energy bills hitswages
Unemployment in the UK has fallen below pre-Covid levels, but high inflation amid Britain’s cost of living crisis means average wages fell at the fastest rate since 2014.
The Office for National Statistics said the unemployment rate fell to 3.9% in the three months to January, dropping below the 4% rate in February 2020 before the coronavirus pandemic took hold in the UK.
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