Category Archives: Wales

17 May reopening: how Covid measures across Britain are changing

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Coronavirus restrictions are set to be eased in England, Wales and most of Scotland from Monday

Coronavirus restrictions will be eased further on Monday in England, Wales and most of Scotland. Northern Ireland will review its measures on Thursday, with a view to lifting more restrictions on 24 May.

The next phase of relaxation comes despite the spread of the coronavirus variant first detected in India, though Boris Johnson warned on Friday that the variant could make it “more difficult” to achieve the final step in England’s roadmap in June.

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NHS in England and Wales treated fewest ever violence-related injuries in 2020

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Lockdown was reason behind sharp fall in number of people treated by NHS for injuries outside the home, say researchers

Lockdown led to the smallest number of people on record being treated by the NHS for injuries caused by violence away from the home, a study shows.

The closure of pubs, clubs and other venues that sell alcohol as part of the bans on social mixing was a key reason for the sharp decline in serious violence, the researchers say.

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Elections 2021: Labour wins mayoral races in Greater Manchester and West of England, holds Welsh Senedd – live

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All the latest news and results as counts continue in England and Scotland after Thursday’s elections

Scotland’s first list results are out, with Central Scotland declaring the following:

First list declaration out - for Central Scotland, it's Leonard (Lab) Kerr (Con), Lennon (Lab), Simpson (Con), Griffin (Lab), Gallacher (Con), Mackay (Green). So three Labour, three Tory, and one Green.

Asked whether it was realistic to have a referendum in the first half of parliament, Nicola Sturgeon said that while getting through the pandemic has to come first, it looks as though it is “beyond any doubt that there will be a pro-independence majority in Scottish parliament”.

She told BBC News: “By any normal standard of democracy that majority should have the commitments it made to the people honoured.

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Spring cold snap hits as England relaxes Covid lockdown restrictions

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Snowfall in some areas dampens hopes of businesses reopening their doors for first time in months

The lifting of lockdown restrictions to allow people in England to use pub beer gardens and dine in the outdoor areas of restaurants is being met by snowfall, as a spring cold snap hits.

The inclement weather will come as a blow to thousands of businesses that were hoping to welcome back customers on Monday after months of restrictions.

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Union in peril as PM ‘speaks for England alone’, former civil servant warns

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Philip Rycroft says PM’s ‘muscular brand of unionism’ has deepened divisions between four nations

The pandemic has seeded the idea of a prime minister “who speaks for England alone” as relations between the four nations of the UK deteriorate amid “deep-rooted complacency”, a senior former civil servant has warned.

There is widespread ignorance towards the union, meaning ministers can be kept in the dark about major reforms with little consideration for the four nations, Philip Rycroft, the permanent secretary to the Brexit department until 2019, says in a report.

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Patients in Wales to be first in UK to receive Moderna Covid vaccine

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Nation’s mass rollout begins on Wednesday, while Scotland will administer first doses later this week

Patients in Wales will from Wednesday become the first in the UK to receive the Moderna vaccine as part of a mass vaccination programme, with the first doses in Scotland set to come later this week.

The initial jabs would be given at the West Wales general hospital in Carmarthen, the Welsh government said.

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What is allowed under Covid lockdown rules around the UK?

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How restrictions are being eased varies in the UK’s four constituent parts

The lockdown is being gradually eased in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, but the details of how and when this is happening vary in the four constituent parts of the UK.

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UK weather: Wednesday could be hottest March day on record

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Spell of early spring warm weather continues after record 24.5C on Tuesday

Forecasters say there is a small possibility the UK could see the hottest day on record on Wednesday, as the spell of early spring warm weather continues.

It has been particularly welcomed in England, where temperatures have been the highest and people have just emerged blinking into the light as the nation begins to shake off a long national lockdown.

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Welsh tourism sector can start to reopen from this weekend

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Lifting of stay-local rule is for Welsh residents only as country stays shut to visitors from other parts of the UK

The tourism sector in Wales can begin to reopen from Saturday as the country’s stay-local rule is lifted, but only for Welsh residents.

Organised outdoor activities and sports for children and under-18s will also be able to take place and up to six people from two different households can meet and exercise outdoors and in private gardens.

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Welsh goat population rockets after Covid cancels contraception drive

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Goats of Great Orme venturing even further into town, sparking fears for their safety as lockdown eased

The goats of the Great Orme headland in Wales were a worldwide sensation during the first Covid lockdown last year after they were pictured roaming brazenly around the deserted streets of nearby Llandudno.

This year there has been a population explosion of the kashmiri goats in their north Wales headland home after the Covid crisis forced countryside wardens to cancel a planned contraception campaign.

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Wales set to ease Covid lockdown restrictions from Saturday

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First minister to announce ‘stay local’ will replace ‘stay home’ rule among other changes

Some semblance of normal life will begin again in Wales from Saturday, with the country’s first minister, Mark Drakeford, expected to announce a change from the current “stay home” restrictions to more lenient “stay local” requirements.

Drakeford is expected to say: “We are taking a phased approach to unlocking each sector – starting with schools. We will make step-by-step changes each week to gradually restore freedoms. We will monitor each change we make, so we know what impact each change has had on Wales’s public health situation.”

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Gurrumul, Omar Souleyman, 9Bach and DakhaBrakha: the best global artists the Grammys forgot

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From the Godfathers of Arabic rap to the father of Ethio-jazz, Grammy-winning producer Ian Brennan guides a tour through global music’s greatest

This week I wrote about the glaring lack of international inclusivity in the Grammys’ newly redubbed global music (formerly world music) category.

In the category’s 38-year history, almost 80% of African nations have never had an artist nominated; no Middle Eastern or eastern European musician has ever won; every winner in the past eight years has been a repeat winner; and nearly two-thirds of the nominations have come from just six countries (the US, the UK, Brazil, Mali, South Africa, India). The situation shows little signs of improving.

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‘There’s a lot of nasty stuff’: the people living with long Covid

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Sufferers say they have had little specialist help despite NHS England setting up dedicated clinics

“It’s not that I feel I have been abandoned, I think that is perfectly obvious,” says Rachel Pope. “If you speak to any long Covid patient, they have been abandoned.”

Until exactly a year ago – 5 March 2020 – Pope was “an incredibly fit woman”. A senior lecturer in European prehistory at the University of Liverpool, her work and lifestyle were very active. But after falling ill to Covid, she spent four months unable to walk, then three more when she could manage little more than “a sort of shuffle”.

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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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Wales is first UK nation to offer Covid jab to top four priority groups

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Everyone in top four categories has been offered first vaccine dose, says first minister

Wales has become the first UK nation to have offered a Covid jab to everyone in the top four priority groups, the first minister, Mark Drakeford has announced.

Last month, Drakeford was forced to defend Wales’s vaccination programme after criticism of delays from opposition parties and doctors. But at a press conference on Friday, he said that 66 days after people in Wales first began getting the jab, the key target had been achieved.

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Dramatic discovery links Stonehenge to its original site – in Wales

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Find backs theory that bluestones first stood at Waun Mawn before being dragged 140 miles to Wiltshire

An ancient myth about Stonehenge, first recorded 900 years ago, tells of the wizard Merlin leading men to Ireland to capture a magical stone circle called the Giants’ Dance and rebuilding it in England as a memorial to the dead.

Geoffrey of Monmouth’s account had been dismissed, partly because he was wrong on other historical facts, although the bluestones of the monument came from a region of Wales that was considered Irish territory in his day.

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UK weather: temperature hits lowest level in decade after ‘extreme freeze’

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Mercury drops to -21.4C in Scotland, the coldest temperature recorded in UK since December 2010

Temperatures plunged to below -21C in Scotland overnight, the lowest level in the UK in more than a decade, following an “extreme freeze”.

The mercury dropped to -21.4C (-6.5F) in Braemar, Aberdeenshire, the coldest temperature recorded in the UK since 2 December 2010, when -21.3C (-6.3F) was recorded in Altnaharra in the Highlands.

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