Expert calls for Home Office to lose powers but councils say they are struggling to cope
The UK’s independent anti-slavery commissioner has called for decision-making on child trafficking cases to be taken away from the Home Office.
Sara Thornton told the Independent that local authorities should take over the powers because they are better placed to provide subsequent support for the child.
Continue reading...PM welcomes restoration of power sharing as he and Varadkar meet first and deputy ministers
Boris Johnson has predicted “an incredible time” for Northern Ireland now that the region has a functioning power-sharing government again.
Prior to a trip to Belfast, the prime minister welcomed the historic deal that restored the cross-community coalition at Stormont.
Continue reading...Local people must ask Underbelly if they want more than six passes to their houses
Edinburgh residents have vented their anger at having to apply to a private company for access to their own homes during this year’s Hogmanay celebrations amid growing concern that the council’s hunger to attract tourism is reducing the Scottish capital to a “theme park”.
People living in some parts of the city centre will also face potential restrictions on the number of guests they can invite if they wish to have parties of their own on New Year’s Eve, when the entertainment giant Underbelly will be running an event expected to attract more than 70,000 people.
Continue reading...Planned changes would be biggest shakeup to country’s electoral system for 50 years
A bill is being introduced that would give the vote to 16- and 17-year-olds in many elections in Wales and empower local authorities to decide which voting system they use.
The Labour-led Welsh government said the planned changes would be the biggest in the Welsh electoral system since the voting age was reduced to 18 in the UK half a century ago. They come as a bill to reduce the voting age to 16 for Welsh assembly elections nears the end of its journey through the Senedd.
Continue reading...Zorba fined £93,000 in Wales for supplying egg-free branded tzatziki dip containing egg
The food company at the centre of a hummus salmonella scare received a substantial fine less than a month ago for food standard offences involving another dip, it has emerged.
Zorba Delicacies, which has been forced to extend a recall of 80 types of hummus products supplied to various supermarkets, was found to have supplied an egg-free branded tzatziki dip which contained egg protein.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Whistleblower tells of links between Paola Cuneo, PM and US businesswoman
A Whitehall official who ran the scheme that granted Jennifer Arcuri a coveted entrepreneur visa had worked for Boris Johnson when he was mayor, the Guardian has learned.
The US businesswoman, who is at the centre of a conflict of interest row over her friendship with the prime minister, beat nearly 2,000 applicants to gain one of 200 sought-after tier 1 entrepreneur visas on the government’s Sirius programme after Johnson helped promote her firm, Innotech, by giving keynote speeches at her events.
Continue reading...Jeremy Corbyn has come under growing internal pressure to commit Labour to a unequivocal policy of remaining in the European Union as more than 100 councillors issued a joint warning to the party’s ruling body that any form of Brexit would threaten jobs, public services, workers’ rights and the environment.
In a letter to the national executive committee (NEC), which meets this week, the Labour councillors, including several leaders of county and borough councils, called on the party “to campaign unambiguously and energetically for a public vote on Brexit and to endorse a ‘remain and transform’ position in all circumstances”.
Continue reading...Children’s commissioner for England condemns ‘scandal’ of family homelessness
Thousands of homeless children are growing up in cheaply converted shipping containers and cramped rooms in former office blocks, putting their health and wellbeing at serious risk, according to the children’s commissioner for England.
Anne Longfield said it was scandal that at least 210,000 young people in homeless families in England were put up by councils in temporary housing and bed and breakfasts or forced to “sofa surf” with friends, often for long periods.
Continue reading...Individual liability removed but duty requires police, councils and NHS to work together to tackle violence
A new legal duty on public health bodies in England to tackle serious violence, including knife crime, must be backed by cash if it is to be effective, organisations have warned.
The public health duty, requiring bodies to share data, intelligence and knowledge, will be announced by the government this week, following the conclusion of an eight-week consultation.
Continue reading...Heather Cairns says woman ‘masqueraded’ as her daughter Eilidh’s aunt at council meeting
A woman posed as the aunt of a cyclist who was killed in London in order to oppose plans for a new segregated bike lane, according to the victim’s mother.
Eilidh Cairns, a television producer from Alnwick in Northumberland, died aged 30 in 2009 after being hit by a tipper truck while riding in Notting Hill in the borough of Kensington and Chelsea.
Continue reading...A decade ago it was the UK’s fastest growing city, but hit by cuts and buy-to-let, support for Nigel Farage’s party is high
On Thursday, voters in Peterborough will take part in one of the most intriguing parliamentary byelections in recent memory. The constituency saw a knife-edge duel between Labour and the Conservatives at the 2017 general election and at last month’s European poll, 38% of voters in the city backed the Brexit party. A first seat in the House of Commons for Nigel Farage’s party is a distinct possibility. If that happens, it will send tremors through middle England, of which Peterborough is typical in many ways, not just geographically.
Economically, Peterborough performs averagely amid struggles with productivity. Wages are stagnant and it has been reshaped by migration, with foreigners arriving to work in the surrounding farmlands and distribution depots, contributing to a decade as the UK’s fastest growing city between 2001 and 2011.
Continue reading...Group of MEPs writes to Electoral Commission over reports of ballot paper delays
The Electoral Commission has been asked to permit late postal votes for the European parliament elections to be counted as reports continue of many British nationals living abroad receiving their ballot papers too late to return on time.
A group of 10 MEPs has written to the regulator to say that it should consider any postal vote that arrives by Sunday when the polls close across Europe. “We cannot permit lousy disenfranchisement like this,” said the Liberal Democrat MEP Catherine Bearder, who wrote the letter to the commission.
Continue reading...MPs and councillors have branded group illiterate and violent over past two years
Politicians have been accused of using racist rhetoric against Travellers to help push through sweeping bans against unauthorised encampments.
In a range of documents and speeches, Travellers have been branded illiterate, violent and lawless by MPs and councillors over the last two years, as a deepening housing crisis has led to an increase in roadside encampments.
Continue reading...Results reveal slight loosening of traditional unionist-nationalist stranglehold
Centrist parties have thrived and the Democratic Unionist party (DUP) has consolidated its support, results of Northern Ireland’s local elections show.
With all first preference votes now counted, the Alliance and Green parties, as well as other small parties and independents, made gains, revealing a slight loosening of the traditional unionist-nationalist stranglehold. The DUP won 24.1% of first preferences, a modest increase from the 2014 local election, and Sinn Fein won 23.3%, a slight drop, confirming both parties still dominate the political landscape.
Continue reading...Next up: Brexit hijacks the European elections
•You can buy your very own print of this cartoon
Continue reading...Lib Dems and Greens surge as Tories and Labour suffer large losses in council elections in England
This is from Tony Robinson, the former Black Adder actor and longstanding Labour activist. It speaks for itself ...
I’ve left the Labour Party after nearly 45 years of service at Branch, Constituency and NEC levels,partly because of it’s continued duplicity on Brexit, partly because of it’s antisemitism, but also because its leadership is complete shit.
Here is a picture of Stuart Davies, the Tory activist who heckled Theresa May as she started speaking at the Welsh Conservative conference. “Why don’t you resign,” he shouted.
As the man shouted “we don’t want you here”, a small group of delegates at the Welsh Conservative conference at Llangollen Pavilion clapped and chanted “out”, in an apparent call for the heckler to be removed. As the Press Association reports, the prime minister then drew laughter and applause from a majority of the hall as she told the conference: “It’s great to be back in North Wales again - I have to say my experience of North Wales is that everybody I meet here is friendly.”
Continue reading...Voters are predicted to punish the party for its failure to pass a Brexit deal
The Conservatives can expect to lose 800 or more seats at the local elections this week, as voters punish Theresa May’s administration for failing to pass a Brexit deal, a leading Conservative analyst has said.
In his latest projection for Thursday’s polls, in which more than 8,000 council seats in England are being contested, the Tory peer Robert Hayward suggested his party could lose about 500 to the Liberal Democrats, and 300 to Labour.
Continue reading...Conservatives have launched inquiry into alleged racist incidents in local party
Portsmouth’s major political parties are struggling to contain claims they have racially discriminated against local minority ethnic council candidates.
The Conservatives have launched an inquiry into alleged racist incidents in the local party. A leaked letter shows a former council candidate for the party has claimed he was marginalised, bullied and racially abused.
Continue reading...Ombudsman orders Cornwall to pay compensation over locals’ plan for land near Saltash
Cornwall council has been strongly criticised by an ombudsman for taking more than a decade to examine an application to turn a riverside beauty spot into a village green.
The local government and social care ombudsman expressed concern that the council had still not made a decision on the land at Forder, near Saltash, and said it had taken so long that some of those who had backed the application had died.
Continue reading...Ron McMillan has come under fire over handling of former chief executive’s departure
The chair of Yorkshire’s tourism body is expected to resign after an expenses scandal surrounding its former chief executive Sir Gary Verity.
Welcome to Yorkshire’s Ron McMillan will reportedly tender his resignation at a board meeting on Friday.
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