Category Archives: UK news

English test scandal: Home Office accused of ‘shocking miscarriage of justice’

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Students wrongly accused of deception should be helped to clear names, says shadow minister

The Home Office was accused of presiding over a “shocking miscarriage of justice” by MPs during an urgent debate on the English language testing scandal which saw thousands of international students wrongly accused of cheating in an exam they were required to sit as part of their visa application process.

Those students who were wrongly accused of deception, many of whom were subsequently detained and deported, should now be helped to clear their names, shadow Home Office minister Stephen Kinnock told parliament.

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More than 50 people to face police questions on Downing Street parties

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Those identified as part of Operation Hillman will be sent questionnaire asking for their account of events

More than 50 people must answer police questions about alleged parties in Downing Street and Whitehall that may have breached strict Covid rules, Scotland Yard has said.

In a sign of the scale of the “partygate” criminal inquiry, the Metropolitan police revealed on Wednesday they would this week start contacting more than 50 people as part of “Operation Hillman”, an investigation into events on eight dates between May 2020 to April 2021.

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Covid rules are to be axed in England, but is pandemic’s end really in sight?

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Analysis: Plans to end isolation rules have been gleefully announced, but questions about infection control remain

As the threat of the Omicron wave has receded in England, the government has been quick to move the conversation on to “living with Covid”.

It was inevitable that this would mean the eventual lifting of legal restrictions, including the need to self-isolate. But even given the optimistic tone in recent weeks, Boris Johnson’s announcement on Wednesday came sooner than many expected.

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Is England an outlier in abandoning Covid isolation rule?

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How does England’s move to end self-isolation compare with rules in other European countries?

Boris Johnson has announced plans to abolish the legal requirement for people in England to self-isolate, even if they test positive for the coronavirus and have symptoms.

The move, planned for later this month, would represent “an important step for this country as we move out of the pandemic”, said the prime minister’s spokesperson. “It shows that the hard work of the British people is paying off.”

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‘Life was lovely’: Chagossian women head home 50 years after forced exile

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Women on Mauritian-chartered vessel bound for Chagos Islands recall how life there was ‘paradise’

Rosemonde Bertin was only 17 when British officials arrived on Salomon Atoll in 1972. Everyone was ordered to gather at the manager’s office on the coconut plantation. She does not remember any advance warning.

The commissioner of the British Indian Ocean territory (BIOT) told them they had to leave their homes because Americans were coming to the Chagos archipelago to set up a military base.

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Nuclear fusion heat record a ‘huge step’ in quest for new energy source

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Oxfordshire scientists’ feat raises hopes of using reactions that power sun for low-carbon energy

The prospect of harnessing the power of the stars has moved a step closer to reality after scientists set a new record for the amount of energy released in a sustained fusion reaction.

Researchers at the Joint European Torus (JET), a fusion experiment in Oxfordshire, generated 59 megajoules of heat – equivalent to about 14kg of TNT – during a five-second burst of fusion, more than doubling the previous record of 21.7 megajoules set in 1997 by the same facility.

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Covid live: Sweden scraps almost all restrictions and testing despite pleas from scientists; Spain’s King Felipe tests positive

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Sweden scraps almost all of its few restrictions and stops most testing; Spain’s King Felipe tests positive after displaying mild symptoms

Sajid Javid, the UK health secretary, has pledged to recruit 15,000 new health workers by the end of March to tackle the pandemic treatment backlog.

Writing in the Daily Telegraph, he said the NHS planned “to recruit 10,000 more nurses from overseas and 5,000 more healthcare support workers by the end of March” to improve capacity.

“Remove your mask,” a man demands, as I walk through the crowd. When I say I would like to keep it on, he immediately asks if I’m from mainstream media. I reply that I am and he says “don’t twist the truth just because you’re on the government dollars”. He is not the only one demanding I remove the mask.

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Sadiq Khan warns Cressida Dick has days or weeks to act on Met failings

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Mayor of London ‘disgusted’ by recent scandals and suggests he is prepared to try to oust commissioner

The mayor of London has signalled he is prepared to try and oust the Metropolitan police commissioner in days or weeks over a series of scandals.

Sadiq Khan said he was “disgusted and angry” by recent failings and that he thought Cressida Dick lacked a plan to boost confidence in the police force which had been “knocked and shattered”.

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Billionaire Tory donor calls for Boris Johnson to resign

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John Armitage, who has given £3.1m to the Conservatives, says PM has gone ’past the point of no return’

A billionaire donor to the Conservative party has suggested that Boris Johnson should resign, saying that the prime minister was “past the point of no return”.

John Armitage, co-founder of the hedge fund firm Egerton Capital, who has given £3.1m to the Conservatives, including more than £500,000 since Boris Johnson entered No 10, told the BBC he thought leaders should leave if they lose their moral authority.

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Cultivating conspiracy: how Boris Johnson amplified the far right

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Prime minister follows Donald Trump playbook by tacitly endorsing wild conspiracy theory to score points

What started out as a conspiracy meme on the outer reaches of the internet has, with the help of Boris Johnson, swiftly established itself amid the cocktail of ideas and conspiracies that define the new extreme right.

The protesters who surrounded Keir Starmer on Monday night mostly shouted the word “traitor” – once a term of abuse against pro-EU MPs during the Brexit crisis – as well as “paedophile protector”, a reference to false claims about the Labour leader’s links to the Jimmy Savile case.

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Port Talbot says bye-bye to its Banksy as art dealer brings in a crane

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Much loved work that appeared in 2018 on a steelworker’s garage heads to England on the back of a lorry

It appeared one winter’s night on a steelworker’s garage, a wondrous piece of street art making points about the innocence of childhood, industrial decay and air pollution.

After a three-year sojourn in the town of Port Talbot, Season’s Greetings, Wales’ first and only Banksy, was craned on to the back of a flatbed lorry and trucked out of the country.

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Rees-Mogg becomes minister for Brexit opportunities in Boris Johnson reshuffle

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Chris Heaton-Harris takes over as chief whip in shake-up as PM seeks to reassure mutinous Tories

Boris Johnson has made Jacob Rees-Mogg the new minister for “Brexit opportunities” and installed a key loyalist as his chief whip in a reshuffle intended to shore up his position after weeks of terrible headlines.

Rees-Mogg, who was Commons leader, is moved to the Cabinet Office to take on a newly created role as Brexit opportunities minister, a cabinet-level job that also includes “government efficiency”.

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Rebekah Vardy said she would ‘love’ to leak stories about Coleen Rooney to media

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Vardy is suing Rooney for libel over allegation that Vardy leaked stories from Rooney’s private Instagram account

Rebekah Vardy said she would “love” to leak stories about Coleen Rooney to the media, according to messages disclosed at the high court.

The court filings suggest Vardy and her former agent Caroline Watt had an ongoing relationship with reporters at the Sun newspaper and discussed at length how to leak stories to the tabloid.

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Two suspected British Islamic State recruits seized by Taliban at border

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Exclusive: first reported case of attempted international recruitment to IS since US left Afghanistan

Two suspected Islamic State recruits, one of them carrying a British passport, were seized by the Taliban when they tried to slip into Afghanistan last autumn through its northern border, the Guardian can reveal.

The men, who were carrying more than £10,000 in cash, military fatigues and night-vision goggles in their bags, were arrested after a tipoff from Uzbekistan, according to a Taliban source with knowledge of the operation.

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‘There’s a truth to it’: RSC casts disabled actor as Richard III

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Arthur Hughes says decision for 2022 production will allow lived experience to be ‘shown properly’

He is one of Shakespeare’s most reviled characters, distinguished by his “deformed, unfinish’d” figure. Now, for the first time, the Royal Shakespeare Company has cast a disabled actor in the title role of Richard III in a new production opening later this year.

For Arthur Hughes, it is a “dream come true” although his first reaction to being cast as the 15th-century king of England was disbelief. “It’s a part I’ve always wanted to play, it’s a very complex role, and it’s the biggest thing I’ve done,” said Hughes, 30.

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Senior Tory and Labour figures speak out over media focus on Carrie Johnson

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MPs defend PM’s wife after criticism of her in extracts from book by Conservative peer Michael Ashcroft

Senior political figures, from Keir Starmer to Sajid Javid, have criticised negative briefings that suggest Carrie Johnson is partly to blame for the troubles of her husband’s premiership.

MPs came to the defence of the prime minister’s wife after the publication of extracts from a new book by the Conservative peer Michael Ashcroft which suggested her “behaviour is preventing [Boris Johnson] from leading Britain as effectively as the voters deserve”.

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MPs blame Boris Johnson’s ‘poison’ after protesters mob Keir Starmer

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Police rescue Labour leader from anti-vaxxers shouting ‘traitor’ and ‘Jimmy Savile’ days after PM’s smear of Starmer in parliament

MPs from all sides angrily rounded on Boris Johnson and accused him of whipping up political poison after the Labour leader, Keir Starmer, was set upon by protesters who accused him of protecting the paedophile Jimmy Savile.

Johnson provoked widespread fury last week when he suggested Starmer had protected Savile during his time as director of public prosecutions. The comments drew criticism from two former Tory chief whips and prompted the resignation of a long-serving aide.

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How the UK’s dutiful launderette is fading under Covid and energy prices

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A much-loved community space and an essential service, their days now seem numbered

The first thing Rajiv Shrikul does when he opens up his launderette in south Edinburgh each morning is pray. He says the 7am routine, which he started as a young boy in India, helps him cope with the kaleidoscope of personalities that pass through his shop. “Some people are angry, some are generous – you need to have a very stable mind. Meditation calms you down, especially in these hard times.”

Photograph: Murdo MacLeod

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Keir Starmer cleared of breaking lockdown rules over office beer

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Durham police confirm they will take no further action against Labour leader over April 2021 incident

Keir Starmer has been cleared of an allegation he broke lockdown rules after he was filmed drinking a beer in an office.

The Labour leader was in the City of Durham MP’s office, working in the run-up to the Hartlepool byelection in April 2021.

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Skinny spud latte to go? Potato milk hits UK supermarket shelves

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Dairy alternative goes on sale at Waitrose this week, the latest offering in a booming alt-milk market worth £400m a year

First came soya, nut and then oat but the new challenger to the plant milk crown is the humble spud as potato milk arrives on UK supermarket shelves.

Described as “deliciously creamy” and capable of producing the “perfect foam” for a homemade latte or cappuccino, the Swedish potato milk brand Dug goes on sale in 220 Waitrose stores this week.

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