Category Archives: UK news

Pubs in Wales to close by 6pm under new Covid restrictions

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First minister says virus spreading ‘incredibly quickly’ and firebreak gains being eroded

Pubs, bars and restaurants in Wales will be banned from selling alcohol and forced to shut early, as the Welsh first minister said Covid was spreading “incredibly quickly” across the country and that the gains made during its “firebreak” lockdown were being eroded.

Mark Drakeford said that unless strict new rules were brought in now, there could be as many as 1,700 preventable deaths this winter.

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Protecting others and record of vaccines main reasons to get Covid jab, poll shows

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Survey suggests almost one in two British people expect life to return to normal in a year

Preventing others from catching coronavirus and immunisation’s proven success against disease are the main reasons people see for taking the new vaccine, research has shown.

In a survey of 1,049 Britons, the top two reasons for having it – each cited by 77% – were to protect others from the virus and because vaccines have a long track record of working.

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Silent victims: the hidden Romanian women exploited in the UK sex trade

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Sex traffickers can make profits of over £1m a year per brothel – and Covid lockdowns have only made it easier for them to operate

Three weeks ago, police entered a brothel in south-east England after receiving intelligence about criminal activity there. Inside, they found eight Romanian women wearing face shields and masks, and laminated Covid-19 health and safety sheets on the wall. An industrial-size bottle of hand sanitiser stood by the front door.

“On the surface, this did not look like a place where criminality and sexual exploitation was taking place,” says Cristina Huddleston, a trafficking victim support specialist who joined the raid that evening.

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Coronavirus live news: Moderna to seek US and EU approval for vaccine; Italy records 672 new Covid-related deaths

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Moderna reports a 100% success rate in preventing severe cases; Italy reports 672 new Covid-related deaths, a rise on Sunday’s figure

Turkey’s daily Covid-19 death toll hit a record high for an eighth consecutive day on Monday, with 188 fatalities in the last 24 hours.

The number of new coronavirus cases, including asymptomatic ones, over the past 24 hours also reached a record high of 31,219.

The state of Sao Paulo, home to Brazil’s biggest city, has imposed stricter social distancing measures as it wrestles to contain a fresh rise in Covid-19 cases.

Opening hours and capacities for bars, restaurants and shopping malls will be restricted in Brazil’s most populous state which has been the centre of the country’s coronavirus outbreak.

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Huawei: UK bans new 5G network equipment from September

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Digital secretary says he is setting ‘clear path for complete removal of high risk vendors’ from 5G networks

Telecoms providers must stop installing Huawei equipment in the UK’s 5G networks from next September, the government has said.

The digital secretary, Oliver Dowden, set out a roadmap to remove high-risk vendors ahead of the telecommunications (security) bill coming before parliament.

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Covid infections in England down by nearly a third since second lockdown

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R number now stands below 1 after 30% drop in cases across country over almost a fortnight

Coronavirus infections in England have fallen by nearly a third since the country entered its second lockdown, swab tests on 105,000 volunteers have shown.

There was a 30% drop in cases across the country over almost a fortnight this month, with 96 people infected per 10,000 between 13-24 November, down from 132 per 10,000 between 26 October and 2 November.

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Police apologise after officers wrongly bust online church service

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Nine officers broke up legal Milton Keynes event after misunderstanding Covid rules

Police have apologised after a pastor was accused of breaking coronavirus regulations while holding a religious service online.

The Rev Daniel Mateola said he was “treated like a criminal” when officers arrived at Kingdom Faith Ministries International church in Milton Keynes earlier this month.

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Nearly a third of English hospital trusts exceed first peak of Covid patients

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Scientists warn that scrapping or relaxing tier system too quickly could imperil NHS

Nearly a third of England’s hospital trusts have exceeded their first wave peak of Covid patients undergoing treatment, as scientists warned that relaxing or scrapping the three-tier system too quickly could further hamper the NHS.

Hospital trusts in south Somerset and Devon last week treated more than twice as many Covid patients as they did at the peak of the first wave in spring, Guardian analysis shows. But, reflecting the fact that tier decisions are based on a range of data, both areas will go into tier 2 from Thursday.

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Jamaicans who came to UK as children will be left off deportation flight

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Exclusive: Home Office quietly agrees deal with Jamaica amid outcry over charter plane

A deal has been quietly agreed between the Home Office and Jamaica not to remove people who came to the UK as children on a controversial charter flight to the Caribbean island this week, its high commissioner has said.

Seth Ramocan told the Guardian that following diplomatic overtures to the Home Office, officials agreed not to deport Jamaicans who came to Britain under the age of 12. The Home Office has declined to comment and there has been no public announcement.

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‘It’s impossible’: how Brexit has left British families unable to return to the UK

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Up to 40% of Britons in dual-national relationships likely to want to return fear they do not fulfil the income requirement

When Britain’s new immigration bill became law earlier this month, the home secretary, Priti Patel, tweeted her “delight, after many years of campaigning,” that free movement between the EU and Britain would at last end on 31 December.

But the bill does not just repeal EU citizens’ right to work and live in UK – a key Brexit ask – or British nationals’ right to do the same across the bloc. It will also make it very hard indeed for many Britons who have already moved to ever come home again.

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Culture secretary to ask Netflix to play ‘health warning’ that The Crown is fictional

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Oliver Dowden says younger viewers might take historical drama’s portrayal as fact

The culture secretary plans to write to Netflix and request a “health warning” is played before The Crown so viewers are aware that the historical drama is a work of fiction, he said in an intervention that prompted criticism.

Oliver Dowden said that without the caveat younger viewers who did not live through the events might “mistake fiction for fact” following complaints that the fourth series of the drama had abused its artistic licence and fabricated events.

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UK universities fine students £170,000 for Covid rule breaches

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Exclusive: 28 institutions issued fines, with Nottingham University students alone hit for £58,865

Universities fined students more than £170,000 for breaching coronavirus safety rules in the first weeks of the new academic year, a Guardian analysis has found, as students told of struggling to make friends without flouting restrictions.

Twenty-eight institutions fined students for breaking university, local and national Covid rules, including on household mixing, mandatory face coverings and social distancing, according to responses from 105 universities to freedom of information (FoI) requests.

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Dominic Raab warns UK at risk of third wave of coronavirus – video

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The UK is at risk of a third wave of Covid-19 in the new year if the right balance is not struck on restrictions, Dominic Raab has told BBC One's The Andrew Marr Show. 

The foreign secretary also refused to rule out the prospect of a third nationwide lockdown next year. The Commons will vote on Tuesday on whether to approve the three-tier system replacing the national lockdown

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Working in the NHS, it doesn’t feel like any end to Covid is in sight

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The news about a vaccine doesn’t feel real to stressed and exhausted hospital staff, says a consultant

It turns out that a pandemic really is a marathon, not a sprint to a finish line. I guess that was obvious really.

It’s not all bad. We are no longer dealing with an unknown threat that we are having to discover as we go along. The disease is known, its presentation recognised, its complications understood.

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UK woman who has travelled Europe for six years goes missing in Pyrenees

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Urgent search under way for Esther Dingley, who was hiking alone in the mountains

A British woman who has spent six years travelling across Europe has gone missing while on a solo hiking tour in the French Pyrenees.

Esther Dingley, 37, had been travelling with her partner, Dan Colegate, since 2014, with the couple’s travel adventures well-documented in a blog and in the national press. She had embarked on a month-long solo trip when she went missing.

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Keir Starmer warned not to insist Labour MPs vote for Brexit deal

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Leader faces resignations from his front bench in a ‘dangerous moment’ for his authority

Keir Starmer, the Labour party leader, faces the threat of resignations from his frontbench team should he order MPs to vote in favour of a Brexit deal agreed by the government.

Labour sources said that there were shadow ministers willing to step down if ordered to vote for the deal that could be agreed this week, with one describing it as a “dangerous moment” for the Starmer’s authority.

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Among Us: the video game that has shot 100 million players into outer space

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A new hunger for social contact during lockdown has boosted participation in online multiplayer games

If “sus” and “vent” mean nothing to you, then you’ve somehow missed out on the smash-hit multiplayer game Among Us. But with numbers playing the online game heading towards 100 million, maybe you’ll find out before Christmas how good you are at being an “impostor” .

For the uninitiated, Among Us is the sleeper game hit of 2020. The premise is simple: it’s Cluedo or Wink Murder on a spaceship with four to 10 players of crewmates and impostors. The crewmates perform simple tasks for take-off, while impostors sabotage operations and kill other players. Impostors are the only players who can travel through vents – hence the significance of vent in Among Us. Gamers hold meetings to pick a suspect – which is where the word sus comes in – to jettison. The aim is to catch the impostors.

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Life after Covid: will our world ever be the same?

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From cities, to science, to politics, six Observer writers assess how a post-pandemic world will emerge into a new normal

Here are some things that the pandemic changed. It accustomed some people – those whose jobs allowed it – to remote working. It highlighted the importance of adequate living space and access to the outdoors. It renewed, through their absence, an appreciation of social contact and large gatherings. It showed up mass daily commuting for the dehumanising drain on energy and resources that it is.

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What really happened to Edson Da Costa?

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He was 25, a father and a car mechanic. Five minutes after being stopped by police on 15 June 2017, he was lying unresponsive on the ground. After an inquest and inquiry, family and friends are still fighting for justice

They were cruising at speed down Tollgate Road, the stereo turned high. They all knew they shouldn’t be there, not at this time, not after dark. If you’re from London’s Stratford, showing up in nearby Beckton carried its risks.

Jussara Gomes was driving, a fast-talking 23-year-old with an infectious laugh. Beside her, in the passenger seat of the black A-class Mercedes, was Edir Da Costa, known as Edson, a 25-year-old father and car mechanic, swaying exuberantly to hip-hop.

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