Tony Finn, who worked at West Yorkshire manufacturing firm for 24 years, is in line for compensation
Calling a man “bald” is sexual harassment, an employment tribunal has ruled.
Hair loss is much more prevalent among men than women so using it to describe someone is a form of discrimination, a judge has concluded. Commenting on a man’s baldness in the workplace is equivalent to remarking on the size of a woman’s breasts, the finding suggests.
Continue reading...Dozens of services to and from London cancelled, and strike action hits TransPennine Express routes
Rail passengers face a “disastrous weekend” of disruption as engineering works and strikes hamper one of the busiest Easter getaways in years.
Dozens of services to and from London have been cancelled as Network Rail carries out 530 engineering projects across the bank holiday weekend.
Continue reading...Complainant says they tried to warn Conservative party before Ahmad Khan won election in Wakefield
Imran Ahmad Khan liked to be noticed. Wandering around Westminster in a pinstripe suit with a cane, he looked and sounded like a Conservative MP from another era, calling colleagues “old boy” and “dear chap”, despite only being in his 40s – “like a tinpot Churchill”, as one of his colleagues puts it. He was prone to ostentatious displays of wealth, sometimes parking a Rolls-Royce in the parliamentary car park.
In his 2019 victory speech he paid special tribute to his mother, whom he called “ma-mah”, like a member of the royal family. He is close to his family, particularly his brothers Karim and Khaled, both lawyers, the former a prosecutor at the international criminal court in The Hague.
Continue reading...Jobs set to go at Stocksbridge in South Yorkshire and at West Bromwich, but new posts to be created at Rotherham
Liberty Steel has announced plans to cut 200 jobs in the UK at plants in South Yorkshire and the West Midlands, as industrialist Sanjeev Gupta’s metals group looks to shift production to Rotherham.
The company said on Friday that it would cut 160 jobs at a plant in Stocksbridge, South Yorkshire, and 45 in West Bromwich in the West Midlands as it focused production on the plant in Rotherham, also in South Yorkshire.
Continue reading...Watchdog expresses concern over safety of mothers and babies days after damning Shrewsbury report
Hospital inspectors have uncovered repeated maternity failings and expressed serious concern about the safety of mothers and babies in Sheffield just days after a damning report warned there had been hundreds of avoidable baby deaths in Shrewsbury.
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) found Sheffield teaching hospitals NHS foundation trust, one of the largest NHS trusts in England, had failed to make the required improvements to services when it visited in October and November, despite receiving previous warnings from the watchdog.
Continue reading...Is it hoped discovery of medieval trading town Ravenser Odd can teach people about perils of climate crisis
Hopes are high that a fabled medieval town known as “Yorkshire’s Atlantis” is about to be located and will begin giving up secrets held for more than 650 years.
Ravenser Odd was a prosperous port town built on sandbanks at the mouth of the Humber estuary before it was abandoned and later destroyed and submerged by a calamitous storm in 1362.
Continue reading...Sundas Alam’s threats led to Shah's children fleeing home and innocent family being arrested at gunpoint
A woman whose death threats led to an MP’s children fleeing their home in the middle of the night, and an innocent family being arrested at gunpoint, has been jailed for three and a half years.
Bradford West MP Naz Shah has described how she rang 999 about “an immediate firearms threat” in a disguised email sent by Sundas Alam in April last year that threatened her with a “bullet in her head”.
Continue reading...Ryad Alsous, whose story helped inspire the bestselling book, says life is sweet caring for his hives in Huddersfield
In 2013, Syrian beekeeper Ryad Alsous drank his last cup of mint tea on the balcony of his flat in Damascus. He was about to leave the city where he had spent his whole life and move to Britain. Eight years later, he is again drinking mint tea made in the same flask but this time in Huddersfield. The flask is the only item he still has from his home in Syria. He is talking about the moment he left. “It was very difficult. And also full of hope,” he says.
His block of flats had been bombed twice, and explosions in the eastern part of the city were happening daily. On the day he left, a loud bang nearby caused the doves perched on his balcony to briefly flutter into the air. He had been feeding the birds for years and realised they would have no one to look after them once he left.
Continue reading...Michael Vaughan has said he was sorry for the pain his former Yorkshire teammate Azeem Rafiq endured arising from the racism he experienced at the club.
Yorkshire’s new chairman, Lord Patel, has apologised to Rafiq for what he had been through and the former player told MPs this month of the “inhuman” treatment he suffered during his time at the county, with Vaughan among a number of figures implicated in the case. In an interview with BBC Breakfast shown on Saturday morning, Vaughan denied making racist comments.
Continue reading...Michael Vaughan has been stood down by the BBC from Radio 5 live’s Tuffers and Vaughan Show on Monday after two cricketers said they heard the former England captain make racist comments while playing for Yorkshire in 2009.
The decision came after Vaughan, who has worked as an expert summariser and analyst on Test Match Special for 12 years, was accused of telling three players of Asian descent that there were “too many of you lot, we need to do something about it” before a county match in Nottingham.
Continue reading...Force says it is discouraging the activity this year along with organised events because of Covid
A police force in the north of England is trying to discourage children from trick or treating this Halloween because of Covid-19.
South Yorkshire police (SYP) have produced a poster residents can print out and put in their windows saying “No trick or treaters”, with a picture of a silhouetted pumpkin crossed out like a no-entry sign.
Continue reading...Exclusive: crown estates accused of greed in selling rights to ‘incompatible’ carbon capture and windfarm projects
A clash between two multibillion pound “net zero carbon” schemes is brewing in the North Sea after the Queen’s property manager granted development rights for one patch of seabed to two different projects at the same time.
The crown estate will earn millions of pounds after agreeing to lease an area off the Yorkshire coast to the latest phase of the giant Hornsea offshore windfarm, as well as to a scheme led by BP which plans to begin storing carbon dioxide under the seabed. This has prompted concern that the giant wind turbines could interfere with seabed sensors for the carbon storage project.
Continue reading...Seabird carcasses discovered along Northumberland, North Yorkshire and Scottish shores, with many more found emaciated
Several hundred seabirds have been found dead along the coasts of north-east England and Scotland, while many have been discovered emaciated.
The UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (CEH), which is investigating the cause of the deaths, said the majority of the birds were guillemots.
Continue reading...‘Nothing of obvious significance’ found at gravel pits near York as part of inquiry into disappearance of chef
Police have said “nothing of obvious significance” was found during a search of a lake as part of the investigation into the disappearance of university chef Claudia Lawrence.
Teams of police experts, search dogs, divers and forensic archaeologists spent two weeks scouring the lake and nearby woods as the murder probe continues.
Continue reading...Leaders of £24m Stocksbridge fund include local MP, her husband, and others with personal or business links to plans
Labour has raised concerns about the management of a flagship levelling up scheme after it emerged that decisions about one local £24m fund were primarily led by a group including the local MP, her husband, and others with personal or business links to some of the plans.
Documents also show that the towns fund board for Stocksbridge in South Yorkshire, co-chaired by Conservative MP Miriam Cates, met for eight months before members began filing details of personal interests, and that the scheme of governance was only published after more than a year.
Continue reading...Sister of murdered MP Jo Cox holds West Yorkshire seat for party, easing pressure on leader Keir Starmer
Labour has narrowly won the Batley and Spen byelection, holding on to the West Yorkshire seat after a hotly contested campaign.
Labour won 13,296 votes with the Tories recording 12,973, according to official results. Kim Leadbeater defeated Ryan Stephenson, the Conservative candidate, by 323 votes. George Galloway, representing the Workers Party of Britain, came third with 8,264 votes.
Continue reading...My parents have been eating pheasants killed on the roads for years and encouraging me to try them. Is this the most ethical approach to meat-eating?
Motorists shoot me funny looks as I sheepishly cross a scrubby verge, trying my best to conceal the dead pheasant under my arm. I am in a part of Saddleworth Moor called the Isle of Skye by locals, and have just collected a free meal from the middle of the road.
Nobody can agree on how this area of moorland, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, earned its nickname. Some think it comes from a Victorian navvy, who exclaimed in a broad Irish brogue: “Look, there’s an ’ole in the sky,” as he considered a parting in the thick mist above him. Others think it was named after an inn of the same name. But either way, the area should be immediately renamed Pheasant Cemetery. Because, before I picked up my own bird, I counted 46 pheasant carcasses in various stages of decomposition, scattered and splattered on the road over several miles as I drove to Holmfirth for a day out.
Continue reading...The weather couldn’t dampen spirits as the Yorkshire resort’s hoteliers and guests celebrated the return of domestic travel
The sky was overcast, a chill wind blew in from the sea, and everyone was wearing coats. But for four-year-old Caitlin and two-year-old Jim, there was little to complain about – they were on a beach and they were building sandcastles.
For their parents, Lindsay and Jim Roger, a week’s holiday in the North Yorkshire seaside town of Scarborough was a blessed relief. Lindsay is a nurse who has been working on Covid wards, while Jim works in construction. As key workers with young children, lockdown has been difficult but they were “really pleased” to be able to travel again. “It’s just nice to get out and nice to see the sea,” Jim said. “It makes such a change from the house and the garden.”
Continue reading...Government has not been straight with fishing industry, says Sam Baron of Baron Shellfish in Bridlington
A lobster exporter who is winding up his 60-year-old family business has blamed the government for failing to be honest about Brexit red tape and hidden costs.
Sam Baron, who worked alongside his father to set up Baron Shellfish in Bridlington, east Yorkshire, said the government had failed to be straight with the fishing industry.
Continue reading...R number now stands below 1 after 30% drop in cases across country over almost a fortnight
Coronavirus infections in England have fallen by nearly a third since the country entered its second lockdown, swab tests on 105,000 volunteers have shown.
There was a 30% drop in cases across the country over almost a fortnight this month, with 96 people infected per 10,000 between 13-24 November, down from 132 per 10,000 between 26 October and 2 November.
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