Category Archives: Politics

Failure to enact public duty law ‘has worsened England inequality in pandemic’

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Exclusive: government urged to activate part of Equality Act that would impose duty on public bodies to tackle inequality

The failure of successive governments to enact part of the Equality Act, which would have imposed a duty to address socio-economic disadvantage, has exacerbated inequalities in England during the coronavirus pandemic, a thinktank has claimed.

The Runnymede Trust’s report, Facts Don’t Lie, says that the public sector duty provision would have imposed a legal obligation on education authorities in England to ensure working class children on free school meals were fed properly while schools were shut and had access to laptops for remote learning.

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Easing lockdown will allow Covid to spread. Here’s how to mitigate the risks | Sam Bowman

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The key is ventilation, ventilation and more ventilation – but isolation must be properly supported too

The government’s roadmap for ending Covid restrictions in England commits it to steps that may increase the rate at which the virus spreads. Some of that is unavoidable. But even as we reopen, there is more that we could do to mitigate the risk, and get us to the summer – and normality – without a resurgence.

One reason that east Asian countries have done better during the pandemic is that prior experience with Sars has given people the understanding of how respiratory diseases spread, and how to avoid them. Japan’s three Cs guidance – avoidance of closed spaces, crowded places, and conversations – helped it avoid a serious epidemic without imposing a national lockdown.

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Boris Johnson sets out four-step plan to ease lockdown in England – video

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The prime minister has announced that schools will reopen from 8 March, while non-essential retail outlets and outdoor service in pubs and restaurants could be back by 12 April, with indoor service earmarked for 17 May at the earliest. No 10 stresses that after the first step, the subsequent stages could be subject to delay and would be guided by 'data rather than dates'

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No 10 ‘concerned’ about Facebook news shutdown in Australia

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Oliver Dowden expected to meet US company, as No 10 says UK will ‘defend free speech and journalism’

The UK government is “obviously concerned” at the repercussions of Facebook’s shutdown of large numbers of news and public information resources in Australia, Downing Street has said, confirming that the culture secretary will meet the US company this week.

Oliver Dowden is “expecting to meet Facebook this week”, Boris Johnson’s spokesperson said, adding that the date had yet to be confirmed.

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UK’s anti-terror chief fears rights group boycott threatens Prevent review

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Neil Basu says move to protest appointment of William Shawcross could harm process

Britain’s best chance of reducing terrorist violence risks being damaged amid a huge backlash to the government’s choice of William Shawcross to lead a review of Prevent, the country’s top counter-terrorism officer has told the Guardian.

Assistant commissioner Neil Basu’s comments came after key human rights and Muslim groups announced a boycott of the official review of Prevent, which aims to stop Britons being radicalised into violent extremism.

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Cautious Johnson faces battle with own MPs over lockdown exit

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Analysis: many on the Tory backbenches want Covid restrictions over by end of April

When Boris Johnson stands at the dispatch box on Monday to deliver his roadmap for easing Covid restrictions for what he hopes will be the final time, there is likely to be a sigh of relief from his scientific advisers who will have won the most recent battle.

Johnson is now gearing up for the next tussle, which will be with his MPs. There is a truce with the cabinet.

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Johnson unveils lockdown exit plan: schools and social contact first

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PM to unveil proposals for England on Monday, with shops and restaurants facing longer wait

Social contact with loved ones will take precedence over the reopening of shops and hospitality when Boris Johnson sets out his roadmap for lifting restrictions in England on Monday, with school sports and family picnics offered as a trade-off for a longer closure of retail and restaurants.

Johnson will order the reopening of all schools on 8 March and pledge that two families or a group of six friends will be allowed to meet outdoors three weeks later, the Guardian understands.

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DUP leadership starts legal challenge against Northern Ireland protocol

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Arlene Foster and senior MPs want new post-Brexit trade arrangements to stop disruption at Irish Sea ports

The leader of the Democratic Unionist party, Arlene Foster, and senior DUP MPs are launching a legal action challenging the Brexit deal’s Northern Ireland protocol.

They will be joining other unionists from across the UK in judicial review proceedings unless alternative post-Brexit trade arrangements are put in place that secure their consent.

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Ports feel the chill as trade re-routes around Brexit Britain

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In Holyhead, traffic has fallen 50% as hauliers stymied by Brexit find their way from Ireland to France without entering the UK

Perched on the shores of Anglesey, the island linked by road bridges to the north-west coast of Wales, Holyhead’s geography has given it a leading role in British-Irish trade since the early 19th century.

About 50 miles directly across the Irish Sea from Dublin, a journey of just three-and-a-quarter hours by ferry, Holyhead was until December the second busiest roll-on roll-off port in the UK after Dover. About 450,000 trucks rumbled through each year on their way to Dublin, with cargoes of meat and agricultural produce, secondhand cars and items destined for the shelves of Irish supermarkets.

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The path out of lockdown: can Boris Johnson keep his boosterism at bay?

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England waits to see if PM will stay restrained or bow to backbench pressure with Covid plan

It was an uncharacteristically subdued Boris Johnson who announced from Downing Street that Britain had surpassed the first, phenomenally ambitious target of giving 15 million people a coronavirus vaccine: this was a success, yes, but it was “no moment to relax”, the prime minister said on Monday.

The boosterish rhetoric has been restrained for several weeks – gone is the talk that led to claims there would be normality by November last year, or that it would be “inhuman” to cancel Christmas. Now, escape from the third lockdown must be “cautious but irreversible”.

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Northern Ireland firms optimistic Brexit barriers will be eased

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Business leaders buoyed by meeting with Michael Gove and EU counterpart on protocol glitches

Business leaders in Northern Ireland are optimistic that Brexit barriers preventing parcels, pets, potatoes and plants getting to the region from Britain will be eased after a meeting between Michael Gove and his EU counterpart, Maroš Šefčovič, on Thursday.

They said the UK and the EU had a legitimate reason to remove or ease the barriers because they were having an impact on daily lives, in breach of a pledge in the Northern Ireland protocol that states the “application of this protocol should impact as little as possible on the everyday life of communities in both Ireland and Northern Ireland”.

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Iran nuclear deal hangs in balance as Tehran turns screw on US

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Western foreign ministers to discuss response to Iranian plan to ban snap intrusive inspections

The future of the Iran nuclear deal is hanging in the balance as the west prepares its response to Iranian plans to increase pressure on Washington by banning snap intrusive inspections of its nuclear sites.

The German, French and British foreign ministers are to confer urgently with the US secretary of state, Tony Blinken, on how to respond to Iran’s plans, which it is expected to implement on Tuesday.

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Mass testing still a vital tool in Covid efforts despite UK vaccine success

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Analysis: Operation Moonshot rhetoric has been toned down but tests will help spot variants

When the government’s Operation Moonshot plans for mass testing of the population for Covid-19 were first revealed, the intention was to use that as the route out of perpetual cycles of lockdown.

It was described as a £100bn-plus endeavour, with resources likened to the Manhattan Project, the top-secret wartime endeavour led by the US to develop a nuclear bomb.

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Brexit forces Northern Ireland buyers to cancel orders for 100,000 trees

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Exclusive: Ban on plants being moved across Irish Sea is major setback for tree-planting programmes in region

Orders for almost 100,000 trees have been cancelled by Northern Ireland buyers because of a post-Brexit ban on the plants being moved from Britain, the Guardian can reveal.

Leaders in the business say it is a major setback for tree-planting programmes in Belfast and elsewhere in the region.

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How to have better arguments online

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The troubled times we live in, and the rise of social media, have created an age of endless conflict. Rather than fearing or avoiding disagreement, we need to learn to do it well

In 2010, Time magazine made Mark Zuckerberg its person of the year. It described Facebook’s mission as being to “tame the howling mob and turn the lonely, antisocial world of random chance into a friendly world”. During the first decade of mass internet use, this was a popular theory: the more that people were able to communicate with others, the more friendly and understanding they would become, the result being a more peaceable and harmonious world.

In 2021, that vision seems painfully naive. Howling online mobs clash day and night, and some of them commit real-world violence. The internet is connecting people, but it isn’t necessarily creating fellow feeling. At its worst, it can resemble a vast machine for the production of mutual antipathy.

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Stars including Sir Ian McKellen urge changes to visa rules for artists

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Julie Walters among signatories to letter saying post-Brexit changes a ‘towering hurdle’ to working in Europe

New visa rules for British artists, actors and theatre workers who want to work in Europe after Brexit are a “towering hurdle” that must be urgently addressed, according to an open letter signed by stars including Sir Ian McKellen, Julie Walters and Patrick Stewart.

In the letter from the performing arts union Equity, some of the biggest names in British theatre have implored the prime minister to go back to the negotiating table to ensure visa-free work in the EU.

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Johnson says end of lockdown must be ‘cautious but irreversible’ – video

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The prime minister said the government would provide target dates for sectors to reopen ‘if we possibly can’ when he reveals his plan for easing lockdown next week. Speaking to broadcasters in Kent, Johnson said: ‘The dates that we will be setting out will be the dates by which we hope we can do something at the earliest’

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Libs Dems warn China over ‘international bullying’ after sanctions threat

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Chinese newspaper said countries that boycott 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics over treatment of Uighurs would face retaliation

The Liberal Democrats have warned China against “international bullying” after a call by UK MPs for countries to boycott the 2022 Winter Olympics was met by a warning of potential sanctions.

Last week, Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, joined with the Labour MP and former Foreign Office minister Chris Bryant in demanding that the government and the British Olympic Association act over the mass repression of the Muslim Uighur population in the Chinese region of Xinjiang, which campaigners say constitutes genocide.

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Johnson should repay north of England voters with private investment – report

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Research argues ministers should create economic ‘big bang’ for area that turned Tory in last election

The prime minister should repay voters in the north of England who lent the Conservatives their vote at the last election by unleashing billions of pounds of private investment, according to a report.

It argues that ministers should aim to harness the “restless radicalism” from those who voted for Brexit in 2016 and the Conservatives in 2019 by creating an economic “big bang”, along the lines of the Thatcherite deregulation of the City in the 1980s which reinforced London’s position as a global financial centre.

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