Temperatures set to climb to 34C across much of England in one of hottest June days ever
This year’s Wimbledon tennis championships have begun with the hottest opening day on record, according to the Met Office.
Temperatures reached a provisional high of 29.7C (85.5F) at Kew Gardens in west London on Monday afternoon, surpassing the previous record of 29.3C set in June 2001.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Vicky Foxcroft, who resigned as whip over welfare bill, urges ministers to work with affected people on changes
The Labour whip who resigned in protest against disability benefit cuts has said Keir Starmer’s concessions do not yet go far enough to win her over, as No 10 launched a fresh attempt to stem the revolt against its welfare bill.
Vicky Foxcroft, who quit her frontbench role over the welfare bill a little more than a week ago, urged the government to work jointly on the changes with disabled people and to publish the review of the system before bringing in cuts.
Continue reading...Committee says products may not be best use of public money and may have been mis-sold to people on certain benefits
Lifetime Isas could lead to savers making poor investment decisions and may not be the best use of public money, a cross-party committee of MPs has said.
In a report published on Monday, the Treasury select committee described rules which penalise benefit claimants as “nonsensical” and concluded that lifetime Isas, known as Lisas, may have been mis-sold to savers eligible for universal credit or housing benefit.
Continue reading...Patient safety measure is part of 10-year plan to tackle poor standards in mental health and maternity services
The NHS is to become the first health system in the world to use AI to analyse hospital databases and catch potential safety scandals early, the government has said.
The Department of Health and Social Care said the technology will provide an early warning system which could detect patterns or trends and trigger urgent inspections. The scheme is part of the 10-year plan for the NHS that is due to be published by Wes Streeting this week.
Continue reading...Sites will accommodate 4,000 children as part of ministers’ plan to improve childcare, Bridget Phillipson to announce
About 200 school-based nurseries will open in England this September as part of the government’s plan to improve access to childcare for working parents.
The milestone will be announced on Monday by Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary, who will say that the sites will accommodate 4,000 children under school age.
Continue reading...Estimate by disability charity published on eve of MPs’ vote on restricting welfare payments for new claimants
The extra cost of being disabled is on course to rise by almost 12% to £14,688 in five years, according to a new estimate published on the eve of a controversial vote to restrict welfare payments for new claimants.
A threatened rebellion by more than 120 Labour MPs forced the government into a last-minute climbdown on its welfare bill, by exempting claimants to planned cuts in personal independence payments (Pip), England’s main disability payment.
Continue reading...Jonathan Reynolds to hold talks with carmaker after reports suggested its UK factory could close
The business secretary, Jonathan Reynolds, will hold talks with Lotus after the carmaker appeared to shelve plans to shut its UK operations.
After reports that Chinese owner Geely was planning to stop manufacturing at the Hethel plant in Norfolk, putting 1,300 jobs at risk, Lotus issued a statement saying it had “no plans” to close the factory.
Continue reading...Seven-year-old girl dies in hospital after incident at Chalkwell park in Southend-on-Sea involving five children
A young girl has died and another is in a critical condition after a tree fell in a seaside park in Essex on Saturday.
The girls, aged seven and six, suffered serious injuries and were taken to hospital. Police said the seven-year-old girl died in hospital.
Continue reading...Report in the Times alleges George Freeman was paid by company that helped him write questions to government
A Conservative MP has referred himself to the parliamentary watchdog after it was alleged he was paid by a company that helped him write questions to government.
Former minister George Freeman submitted queries to Labour ministers about the sector the firm operates in, the Times reported.
Continue reading...Venue drops gig under pressure from campaigners and local MP, who said show was against ‘city’s values’
Heavy metal star Marilyn Manson, has had the first UK concert of his One Assassination Under God Tour cancelled after pressure from campaign groups and an MP.
The first leg of the tour was due to kick off at the Brighton Centre on Wednesday, 29 October. Ticketmaster have since informed customers that the event will no longer go ahead as planned and they will be refunded.
Continue reading...Regulator tells Sally Westcott to pull product that allegedly has undeclared levels of prescription-only melatonin
An NHS manager has been stopped from selling children’s gummies allegedly laced with undeclared levels of a prescription-only sleeping drug, the Guardian can reveal.
Magnesium glycinate gummies for children who have trouble sleeping have been sold since March last year by Nutrition Ignition, an Epsom-based company owned by Sally Westcott, whose other job is a clinical therapy lead at Epsom and St Helier NHS trust.
Continue reading...Saucy Books in London has become the go-to destination for romance readers – but fans say misogyny is stopping the genre getting the recognition it deserves
Whether you want a brooding billionaire, a queer awakening, a dragon rider (yes, really) or an old-fashioned enemies-to-lovers tale, there’s a romance novel for everybody at Saucy Books.
England’s first romance-only bookshop opened last week in Notting Hill, west London, instantly becoming a go-to destination for readers and turning into a meeting spot for like-minded folk to share their love stories.
Continue reading...These small, joyful indulgences are ‘an antidote to life’s uncertainties’, food trend watchers say
If you said to a friend that you fancied Japanese food this weekend, they might be forgiven for thinking you meant sushi. But lately a new culinary export from Japan is catching up with fish and rice in the hearts and tastebuds of British foodies.
Soft, sweet and full of character, Japanese-style desserts – from mochi ice cream to matcha cookies – have been steadily gaining ground on UK shelves.
Continue reading...Alliance of groups wants Council of Europe to investigate implementation of supreme court ruling on biological sex
A collection of groups campaigning on transgender issues have urged Europe’s main human rights body to investigate the UK over the implementation of the supreme court’s ruling on gender.
In a joint letter to the Council of Europe, the organisations said the situation in which transgender people were likely to be barred from using toilets of their acquired sex or joining single-sex organisations placed them in an “intermediate zone” of gender, saying this was a violation of the European convention on human rights (ECHR).
Continue reading...Digital bank hopes to tempt switchers with package including in-credit interest and fee-free travel spending
The battle for bank customers intensified this week, with a new player entering the UK current account market and offering cashback on bills and access to a savings account paying 7.1%.
Digital bank Zopa is hoping the perks – which also include in-credit interest and fee-free spending abroad – will tempt switchers to its first day-to-day account.
Continue reading...Music executives have condemned Irish rappers and Keir Starmer says appearance is not ‘appropriate’, but 100 musicians have signed letter in support
Kneecap will be taking to the Glastonbury stage on Saturday afternoon in front of a packed crowd eagerly anticipating what could be one of the most controversial sets in the festival’s history.
The Irish rap group are performing at 4pm on the West Holts stage, amid criticism from music industry executives and from the UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, who said it was not “appropriate” for the band to perform.
Continue reading...No 10 has offered significant concessions to the rebels, estimated to cost around £3bn a year, amid fears over Tuesday’s vote
Stephen Kinnock, the care minister, was the government voice on the airwaves this morning. Here are the main points he made about the welfare bill U-turn.
Kinnock rejected claims that the U-turn was a sign of weakness. When it was put to him on the Today programme that this move, coming after the U-turns on winter fuel payments and a national inquiry into grooming gangs, showed that if Keir Starmer was pushed, he would give in, Kinnock replied:
I think if you talk to people out there in the country, they respond very positively to politicians listening, engaging, recognising that you don’t get everything right from day one every time, and making the adjustments and the changes that are needed.
And this prime minister will always put the country first. He puts country before party, and he does the right thing for the country.
He defended having a “staggered” approach to changing benefit rules. Asked about the Tory claim that the government was creating a “two-tier benefits system” (see 8.30am), he replied:
Whenever you bring forward change to a complex system, you always have to decide between do you make the change for everybody that’s in that system, in one big move, or do you do it in a more staggered way? What’s clear from the announcement today is that it’s going to be a more staggered process.
He declined to say how much the U-turn would cost. He told Times Radio:
The full details around what we are laying out, what I’ve summarised really today, is going to be laid out in parliament, and then the chancellor will set out the budget in the autumn the whole of the fiscal position and this will be an important part of that.
He said he was now confident that the UC and Pip bill will pass its second reading on Tuesday.
All of the MPs I’ve spoken to who signed the reasoned amendment – MPs from across the party, not just on the left – are sticking to their position because we understand that we are answerable to our constituents.
If the government doesn’t pull the bill, doesn’t consult properly with disabled people and come back to MPs with a serious proposal that protects the dignity of disabled people, I will vote against and I will be far from the only one.
Continue reading...Immigration speech was criticised for echoing Enoch Powell’s ‘rivers of blood’ rhetoric
Keir Starmer has said he “deeply regrets” a speech in which he described the UK as being in danger of becoming an island of strangers without tough curbs on immigration.
The prime minister made the remarks in an interview with the Observer, saying he should have read the speech more carefully and “held it up to the light a bit more”.
Continue reading...Writer’s mother eases hunger strike as Starmer raises Alaa Abd el-Fattah case in phone call with Egypt’s president
The family of Alaa Abd el-Fattah have expressed cautious optimism that progress is being made to secure the British-Egyptian dissident’s release from jail in Cairo after Keir Starmer managed to secure a long-delayed phone call with the Egyptian president, Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, in which the two leaders discussed improving UK-Egypt trade relations.
The call coincided with a decision by Abd el-Fattah’s mother, Laila Soueif, to ease her hunger strike in the hope diplomacy may work. She is on a glucose drip in St Thomas’ hospital in London. The 69-year-old’s decision came after discussions with doctors and her family. She has been on hunger strike for more than 270 days to secure improvement in Abd el-Fattah’s jail conditions or his release.
Continue reading...Judge rejects former CEO’s request to dismiss case, paving way for class action also against chair Nigel Higgins
Barclays and its former chief executive Jes Staley are facing a class action lawsuit in the US over claims they defrauded and misled investors over Staley’s relationship with the child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
A judge in a Los Angeles court denied Staley’s request to dismiss the case this week, paving the way for a fresh hearing that continues a long-running legal saga emanating from Staley’s statements to regulators and investors over the nature of his ties to the disgraced financier.
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