Category Archives: UK news

Home Office challenged over ‘sped-up’ removal of Vietnamese nationals

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Signs that detainees were victims of trafficking are being overlooked, say campaigners

Lawyers are challenging the Home Office policy of deporting people to Vietnam who could be victims of trafficking after the UK sent a second charter flight to the country within a matter of weeks.

The challenge follows concern from lawyers and charities that some victims of trafficking could be wrongly removed from the UK under a speedy processing system for migrants in detention known as “detained asylum casework”.

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EU citizens who applied to stay in Britain facing threat of deportation

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The Home Office appears to be in breach of the Brexit withdrawal agreement, says legal charity

European citizens who have applied for settled status are being detained and threatened with deportation, a development that contradicts assurances from ministers and appears to contravene the Brexit withdrawal agreement.

The Home Office has served EU nationals with removal directions even though they could prove they had applied for settled status, which should protect their rights to remain in the UK.

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Doggerland: Lost ‘Atlantis’ of the North Sea gives up its ancient secrets

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The land mass that linked Britain to continental Europe was rich in early human life until it flooded

The idea of a “lost Atlantis” under the North Sea connecting Britain by land to continental Europe had been imagined by HG Wells in the late 19th century, with evidence of human inhabitation of the forgotten world following in 1931 when the trawler Colinda dredged up a lump of peat containing a spear point.

But it is only now, after a decade of pioneering research and the extraordinary finds of an army of amateur archaeologists scouring the Dutch coastline for artefacts and fossils, that a major exhibition is able to offer a window into Doggerland, a vast expanse of territory submerged following a tsunami 8,000 years ago, cutting the British Isles off from modern Belgium, the Netherlands and southern Scandinavia.

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Police review teen killings in search of catalyst for spike in murders

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Pilot scheme hopes to discover patterns that will help prevent more deaths

Measures are being introduced to try to identify what is driving rising murder rates in the wake of a spike in teenage deaths in some of the UK’s homicide hotspots.

All homicides in London, Birmingham and south Wales will be reviewed by the authorities in an attempt to learn from the chaotic sequences of events that often preempt a death.

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Lily Allen: from chart-topping handbag kid to the heart of London’s West End

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The singer is back in front of a live audience this week, playing ‘a woman with a real point of view’ in a spooky new play, 2:22 – A Ghost Story

There, in the background, wearing drop pearl earrings, is 13-year-old Lily Allen dressed up as a little lady-in-waiting. Cinema audiences watching Cate Blanchett as Elizabeth when the film of that name came out in 1998 might have been concentrating on the queen’s courtly dancing in the middle of the frame, but yes, it really was Allen playing a mini royal favourite in director Shekhar Kapur’s lavish production.

Now, more than two decades later, the 36-year-old singer-songwriter is taking centre stage as an actress in the West End, appearing in a spooky new play, 2:22 – A Ghost Story, which opens this week.

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Is Covid-19 on the run in the UK?

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A fall in case numbers last month raised hopes that Britain may be reaching herd immunity, but experts warn against complacency, given uncertainty about new variants and autumn’s return to school

John Edmunds has been at the centre of the unravelling of the Covid-19 pandemic since cases first appeared in January 2020. A member of Sage, the government’s scientific advisory group, and a professor of epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, he has consistently warned ministers about the threats posed by the disease.

These risks have often been clear in their nature. But today, 18 months after Covid-19 first appeared, he believes the nation stands at a point of maximum uncertainty about the future of the pandemic.

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Jimmy Savile: 10 years on, what has changed in uncovering abuse?

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As TV revisits the scandal, the author of an acclaimed play about it asks what the media and key institutions have learned – and whether survivors are now treated any better

Journalistic parlour game question: what are the most significant news stories of the past decade? Few would argue with the pandemic and Brexit. Not far behind, perhaps, is the Jimmy Savile scandal.

Not many stories change our world. This one did. It transformed how we deal with allegations of sexual assault. We reassessed our attitude to celebrity. We saw more clearly than ever how morally corrupt institutions could be. It was the harbinger of the #MeToo movement.

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Boris and Carrie Johnson expecting their second child

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In a message on Instagram, prime minister’s wife also reveals she had miscarriage at start of the year

Boris Johnson and his wife, Carrie, are expecting their second child, as the prime minister’s wife revealed she had a miscarriage at the start of this year.

The couple, who married in secret at Westminster Cathedral in May, had their son, Wilfred, in April 2020.

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Clubbers shun reopened venues in England amid confusion over Covid safety

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Owners blame ‘low consumer confidence’ and confused government messages for poor post-‘freedom day’ attendances

Nightclubs in England have seen low attendances and been forced to cancel events as the pandemic continues to disrupt the nightlife industry almost two weeks on from “freedom day”.

Many operators blamed “low consumer confidence” in the face of confusing government messages about whether it was safe to attend.

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Coronavirus live: China facing worst outbreak in months; UK reports 26,144 new infections

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Delta variant blamed for rise in cases in 14 provinces; UK records a further 71 deaths

Several hundred Israelis demonstrated in Tel Aviv against new coronavirus restrictions and vaccines as positive cases and hospitalisations rose to levels not seen in months, AFP reports.
The health ministry reported Saturday that 2,435 new Covid cases had been recorded the day before - the highest number since March - driven by the Delta variant. There were 326 hospitalisations, the highest since April, although well below the January peak, when more than 2,000 people were being hospitalised daily. Israel has in recent days rolled out a booster vaccine shot for older citizens, reimposed mask requirements indoors and restored “green pass” restrictions requiring vaccine certificates for entering enclosed spaces such as gyms, restaurants and hotels.

Ireland’s premier Micheal Martin hailed the country’s “brilliant” Covid-19 vaccine programme after its full vaccination rate overtook the UK’s.
Ireland reached the figure of 72.4% of adults fully vaccinated. In the UK the rate was 72.1% on Saturday. More than 5.8 million jabs have been administered in Ireland to date. “The vaccine rollout is continuing at great pace,” tweeted Martin. “Today we edged ahead of our nearest neighbours - a brilliant effort by everyone involved. Ireland: 72.4% of adults fully vaccinated UK: 72.1% of adults fully vaccinated.”

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How Games Workshop grew to become more profitable than Google

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Tabletop gaming, based on a mix of science fiction and fantasy worlds, has seen sales surge during lockdown

It started in a small flat in west London, with three friends selling board games and a fanzine via mail order; now Games Workshop is worth more than Marks & Spencer and Asos and is more profitable than Google.

This week the Nottingham-based company, which produces the Warhammer fantasy role-playing brand, announced all of its workers would get a £5,000 bonus after sales and profits surged during the pandemic.

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Father hopes to reopen case of British woman who disappeared 20 years ago

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Louise Kerton went missing in 2001 after travelling to stay with her boyfriend’s family in Germany

Twenty years since the disappearance of Louise Kerton, who travelled to Germany to holiday with her boyfriend’s family and disappeared, her father is looking for fresh leads.

Phil Kerton is hoping publicity to mark the anniversary might trigger memories or encourage police in Germany, the UK or Belgium – which she is supposed to have travelled through via rail and sea – to reopen the case.

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UK weather: flood warnings as Storm Evert moves eastwards

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Unsettled weather forecast across England and Wales with ‘torrential thundery downpours’ in the east

The Met Office has issued weather and flood warnings as Storm Evert moved eastwards across Britain with thunderstorms forecast for the weekend.

Yellow wind warnings are in place for coastal areas in south-east England and East Anglia, and thunderstorm warnings for a swath of England from Nottingham to Norwich and north as far as Hull.

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First image revealed of Imelda Staunton as the Queen in The Crown

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Actor best known for Vera Drake takes over from Olivia Colman for fifth series about the UK royal family

The first image of Imelda Staunton in character as the Queen in season five of The Crown has been revealed.

Staunton has taken over from the Golden Globe winner Olivia Colman, as the fresh series ushers in a new era for the royal family. Netflix gave fans a first glimpse of Staunton as the monarch while she was still filming the next instalment of the Netflix show.

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Olympic antihero: how Michael Gove trashed the legacy of London 2012 | Letter

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Chris Dunne on the successful school sport partnership scheme that the Conservatives dismantled in 2010 – and on why good coaching is the crucial factor at any level of sport

Barney Ronay (Gold medals are illusory, world-class public facilities should be the goal, 23 July) says “the idea of a tangible legacy [from the London 2012 Olympics] was always flimflam”, but one of the most important factors in the Games being awarded to the UK was that we had already put in place the grassroots plan to ensure the legacy years before we even made the bid.

In 2002 the Labour government had created, in England, school sport partnerships (SSPs), based in 450 secondary sports colleges, each of which was responsible for hugely increasing participation in sport in both their own school and a network of local secondaries, each releasing PE specialists for half of every week to help train primary school teachers to widen the sports offer to their pupils and to deliver quality coaching. Identifying talent at the grassroots and nurturing it through to local clubs and on to county, national and Team GB participation was another very firm objective.

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UK says it has no plans for South China Sea confrontation after Beijing warning

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Naval strike group is sailing through waters heavily contested between China and neighbouring countries

Britain has said it has no plans to stage a naval confrontation with China in the South China Sea and that it aims to send its carrier strike group in the most direct route across the contested body of water from Singapore to the Philippine Sea.

The cooling message emerged hours after China’s military and state media warned the UK against provocation as the group, led by Royal Navy aircraft carrier Queen Elizabeth, undertakes what had been expected to be a more assertive deployment.

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Drug firm that hiked prices by 6,000% paid shareholders £400m

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Advanz Pharma and former private equity owners were fined £100m by markets watchdog

A pharmaceuticals firm that inflated thyroid drug prices by up to 6,000% over a decade paid out more than £400m to shareholders and directors during the same period.

London-based Advanz Pharma – and its former private equity owners HgCapital and Cinven – were fined a combined £100m by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) on Thursday.

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Israel blames Iran for attack on tanker that killed Briton and Romanian

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Israeli foreign minister contacts Dominic Raab and says ‘Iran is not just an Israeli problem’

Israel has blamed Iran for a suspected drone attack on a tanker in the Arabian Sea that killed two crew, including a British national, and has vowed a harsh response.

The Liberian flagged Mercer Street, which is linked to an Israeli tycoon, was hit off the coast of Oman late on Thursday in what is thought to have been a swarm attack involving multiple drones.

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Conditions that led to 2011 riots still exist today, experts warn

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Data analysis finds large-scale cuts to youth services and increase in racial disparity 10 years on

The conditions that led to riots across England 10 years ago still exist today, experts have warned, as data analysis showed significant cuts to youth services in affected areas and an increase in racial disparity in stop and search.

On 4 August 2011, police officers shot and killed Mark Duggan, a 29-year-old mixed-race man, in Tottenham, north London. His death sparked a wave of civil unrest that started the capital and spread to other cities, causing property damage to the value of £40m a day.

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