Category Archives: Society

Government confirms plan to scrap two-week cancer wait targets in England – UK politics live

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Currently two-week wait target is not being met as government says new guidelines will consolidate ten current targets into three

There was some consternation in the comments yesterday at any passing mention of the football, which is going to make it awkward to do the front pages today, with an awful lot of papers featuring the Lionesses upfront and centre.

The Guardian led with the prime minister promising to protect the pensions triple lock, which could see a massive benefits rise given how high inflation is running.

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Canada calls gender violence an epidemic after triple femicide inquest

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Exclusive: government’s response also indicates Canada intends to criminalise coercive control, a form of intimate partner violence

Gender-based violence is an “epidemic” that “has no place in our country”, Canada’s new justice minister has said in a letter delivered in response to a public inquest into a triple femicide in rural Ontario.

The six-page letter dated 14 August – the federal government’s official response to last summer’s inquest – also indicates Canada intends to pursue the criminalisation of coercive control, a form of intimate partner violence intended to isolate, intimidate and control victims.

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‘Dire crisis for children’ in Sudan, aid groups warn as millions more go hungry

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Up to 17,000 more children a day lack food, Save the Children say, as global indifference to humanitarian crisis condemned as ‘racist’

The past four months of fighting in Sudan has pushed millions into food insecurity – with an additional 1.5 million children expected to fall into crisis levels of hunger by September – as aid agencies say they are struggling to reach people.

Up to 17,000 children a day have been falling into crisis levels of hunger, Save the Children warned on Tuesday. With 4 million people displaced so far, the charity said more people were facing hunger in Sudan than at any point since records there began in 2012.

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Patients could get cancer scans without GP referral, says Steve Barclay

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Health secretary suggested patients could go directly to diagnostic test or clinician to ease ‘bottleneck’ in NHS system

Patients with cancer symptoms could bypass their GP in the future and go straight for a scan, the health secretary has suggested, in the latest “radical” attempt by the government to cut huge NHS waiting lists.

The suggestion, which comes as the government is expected to reduce the number of NHS cancer waiting time targets, could form part of proposals to “design out bottlenecks” in the NHS system, Steve Barclay said in an interview.

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Charities and experts call for overhaul of ‘broken’ UK sick pay system

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Coalition urges health secretary to back changes as long-term sickness levels reach record high

A coalition of charities and health experts has called for an overhaul of the UK’s “broken” sick pay system, as the number of people prevented from working by long-term sickness reached a record high.

The health secretary, Steve Barclay, was urged in a letter to support changes that the campaign says would not just address widening health inequalities but also benefit the economy.

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Legionella on the Bibby Stockholm barge: five questions for Home Office

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Many issues remain to be resolved after asylum seekers were evacuated on Friday because of a potentially deadly bacteria

The Home Office’s decision to use the Bibby Stockholm barge to accommodate asylum seekers generated controversy long before the first person set foot onboard.

But issues with its use came to a head on Friday when the government confirmed the asylum seekers were being evacuated just days after moving in because of legionella, a potentially deadly bacteria, being found in its water system. While officials have provided a plan to use an RAF base instead, many questions remain.

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Keir Starmer accuses Tories of ‘moving goalposts’ on NHS cancer care

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Proposals to ‘streamline’ treatment, which government says are clinically led, would cut number of targets from nine to three

Keir Starmer has accused the government of “moving the goalposts” as the number of NHS cancer waiting time targets is expected to be reduced.

The government has been consulting on the proposed measures to streamline NHS cancer care, which would replace the nine existing cancer targets with just three. The target of all patients seeing a specialist within two weeks of an urgent referral for cancer tests by the GP is expected to be scrapped.

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Nearly 4m fewer UK working days in past year due to strike action, study says

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Resolution Foundation report says much of industrial action ‘fuelled’ by public sector workers’ anger over falls in real-terms pay

About 3.9m working days have been lost to industrial action in the past year, more than at any point since the 1980s, according to a new analysis.

The Resolution Foundation, which focuses its research on low- to middle-income households, said many of the strikes were “fuelled” by anger among public sector workers over real-terms pay declines, which amounted to an average cut of more than 9% since 2021, adjusted for inflation.

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Sharp rise in cost of food basics forces UK families ‘to make desperate choices’

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Which? research finds cheese, butter and bread are up by more than 30% in the past two years, hitting the poor hardest

The cost of some basic food items such as cheese, butter and bread has soared by more than 30% in the last two years, forcing poorer households to “make desperate choices between keeping up with their bill payments or putting food on the table,” campaigners have said.

Food price inflation has slowed in recent months, but costs remain much higher than they were two years ago, disproportionally affecting low-income households, according to research by consumer body Which? shared exclusively with the Guardian.

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Landmark NHS recruitment plan in danger from applicant shortfall

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The huge increase in students needed to fill medical training places, and supplying the staff to teach them, may not be feasible

A “once in a generation” NHS recruitment plan requiring an extra 50,000 clinical training places in less than a decade risks being derailed by difficulties in finding enough applicants and a shrinking number of staff to teach them.

A new analysis seen by the Observer reveals the sheer scale of the proposed increase in NHS staff implied by the government’s long-awaited workforce plan, unveiled at the start of the summer and given a broad welcome across the NHS.

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Forty days, 117 buses, 1,650 miles: man completes charity trip round England

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Stephen Chitty, 70, from Watford raised about £2,000 for Mercy Ships on ‘tiring but rewarding’ journey

A 70-year-old man has raised almost £2,000 for charity by completing a 40-day challenge to travel the length and breadth of England entirely by bus.

Stephen Chitty, from Watford, Hertfordshire, travelled 1,650 miles on 117 buses. He started and finished his ambitious journey in Watford and travelled to English cities including Newcastle and Norwich.

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Bailiffs making record profits collecting debt for councils in cost of living crisis

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Charities call for an end to the outsourcing of public debt as firms’ turnover rises nearly 50% in a year

Bailiffs hired by councils to recover unpaid debts have seen their profits rise to record levels during the cost of living crisis, company filings show.

Newlyn Group, which is hired by councils to recover unpaid traffic fines and council tax, saw its turnover from debt collection increase by 43.8% to £25.8m in the year to December 2022, while its gross profit rose to £15.5m. Company documents describe the figures as Newlyn’s “best ever results”.

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Sunak’s ‘intransigence’ on pay will lead to more NHS strikes, warns top doctor

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Exclusive: BMA council chair says medics will have no option but to stage more industrial action until ministers make ‘credible offer’

Rishi Sunak’s “increasingly intransigent” and “belligerent” stance on medics’ pay is blocking the path to ending the industrial action in the NHS, leaving no option but to strike until the next general election, one of Britain’s top doctors has warned.

Speaking to the Guardian on Friday after junior doctors launched a fifth round of industrial action, Prof Philip Banfield, the chair of the British Medical Association (BMA) council, said the union was standing firm and that doctors would continue to hold stoppages until they received a “credible offer”.

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China’s new London embassy on hold pending Westminster intervention

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Deadline has passed for Beijing to appeal against Tower Hamlets council’s rejection of plans

China has temporarily shelved plans to build a new embassy in London, angrily accusing the British government of not doing enough to force through planning permission for the project.

China had been given until Thursday to file an appeal to Tower Hamlets council in east London after the proposals for the embassy were rejected.

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Teenage girl dies after being forced to stay in a ‘period hut’ in Nepal

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Campaigners say efforts to stamp out custom of banishing girls and women during menstruation have been set back by Covid

A 16-year-old girl from Nepal has died as a result of the illegal practice of chhaupadi, where menstruating women are forced to stay in huts outside their homes.

Anita Chand, from Baitadi district, in the west of the country, bordering India, is understood to have died on Wednesday from a snake bite while she was sleeping. Her death is the first reported fatality from chhaupadi since 2019 and campaigners fear progress to eliminate the practice is being eroded.

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Youth say they need education and job skills to thrive in the modern world

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The pandemic, cost-of-living crisis and the climate emergency are influencing responses to the largest-ever survey of young people

Getting a good education and a job are the top priorities for 10 to 24-year-olds, according to the preliminary results of the largest-ever global survey of young people.

More than 700,000 were asked what would improve their wellbeing. About 40% cited education and work, while 21% said safety and 16% good health and nutrition.

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UK government urged to scrap 20% VAT on period pants

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Campaigners say absorbent alternative to tampons and sanitary towels should not be classed as garments

MPs, retailers and charities have written to the government urging it to axe the 20% VAT on period pants, the absorbent underwear designed to be worn as an alternative to tampons and sanitary towels.

Period pants are classed as garments but campaigners are asking Victoria Atkins, who as financial secretary to the Treasury is the minister responsible for VAT, to get them reclassified as period products in the chancellor’s autumn statement later this year.

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Thousands of adopted children names revealed on Scottish website

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Genealogy site Scotland’s People made available records of adoptions dating back 100 years, raising fears for breaches of privacy

A genealogy website operated by the Scottish government has disclosed the names of thousands of people adopted as children.

The Scotland’s People site made available the records of adoptions dating back more than 100 years, records that included the adopted child’s first name and new surname. While the Information Commissioner’s Office has not received a formal breach report, its officials were contacted by National Records of Scotland (NRS), an official arm of the Scottish government that runs the website.

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UN aid deliveries to rebel-held area of Syria poised to resume

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The Bab al-Hawa crossing from Turkey will reopen to the UN for six months after negotiations with Assad’s government

The United Nations is poised to resume aid deliveries into north-western Syria, an area controlled by rebels, via a crossing that has been a lifeline for the region, after aid workers said Damascus appeared to loosen terms that had led to a hiatus.

Deliveries from Turkey via the Bab al-Hawa crossing stopped in July when western powers and Russia, the Syrian government’s main ally, failed to agree on extending a UN security council mandate for the operation. Syria then gave unilateral approval – but on terms that the UN rejected as unacceptable.

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Universities must treat students better, says father whose son killed himself

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Mark Winfield said that his son Jos was ‘left to rot’ after struggling with his mental health while at Brunel University London

A father whose undergraduate son killed himself after he fell behind with his studies has urged universities to take better care of students who are struggling with mental health issues.

Jos Winfield, an undergraduate at Brunel University London, would have celebrated his 22nd birthday this Saturday, but on Fathers’ day this year his parents found him dead in his bedroom at the family home in Somerset.

In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, you can call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on 988, chat on 988lifeline.org, or text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis counselor. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org

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