Police drivers would be held to different driving standards to public when in road chases
Police drivers will be held to different standards to the public if they are involved in a car crash while chasing a suspected criminal under changes put forward by the home secretary, Sajid Javid.
Officers are currently held to the same standards as members of the public when involved in a crash during a pursuit and the Home Office argues this overlooks the training they receive.
Continue reading...Letters to Sajid Javid and Diane Abbott call for attention to focus on any Swedish case
Political pressure is mounting on Sajid Javid to prioritise action that would allow Julian Assange to be extradited to Sweden, amid concerns that US charges relating to Wikileaks’ activities risked overshadowing longstanding allegations of rape.
More than 70 MPs and peers have written to Javid and the shadow home secretary, Diane Abbott, urging them to focus attention on the earlier Swedish investigations that Assange would face should the case be resumed at the alleged victim’s request.
Continue reading...Free movement, housing and social security rights at risk, says parliamentary report
EU citizens living in the UK would be stripped of their freedom of movement, housing and social security rights by Home Office legislation introduced to regulate immigration following Brexit, a parliamentary report has warned.
Despite repeated government reassurances that their privileges will be protected, a study by the joint committee on human rights (JCHR) concludes that more than 3 million Europeans living in Britain would be left in legal “limbo”.
Continue reading...Reema and Zara Iqbal – whose husbands died fighting for Isis – said to have five children between them
Two more British women who are being held in Syrian camps with their young children have reportedly had their citizenship removed.
The move comes as the home secretary, Sajid Javid, faces increasing criticism over the case of Shamima Begum, the 19-year-old Londoner who was stripped of her British citizenship on his orders, after the death of her three-week-old son.
Continue reading...Former DPP accuses home secretary of treating UK like a ‘banana republic’ over decision to strip Isis bride of citizenship
Syrian camps: vulnerable children of Isis ignored by the outside world
Sajid Javid has been accused of moral cowardice and “treating the UK as a banana republic” in pursuit of his leadership ambitions following the death of Jarrah, the three-week-old son of Isis bride Shamima Begum.
A Church of England bishop and a former director of public prosecutions led the chorus of outrage directed at the home secretary as demand grew for him to review his controversial decision to strip the 19-year-old of British citizenship – a move that left her stateless and her baby in legal limbo.
Continue reading...Sajid Javid accused of appeasing populists by ordering UK citizenship to be revoked
The home secretary, Sajid Javid, has come under fire for his decision to revoke the British citizenship of Shamima Begum, whose baby son has died in a Syrian refugee camp.
Begum, 19, left the UK in 2015 with two school friends to join Islamic State in Syria and said last month she wanted to return home. But Javid insisted he would do all in his power to prevent her coming back and ordered her citizenship to be revoked.
Continue reading...Home secretary insists he will back chiefs despite cabinet clash with May
Sajid Javid has said the government must listen to police chiefs’ demand for more resources after they asked the home secretary for emergency cash to fund an immediate rise in the number of officers in England to tackle knife crime.
Javid met chief constables from seven of the areas worst affected by knife crime on Wednesday to discuss solutions to the problem, which has been described as a national emergency.
Continue reading...Spokesman says party will not oppose measure but cites lack of sufficient evidence
Labour has said it will not seek to block the government’s decision to ban the political wing of Hezbollah in the UK, but suggested the move by Sajid Javid was motivated by his leadership ambitions rather than actual evidence.
Membership of the Lebanon-based group’s military wing is already outlawed, but the proscription will now be extended to its political arm, the home secretary announced on Monday.
Continue reading...A coalition of human rights groups is pressing the home secretary to scrap his new measures to tackle knife crime, branding them “deeply counterproductive”.
Sajid Javid’s knife crime prevention orders place a range of curbs and curfews on suspects, but groups working with young people including Liberty, the Runnymede Trust and the Children’s Society, say they have “profound human rights concerns”.
Continue reading...Nineteen-year-old who joined Isis asks UK to show ‘a bit more mercy’ in assessing her case
Shamima Begum has said she is “willing to change”, as she issued a plea to the UK government for “mercy” after the home secretary moved to strip her of her British nationality.
The British-born 19-year-old, who travelled from east London to Syria to join Islamic State in 2015, wants to return from Syria because her newborn son is unwell, and she does not wish to allow him to return to the UK alone.
Continue reading...Experts split over whether Sajid Javid’s move to revoke her UK citizenship is legal
According to the UK government, she is no longer a British citizen. The Home Office wrote to Begum’s parents on 19 February saying they had made the order to remove her citizenship that day.
Continue reading...Country at odds with UK over decision to strip 19-year-old of British citizenship
Shamima Begum is not a Bangladeshi citizen and there is “no question” of her being allowed into Bangladesh, the country’s ministry of foreign affairs has insisted, setting up a clash with the UK after Sajid Javid’s move to strip the teenager of her UK citizenship.
“The government of Bangladesh is deeply concerned that [Begum] has been erroneously identified as a holder of dual citizenship,” Shahriar Alam, the state minister of foreign affairs, said in a statement issued to the Guardian, adding that his government had learned of Britain’s intention to cancel her citizenship rights from media reports.
Continue reading...Teenager who travelled from London to Syria to join Isis says decision is ‘kind of heart-breaking’
Shamima Begum, the teenager who travelled from east London to Syria to join Islamic State in 2015, has described Home Office plans to strip her of citizenship as “kind of heart-breaking”.
Related: Shamima Begum: will the plan to revoke her citizenship succeed?
Continue reading...The Home Office is selling the services of its immigration officials to private companies in a move attacked as an escalation of the “hostile environment” strategy.
According to internal documents seen by the Observer, the department is attempting to embed immigration officers at a rate of almost £60 an hour as part of an “enhanced checking service” being offered to public services, understood to include NHS trusts and local authorities, as well as private firms.
Continue reading...Seventy-one Labour MPs and MEPs have accused the Home Office of “digital discrimination” for creating an Android-only app for EU citizens to apply for settled status.
In an open letter to home secretary Sajid Javid, frontbenchers including Luke Pollard, shadow environment minister, and Paul Blomfield, shadow Brexit minister, say the system “flies in the face of fair treatment of EU nationals”.
Continue reading...French authorities to improve cooperation with UK and increase coastal surveillance
The French authorities have set out plans to prevent people in small boats risking the dangerous Channel crossing to England.
Measures being taken include improved cooperation between law enforcement agencies and more surveillance and security on beaches along the northern French coastline.
Continue reading...HMS Mersey’s mission follows request for military assistance from the home secretary, Sajid Javid
The Royal Navy patrol vessel HMS Mersey has been deployed to the Channel to help deal with people attempting to cross to the UK from France, ministers have confirmed.
The move came after a formal request for military assistance from the home secretary, Sajid Javid. The deployment will be financed by the Home Office.
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