Britain is eroding global reputation for conserving its historic assets, culture bodies are warning
The UK is eroding its global reputation for conserving its “unparalleled” historic assets, culture bodies have warned, with Stonehenge expected to be next in line to lose its coveted World Heritage status after Liverpool.
Related: Unesco strips Liverpool of its world heritage status
Continue reading...Businessman Barry Pring sustained fatal injuries when hit by car in Ukrainian capital in February 2008
There was no conspiracy to kill a British businessman who died in a hit-and-run incident in Ukraine while celebrating his first wedding anniversary, a judge has concluded.
Barry Pring, an IT consultant, sustained fatal injuries when he was hit by a car while waiting for a taxi on a carriageway outside a restaurant in Kyiv on 16 February 2008.
Continue reading...Ageing fleet hit by breakdowns and cancellations, with capacity low on services that do run due to Covid
The perfume and toiletries shop overlooking Brodick Bay on Arran is normally packed in the summer, as day-trippers and holidaymakers stream off the mainland ferries at the busy terminal just across the bay.
But this summer has been grim, said Andrew Russell, the sales director for Arran Sense of Scotland, formerly known as Arran Aromatics. For thousands of people and businesses up and down the west coast of Scotland, this summer has been marred by repeated crises affecting ferry services run by the state-funded CalMac.
Continue reading...‘Real prospect’ 1998 attack by dissident republicans could have been thwarted, says Mr Justice Horner
Security forces had a “real prospect” of preventing the 1998 Omagh bombing – the deadliest atrocity of the Northern Ireland Troubles – a Belfast high court has ruled.
Mr Justice Horner recommended on Friday that the British and Irish governments each undertake human rights compliant investigations into the bombing, which killed 29 people, including a woman pregnant with twins, and injured 220 people.
Continue reading...The Guardian’s picture editors select photo highlights from around the world
Continue reading...In the last seven days the UK government has flailed from one controversy or misstep to the next
Often, the political week heading into the Commons summer recess can feel almost soporific, with the thoughts of ministers and MPs geared more towards holiday sunbeds than rows. But the last seven days has been different, and not only because of the ongoing political flux of coronavirus, with the government seeming to flail from one controversy, U-turn or misstep to the next, day after day.
Continue reading...Driver of car, 79, believed to have suffered a medical episode before crashing in Pontyclun
Six people have been taken to hospital after a car ploughed into a crowd outside a pub in south Wales.
Police were called to the serious incident on Llantrisant Road, Pontyclun at about 8.30pm on Thursday, sparking a huge emergency services response.
Continue reading...Lords report calls on the government to ensure support remains in place to help late applicants secure their status
Significant numbers of Europeans in the UK aged over 65 failed to apply to the EU settlement scheme (EUSS) before the deadline, a parliamentary report has found, warning that this could make thousands of retirement-aged EU nationals vulnerable to Britain’s hostile environment policies.
Just 2% of all applications for the settlement scheme were submitted by people aged over 65, a percentage that is unlikely to reflect the population of older EU nationals living in the UK. Charities supporting older Europeans to apply said they had “encountered many individuals who have no mobile phone, no digital access and inappropriate or no documentation”, and the report warned that people who struggled with the digital technology required to apply were more likely to have missed the deadline for applications at the end of last month.
Continue reading...Once There Was a Bear by Jane Riordan and Mark Burgess will channel the original books’ voice and pictorial style using details from Christopher Robin’s real life
The story of how Winnie-the-Pooh went from a Harrods toy shelf to the home of Christopher Robin and the Hundred Acre Wood is set to be told for the first time, in an official prequel to AA Milne’s original stories.
Winnie-the-Pooh: Once There Was a Bear has been written in the style of Milne by children’s writer Jane Riordan, with illustrations by Mark Burgess emulating the original drawings of EH Shepard. It is the first prequel to Milne’s books and poetry about the bear, and has been authorised by the estates of both Milne and Shepard.
Continue reading...Several factors, including the portion of those at highest risk among the double-vaccinated and antibody levels, account for the data
The next wave of Covid will be different. When cases soared in spring and winter last year lockdowns rapidly brought them back under control. This time it will be vaccines that do the hard work.
But Covid jabs are not a perfect shield. They slow the spread of the virus, help prevent disease, and reduce the risk of dying. They do not bring all this to an end.
Continue reading...EU has already proposed changes to lessen impact on Northern Irish citizens, say officials
The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, has rejected Boris Johnson’s move to renegotiate the Northern Irish protocol, raising the temperature of a simmering Brexit row.
“The EU will continue to be creative and flexible within the protocol framework. But we will not renegotiate,” she said after a call with the prime minister on Thursday.
Continue reading...The vaccines minister has confirmed the government intends to go ahead with making Covid vaccination a condition for entry to nightclubs from September in England.
Nadhim Zahawi said that after a successful trial the government has rolled out the NHS Covid pass, which allows people to show their Covid status, whether proof of vaccination, test results or natural immunity.
He added the government reserved the right to make its use compulsory in future but confirmed MPs will get a vote on plans to use Covid passports
Continue reading...Report also says government’s process for managing lobbying is insufficiently transparent
The businessman Lex Greensill was given “extraordinarily privileged” access to government while the government’s process for managing lobbying is insufficiently transparent and allows access to a “privileged few”, a report into the Greensill lobbying scandal commissioned by the prime minister has concluded.
The former prime minister David Cameron and the late cabinet secretary Jeremy Heywood have been criticised in the 141-page review drawn up by the City solicitor Nigel Boardman.
Continue reading...More Olympic athletes confirmed to have Covid; Seoul considering new restrictions amid one of worst outbreaks to date
In the UK, a record 618,903 alerts were sent to users of the NHS Covid-19 app in England and Wales in the week to July 14 telling then they had been in close contact with a person who had tested positive for coronavirus, according to NHS figures.
Angela Merkel has urged Germans to get vaccinated amid a worrying rise in cases, telling the nation: “The more we are vaccinated, the freer we will be.”
“We all want our normality back,” the German chancellor, who is preparing to step down later this year, said. “The more we are vaccinated, the freer we will be.”
Continue reading...Ballywatticock was country’s hottest ever spot last week – but its reign had ended within days
In the annals of climate change it will be remembered, if at all, as a diverting footnote: the brief reign of Ballywatticock.
Few people in Northern Ireland had heard of this townland on the shores of Strangford Lough in County Down until its weather station recorded the hottest temperature for the UK last Saturday: 31.2C (88.16F).
Continue reading...Westminster council unable to block Cheung Chung-kiu’s grand plans for Knightsbridge property despite ban on “Monopoly board-style” homes
A Chinese billionaire has been granted planning permission to construct an eight-storey, 5,760-sq metre (62,000-sq-ft) private palace overlooking Hyde Park, central London.
Westminster city council granted Cheung Chung-kiu, a Hong Kong-based property tycoon, permission to partly demolish and reconstruct 2-8A Rutland Gate, in Knightsbridge, in order to create his vast new home, which experts said could be worth up to £500m when completed.
Continue reading...In the face of scorn and contempt from former IRA members, a small number of dissident groups remain committed to armed action. What do they think they can achieve?
In the early hours of 19 April 2019, Belfast-born Irish republican Anthony McIntyre was awakened by his wife, Carrie, in their home in Drogheda, just south of the border in Ireland. “It’s not true, it can’t be true,” she was saying. “Lyra has been shot dead.”
Drowsy, confused and not quite believing what he had just been told, McIntyre fell back asleep. He awoke the following morning thinking, “What did she tell me?” McIntyre looked online, and saw that it was true: their good friend, the 29-year-old journalist Lyra McKee, had been observing a riot in Derry the previous night when she was shot by a republican gunman.
Continue reading...Trading arrangements continue to be a significant flashpoint in relations with Dublin and Brussels
Just seven months after it came into force, the Northern Ireland protocol is proving once again a significant flashpoint in the UK’s relations with Dublin and Brussels.
On Wednesday, the UK published a “command paper” on the protocol. Some will see it as an attempt to tear up the agreement Boris Johnson struck in 2019, others will see it as a serious attempt to fix a deal they argue was flawed from the beginning but signed to help the British prime minister to get Brexit done, as he had promised.
Continue reading...Notes left on defaced Manchester mural will be removed to protect from rain, amid plans for digital exhibition
Thousands of messages left on the mural of footballer Marcus Rashford in Manchester will be removed and preserved on Friday, to protect them from forecasted rain this weekend.
A team of archivists and conservators will detach the tributes so they are preserved for future generations to mark the national moment of solidarity that followed the mural being defaced and a torrent of racist abuse was targeted at the player on social media, as well as England teammates Bukayo Saka and Jadon Sancho.
Continue reading...Government estimates between 3% and 12% of staff may resist getting jab – meaning they will lose their jobs
Up to 70,000 care home staff in England could leave the workforce or lose their jobs because the government is insisting they must be vaccinated against Covid, with women and ethnic minorities disproportionately affected, according to an official estimate.
In an impact statement from the government, officials believe between 3% and 12% of care home staff may still resist getting a Covid jab by the end of a 16-week grace period. The central estimate was that 40,000 could be left without jobs, but it could be as high as 70,000 or as low as 17,000.
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