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Kherson: As Russia retreats, Ukrainians still fear a trap - BBC News
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2022-11-10
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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"I learnt not to believe a word the Russians say," one resident tells the BBC's Jeremy Bowen.
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Europe
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Ukrainian soldiers near Kherson believe Moscow is trying to lure them into a trap
Not long after the Russians announced they would be pulling out of Kherson, a text popped up on my phone.
It was from a resident of the city, who wanted to remain anonymous, giving me her impressions of what was happening.
"I've seen the announcement and I'm really surprised," she wrote.
"Of course, I hope things are going to get better, but during these eight months of occupation I learnt not to believe a word the Russians say. They lie so much about everything."
She could see Chechen fighters, loyal to Moscow, moving around the city, many wearing civilian clothes. Her concern, like so many of her fellow citizens, was that Russia's announcement could be a trap - designed to draw Ukrainian troops into a killing ground.
"I really hope they don't lie," went her next message, "and that they don't make traps for our Ukrainian army."
Since then, her account has been silent. Until the Russians declared their intention to pull out, internet connections, only available on Russian SIM cards, were patchy.
From this morning, not only has the internet mostly been down in Kherson, but supplies of electricity and water have been cut, according to messages coming out of the city.
Someone living under occupation for months might be forgiven for fearing the malign intentions of Kherson's occupiers.
But in the days before Moscow's announcement of a pullback - when rumours of it were widely reported - the first instinct of all the Ukrainians I met was that Russia was trying to lure their army into a trap.
That was the strongly-held view of soldiers at a frontline mobile artillery unit on the flatlands where the two sides were still fighting - between Kherson and Mykolaiv, the nearest town controlled by Ukraine.
Russia's plans were not their biggest concern. The war, they insisted, was going to be fought on their timetable, not President Putin's. They believed in their own power and Ukraine's alliance with Nato.
All the same, their commander, whose nickname was Kurt, had firm ideas about Russia's intentions. "This is one of the ways they want to trap Ukrainian armed forces and surround our units," he said.
"But the Russians won't manage it. Our intelligence works much better than theirs. We know about their plans, and the kind of troops that are ahead of us. Step by step, we'll get to victory."
Commander 'Kurt' is adamant Russian forces will not be able to surround Ukraine's units
Wise commanders always project certainty. And if they have doubts, they share them only with trusted deputies - not their men - and certainly not visiting journalists.
But soldiers of all ranks on the Ukrainian side are almost always positive about winning the war. And, rightly, they regard Russia's decision to leave Kherson as a significant victory.
In Kherson, languishing under months of occupation, it has been much harder for Ukrainians to stay positive. We managed to reach a man there who said many of the Ukrainians there felt abandoned by the army and government in Kyiv.
"Frankly, morale is very low. People ran out of money; they have no medical help. We've been told for half a year or more that Kherson is going to liberated, but nothing changes. That's why Khersonites do not believe anything any more."
He will not believe the hour of liberation has come until he sees Ukrainian soldiers driving down the street.
Ukrainian tanks move towards the Kherson front line after Russia's announcement to retreat
If there is to be a Russian trap, the chances are that they would want to spring it at the moment Ukrainian forces advance.
Russian troops could leave booby-trapped buildings, mines and roadside bombs. Once Ukrainians move forward, they would become targets for Russian artillery on the left, or eastern bank of the river.
Russia has built a double line of fortifications east of the Dnipro, and along with the mighty river itself, it would all amount to a formidable series of hazards and obstacles.
That is why, since the Russians said they were leaving Kherson, Ukrainian commanders have emphasised caution.
A special forces officer, who runs what he calls "partisan warfare" inside Kherson, reflected a common attitude to casualties. Like other interviewees, he did not want to be named, in his case because of the secret nature of his job.
"We've got one more task. To save the lives of our soldiers. As of today, Russians have got strong fortifications on the other bank of the river. If you go on a frontal attack, it will lead to mass death of people. Our commandment has got other goals."
Russia sounds serious about the withdrawal. It was announced by the country's military leaders on national television. President Putin was not in the broadcast, but in the end, it would have to be his decision.
It is without question a serious defeat. But is is less a newly-inflicted wound, than an acknowledgement that Moscow's plan to seize much of Ukraine's Black Sea coast failed months ago.
Russia has been under pressure in Kherson, but its defences have mostly been holding. Withdrawals have been slow and advancing Ukrainians have been hit hard by artillery.
Gen Sergei Surovikin, appointed only a month or so as Russian commander in Ukraine, might have presented the decision to President Putin as the least bad option - and one with possibilities of stabilising the front before the Ukrainians could inflict another defeat.
Gen Surovikin might have asked what the point of a continued occupation of Kherson and the surrounding area was, in the face of a slow defeat.
It has been clear for months that Russia's plan to use Kherson as a jumping-up point for a push along the coast towards Odesa, a major port, had failed. Ukraine, after all, stopped Russia's thrust in the spring.
Since then, Putin's men have hammered neighbouring Mykolaiv with artillery from the big pocket of farmland west of the river Dnipro, which they seized at the same time as the city of Kherson.
Perhaps Gen Surovikin's argument was something like this. Miles and miles of flat fields and farmland on the west bank of the Dnipro, separated from Moscow's main supplies by the river, were always going to be hard to defend.
Pulling back to prepared positions east of the Dnipro would create a serious obstacle to another Ukrainian advance.
If Ukraine loses its sense of caution, and pushes forward too fast to exploit Russia's retreat, Gen Surovikin might be able to spring a trap and inflict serious losses. If that happened, he could present the withdrawal as one of the better Russian decisions in this war.
For their part, Ukrainian generals will try to punish the Russians as they retreat; to do their best to turn a retreat across the river Dnipro into a trap of Russia's own making.
A Russian retreat over the Dnipro is not the end of the war. Far from it.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-63587639
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news_world-europe-63587639
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COP27: Sharp rise in fossil fuel industry delegates at climate summit - BBC News
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2022-11-10
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Data shared exclusively with the BBC show large numbers of oil and gas lobbyists attending COP27.
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Science & Environment
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The number of delegates with links to fossil fuels at the UN climate summit has jumped 25% from the last meeting, analysis shared with the BBC shows.
Campaign group Global Witness found more than 600 people at the talks in Egypt are linked to fossil fuels.
That's more than the combined delegations from the 10 most climate-impacted countries.
Around 35,000 people are expected to attend the COP27 summit in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.
These conferences have always attracted significant numbers from the coal, oil and gas industries, who are keen to influence the shape of the debate.
At last year's summit in Glasgow, a similar analysis of official attendance lists found 503 delegates connected to fossil fuels.
Global Witness says there are 200 lobbyists in national delegations. Another 436 are in trade groups, international bodies or other non-governmental organisations
This year that figure has gone up to 636.
"COP27 looks like a fossil fuel industry trade show," said Rachel Rose Jackson, from Corporate Accountability, one of a group of campaigners who released the data along with the Corporate Europe Observatory.
"We're on a carousel of madness here rather than climate action. The fossil fuel industry, their agenda, it's deadly. Their motivation is profit and greed. They're not serious about climate action. They never have been and they never will."
The President of the UAE, Mohammed Bin Zayd, speaking to delegates at COP27
The researchers counted the number of individuals registered who were either directly affiliated with fossil fuel companies or attending as members of national delegations that act on behalf of the fossil fuel industry.
The data shows that this year, there are more fossil fuel lobbyists than total delegates from the ten countries most impacted by climate change, including Pakistan, Bangladesh and Mozambique.
The biggest single delegation at COP27 is from the United Arab Emirates, who will host COP28 next year.
They have 1,070 people on the ground here, up from just 170 last year.
The analysis found that 70 of that delegation were connected to fossil fuel extraction.
Russia's delegation has 33 lobbyists for oil and gas in their delegation of 150.
"If you are not at the table, you'll be on the menu". That's the view of Dr Omar Farouk Ibrahim, the head of the African Petroleum Producers Organisation, speaking to the BBC at COP27.
The head of the African Petroleum Producers Organisation, Dr Omar Farouk Ibrahim
He said he was here to try and influence negotiators to support the development of oil and gas in Africa. He said there were 600m people across the continent who don't have access to electricity.
He rejects the idea that Africa should forgo its large reserves of oil and gas in exchange for renewable technology and funding from the richer nations.
"We've been failed in the past. And there is no guarantee that they wouldn't fail us again," he told BBC News.
But rather than being a powerful influence, Dr Ibrahim says his group and others struggle to make an impact at the highest levels.
"I guarantee you, even if we are to pay to come here, they will not allow us to come because they don't want the other voice heard."
There is some evidence that the arguments being made by those in favour of oil and gas are having an impact.
There has been a "dash for gas" recently among some African nations, keen to exploit their resources at a time of increased demand in Europe and elsewhere.
Senegal is one of the African countries that wants to exploit its recently discovered reserves of gas.
Campaigners are angry about the presence of lobbyists for the fossil fuel industry
"What is important for us is how can we use these resources to develop our country and reinforce our economy and to export it to emerging and developed countries," said Idy Niang, from the Senegal delegation.
But others attending were clear that the climate situation was now so serious, there should be no room at any COP for those backing fossil fuels.
"If you want to address malaria, you don't invite the mosquitoes," said Phillip Jakpor, who's from Nigeria and works with Public Participation Africa.
"As long as we have the fossil fuel lobby and machinery in full swing, we will not make progress and we have not made progress," he told BBC News.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-63571610
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news_science-environment-63571610
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Independence referendum: Scottish government loses indyref2 court case - BBC News
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2022-11-26
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The Supreme Court rules that an independence referendum cannot be held without UK government's consent.
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Scotland politics
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Supreme Court president Lord Reed read the verdict of the justices
The Scottish government cannot hold an independence referendum without the UK government's consent, the Supreme Court has ruled.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon wants to hold a referendum on 19 October next year.
But the court ruled unanimously that she does not have the power to do so because the issue is reserved to Westminster.
The UK government has refused to grant formal consent for a referendum.
Court president Lord Reed said the laws that created the devolved Scottish Parliament in 1999 meant it did not have power over areas of the constitution including the union between Scotland and England.
These issues are the responsibility of the UK Parliament, he said, and in absence of an agreement between the two governments the Scottish Parliament is therefore unable to legislate for a referendum.
He also rejected the Scottish government's argument that any referendum would simply be "advisory" and would have no legal effect on the union, with people only being asked to give their opinion on whether or not Scotland should become an independent country.
Lord Reed said: "A lawfully held referendum would have important political consequences relating to the union and the United Kingdom Parliament.
"Its outcome would possess the authority, in a constitution and political culture founded upon democracy, of a democratic expression of the view of the Scottish electorate.
"It is therefore clear that the proposed Bill has more than a loose or consequential connection with the reserved matters of the Union of Scotland and England, and the sovereignty of the United Kingdom Parliament."
Responding to the outcome, Ms Sturgeon said she was disappointed but respected the ruling of the court, and stressed that the judges do not make the law and only interpret it.
She added: "That is a hard pill for any supporter of independence, and surely indeed for any supporter of democracy, to swallow."
The first minister told a media conference that a referendum remained her preferred option, but in the absence of an agreement the SNP would use the next UK general election as a "de facto referendum" in an attempt to demonstrate that a majority of people in Scotland support independence.
The "precise detail" of how this would work will now be a matter for the party to debate, she said, with a special conference to be held in the new year.
Ms Sturgeon said: "We must and we will find another democratic, lawful means for Scottish people to express their will" and accused the UK government of "democracy denial".
Nicola Sturgeon addressed a rally by independence supporters outside the Scottish Parliament on Wednesday evening
A series of pro-independence rallies were held in towns and cities across Scotland on Wednesday evening, with Ms Sturgeon addressing a crowd that gathered outside the Scottish Parliament.
She told the rally that the independence movement would now become "Scotland's democracy movement".
Recent opinion polls have suggested that the country is essentially split down the middle on the independence question, but with a very narrow majority in favour of staying in the UK.
However the SNP and Greens form a pro-independence majority in the Scottish Parliament.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak welcomed the "clear and definitive ruling" from the Supreme Court.
Speaking at Prime Minister's Questions, he said: "The people of Scotland want us to be working on fixing the major challenges that we collectively face, whether that's the economy, supporting the NHS or indeed supporting Ukraine.
"Now is the time for politicians to work together and that's what this government will do."
Downing Street later said Mr Sunak will seek to avoid another referendum while he is prime minister.
His press secretary told reporters: "I think that would be something that we would look to do."
She added that there had been a "once-in-a-generation referendum not too long ago and that result should be respected".
Rallies were held in several towns and cities across Scotland
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said there was not a majority in Scotland for either a referendum or independence, but there was a "majority in Scotland and across the UK for change".
The case was referred to the Supreme Court by Lord Advocate Dorothy Bain KC, the Scottish government's top law officer.
Ms Bain said at the time that she did not have the "necessary degree of confidence" that Holyrood would have the power to pass legislation for a referendum without UK government consent.
She said the issue was of "exceptional public importance" and asked the UK's top court to provide a definitive ruling.
The court heard two days of legal arguments from both the UK and Scottish governments last month, with its ruling being delivered just six weeks later - earlier than many experts had expected.
The independence referendum in 2014, in which voters backed remaining in the UK by 55% to 45%, was possible because the UK government agreed to temporarily transfer the necessary powers to the Scottish Parliament to allow the vote to be held through what is known as a Section 30 order.
Clarity was what Nicola Sturgeon asked for and clarity is what she now has from the UK Supreme Court.
The judges have made clear that the law does not allow Holyrood to legislate for an independence referendum without Westminster's agreement.
That means there will not be an indyref2 on 19 October 2023, as the Scottish government had planned.
SNP ministers will accept the judgement and respect the law. A wildcat ballot in the Catalan-style is not an option.
A legal referendum can only happen if the first minister somehow persuades the prime minister to abandon his opposition.
There's little prospect of that happening in the short term, so the renewed campaign for independence just became a longer haul.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-63727562
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news_uk-scotland-scotland-politics-63727562
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Suella Braverman failed to prove source of MI5 spy story leak - judge - BBC News
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2022-11-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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A judge says Suella Braverman was unable to say the source of a story was not from within government.
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UK
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Suella Braverman failed to show a government source had not leaked confidential details of a court case involving MI5 to a newspaper, a judge has said.
Mr Justice Chamberlain made the comments as he ruled against the government's attempt to have its legal costs paid by the BBC.
This followed a High Court battle over identifying an abusive MI5 agent.
The government got an injunction preventing the man being identified.
The BBC had wanted to name the man, known as X in legal proceedings, saying he abused his status as an MI5 informant to coerce a former partner.
The judge said the BBC was "entirely successful" on one issue, partly because Ms Braverman had been unable to show a leak did not come from within government.
In January, Ms Braverman - who was then the attorney general and is now home secretary - had applied for an injunction preventing X from being identified by the planned story.
Ms Braverman had initially wanted the entire case heard in private, but lost this application.
Before a hearing had taken place, the Daily Telegraph reported Ms Braverman was seeking an injunction to block a BBC story about a spy working for British intelligence.
The briefing received by the newspaper damaged the government's argument that publishing details of the case could harm national security.
Mr Justice Chamberlain today said the issue of open justice had a "special importance" in the proceedings.
He said that the BBC "was entirely successful on this issue, in part because the attorney general had been unable to negative the inference that a government source had briefed the Daily Telegraph about the case, while at the same time inviting the court to order an entirely private hearing".
A government leak inquiry was ordered into who briefed confidential details to the newspaper.
Ms Braverman was one of those investigated by the leak inquiry, the BBC understands.
The government has not responded to the BBC's questions about the inquiry, including as to whether Ms Braverman was questioned.
Last month, No 10 defended her after questions about her relationship with MI5 because of the leak.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak reappointed Ms Braverman as home secretary days after she quit for breaching the ministerial code by sending confidential material via a private email account.
Because an injunction was granted, after the judge said identifying X would create a risk to him, the government argued its legal costs should be paid by the BBC.
The judge dismissed that claim on Friday, saying the BBC had been able to publish a detailed story "far beyond" the initial broad restrictions sought by the government.
"Applying common sense", he ruled, "the outcome was mid-way between what the attorney general had initially said she would accept and what the BBC wanted to publish."
Both sides will pay their own costs, which is what the BBC had argued for.
The BBC investigation included interviews with two former partners of X, one of whom had filmed the MI5 agent attacking her with a machete.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-63679685
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news_uk-63679685
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Autumn Statement: Cuts, Brexit and the political battles to come - BBC News
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2022-11-18
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Jeremy Hunt draws economic dividing lines with Labour but there is plenty they agree on too.
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UK Politics
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The crucial judgement on the Autumn Statement will be does what we heard from Chancellor Jeremy Hunt on Thursday amount to making a bad situation a little less bad or does it make it worse?
Here's the problem for the government: even if a set of ideas makes a grim situation a little less grim, it is still a grim situation. And it's likely ministers will get the blame for that.
The coming political argument will be all about who is judged to be the competent and trustworthy stewards of very, very difficult times.
Here are a few things that stood out for me from the various interviews on Friday morning:
Labour accept the size of the financial "black hole" set out by the Office for Budget Responsibility.
So the terms of trade between the Conservatives and Labour on this match up.
But then there are the policy choice differences between them, and the other parties.
Take one example: Labour would go after so-called non doms, Mr Hunt told BBC Radio 4's Today programme he has chosen not to.
Then there is income tax.
The government chose to make the best paid pay more.
And they chose that, over time, more people should pay income tax and pay more of it.
That is the consequence of freezing the levels, the thresholds, at which you start paying it or pay more, as earnings increase over time.
Labour, meanwhile, are determined to say, for now at least, as little about income tax as possible.
Have a watch here of a little clip from the latest BBC Newscast, where I tried, and failed, to get the Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves to set out her instincts on income tax.
You have to wonder how long that position of saying nothing on income tax will hold.
Neither the Conservatives nor Labour want to fundamentally alter the UK's relationship with the EU.
Jeremy Hunt said on Today that "unfettered trade" was "very beneficial" to growth but rejoining the EU single market would not be "the right way to boost growth" because voters had demanded Brexit in order to get rid of freedom of movement, unlimited migration from and to the EU.
In other words, he appeared to tacitly acknowledge rejoining the single market would help with growth, but it was politically unpalatable.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Watch: Fairer tax choices could have been made - Labour's Rachel Reeves
And Labour agree - they don't want to reopen the argument about the single market or the customs union, the two big economic structures of the EU.
Instead, Rachel Reeves said there were other elements of the Brexit deal "we can fix" as she sees it - pointing to a veterinary agreement with Brussels and the mutual recognition of professional qualifications, for example.
And finally, a word about cuts. When is a cut a cut, and when isn't it a cut?
The following thoughts come courtesy of Peter Barnes, the BBC's senior political analyst.
The Autumn Statement set out a plan for the government to generate £55bn from a combination of tax rises and spending less than they had planned to.
So, by the year 2027-28 the overall effect of the policy decisions announced, excluding energy, is expected to be a net gain to the Treasury of £55bn.
That's made up of £30bn from spending policy decisions and £25bn from tax policy decisions.
The £30bn squeeze in public spending is a cut compared to what had previously been planned. It is not a cut compared to current levels of spending.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Watch: Chancellor defends the impact of his Autumn Statement on "squeezed middle"
As the chancellor said: "Overall spending in public services will continue to rise, in real terms, for the next five years".
But it will rise less quickly than planned from 2025-26, so the Treasury is saving money compared to what was expected.
It's also true that the very limited growth in overall public spending above inflation will almost certainly mean actual cuts for many departments.
Defence and overseas development spending are protected, and it seems inevitable that health will continue to eat up a disproportionate share of the extra money.
So that means real term cuts compared to current levels of spending elsewhere.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-63676931
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news_uk-politics-63676931
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Should public sector workers get bigger pay rises? - BBC News
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2022-11-05
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The government risks economic dynamite as some state workers lobby for double-digit wage rises.
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Business
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The reports of the public sector pay review bodies are arriving across Whitehall right now, with the potential to become both economic and political dynamite.
They cover eight areas and just under half the public sector workforce but it may be the case that the evidence submitted, mainly at the turn of the year, is already out of date.
Inflation is on a march. But as Treasury Minister Simon Clarke told me last week, and reiterated yesterday, there is no automatic link in the Treasury's view between the rate of inflation and wage settlements.
In private, senior Cabinet ministers go further, saying that matching wages to inflation would be dangerous and damaging - even suggesting such a thing is irresponsible.
They point to two factors around a significant real terms pay cuts for NHS workers, teachers, police officers and council workers.
The bulk of the 9% current rate of inflation, as measured by the Consumer Price Index, is driven by energy price rises.
The Government has already announced support for energy bills for millions of households, especially those on lower incomes. It also points to early indications of private sector wage growth at around 4-5%, as a more relevant metric.
There are two counter arguments here Firstly, those payments, which cover almost all the cost for several million households, are currently a one-off. Second, public sector pay has fallen overall since 2010 already, and there are some recruitment challenges already affecting some provision of services.
Furthermore, state pensions and some benefits are pegged to the prevailing rate of inflation, and that potentially huge increase will be delivered next year, under current plans. Other bills are also linked to inflation, such as mobile phone and broadband payments.
Unions have asked for pay rises reflecting the current huge spike in inflation. Unison, for example, has asked for rises to match the higher Retail Price Index measure of inflation at 11%. Nurses have asked for 15%.
Our Cost of Living survey last week suggested eight in 10 Britons thought that wages should go up with the cost of living.
Fewer though - just over a third of workers - said they would push their employer for such a rise. Unions also face some difficulties in reaching new thresholds required in ballots for legal strike action on a national basis. Though the RMT did manage to clear such hurdles to go ahead with the rail strike.
Then there is the more general argument about a 1970s-style wage-price spiral emerging. Certainly the last time inflation reached double digits in the 1970s when inflation topped over 20%, and in some years wage inflation was 30%.
Prices went up in anticipation that wages would, which in turn increased because of expectations of price rises, and so on and so forth. This was the classic wage-price spiral that saw the period of very high inflation last years rather than months.
There is some evidence that this is happening in the US. But not much so far in the UK, where prices certainly have spiked and wages haven't - though that could change. There are structural reasons for this.
Union membership has fallen from 13 million at the 1970s peak to six million now. While the Government privately accepts that the numbers affected are small in relation to the whole economy, there is a "signalling effect", they argue, from high profile public disputes.
We are obviously a world away from Downing Street slapping down the Bank of England Governor after my interview in February, where Andrew Bailey warned workers not to ask for excessive pay rises. And significant in-year real wage cuts may leave some voters who were promised a "high wage" economy a little short-changed.
But the Treasury insists there is no "central pay" policy. The result of the Pay Review Body process is for relevant departments to make decisions, based on recruitment and retainment and existing policies on, for example, starting salaries for teachers.
The important fact here though is that the Treasury is not intending to increase the cash budgets for departments. If they want to find funds to increase wages against Spending Review plans, they will have to find it in efficiency savings or cuts in their own departments.
It is time for Cabinet ministers who like to talk about a smaller state and tax cuts to show how they intend to contribute, say some of their colleagues.
All of which leaves unions claiming their members are ready to move towards industrial action across a range of public services. At a time of labour shortages, some union leaders believe they will never have more leverage to force their wages higher, and that there will be post-pandemic public sympathy for their asks not to see a cut to living standards.
The Government will argue this way lies the inflationary dangers of the past.
But for many of the workers concerned, it is not just that their memories have faded - they were not even born the last time inflation hit double digits. So for many, we are in uncharted territory.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-61874732
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news_business-61874732
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Kherson: As Russia retreats, Ukrainians still fear a trap - BBC News
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2022-11-11
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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"I learnt not to believe a word the Russians say," one resident tells the BBC's Jeremy Bowen.
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Europe
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Ukrainian soldiers near Kherson believe Moscow is trying to lure them into a trap
Not long after the Russians announced they would be pulling out of Kherson, a text popped up on my phone.
It was from a resident of the city, who wanted to remain anonymous, giving me her impressions of what was happening.
"I've seen the announcement and I'm really surprised," she wrote.
"Of course, I hope things are going to get better, but during these eight months of occupation I learnt not to believe a word the Russians say. They lie so much about everything."
She could see Chechen fighters, loyal to Moscow, moving around the city, many wearing civilian clothes. Her concern, like so many of her fellow citizens, was that Russia's announcement could be a trap - designed to draw Ukrainian troops into a killing ground.
"I really hope they don't lie," went her next message, "and that they don't make traps for our Ukrainian army."
Since then, her account has been silent. Until the Russians declared their intention to pull out, internet connections, only available on Russian SIM cards, were patchy.
From this morning, not only has the internet mostly been down in Kherson, but supplies of electricity and water have been cut, according to messages coming out of the city.
Someone living under occupation for months might be forgiven for fearing the malign intentions of Kherson's occupiers.
But in the days before Moscow's announcement of a pullback - when rumours of it were widely reported - the first instinct of all the Ukrainians I met was that Russia was trying to lure their army into a trap.
That was the strongly-held view of soldiers at a frontline mobile artillery unit on the flatlands where the two sides were still fighting - between Kherson and Mykolaiv, the nearest town controlled by Ukraine.
Russia's plans were not their biggest concern. The war, they insisted, was going to be fought on their timetable, not President Putin's. They believed in their own power and Ukraine's alliance with Nato.
All the same, their commander, whose nickname was Kurt, had firm ideas about Russia's intentions. "This is one of the ways they want to trap Ukrainian armed forces and surround our units," he said.
"But the Russians won't manage it. Our intelligence works much better than theirs. We know about their plans, and the kind of troops that are ahead of us. Step by step, we'll get to victory."
Commander 'Kurt' is adamant Russian forces will not be able to surround Ukraine's units
Wise commanders always project certainty. And if they have doubts, they share them only with trusted deputies - not their men - and certainly not visiting journalists.
But soldiers of all ranks on the Ukrainian side are almost always positive about winning the war. And, rightly, they regard Russia's decision to leave Kherson as a significant victory.
In Kherson, languishing under months of occupation, it has been much harder for Ukrainians to stay positive. We managed to reach a man there who said many of the Ukrainians there felt abandoned by the army and government in Kyiv.
"Frankly, morale is very low. People ran out of money; they have no medical help. We've been told for half a year or more that Kherson is going to liberated, but nothing changes. That's why Khersonites do not believe anything any more."
He will not believe the hour of liberation has come until he sees Ukrainian soldiers driving down the street.
Ukrainian tanks move towards the Kherson front line after Russia's announcement to retreat
If there is to be a Russian trap, the chances are that they would want to spring it at the moment Ukrainian forces advance.
Russian troops could leave booby-trapped buildings, mines and roadside bombs. Once Ukrainians move forward, they would become targets for Russian artillery on the left, or eastern bank of the river.
Russia has built a double line of fortifications east of the Dnipro, and along with the mighty river itself, it would all amount to a formidable series of hazards and obstacles.
That is why, since the Russians said they were leaving Kherson, Ukrainian commanders have emphasised caution.
A special forces officer, who runs what he calls "partisan warfare" inside Kherson, reflected a common attitude to casualties. Like other interviewees, he did not want to be named, in his case because of the secret nature of his job.
"We've got one more task. To save the lives of our soldiers. As of today, Russians have got strong fortifications on the other bank of the river. If you go on a frontal attack, it will lead to mass death of people. Our commandment has got other goals."
Russia sounds serious about the withdrawal. It was announced by the country's military leaders on national television. President Putin was not in the broadcast, but in the end, it would have to be his decision.
It is without question a serious defeat. But is is less a newly-inflicted wound, than an acknowledgement that Moscow's plan to seize much of Ukraine's Black Sea coast failed months ago.
Russia has been under pressure in Kherson, but its defences have mostly been holding. Withdrawals have been slow and advancing Ukrainians have been hit hard by artillery.
Gen Sergei Surovikin, appointed only a month or so as Russian commander in Ukraine, might have presented the decision to President Putin as the least bad option - and one with possibilities of stabilising the front before the Ukrainians could inflict another defeat.
Gen Surovikin might have asked what the point of a continued occupation of Kherson and the surrounding area was, in the face of a slow defeat.
It has been clear for months that Russia's plan to use Kherson as a jumping-up point for a push along the coast towards Odesa, a major port, had failed. Ukraine, after all, stopped Russia's thrust in the spring.
Since then, Putin's men have hammered neighbouring Mykolaiv with artillery from the big pocket of farmland west of the river Dnipro, which they seized at the same time as the city of Kherson.
Perhaps Gen Surovikin's argument was something like this. Miles and miles of flat fields and farmland on the west bank of the Dnipro, separated from Moscow's main supplies by the river, were always going to be hard to defend.
Pulling back to prepared positions east of the Dnipro would create a serious obstacle to another Ukrainian advance.
If Ukraine loses its sense of caution, and pushes forward too fast to exploit Russia's retreat, Gen Surovikin might be able to spring a trap and inflict serious losses. If that happened, he could present the withdrawal as one of the better Russian decisions in this war.
For their part, Ukrainian generals will try to punish the Russians as they retreat; to do their best to turn a retreat across the river Dnipro into a trap of Russia's own making.
A Russian retreat over the Dnipro is not the end of the war. Far from it.
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COP27: Sharp rise in fossil fuel industry delegates at climate summit - BBC News
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2022-11-11
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Data shared exclusively with the BBC show large numbers of oil and gas lobbyists attending COP27.
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Science & Environment
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The number of delegates with links to fossil fuels at the UN climate summit has jumped 25% from the last meeting, analysis shared with the BBC shows.
Campaign group Global Witness found more than 600 people at the talks in Egypt are linked to fossil fuels.
That's more than the combined delegations from the 10 most climate-impacted countries.
Around 35,000 people are expected to attend the COP27 summit in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.
These conferences have always attracted significant numbers from the coal, oil and gas industries, who are keen to influence the shape of the debate.
At last year's summit in Glasgow, a similar analysis of official attendance lists found 503 delegates connected to fossil fuels.
Global Witness says there are 200 lobbyists in national delegations. Another 436 are in trade groups, international bodies or other non-governmental organisations
This year that figure has gone up to 636.
"COP27 looks like a fossil fuel industry trade show," said Rachel Rose Jackson, from Corporate Accountability, one of a group of campaigners who released the data along with the Corporate Europe Observatory.
"We're on a carousel of madness here rather than climate action. The fossil fuel industry, their agenda, it's deadly. Their motivation is profit and greed. They're not serious about climate action. They never have been and they never will."
The President of the UAE, Mohammed Bin Zayd, speaking to delegates at COP27
The researchers counted the number of individuals registered who were either directly affiliated with fossil fuel companies or attending as members of national delegations that act on behalf of the fossil fuel industry.
The data shows that this year, there are more fossil fuel lobbyists than total delegates from the ten countries most impacted by climate change, including Pakistan, Bangladesh and Mozambique.
The biggest single delegation at COP27 is from the United Arab Emirates, who will host COP28 next year.
They have 1,070 people on the ground here, up from just 170 last year.
The analysis found that 70 of that delegation were connected to fossil fuel extraction.
Russia's delegation has 33 lobbyists for oil and gas in their delegation of 150.
"If you are not at the table, you'll be on the menu". That's the view of Dr Omar Farouk Ibrahim, the head of the African Petroleum Producers Organisation, speaking to the BBC at COP27.
The head of the African Petroleum Producers Organisation, Dr Omar Farouk Ibrahim
He said he was here to try and influence negotiators to support the development of oil and gas in Africa. He said there were 600m people across the continent who don't have access to electricity.
He rejects the idea that Africa should forgo its large reserves of oil and gas in exchange for renewable technology and funding from the richer nations.
"We've been failed in the past. And there is no guarantee that they wouldn't fail us again," he told BBC News.
But rather than being a powerful influence, Dr Ibrahim says his group and others struggle to make an impact at the highest levels.
"I guarantee you, even if we are to pay to come here, they will not allow us to come because they don't want the other voice heard."
There is some evidence that the arguments being made by those in favour of oil and gas are having an impact.
There has been a "dash for gas" recently among some African nations, keen to exploit their resources at a time of increased demand in Europe and elsewhere.
Senegal is one of the African countries that wants to exploit its recently discovered reserves of gas.
Campaigners are angry about the presence of lobbyists for the fossil fuel industry
"What is important for us is how can we use these resources to develop our country and reinforce our economy and to export it to emerging and developed countries," said Idy Niang, from the Senegal delegation.
But others attending were clear that the climate situation was now so serious, there should be no room at any COP for those backing fossil fuels.
"If you want to address malaria, you don't invite the mosquitoes," said Phillip Jakpor, who's from Nigeria and works with Public Participation Africa.
"As long as we have the fossil fuel lobby and machinery in full swing, we will not make progress and we have not made progress," he told BBC News.
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Rishi Sunak grilled over tax rises, spending cuts and small boat crossings - BBC News
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2022-11-15
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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On his way to the G20 in Indonesia, the PM explains his thinking on the Autumn Statement and migrant crisis.
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UK Politics
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Prime Minister Rishi Sunak took questions from the travelling press pack on the way to the G20 summit in Indonesia.
I've been the BBC's political editor for six months, but this is the first overseas trip I've done where the prime minister travelling is the same as the one on my previous trip.
In June, I travelled with Boris Johnson to the G7 Summit in Germany and the Nato summit in Spain. In September, it was Liz Truss travelling to the United Nations in New York.
And then, last week, Rishi Sunak did his first foreign visit as prime minister, to the COP27 climate summit in Egypt.
I now type these words during a brief, middle-of-the-night refuelling stop in Dubai, ahead of another 10 hours in the air to Indonesia - and yes, Mr Sunak is with us as we head to the G20 summit in Bali.
Like many of us, he's changed out of his work clothes for something more comfortable - he's a fan of hoodies - for the long haul to the southern hemisphere.
The G20 is an economic forum where the long haul of reviving the global economy, given the consequences of the war in Ukraine, will dominate.
And so the economy frames the prime minister's week: the international picture from Monday to Wednesday in Bali, and then - with a spot of jet lag, no doubt - the Autumn Statement in Westminster on Thursday.
All the political talk is about that statement, now in just a few days' time.
What many will see as a bad news budget is highly likely to provoke the kind of rows within the Conservative Party and beyond that we haven't yet seen during Mr Sunak's time in No 10 - rows about whether the prime minister and the chancellor have made the right calls.
Already some on the right, both on the Tory backbenches and among the Conservative-leaning newspapers, are arguing tax rises and spending cuts are un-Conservative and risk making a bad situation worse.
The travelling press pack got to ask Mr Sunak about this on the first leg of this schlep out to Indonesia.
It happened in what is called a huddle, where the prime minister comes to the back of the plane, we all crowd around and he takes questions from each of us for the best part of 45 minutes, on any topic we can think of.
I know what you might be thinking reading about a load of reporters flying to the other side of the world with the prime minister: is it a bit cosy?
Well, all I can say is having a couple of dozen sceptically minded reporters surrounding the prime minister and asking whatever we like, including follow-ups, for rather a while - and then dissecting every syllable afterwards - feels like close scrutiny.
So, what did he say about the tax rises and spending cuts that are coming?
He claimed it was his approach that had meant "financial conditions in the UK had stabilised".
This was specifically because, he reckoned "people expect the government to take the decisions that will put our public finances on a sustainable trajectory, and it's the government's job to deliver on that".
To advocate anything else could lead to chaos, is the thrust of his argument, one some on the left and the right would take issue with.
But what he portrays as a necessity, others see as an economic choice.
There are Conservatives who think there should be more emphasis on spending cuts and less on tax rises, as well as a much greater focus on economic growth.
And there are the opposition parties who argue so much of what Mr Sunak and Chancellor Jeremy Hunt confront is a consequence of what they see as long term Conservative mismanagement of the economy.
The other main thing worth mentioning as this trip gets under way is the issue of migrants crossing the English Channel in small boats.
The government is signing a new deal with France on Monday to try to stop people crossing in that way.
It will see the number of officers patrolling the French coast to try to stop people setting off rising from 200 to 300, with the UK paying France around £63m to fund it - an £8m increase on the current annual cost.
The prime minister sought to emphasise to us how important he sees it - and how much of his own time it has taken up.
"I've spent more time working on that than anything else, other than obviously the Autumn Statement, over the past couple of weeks," he told us.
The big question is whether what is being announced will make a noticeable difference. Home Secretary Suella Braverman has acknowledged the situation was "out of control."
The big test, then, is will these measures leave people with the impression the government is actually in control?
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-63619412
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news_uk-politics-63619412
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Mark Brown: Murder-accused strung victim along, court hears - BBC News
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2022-11-15
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Mark Brown told a court he and Leah Ware would argue over his refusal to leave his partner.
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Sussex
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Mark Brown denies murdering Leah Ware, 33, from Hastings, East Sussex, and Alexandra Morgan, 34, from Sissinghurst, Kent
A man accused of murder told a court he strung along his alleged victim by changing his mind over whether he would leave his partner to be with her.
Mark Brown, 41, from St Leonards, East Sussex, denies murdering Alexandra Morgan, 34, in November 2021 and Leah Ware, 33, in May of that year.
Mr Brown said he told Ms Ware he would not leave his long-term partner until his eldest child turned 16.
This changed when Ms Ware became pregnant, Hove Crown Court heard.
Ms Ware had a termination in February 2020, and again in November 2020.
Mr Brown was asked by the prosecution about his "rollercoaster" relationship with Ms Ware, whom he first met as a client through an escort site in 2018.
He admitted to "stringing Ms Ware along", and that this led to arguments in which Mr Brown said he "would blow up at her."
Mr Brown also said he was "hurting Leah emotionally" and that they were "fighting all the time" over Ms Ware's alleged drug use and his refusal to leave his partner, Lisa Clark.
"I only told Leah I would leave Lisa when Leah was pregnant. I never planned on leaving Lisa until my oldest child was 16 and Leah knew that," he said.
"It changed slightly when Leah was pregnant, then I told her I was going to leave."
The court was told Ms Ware lived at Little Bridge Farm, first in a static caravan and then in a converted shipping container inside a barn on the site, until the prosecution say she was killed on 7 May 2021.
Ms Ware's remains have never been found. Mr Brown maintains that he does not know where she is, but that she is still alive.
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The Supreme Court judgement is clear but not what Nicola Sturgeon wanted - BBC News
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2022-11-23
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The judges made clear Holyrood cannot legislate for an independence referendum without Westminster's agreement.
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Scotland
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Clarity was what Nicola Sturgeon asked for and clarity is what she now has from the UK Supreme Court.
The judges have made clear that the law does not allow Holyrood to legislate for an independence referendum without Westminster's agreement.
That means there will not be an indyref2 on 19 October 2023, as the Scottish government had planned.
SNP ministers will accept the judgement and respect the law. A wildcat ballot in the Catalan-style is not an option.
A legal referendum can only happen if the first minister somehow persuades the prime minister to abandon his opposition.
There's little prospect of that happening in the short term, so the renewed campaign for independence just became a longer haul.
It will immediately incorporate this court defeat into its narrative and seek to use it to build support.
At rallies across Scotland, independence supporters will protest that Scottish democracy is being denied.
Some will argue the nature of the Anglo-Scottish union has changed from one based on consent to one based on law.
Others will ask: if a Holyrood majority for indyref2 is not accepted as a mandate by Westminster then what is the democratic route to independence?
The reply from supporters of the union will be that the democracy of the 2014 referendum should be allowed to stand for at least a generation.
The big question is what will Nicola Sturgeon do next?
They will argue that tackling the cost of living crisis should be taking up all the available bandwidth in politics right now.
UK PM Rishi Sunak may want to demonstrate his commitment to devolution through an early visit to Scotland and perhaps a joint announcement with the Scottish government on freeports.
UK Labour leader Keir Starmer is likely to adopt plans for a UK-wide redistribution of power along the lines proposed by the former prime minister Gordon Brown, who is due to publish a blueprint soon.
The big question is what will Nicola Sturgeon do next?
Plan A - that Westminster would accept a Holyrood majority for indyref2 as a mandate has failed.
Plan B - that the courts might allow a referendum without Westminster consent has failed.
That leaves her stated Plan C - to take the independence argument into the next UK general election and treat it like a referendum.
Ms Sturgeon has previously said she would seek to win more than 50% of the vote in the election and if successful would claim that as a mandate for independence.
She recommitted to that plan in the aftermath of the Supreme Court ruling but left some of the details to a special SNP conference to be held in the New Year.
It would be a huge gamble.
In its best ever election result in 2015, the SNP fell just short of 50%.
That is an extremely high bar in an election where any number of other issues could be at play.
Clearing it is unlikely to get easier if Labour continue to be seen as serious challengers to the Conservatives in the battle for Number 10 and an alternative route to political change.
There is also no guarantee that record-breaking electoral success for the SNP (and its allies) would be accepted by whomever forms the next UK government as a basis for independence negotiations.
Even some on Nicola Sturgeon's side privately hope she will back off this all-or-nothing approach.
Because if this Plan C fails, it would be time for a new independence strategy and presumably new leadership of the SNP.
Nicola Sturgeon refuses to be drawn on what would happen in these circumstances, except to say: "if we can't win, we don't deserve to be independent".
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-63729280
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Shamima Begum: Stripping of UK citizenship was unlawful, lawyers say - BBC News
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2022-11-23
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Decision to remove UK citizenship from woman who went to Syria when schoolgirl is being challenged.
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UK
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The removal of Shamima Begum's UK citizenship in 2019 was unlawful, her lawyers have argued.
Ms Begum's citizenship was stripped after she travelled to Islamic State group-controlled Syria when she was 15.
In a hearing challenging the decision, her legal team said it ignored the fact that she may have been trafficked into Syria, adding she has been "banished".
The Home Office said Ms Begum was a risk to national security in 2019, and MI5 assesses she still poses a risk.
The case is being heard at the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC), which has similar standing to the High Court, and can hear national security evidence in secret if necessary.
Lawyers for Ms Begum, now 23, has argued that - based on the government's own evidence - she was trafficked into Syria for sexual exploitation in 2015.
She was a minor who had been radicalised and had travelled to Islamic State-group controlled territory without telling her family, they said.
Ms Begum ran away from home at the age of 15, with two other east London schoolgirls - Kadiza Sultana, 16, and 15-year-old Amira Abase. Once there, she married a Dutch recruit and lived under IS rule for more than three years.
She was found by the Times newspaper in a Syrian refugee camp in 2019. Ms Sultana is believed to have been killed in a Russian air strike in Syria, according to her family's solicitor, and the whereabouts of Ms Abase are unknown.
In a statement, Ms Begum's mother Asma Begum told the hearing that her world "fell apart" when her youngest daughter went to Syria, adding that she still thinks about her "every hour of every day".
Many of her belongings are still where she left them, Ms Begum's mother said, including her school blazer "still hanging on the door in the front room just as it was when she left".
Marrying Ms Begum off to an adult in Syria was part of the IS agenda, and MI5 knew this, her lawyer Samantha Knights KC told the court.
Ms Begum left IS territory in 2019. Two weeks later, her UK citizenship was stripped by the then Home Secretary Sajid Javid.
Ms Knights called this decision "hugely draconian - effectively an exile for life", while her colleague Dan Squires KC described it as "permanent banishment" from the UK.
The lawyers said the government should have considered whether she had been trafficked into IS territory before deciding to take away her citizenship.
They also argued the Home Office had not properly considered the effect taking away Ms Begum's citizenship might have on the wider Muslim community and other minorities in the UK. Mr Squires said for some people British citizenship is somehow "conditional on their good behaviour".
The legal team also suggested that Mr Javid had "made up his mind" to take away the citizenship before seeing all the official documentation.
In a written opinion produced as part of Ms Begum's case, MI6's former director of counter-terrorism said the UK government's approach to Ms Begum had been "fundamentally misguided".
Richard Barrett and Paul Jordan, head of responding to violent extremism at the European Institute of Peace, said that from a national security perspective, refusing to repatriate people in camps in Syria "is likely to be significantly more dangerous" than repatriating them and subjecting them to prosecution, rehabilitation and reintegration.
Lawyers for the Home Office will make their legal submissions on Thursday - the fourth day of the five-day hearing.
But in written submissions the Home Office said: "MI5 assessed that the best way to mitigate the threat posed to national security by Ms Begum was to deprive her of her citizenship".
They went on to say: "For completeness and for the avoidance of doubt, the security service continue to assess that Ms Begum poses a risk to national security."
The decision to take away Ms Begum's citizenship was made soon after she re-emerged from territory controlled by the Islamic State group as its collapsed. MI5 assessed that she had only fled to save her unborn son, after her two other children had died, rather than because of a move away from IS ideology.
In their written arguments, the Home Office lawyers concluded that this was "not a case about trafficking", and that Mr Javid had considered Ms Begum's age and the circumstances of her travel to Syria when making his decision.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-63734899
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news_uk-63734899
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Independence referendum: Scottish government loses indyref2 court case - BBC News
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2022-11-23
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The Supreme Court rules that an independence referendum cannot be held without UK government's consent.
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Scotland politics
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Supreme Court president Lord Reed read the verdict of the justices
The Scottish government cannot hold an independence referendum without the UK government's consent, the Supreme Court has ruled.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon wants to hold a referendum on 19 October next year.
But the court ruled unanimously that she does not have the power to do so because the issue is reserved to Westminster.
The UK government has refused to grant formal consent for a referendum.
Court president Lord Reed said the laws that created the devolved Scottish Parliament in 1999 meant it did not have power over areas of the constitution including the union between Scotland and England.
These issues are the responsibility of the UK Parliament, he said, and in absence of an agreement between the two governments the Scottish Parliament is therefore unable to legislate for a referendum.
He also rejected the Scottish government's argument that any referendum would simply be "advisory" and would have no legal effect on the union, with people only being asked to give their opinion on whether or not Scotland should become an independent country.
Lord Reed said: "A lawfully held referendum would have important political consequences relating to the union and the United Kingdom Parliament.
"Its outcome would possess the authority, in a constitution and political culture founded upon democracy, of a democratic expression of the view of the Scottish electorate.
"It is therefore clear that the proposed Bill has more than a loose or consequential connection with the reserved matters of the Union of Scotland and England, and the sovereignty of the United Kingdom Parliament."
Responding to the outcome, Ms Sturgeon said she was disappointed but respected the ruling of the court, and stressed that the judges do not make the law and only interpret it.
She added: "That is a hard pill for any supporter of independence, and surely indeed for any supporter of democracy, to swallow."
The first minister told a media conference that a referendum remained her preferred option, but in the absence of an agreement the SNP would use the next UK general election as a "de facto referendum" in an attempt to demonstrate that a majority of people in Scotland support independence.
The "precise detail" of how this would work will now be a matter for the party to debate, she said, with a special conference to be held in the new year.
Ms Sturgeon said: "We must and we will find another democratic, lawful means for Scottish people to express their will" and accused the UK government of "democracy denial".
Nicola Sturgeon addressed a rally by independence supporters outside the Scottish Parliament on Wednesday evening
A series of pro-independence rallies were held in towns and cities across Scotland on Wednesday evening, with Ms Sturgeon addressing a crowd that gathered outside the Scottish Parliament.
She told the rally that the independence movement would now become "Scotland's democracy movement".
Recent opinion polls have suggested that the country is essentially split down the middle on the independence question, but with a very narrow majority in favour of staying in the UK.
However the SNP and Greens form a pro-independence majority in the Scottish Parliament.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak welcomed the "clear and definitive ruling" from the Supreme Court.
Speaking at Prime Minister's Questions, he said: "The people of Scotland want us to be working on fixing the major challenges that we collectively face, whether that's the economy, supporting the NHS or indeed supporting Ukraine.
"Now is the time for politicians to work together and that's what this government will do."
Downing Street later said Mr Sunak will seek to avoid another referendum while he is prime minister.
His press secretary told reporters: "I think that would be something that we would look to do."
She added that there had been a "once-in-a-generation referendum not too long ago and that result should be respected".
Rallies were held in several towns and cities across Scotland
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said there was not a majority in Scotland for either a referendum or independence, but there was a "majority in Scotland and across the UK for change".
The case was referred to the Supreme Court by Lord Advocate Dorothy Bain KC, the Scottish government's top law officer.
Ms Bain said at the time that she did not have the "necessary degree of confidence" that Holyrood would have the power to pass legislation for a referendum without UK government consent.
She said the issue was of "exceptional public importance" and asked the UK's top court to provide a definitive ruling.
The court heard two days of legal arguments from both the UK and Scottish governments last month, with its ruling being delivered just six weeks later - earlier than many experts had expected.
The independence referendum in 2014, in which voters backed remaining in the UK by 55% to 45%, was possible because the UK government agreed to temporarily transfer the necessary powers to the Scottish Parliament to allow the vote to be held through what is known as a Section 30 order.
Clarity was what Nicola Sturgeon asked for and clarity is what she now has from the UK Supreme Court.
The judges have made clear that the law does not allow Holyrood to legislate for an independence referendum without Westminster's agreement.
That means there will not be an indyref2 on 19 October 2023, as the Scottish government had planned.
SNP ministers will accept the judgement and respect the law. A wildcat ballot in the Catalan-style is not an option.
A legal referendum can only happen if the first minister somehow persuades the prime minister to abandon his opposition.
There's little prospect of that happening in the short term, so the renewed campaign for independence just became a longer haul.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-63727562
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news_uk-scotland-scotland-politics-63727562
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We'll find another way to Scottish independence - Nicola Sturgeon - BBC News
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2022-11-23
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Scotland's first minister wants a second referendum despite judges saying she does not have the powers to hold one.
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Scotland
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The rally in Edinburgh is just one of many being held across Scotland.
Time for Scotland, which organised the events, said 15 events were being held across Scotland - in Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Perth, Dundee, Greenock, Inverness, Inverurie, Portree, Kirkwall, Lochgilphead, Selkirk, Dumfries, Fort William and Stirling.
Journalist Lesley Riddoch, who is a co-organiser, said: ‘We have no argument with the judges. Thanks to them, the world now sees Scotland’s predicament. We are trapped in a union with no lawful escape. And the solution – as the judges have made clear – is not a legal but political."
Crowds at Glasgow's Buchanan Street steps - scene of many rallies during the 2014 referendum Image caption: Crowds at Glasgow's Buchanan Street steps - scene of many rallies during the 2014 referendum
Linda (left) and Hazel from Glasgow. Hazel says she’s “hopeful but raging” after the Supreme Court decision Image caption: Linda (left) and Hazel from Glasgow. Hazel says she’s “hopeful but raging” after the Supreme Court decision
Around 60 people gathered in front of St Magnus cathedral in the centre of Kirkwall on Orkney, responding to the Supreme Court decision that the Scottish government cannot hold its planned independence referendum, without permission from Westminster.
SNP Convenor in Orkney, Robert Leslie, said: “The myth that this is a voluntary partnership of nations that we’re in went out of the window with that ruling.”
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Chris Mason: Brexit has shifted Labour's instinct on immigration - BBC News
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2022-11-23
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Labour is keen to be seen to be learning a lesson of the Brexit vote - a concern about immigration.
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UK Politics
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Yes, it's been in the offing for a while.
But it is worth emphasising what an about-turn Sir Keir Starmer's call to wean the UK off its "immigration dependency" amounts to.
This from a party that oversaw huge levels of immigration from central and eastern Europe almost two decades ago, which transformed many communities all over the UK.
And this from a man who campaigned to maintain freedom of movement with the European Union when he ran to be Labour leader under three years ago.
It was even one of his 10 pledges for the leadership.
Labour's instinct now is different. Very different.
Sir Keir repeatedly refused to tell me if he thought net migration was currently too high, but this is a party determined to be seen to learn one of the lessons of the Brexit referendum; a concern about the scale of immigration.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Sir Keir Starmer says he will not pick "arbitrary migration targets" over the number of workers coming to the UK from abroad
Yet this comes as some business leaders say they have run out of available workforce, which, they argue, is crushing growth and pushing up prices.
And it's not just here in the conference centre in Birmingham, on a retail park next to the airport, where you hear those concerns.
We drove half-an-hour down the road to the headquarters of the National Farmers' Union near Kenilworth in Warwickshire, where the main item on the agenda of the union's National Horticulture and Potatoes Board today was the very same issue.
Ali Capper, a hops and apples farmer on the Worcestershire-Herefordshire border, told me "there is a strong chance that it will put our business out of business".
She said: "It is very difficult to see a way forward when we have no clear idea how we are going to recruit next year.
"And when the cost, the inflation that is built into that workforce every year, is going up in double digits."
Farmer Ali Capper fears the lack of labour could put her company out of business
And she doesn't think politicians from either the Conservatives or Labour are listening.
Other farmers also told me there is an obvious cost to their businesses. But a moral cost too.
At a time of spiralling food prices, and some families struggling to feed themselves, food is left to rot because there aren't the workers to pick it.
Some argue too many British people aren't willing to do what can be backbreaking work.
But with unemployment at historically low levels, for now at least, the farmers argue that isn't the crux of the issue.
The crux is numbers. There simply aren't enough workers.
But, six years on, the Brexit referendum is still a major contributor to the political weather and that isn't likely to fundamentally change before the general election.
Labour have to convince the millions of voters who rejected them in 2019 that they understand the contributory factors that led to that rejection.
Sir Keir wants to frame an argument for a post-Brexit world, where "low pay and cheap labour" - as he put it - are not part of the "British way on growth".
He reckons that is an approach that "borders on a disaster" in the long run, and the solution is investing in people, to boost skills and productivity.
He wants to make the immigration system more responsive to short-term need, but not a crutch.
But speak to people here at the CBI privately, and they fear neither the Conservatives nor Labour get it.
They say the Conservatives don't have a growth strategy and Labour's could prove prohibitively expensive.
There is, though, another thing worth mentioning here.
Beyond his message on immigration, Sir Keir is determined to continue his charm offensive with businesses.
He boasts of meeting over 100 chief executives in the last six months. He talks up the value of enterprise and profit.
Labour hasn't just changed, he claims. He reckons it's been turned "inside out". And the Labour leader was warmly received by the CBI.
The political battle for the endorsement - or at least tolerance - of corporate Britain is on and competitive.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-63722553
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news_uk-politics-63722553
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Scottish independence: Supreme Court to rule on referendum case - BBC News
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2022-11-23
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The court was asked to clarify whether the Scottish government can hold indyref2 without Westminster's consent.
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Scotland politics
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Independence supporters will hold rallies in towns and cities across Scotland on Wednesday
Supreme Court judges are to rule on whether the Scottish government has the power to hold another independence referendum.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon wants a referendum to be held on 19 October next year.
But the UK government has so far refused to give formal consent for the vote to go ahead.
The court was asked to clarify whether the Scottish Parliament can legislate for a referendum without that consent.
Its decision is due to be delivered at 09:45 on Wednesday, with the result potentially having huge implications for the future of the UK.
Pro-independence rallies will be held in several Scottish towns and cities after the ruling is announced, and Ms Sturgeon is also expected to give her response to the decision.
The first minister has previously said she wants to reach an agreement with the UK government similar to the one that was in place ahead of the referendum in 2014, when Scottish voters backed staying in the UK by 55% to 45%,
She has said this would ensure the result is seen as being legitimate and is recognised by the international community, and has accused Westminster of having no respect for democracy by opposing a referendum.
But a series of prime ministers - including Rishi Sunak - have argued that the country's focus should be on dealing with issues such as the cost of living crisis and the war in Ukraine rather than independence, and that the result of the 2014 referendum should be respected.
There have also been suggestions that the pro-UK side could boycott a referendum even if the court rules in favour of the Scottish government.
This ruling could have a huge bearing on the debate about Scottish independence and on whether there is to be a referendum next October.
But it is also not going to put the issue to bed on its own. Regardless of the outcome, an almighty political row is going to follow the case.
A Scottish government win would pave the way for a referendum which in their own words would be "advisory" and "consultative".
There would still need to be negotiations with Westminster to actually deliver independence, and Nicola Sturgeon would still want both sides to sign up to a full-throated campaign to make sure the result is internationally recognised.
If the UK government wins, Ms Sturgeon is not going to simply give up on independence. She has been clear that she would paint such an outcome as another roadblock in the path of Scottish democracy, and would hope that the perceived unfairness of being denied a say would prompt a wave of public support.
There would also be significant questions for UK ministers about how exactly the constitutional question is ever going to be resolved, given it continues to dominate Scottish politics.
Judges can rule on what the law tells us, but in the end only politicians can settle this issue once and for all.
The case was referred to the Supreme Court by Lord Advocate Dorothy Bain KC, the Scottish government's top law officer.
Ms Bain said she did not have the "necessary degree of confidence" that Holyrood would have the power to pass legislation for a referendum without UK government consent.
She said the issue was of "exceptional public importance" and asked the UK's top court to provide a definitive ruling.
The court heard two days of legal arguments from both the UK and Scottish governments last month, with its ruling being delivered just six weeks later - earlier than many experts had expected.
Issues relating to the constitution, including the union between Scotland and England, are reserved to the UK Parliament in London under the rules that created the devolved Scottish Parliament in 1999.
The Supreme Court heard two days of legal arguments from the UK and Scottish governments last month
The UK government told the court it was therefore clear that "legislating for a referendum on independence would be outside the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament".
It lawyers also urged the court to refuse to rule on the case, arguing that the question is purely hypothetical at this stage because Holyrood had not yet passed a referendum bill.
But Ms Bain said any referendum would be "advisory" and would have no legal effect on the union, with people simply being asked to give their opinion on whether or not Scotland should become an independent country.
Recent opinion polls have suggested that Scotland is essentially split down the middle on the independence question, but with a very narrow majority in favour of staying in the UK.
Ms Sturgeon has said she will use the next general election as a "de facto referendum" if the court ruling goes against her, with the SNP fighting the election on the single issue of independence.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-63716412
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news_uk-scotland-scotland-politics-63716412
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Scottish government back in court over definition of 'woman' - BBC News
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2022-11-09
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The Court of Session is hearing a fresh case about the Scottish government's definition of 'woman'.
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Scotland politics
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The case is being heard at the Court of Session in Edinburgh
A campaign group has taken the Scottish government back to court over its definition of "woman" in legislation promoting gender balance on boards.
A judge ruled in February that ministers should not have "conflated" women and trans people in the bill, as they have separate protections in law.
But the For Women Scotland group is not happy with how the government revised the bill following the ruling.
Lady Haldane will preside over two days of arguments at the Court of Session.
The Scottish government wants the case dismissed, arguing that its legislation is now in line with the terms of the 2004 Gender Recognition Act.
The case centres on the Gender Representation on Public Boards Act, which was passed by MSPs in 2018.
The legislation, which aims to ensure gender balance on public boards, originally stated that it included people who were living as a woman and who either had gone through or intended to go through the gender recognition process.
For Women Scotland contended that ministers had broken with the separate definitions of women and trans women laid out in the 2010 Equality Act - and had thus acted beyond their powers.
The group lost an initial judicial review in 2021, but were successful on appeal.
Lady Dorrian ruled that by incorporating trans people who were living as women into the definition of woman, the bill "conflates and confuses two separate and distinct protected characteristics".
Because the bill singled out trans people living as women, the judge said it sought to apply to "only some of those with the protected characteristic of gender reassignment".
Her judgement also stressed that the case was about "interpreting the law in relation to the legislative competence of the Scottish parliament", and not transgender rights - "a separate policy issue entirely".
Campaigners have held rallies outside the Scottish Parliament
The Scottish government responded by revising the guidance that accompanies the legislation, to stress that it covers women as defined by the Equality Act - but also trans people as defined by the 2004 Gender Recognition Act (GRA).
The guidance quotes directly from the 2004 Act, and reads: "Where a full gender recognition certificate has been issued to a person that their acquired gender is female, the person's sex is that of a woman. And where a full gender recognition certificate has been issued to a person that their acquired gender is male, the person's sex becomes that of a man."
The government's written argument for the case says the GRA is "unambiguous" that a certificate provides for a change of sex, and that "there is nothing in the 2010 Act which takes away from the fundamental proposition" of the 2004 Act.
For Women Scotland argue that the guidance still does not comply with the court's ruling, and that by making reference to sex the government was "still confusing the protected characteristics and are trying to redefine 'woman' yet again".
The group's lawyer Aidan O'Neill KC argued that obtaining a gender recognition certificate should not "result in a change of sex for the purposes of the Equality Act".
He said if it did, it would "run a coach and horses through the preservation of safe spaces for women and single-sex provision for women under the Equality Act".
The proceedings are taking place at the same time as MSPs are considering separate legislation which would make it easier for trans people to obtain a gender recognition certificate.
Social Justice Secretary Shona Robison told MSPs there would be "no change to the protections under the Equality Act", adding: "Helping one group to better access their rights does not mean diluting or diminishing the rights of another group."
Asked about the judicial review, the minister said she was "not going to comment on a live court case".
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-63568047
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news_uk-scotland-scotland-politics-63568047
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Should public sector workers get bigger pay rises? - BBC News
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2022-11-09
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The government risks economic dynamite as some state workers lobby for double-digit wage rises.
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Business
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The reports of the public sector pay review bodies are arriving across Whitehall right now, with the potential to become both economic and political dynamite.
They cover eight areas and just under half the public sector workforce but it may be the case that the evidence submitted, mainly at the turn of the year, is already out of date.
Inflation is on a march. But as Treasury Minister Simon Clarke told me last week, and reiterated yesterday, there is no automatic link in the Treasury's view between the rate of inflation and wage settlements.
In private, senior Cabinet ministers go further, saying that matching wages to inflation would be dangerous and damaging - even suggesting such a thing is irresponsible.
They point to two factors around a significant real terms pay cuts for NHS workers, teachers, police officers and council workers.
The bulk of the 9% current rate of inflation, as measured by the Consumer Price Index, is driven by energy price rises.
The Government has already announced support for energy bills for millions of households, especially those on lower incomes. It also points to early indications of private sector wage growth at around 4-5%, as a more relevant metric.
There are two counter arguments here Firstly, those payments, which cover almost all the cost for several million households, are currently a one-off. Second, public sector pay has fallen overall since 2010 already, and there are some recruitment challenges already affecting some provision of services.
Furthermore, state pensions and some benefits are pegged to the prevailing rate of inflation, and that potentially huge increase will be delivered next year, under current plans. Other bills are also linked to inflation, such as mobile phone and broadband payments.
Unions have asked for pay rises reflecting the current huge spike in inflation. Unison, for example, has asked for rises to match the higher Retail Price Index measure of inflation at 11%. Nurses have asked for 15%.
Our Cost of Living survey last week suggested eight in 10 Britons thought that wages should go up with the cost of living.
Fewer though - just over a third of workers - said they would push their employer for such a rise. Unions also face some difficulties in reaching new thresholds required in ballots for legal strike action on a national basis. Though the RMT did manage to clear such hurdles to go ahead with the rail strike.
Then there is the more general argument about a 1970s-style wage-price spiral emerging. Certainly the last time inflation reached double digits in the 1970s when inflation topped over 20%, and in some years wage inflation was 30%.
Prices went up in anticipation that wages would, which in turn increased because of expectations of price rises, and so on and so forth. This was the classic wage-price spiral that saw the period of very high inflation last years rather than months.
There is some evidence that this is happening in the US. But not much so far in the UK, where prices certainly have spiked and wages haven't - though that could change. There are structural reasons for this.
Union membership has fallen from 13 million at the 1970s peak to six million now. While the Government privately accepts that the numbers affected are small in relation to the whole economy, there is a "signalling effect", they argue, from high profile public disputes.
We are obviously a world away from Downing Street slapping down the Bank of England Governor after my interview in February, where Andrew Bailey warned workers not to ask for excessive pay rises. And significant in-year real wage cuts may leave some voters who were promised a "high wage" economy a little short-changed.
But the Treasury insists there is no "central pay" policy. The result of the Pay Review Body process is for relevant departments to make decisions, based on recruitment and retainment and existing policies on, for example, starting salaries for teachers.
The important fact here though is that the Treasury is not intending to increase the cash budgets for departments. If they want to find funds to increase wages against Spending Review plans, they will have to find it in efficiency savings or cuts in their own departments.
It is time for Cabinet ministers who like to talk about a smaller state and tax cuts to show how they intend to contribute, say some of their colleagues.
All of which leaves unions claiming their members are ready to move towards industrial action across a range of public services. At a time of labour shortages, some union leaders believe they will never have more leverage to force their wages higher, and that there will be post-pandemic public sympathy for their asks not to see a cut to living standards.
The Government will argue this way lies the inflationary dangers of the past.
But for many of the workers concerned, it is not just that their memories have faded - they were not even born the last time inflation hit double digits. So for many, we are in uncharted territory.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-61874732
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news_business-61874732
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Theranos exec Sunny Balwani convicted of fraud - BBC News
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2022-11-19
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He and fraudster Elizabeth Holmes ran the Silicon Valley company as a couple before its implosion.
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US & Canada
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Balwani's company was once worth $9bn (£7.5bn), but was based on blood testing technology that did not work
Silicon Valley executive Ramesh "Sunny" Balwani has been found guilty of deceiving investors as part of a plot with ex-girlfriend Elizabeth Holmes.
He falsely and repeatedly claimed that their company, Theranos, had a device that could detect hundreds of diseases with a few drops of blood.
Holmes was found guilty at a separate trial in January where she accused Balwani of abuse - which he denies.
Both Holmes, 38, and Balwani, 57, will be sentenced by a judge in the autumn.
Holmes is facing around 20 years in prison and is currently free on bail. Balwani also faces up to 20 years in prison as well as millions of dollars in restitution payments to his victims.
Theranos was once worth $9bn (£7.5bn), but was based on blood testing technology that did not work.
The verdict was read on the fifth day of jury deliberations at a courthouse in San Jose, California, in the heart of Silicon Valley. Balwani was found guilty of all 12 charges against him.
During closing arguments on 21 June, prosecutors showed text messages sent by Balwani to Holmes.
"I am responsible for everything at Theranos," he wrote in 2015. "All have been my decisions too."
Assistant US Attorney Jeffrey Schenk called the message an admission of guilt. "He's acknowledging his role in the fraud," he said.
Holmes was the company's founder and leader. But Balwani ran the everyday operations of the company.
He had no medical training to speak of, and some thought that might be enough to convince a jury that he simply did not understand that Theranos' technology didn't work.
His lawyers also argued that he invested his own money in the company - why do that if he thought the technology was dud?
But this set of verdicts makes him just as culpable, in some respects more culpable, for the Theronos scandal than Holmes.
Holmes was convicted of four charges of fraud, Balwani of 12 counts. He was also convicted of defrauding patients, something Holmes avoided.
It means that Balwani will now go down in history as front and centre in the Theranos saga.
Here in Silicon Valley, execs at start-ups and tech companies will be looking on.
They'll note that an executive was convicted of wider charges of fraud than the founder and chief executive.
It sets an important legal warning to managers - it's not always the boss that shoulders the greatest burden of responsibility.
The verdict also partly vindicates Elizabeth Holmes' legal team, who placed her on the witness stand to be cross-examined. A risky move that may have paid off.
Theranos was once the darling of biotech and Silicon Valley.
Holmes was able to raise more than $900m from investors, including billionaires like media magnate Rupert Murdoch and tech mogul Larry Ellison.
The firm promised it would revolutionise the healthcare industry with a test that could detect conditions such as cancer and diabetes with only a few drops of blood.
But these claims began to unravel in 2015 after a Wall Street Journal investigation reported that its core blood-testing technology did not work.
The three-month case against Balwani bore large similarities to the government's prosecutions of Holmes.
Lawyers for Balwani argued that he was also duped by Holmes, after he joined the company and became chief financial officer in 2010.
Before breaking up as the company fell apart in 2016, the couple went to great lengths to ensure that investors and employees were unaware of their romantic relationship.
His lawyers pointed out that after investing $15m of his own money into Theranos, he never cashed out his stock options despite his investment rising to some $500m.
Unlike Holmes, Balwani did not take the stand to testify in his defence.
Holmes reportedly first met Balwani during a college trip to Beijing when she was 18.
He was a 37-year-old South Asian immigrant who had made millions selling his software company before the dot-com bubble burst. Around the same time he met Holmes, he divorced his wife, a Japanese artist. Their relationship became a romantic one around the time that Holmes was starting Theranos.
While Holmes was the face of the company, he was the businessman serving as the president and chief operating officer.
"Ms Holmes and Mr Balwani were partners in virtually everything," prosecutor Robert Leach said earlier in the trial.
"The defendant and Holmes knew the rosy falsehoods that they were telling investors were contrary to the reality within Theranos."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-61902378
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news_world-us-canada-61902378
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Autumn Statement: Cuts, Brexit and the political battles to come - BBC News
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2022-11-19
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Jeremy Hunt draws economic dividing lines with Labour but there is plenty they agree on too.
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UK Politics
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The crucial judgement on the Autumn Statement will be does what we heard from Chancellor Jeremy Hunt on Thursday amount to making a bad situation a little less bad or does it make it worse?
Here's the problem for the government: even if a set of ideas makes a grim situation a little less grim, it is still a grim situation. And it's likely ministers will get the blame for that.
The coming political argument will be all about who is judged to be the competent and trustworthy stewards of very, very difficult times.
Here are a few things that stood out for me from the various interviews on Friday morning:
Labour accept the size of the financial "black hole" set out by the Office for Budget Responsibility.
So the terms of trade between the Conservatives and Labour on this match up.
But then there are the policy choice differences between them, and the other parties.
Take one example: Labour would go after so-called non doms, Mr Hunt told BBC Radio 4's Today programme he has chosen not to.
Then there is income tax.
The government chose to make the best paid pay more.
And they chose that, over time, more people should pay income tax and pay more of it.
That is the consequence of freezing the levels, the thresholds, at which you start paying it or pay more, as earnings increase over time.
Labour, meanwhile, are determined to say, for now at least, as little about income tax as possible.
Have a watch here of a little clip from the latest BBC Newscast, where I tried, and failed, to get the Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves to set out her instincts on income tax.
You have to wonder how long that position of saying nothing on income tax will hold.
Neither the Conservatives nor Labour want to fundamentally alter the UK's relationship with the EU.
Jeremy Hunt said on Today that "unfettered trade" was "very beneficial" to growth but rejoining the EU single market would not be "the right way to boost growth" because voters had demanded Brexit in order to get rid of freedom of movement, unlimited migration from and to the EU.
In other words, he appeared to tacitly acknowledge rejoining the single market would help with growth, but it was politically unpalatable.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Watch: Fairer tax choices could have been made - Labour's Rachel Reeves
And Labour agree - they don't want to reopen the argument about the single market or the customs union, the two big economic structures of the EU.
Instead, Rachel Reeves said there were other elements of the Brexit deal "we can fix" as she sees it - pointing to a veterinary agreement with Brussels and the mutual recognition of professional qualifications, for example.
And finally, a word about cuts. When is a cut a cut, and when isn't it a cut?
The following thoughts come courtesy of Peter Barnes, the BBC's senior political analyst.
The Autumn Statement set out a plan for the government to generate £55bn from a combination of tax rises and spending less than they had planned to.
So, by the year 2027-28 the overall effect of the policy decisions announced, excluding energy, is expected to be a net gain to the Treasury of £55bn.
That's made up of £30bn from spending policy decisions and £25bn from tax policy decisions.
The £30bn squeeze in public spending is a cut compared to what had previously been planned. It is not a cut compared to current levels of spending.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Watch: Chancellor defends the impact of his Autumn Statement on "squeezed middle"
As the chancellor said: "Overall spending in public services will continue to rise, in real terms, for the next five years".
But it will rise less quickly than planned from 2025-26, so the Treasury is saving money compared to what was expected.
It's also true that the very limited growth in overall public spending above inflation will almost certainly mean actual cuts for many departments.
Defence and overseas development spending are protected, and it seems inevitable that health will continue to eat up a disproportionate share of the extra money.
So that means real term cuts compared to current levels of spending elsewhere.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-63676931
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Ukraine war: Russia's uncertain future a product of its past - BBC News
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2022-11-06
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Russia's invasion of Ukraine is making its future uncertain - but so too is its authoritarian past.
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Europe
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In his St Petersburg apartment, university lecturer Denis Skopin shows me the document which has changed his life.
Until recently Denis was associate professor at the Faculty of Liberal Arts and Sciences of St Petersburg State University. But on 20 October the university sacked him for "an immoral act incompatible with educational functions".
What was this so-called immoral act? Participation in an "unsanctioned" rally.
On 21 September Denis joined a street protest against the Kremlin's decision to draft Russians to fight in Ukraine. Earlier in the day, President Vladimir Putin had declared "partial mobilisation" across the country. During the demonstration Denis was arrested and spent 10 days in jail.
"Freedom of expression in Russia is in crisis," Denis tells me. "All kinds of freedoms are in deep crisis."
"After I was released from detention, I worked for three more weeks. The university sent me letters asking me to explain my absence. I replied that I'd been arrested for participation in a protest and put in detention. Then the Human Resources department called me and told me that I'd been sacked."
On his final day at work, Denis's students gathered outside the university to say goodbye.
In an impromptu speech (the video was posted online) he told them:
"What is an immoral act? Acting against your conscience and passively obeying someone else's orders. I acted according to my conscience. I am sure that the future of our country belongs to you."
The students broke into applause for their sacked teacher.
"I love my students very much," Denis tells me. "They are very smart and they understand very well what is happening now in Russia. Their [show of] approval was not for me personally. Rather, it was disapproval of what is happening now in Russia.
"Many people in Russia don't dare to protest because they risk being punished for it. But many would like to. And, for these people, providing approval to those who do protest is a way of disagreeing with what is happening in Russia."
Denis says a quarter of his colleagues have left Russia since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine
Denis Skopin's story highlights not just the pressure which opponents of the Kremlin's "special military operation" are coming under here. It also raises questions about Russia's future.
"Locked up with me in the detention centre there were IT specialists, scientists, doctors, teachers and students. Many of them are now abroad. Like my cell-mate, a young talented mathematician.
"About 25% of my immediate colleagues have already left Russia. They left after 24 February. Some of them left immediately, some left after mobilisation was declared. I think Russia is losing the best people now. The most educated, the most energetic, the most critically thinking people are leaving the country. In short, Russia is going in the wrong direction."
An uncertain future is not solely the consequence of the present. It is also the product of Russia's past.
Across town a small group of St Petersburg residents is standing beside a monument to the victims of Joseph Stalin's Great Terror of the 1930s.
The monument is made out of a large rock from the remote Solovetsky Islands, home to one of the most notorious forced labour camps of the Gulag. Solovki camp was set up to imprison political prisoners alongside other convicts.
People are queuing up at a microphone. They are taking it in turns to read out names of individuals who were arrested, condemned and executed in and around St Petersburg.
At a monument in St Petersburg, people read the names of victims of Stalin's Great Terror
It is thought that Soviet dictator Stalin had a million of his own citizens executed. Millions more lives were destroyed in his machine of terror which cranked out arrests, deportations and forced labour on a mass scale. Some of his successors, like Nikita Khrushchev and Mikhail Gorbachev, did denounce Stalin's crimes.
And yet, in Vladimir Putin's Russia, Stalin has enjoyed something of a rehabilitation. The authorities today place less emphasis on the darker chapters of the Stalin years, while Stalin himself is often portrayed as a strongman who defeated Nazi Germany and turned the Soviet Union into a superpower. Putin's Kremlin seeks positives in the past - victories.
"Unfortunately, our country didn't turn over this page properly. Stalin's repressions were not talked about enough or fully condemned. This is why the war in Ukraine is happening today," says pensioner Ludmila, who has come to lay flowers at the Solovki Stone.
"Experience shows that remaining silent leads to bad things. We mustn't forget the bloody stains of our country's history."
Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin has undergone a kind of rehabilitation in Putin's Russia - you can even buy Stalin merchandise
Sacked university lecturer Denis Skopin has studied the Stalin years. He sees parallels between then and now.
"I just published a book in English about how people in Stalin's Russia removed from group photographs those who were declared 'enemy of the people'. Colleagues, friends or even close relatives had to remove all signs of them from photographs. They did it with scissors and with ink.
"The faculty where I taught had a partnership with Bard College, an American liberal arts college. Last year Bard College was declared an 'undesirable organisation' in Russia. So, our faculty broke the partnership and the Bard College name was removed from the stands displayed in the corridors of our faculty using exactly black ink. In the same way as in Stalin's Russia."
If, as Denis claims, his students "understand very well" what is happening in Russia and Ukraine, that raises a question: if young Russians are not convinced by the Kremlin's arguments, how will the authorities persuade the public long-term to rally round the flag and back the president?
Answer: by making sure young people "understand" events as the Kremlin does.
To help achieve that, a new patriotic lesson has been introduced into schools across Russia for all schoolchildren: "Conversations About Important Things." It is not part of the official curriculum, but it is the first lesson on a Monday morning and children are strongly encouraged to attend.
What "important things" are discussed there? Well, when President Putin played teacher in Kaliningrad in September, he told a group of children that the aim of Russia's offensive in Ukraine was to "protect Russia" and he described Ukraine as an "anti-Russian enclave." You can see which way the "Conversation" goes.
Olga Milovidova says the "forced education" reminds her of the Soviet era
"This is forced education. To my mind this is as dangerous as it was in Soviet times when we had 'political information' lessons," says St Petersburg teacher Olga Milovidova, who retired last month. "In those days we had to read the newspaper Pravda. And I remember we had to read books by [Soviet leader] Brezhnev as if they were masterpieces. We had to give only positives opinions. There was no critical discussion.
"Education and patriotism mustn't be put together," believes Olga, who was a deputy school director. "There are children who just believe. They open their eyes and they are ready to believe in anything. That is very dangerous."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-63471505
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news_world-europe-63471505
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Should public sector workers get bigger pay rises? - BBC News
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2022-11-06
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The government risks economic dynamite as some state workers lobby for double-digit wage rises.
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Business
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The reports of the public sector pay review bodies are arriving across Whitehall right now, with the potential to become both economic and political dynamite.
They cover eight areas and just under half the public sector workforce but it may be the case that the evidence submitted, mainly at the turn of the year, is already out of date.
Inflation is on a march. But as Treasury Minister Simon Clarke told me last week, and reiterated yesterday, there is no automatic link in the Treasury's view between the rate of inflation and wage settlements.
In private, senior Cabinet ministers go further, saying that matching wages to inflation would be dangerous and damaging - even suggesting such a thing is irresponsible.
They point to two factors around a significant real terms pay cuts for NHS workers, teachers, police officers and council workers.
The bulk of the 9% current rate of inflation, as measured by the Consumer Price Index, is driven by energy price rises.
The Government has already announced support for energy bills for millions of households, especially those on lower incomes. It also points to early indications of private sector wage growth at around 4-5%, as a more relevant metric.
There are two counter arguments here Firstly, those payments, which cover almost all the cost for several million households, are currently a one-off. Second, public sector pay has fallen overall since 2010 already, and there are some recruitment challenges already affecting some provision of services.
Furthermore, state pensions and some benefits are pegged to the prevailing rate of inflation, and that potentially huge increase will be delivered next year, under current plans. Other bills are also linked to inflation, such as mobile phone and broadband payments.
Unions have asked for pay rises reflecting the current huge spike in inflation. Unison, for example, has asked for rises to match the higher Retail Price Index measure of inflation at 11%. Nurses have asked for 15%.
Our Cost of Living survey last week suggested eight in 10 Britons thought that wages should go up with the cost of living.
Fewer though - just over a third of workers - said they would push their employer for such a rise. Unions also face some difficulties in reaching new thresholds required in ballots for legal strike action on a national basis. Though the RMT did manage to clear such hurdles to go ahead with the rail strike.
Then there is the more general argument about a 1970s-style wage-price spiral emerging. Certainly the last time inflation reached double digits in the 1970s when inflation topped over 20%, and in some years wage inflation was 30%.
Prices went up in anticipation that wages would, which in turn increased because of expectations of price rises, and so on and so forth. This was the classic wage-price spiral that saw the period of very high inflation last years rather than months.
There is some evidence that this is happening in the US. But not much so far in the UK, where prices certainly have spiked and wages haven't - though that could change. There are structural reasons for this.
Union membership has fallen from 13 million at the 1970s peak to six million now. While the Government privately accepts that the numbers affected are small in relation to the whole economy, there is a "signalling effect", they argue, from high profile public disputes.
We are obviously a world away from Downing Street slapping down the Bank of England Governor after my interview in February, where Andrew Bailey warned workers not to ask for excessive pay rises. And significant in-year real wage cuts may leave some voters who were promised a "high wage" economy a little short-changed.
But the Treasury insists there is no "central pay" policy. The result of the Pay Review Body process is for relevant departments to make decisions, based on recruitment and retainment and existing policies on, for example, starting salaries for teachers.
The important fact here though is that the Treasury is not intending to increase the cash budgets for departments. If they want to find funds to increase wages against Spending Review plans, they will have to find it in efficiency savings or cuts in their own departments.
It is time for Cabinet ministers who like to talk about a smaller state and tax cuts to show how they intend to contribute, say some of their colleagues.
All of which leaves unions claiming their members are ready to move towards industrial action across a range of public services. At a time of labour shortages, some union leaders believe they will never have more leverage to force their wages higher, and that there will be post-pandemic public sympathy for their asks not to see a cut to living standards.
The Government will argue this way lies the inflationary dangers of the past.
But for many of the workers concerned, it is not just that their memories have faded - they were not even born the last time inflation hit double digits. So for many, we are in uncharted territory.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-61874732
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news_business-61874732
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The Supreme Court judgement is clear but not what Nicola Sturgeon wanted - BBC News
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2022-11-24
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The judges made clear Holyrood cannot legislate for an independence referendum without Westminster's agreement.
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Scotland
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Clarity was what Nicola Sturgeon asked for and clarity is what she now has from the UK Supreme Court.
The judges have made clear that the law does not allow Holyrood to legislate for an independence referendum without Westminster's agreement.
That means there will not be an indyref2 on 19 October 2023, as the Scottish government had planned.
SNP ministers will accept the judgement and respect the law. A wildcat ballot in the Catalan-style is not an option.
A legal referendum can only happen if the first minister somehow persuades the prime minister to abandon his opposition.
There's little prospect of that happening in the short term, so the renewed campaign for independence just became a longer haul.
It will immediately incorporate this court defeat into its narrative and seek to use it to build support.
At rallies across Scotland, independence supporters will protest that Scottish democracy is being denied.
Some will argue the nature of the Anglo-Scottish union has changed from one based on consent to one based on law.
Others will ask: if a Holyrood majority for indyref2 is not accepted as a mandate by Westminster then what is the democratic route to independence?
The reply from supporters of the union will be that the democracy of the 2014 referendum should be allowed to stand for at least a generation.
The big question is what will Nicola Sturgeon do next?
They will argue that tackling the cost of living crisis should be taking up all the available bandwidth in politics right now.
UK PM Rishi Sunak may want to demonstrate his commitment to devolution through an early visit to Scotland and perhaps a joint announcement with the Scottish government on freeports.
UK Labour leader Keir Starmer is likely to adopt plans for a UK-wide redistribution of power along the lines proposed by the former prime minister Gordon Brown, who is due to publish a blueprint soon.
The big question is what will Nicola Sturgeon do next?
Plan A - that Westminster would accept a Holyrood majority for indyref2 as a mandate has failed.
Plan B - that the courts might allow a referendum without Westminster consent has failed.
That leaves her stated Plan C - to take the independence argument into the next UK general election and treat it like a referendum.
Ms Sturgeon has previously said she would seek to win more than 50% of the vote in the election and if successful would claim that as a mandate for independence.
She recommitted to that plan in the aftermath of the Supreme Court ruling but left some of the details to a special SNP conference to be held in the New Year.
It would be a huge gamble.
In its best ever election result in 2015, the SNP fell just short of 50%.
That is an extremely high bar in an election where any number of other issues could be at play.
Clearing it is unlikely to get easier if Labour continue to be seen as serious challengers to the Conservatives in the battle for Number 10 and an alternative route to political change.
There is also no guarantee that record-breaking electoral success for the SNP (and its allies) would be accepted by whomever forms the next UK government as a basis for independence negotiations.
Even some on Nicola Sturgeon's side privately hope she will back off this all-or-nothing approach.
Because if this Plan C fails, it would be time for a new independence strategy and presumably new leadership of the SNP.
Nicola Sturgeon refuses to be drawn on what would happen in these circumstances, except to say: "if we can't win, we don't deserve to be independent".
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-63729280
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Shamima Begum: Stripping of UK citizenship was unlawful, lawyers say - BBC News
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2022-11-24
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Decision to remove UK citizenship from woman who went to Syria when schoolgirl is being challenged.
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UK
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The removal of Shamima Begum's UK citizenship in 2019 was unlawful, her lawyers have argued.
Ms Begum's citizenship was stripped after she travelled to Islamic State group-controlled Syria when she was 15.
In a hearing challenging the decision, her legal team said it ignored the fact that she may have been trafficked into Syria, adding she has been "banished".
The Home Office said Ms Begum was a risk to national security in 2019, and MI5 assesses she still poses a risk.
The case is being heard at the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC), which has similar standing to the High Court, and can hear national security evidence in secret if necessary.
Lawyers for Ms Begum, now 23, has argued that - based on the government's own evidence - she was trafficked into Syria for sexual exploitation in 2015.
She was a minor who had been radicalised and had travelled to Islamic State-group controlled territory without telling her family, they said.
Ms Begum ran away from home at the age of 15, with two other east London schoolgirls - Kadiza Sultana, 16, and 15-year-old Amira Abase. Once there, she married a Dutch recruit and lived under IS rule for more than three years.
She was found by the Times newspaper in a Syrian refugee camp in 2019. Ms Sultana is believed to have been killed in a Russian air strike in Syria, according to her family's solicitor, and the whereabouts of Ms Abase are unknown.
In a statement, Ms Begum's mother Asma Begum told the hearing that her world "fell apart" when her youngest daughter went to Syria, adding that she still thinks about her "every hour of every day".
Many of her belongings are still where she left them, Ms Begum's mother said, including her school blazer "still hanging on the door in the front room just as it was when she left".
Marrying Ms Begum off to an adult in Syria was part of the IS agenda, and MI5 knew this, her lawyer Samantha Knights KC told the court.
Ms Begum left IS territory in 2019. Two weeks later, her UK citizenship was stripped by the then Home Secretary Sajid Javid.
Ms Knights called this decision "hugely draconian - effectively an exile for life", while her colleague Dan Squires KC described it as "permanent banishment" from the UK.
The lawyers said the government should have considered whether she had been trafficked into IS territory before deciding to take away her citizenship.
They also argued the Home Office had not properly considered the effect taking away Ms Begum's citizenship might have on the wider Muslim community and other minorities in the UK. Mr Squires said for some people British citizenship is somehow "conditional on their good behaviour".
The legal team also suggested that Mr Javid had "made up his mind" to take away the citizenship before seeing all the official documentation.
In a written opinion produced as part of Ms Begum's case, MI6's former director of counter-terrorism said the UK government's approach to Ms Begum had been "fundamentally misguided".
Richard Barrett and Paul Jordan, head of responding to violent extremism at the European Institute of Peace, said that from a national security perspective, refusing to repatriate people in camps in Syria "is likely to be significantly more dangerous" than repatriating them and subjecting them to prosecution, rehabilitation and reintegration.
Lawyers for the Home Office will make their legal submissions on Thursday - the fourth day of the five-day hearing.
But in written submissions the Home Office said: "MI5 assessed that the best way to mitigate the threat posed to national security by Ms Begum was to deprive her of her citizenship".
They went on to say: "For completeness and for the avoidance of doubt, the security service continue to assess that Ms Begum poses a risk to national security."
The decision to take away Ms Begum's citizenship was made soon after she re-emerged from territory controlled by the Islamic State group as its collapsed. MI5 assessed that she had only fled to save her unborn son, after her two other children had died, rather than because of a move away from IS ideology.
In their written arguments, the Home Office lawyers concluded that this was "not a case about trafficking", and that Mr Javid had considered Ms Begum's age and the circumstances of her travel to Syria when making his decision.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-63734899
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news_uk-63734899
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Independence referendum: Scottish government loses indyref2 court case - BBC News
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2022-11-24
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The Supreme Court rules that an independence referendum cannot be held without UK government's consent.
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Scotland politics
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Supreme Court president Lord Reed read the verdict of the justices
The Scottish government cannot hold an independence referendum without the UK government's consent, the Supreme Court has ruled.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon wants to hold a referendum on 19 October next year.
But the court ruled unanimously that she does not have the power to do so because the issue is reserved to Westminster.
The UK government has refused to grant formal consent for a referendum.
Court president Lord Reed said the laws that created the devolved Scottish Parliament in 1999 meant it did not have power over areas of the constitution including the union between Scotland and England.
These issues are the responsibility of the UK Parliament, he said, and in absence of an agreement between the two governments the Scottish Parliament is therefore unable to legislate for a referendum.
He also rejected the Scottish government's argument that any referendum would simply be "advisory" and would have no legal effect on the union, with people only being asked to give their opinion on whether or not Scotland should become an independent country.
Lord Reed said: "A lawfully held referendum would have important political consequences relating to the union and the United Kingdom Parliament.
"Its outcome would possess the authority, in a constitution and political culture founded upon democracy, of a democratic expression of the view of the Scottish electorate.
"It is therefore clear that the proposed Bill has more than a loose or consequential connection with the reserved matters of the Union of Scotland and England, and the sovereignty of the United Kingdom Parliament."
Responding to the outcome, Ms Sturgeon said she was disappointed but respected the ruling of the court, and stressed that the judges do not make the law and only interpret it.
She added: "That is a hard pill for any supporter of independence, and surely indeed for any supporter of democracy, to swallow."
The first minister told a media conference that a referendum remained her preferred option, but in the absence of an agreement the SNP would use the next UK general election as a "de facto referendum" in an attempt to demonstrate that a majority of people in Scotland support independence.
The "precise detail" of how this would work will now be a matter for the party to debate, she said, with a special conference to be held in the new year.
Ms Sturgeon said: "We must and we will find another democratic, lawful means for Scottish people to express their will" and accused the UK government of "democracy denial".
Nicola Sturgeon addressed a rally by independence supporters outside the Scottish Parliament on Wednesday evening
A series of pro-independence rallies were held in towns and cities across Scotland on Wednesday evening, with Ms Sturgeon addressing a crowd that gathered outside the Scottish Parliament.
She told the rally that the independence movement would now become "Scotland's democracy movement".
Recent opinion polls have suggested that the country is essentially split down the middle on the independence question, but with a very narrow majority in favour of staying in the UK.
However the SNP and Greens form a pro-independence majority in the Scottish Parliament.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak welcomed the "clear and definitive ruling" from the Supreme Court.
Speaking at Prime Minister's Questions, he said: "The people of Scotland want us to be working on fixing the major challenges that we collectively face, whether that's the economy, supporting the NHS or indeed supporting Ukraine.
"Now is the time for politicians to work together and that's what this government will do."
Downing Street later said Mr Sunak will seek to avoid another referendum while he is prime minister.
His press secretary told reporters: "I think that would be something that we would look to do."
She added that there had been a "once-in-a-generation referendum not too long ago and that result should be respected".
Rallies were held in several towns and cities across Scotland
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said there was not a majority in Scotland for either a referendum or independence, but there was a "majority in Scotland and across the UK for change".
The case was referred to the Supreme Court by Lord Advocate Dorothy Bain KC, the Scottish government's top law officer.
Ms Bain said at the time that she did not have the "necessary degree of confidence" that Holyrood would have the power to pass legislation for a referendum without UK government consent.
She said the issue was of "exceptional public importance" and asked the UK's top court to provide a definitive ruling.
The court heard two days of legal arguments from both the UK and Scottish governments last month, with its ruling being delivered just six weeks later - earlier than many experts had expected.
The independence referendum in 2014, in which voters backed remaining in the UK by 55% to 45%, was possible because the UK government agreed to temporarily transfer the necessary powers to the Scottish Parliament to allow the vote to be held through what is known as a Section 30 order.
Clarity was what Nicola Sturgeon asked for and clarity is what she now has from the UK Supreme Court.
The judges have made clear that the law does not allow Holyrood to legislate for an independence referendum without Westminster's agreement.
That means there will not be an indyref2 on 19 October 2023, as the Scottish government had planned.
SNP ministers will accept the judgement and respect the law. A wildcat ballot in the Catalan-style is not an option.
A legal referendum can only happen if the first minister somehow persuades the prime minister to abandon his opposition.
There's little prospect of that happening in the short term, so the renewed campaign for independence just became a longer haul.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-63727562
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news_uk-scotland-scotland-politics-63727562
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We'll find another way to Scottish independence - Nicola Sturgeon - BBC News
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2022-11-24
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Scotland's first minister wants a second referendum despite judges saying she does not have the powers to hold one.
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Scotland
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The rally in Edinburgh is just one of many being held across Scotland.
Time for Scotland, which organised the events, said 15 events were being held across Scotland - in Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Perth, Dundee, Greenock, Inverness, Inverurie, Portree, Kirkwall, Lochgilphead, Selkirk, Dumfries, Fort William and Stirling.
Journalist Lesley Riddoch, who is a co-organiser, said: ‘We have no argument with the judges. Thanks to them, the world now sees Scotland’s predicament. We are trapped in a union with no lawful escape. And the solution – as the judges have made clear – is not a legal but political."
Crowds at Glasgow's Buchanan Street steps - scene of many rallies during the 2014 referendum Image caption: Crowds at Glasgow's Buchanan Street steps - scene of many rallies during the 2014 referendum
Linda (left) and Hazel from Glasgow. Hazel says she’s “hopeful but raging” after the Supreme Court decision Image caption: Linda (left) and Hazel from Glasgow. Hazel says she’s “hopeful but raging” after the Supreme Court decision
Around 60 people gathered in front of St Magnus cathedral in the centre of Kirkwall on Orkney, responding to the Supreme Court decision that the Scottish government cannot hold its planned independence referendum, without permission from Westminster.
SNP Convenor in Orkney, Robert Leslie, said: “The myth that this is a voluntary partnership of nations that we’re in went out of the window with that ruling.”
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-scotland-63701835
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news_live_uk-scotland-63701835
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Logan Mwangi: Inquiry calls to prevent other tragedies - BBC News
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2022-11-24
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Liberal Democrats say lessons must be learned from the murder with a review of child protection.
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Wales
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Logan Mwangi was murdered by his mother, stepfather and a teenage boy in July 2021
An inquiry into Wales children's services has been called for to prevent tragedies like Logan Mwangi's murder.
On Thursday his mother, stepfather and a teenager were given life sentences for five-year-old Logan's murder.
Welsh Liberal Democrat leader Jane Dodds said lessons must be learned "so that it never happens again".
The Welsh government said it would "closely consider" the results of a children's services inspection and a review of events before Logan's death.
Logan's body was found in the River Ogmore, near his home in Sarn, Bridgend county, in 2021 after he suffered 56 "catastrophic" injuries in a "brutal and sustained attack".
His stepfather John Cole, 40, will be in prison for at least 29 years for the murder, while Logan's mother Angharad Williamson, 31, will serve a minimum of 28 years.
Craig Mulligan, 14, who was brought up by Cole, can now be named after a judge lifted an anonymity order. He will serve a minimum of 15 years.
One visitor to the site near where Logan's body was found thought his killers should have received harsher sentences.
Teresa Mason said: "They should have had a lot longer for the trauma they put that boy through."
She believed his killers' crimes should be punishable by death, and said Logan's life was one nightmare after another.
Sonia Newby and Teresa Mason were horrified by the murder
"Never have we seen anything like this here, it's so devastating, a lot of people around here are afraid to leave their kids out," she said.
"It breaks my heart to know someone can hurt a child like that," she said.
Deputy director of the Children's Social Care Research and Development Centre at Cardiff University, Prof Jonathan Scourfield, told BBC Radio Wales Breakfast it was important to bear in mind that cases like this, where a child appears to have been scapegoated, were very rare.
"The vast majority of people who have social workers are not actively cruel like in Logan's case, but are struggling a lot, therefore it's not a good basis to construct any look at the wider system based on some very, very rare cases, most people need more support.
"We need to wait to hear what the child practice review says before we rush to judgement, we do need to take a look at what is happening in the sector, there are undoubtedly some big problems with staff recruitment and retention and case loads and these have an effect on social workers' ability to form relationships with families, which ultimately are what's needed to protect children."
He said he was on the fence about whether an independent review was needed and could see the arguments for it, but said if one was to take place, it would delay any changes for a couple of years while it took place.
First Minister Mark Drakeford has previously rejected calls for an independent review.
A Welsh government spokesman said: "This is a tragic case and our thoughts remain with everyone affected by Logan's death, particularly his family.
"We await the findings of the recent inspection of Bridgend County Borough Council Children's services, conducted by Care Inspectorate Wales. As well as the completion of the child practice review to look at the events prior to Logan's death.
"All findings and recommendations will be closely considered by the Welsh government."
Angharad Williamson, 31, Craig Mulligan, 14, and John Cole, 40, have been sentenced for Logan's murder
Following the sentencing Ms Dodds, who worked for more than 25 years as a child protection social worker, urged the Welsh government to launch a review of child protection.
"Social workers, their managers, family support workers and colleagues in the health and education systems are working hard to protect children," she said.
"But, more is needed to help social workers to do their job and a chief social worker for children is needed, as they have in England.
"Both Scotland and England are carrying out independent inquiries into the state of children's social services in their jurisdiction. There is no reason for Wales not to do the same."
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. How Logan Mwangi's killers tried to fool police
In May Mr Drakeford rejected calls for an independent inquiry, saying he thought it was never "right to rush into something very general from what is a very specific set of circumstances".
However, he acknowledged then that social work was "under enormous pressure".
He said this was "partly because during the pandemic, social workers were not able to visit and meet children in the way that they normally would have".
"Now they are having to make up for a backlog of work that they weren't able to discharge in the normal way.
"I don't think we need an inquiry to tell us that," he added, saying figures and inspections had showed this already."
Speaking after the sentence, Huw Irranca-Davies, the Member of the Senedd (MS) for Ogmore, said lessons needed to be learned from the child practice review.
He said that would be done "properly and rigorously, and we want to see the outcome of that, because, for goodness sake, if something was missed, we need to know and we need to learn the lessons - but that is why we need a really thorough investigation now".
Previously, Prof Donald Forrester of Cardiff University has said there are "profound problems" with children's social work in Wales, and that it is now in "crisis", adding that Wales was "out of line" in not carrying out an independent review of all children's social work.
Logan's family was known to social services, but he was removed from the child protection register a month before his death.
During sentencing Mrs Justice Jefford told the trio they were "all responsible for Logan's death and all the anguish that has flowed from it".
"There were 56 external injuries on his body, mostly bruising. He had suffered a blunt force trauma injury to the head," she said.
She described the injuries Logan suffered as "the sort of injuries seen in abused children".
Logan's body was found 250m away from the flat he shared with his family
"The inflicting of these injuries on a small, defenceless five-year-old is nothing short of horrifying," she added.
She detailed how Logan was kept "like a prisoner" in his bedroom for 10 days before his death after testing positive for Covid.
"When food was brought to him he was required to turn away - in effect to face the wall - while food was put down and left for him."
"This treatment of Logan was the culmination of treatment which had dehumanised him in the eyes of his parents."
In a written answer to a question from Plaid Cymru's Heledd Fychan in May, Deputy Minister for Social Services Julie Morgan said the Welsh government had committed to "radically reform" services for children.
"While our thoughts are with everyone affected by Logan's death, I do not intend to undertake an independent review of children's social care," she added.
Conservatives and Plaid Cymru also support the call for an independent review.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-61996129
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news_uk-wales-61996129
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Scotland's future remains in the balance - BBC News
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2022-11-24
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The ruling on the right to hold a referendum leaves questions hanging and a nation divided, says BBC's James Cook.
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Scotland
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For years politicians and the public have pronounced on Scotland's future, a topic where passions run high.
Now the judges have had their say in the calm and careful language of the law.
The issue at hand in the Supreme Court was relatively narrow. It was not whether Scotland should be independent or even whether there should be a referendum but specifically whether Holyrood could hold a poll without the consent of Westminster.
The answer was not a surprise but it leaves two big questions hanging in the air for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and First Minister Nicola Sturgeon.
Is the UK a voluntary union of nations? Is there a credible path to independence?
In 2016 voters in Scotland said no to Brexit by a big margin and were forced to leave the EU anyway; they have rejected Conservative rule for decades; and last year they again elected a majority of MSPs to the Scottish Parliament on manifesto commitments to hold another referendum.
That is the core of the case for another referendum.
The case against focuses on stability, security and the fact that Scottish voters have already had a chance to choose a different path which, in 2014, they rejected by 55% to 45%.
Research suggests the Better Together campaign for the union won because enough voters, particularly pensioners and the middle classes, thought they would be better off in the UK.
In my travels around Scotland these days I hear two contradictory views about the economics of independence: the first, that things are now so bad that Scotland may as well jump in the lifeboat; the second that these tough times would be the worst possible moment to set sail as an independent nation.
Either way the polls aren't shifting much. The nation appears to remain more or less evenly divided.
In any case there now appears to be almost zero chance of a second uncontested poll on the issue.
Last time London agreed to lend Edinburgh the power to stage it. Now Mr Sunak refuses to do another deal, arguing that voters understood the first referendum to be a once-in-a-generation poll and that it makes more sense to focus on tackling the cost of living crisis.
That is what forced the Scottish government's hand and propelled the alternative plan into the Supreme Court where five judges ruled, unanimously, that Holyrood could not hold a "Made in Scotland" poll without the consent of Westminster.
This was not Nicola Sturgeon's preferred path, nor was victory ever likely, but even so the first minister admitted the judgment was a hard pill to swallow.
Now she intends to try to frame the next general election as a referendum in all but name.
She says the SNP will thrash out the tricky details — and they are exceptionally tricky — at a special party conference which she tells me will be held in early spring.
That will not quiet difficult questions about the mechanics and the legitimacy or otherwise of Ms Sturgeon's de facto referendum plan.
Some of those questions come from her own side.
The independence movement is far more divided than it was eight years ago and some "yessers" worry that the first minister is leading them into a trap.
The first concern is that even if she prevails Ms Sturgeon may struggle to prove that a majority of voters casting ballots for independence-supporting parties is an unambiguous vote for leaving the UK.
The second is that even in the yellow wave that swept the nation in 2015 when the SNP won all but three of the 59 Scottish seats at Westminster, the party still failed, by a whisker, to top 50% of the vote.
When I put those concerns to the first minister in her news conference she batted them away, insisting "if we can't win 50% of the Scottish population's support for independence we can't be independent," adding, "if we can't win we don't deserve to be independent."
Those words will not be forgotten.
In her news conference the SNP leader also acknowledged that this was not where she wanted to be at this stage of her campaign for independence, 36 years after she started knocking on doors for the SNP as a teenager in Ayrshire.
"A referendum is my preferred option," she said, acknowledging that her general election plan was "not perfect."
"Is that the best way of resolving this question? No," she said, bluntly.
The party and the wider movement have made stunning progress during Ms Sturgeon's political lifetime but despite a string of landslide election victories, that progress appears to have stalled.
There were a handful of union supporters outside the Scottish Parliament after the Supreme Court ruling
And so Ms Sturgeon's advisers are hammering home the argument about democracy, pointing to paragraph 81 of the Supreme Court judgment which states that "a clear outcome" in any referendum "would possess the authority... of a democratic expression of the view of the Scottish electorate."
Mr Sunak's team on the other hand are stressing that they intend to cooperate with Edinburgh in Scotland's interests — Scotland has two governments is the refrain.
Labour may now hope to seize the initiative with another plan for reforming the UK constitution and with the party making progress in the polls nationally.
But for now Scotland remains divided.
Defenders of the union may be quietly pleased with the Supreme Court ruling. There were a handful outside the Scottish Parliament in the hours afterwards.
But it was supporters of independence who were out in force on the streets of towns and cities around the nation demanding that their voices be heard.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-63738280
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news_uk-scotland-63738280
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Supreme Court to rule on indyref2 powers next week - BBC News
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2022-11-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The judgement on powers to stage a second referendum will be handed down next Wednesday.
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Scotland politics
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The Supreme Court will deliver its judgement next Wednesday on whether the Scottish Parliament can hold a second independence referendum without Westminster's approval.
The UK's highest court heard arguments in the case last month.
The Scottish government said a referendum would fall within devolved powers, but the UK government said it was a reserved matter.
The decision will be delivered at 09:45 on Wednesday 23 November.
Scotland's lord advocate, Dorothy Bain KC, referred the case to the Supreme Court due to uncertainty over whether Holyrood could legislate for a second independence referendum while this was opposed at Westminster.
The judgement on Holyrood's proposed Scottish Independence Referendum Bill will come six weeks after the two-day hearing on 11 and 12 October.
The Supreme Court's senior judge, Lord Reed, warned at the time that it could be "some months" before a ruling is reached in the case.
He said the arguments heard in court were just the "tip of the iceberg", with more than 8,000 pages of written material to consider.
This is a comparatively quick turnaround from the court, six weeks on from the hearing - although we shouldn't read anything into what that means for the judgement.
There are three possible outcomes: the judges let MSPs pass a referendum bill; they block them from doing so; or they refuse to make a ruling either way.
Obviously the Scottish government has fingers and toes crossed for a green light.
But the UK government side spent much of the hearing last month arguing for no ruling at all, hoping to leave Scottish ministers in an awkward limbo.
That underlines that this case won't necessarily settle the vexed question of indyref2 once and for all.
Even if judges do make a ruling, that still only tells us whether there can be a referendum, in strict legal terms. There would still need to be a political settlement over whether there should be a vote next October.
So regardless of the result, the case is sure to tee up an almighty political clash between ministers in Edinburgh and London.
Ms Bain, the Scottish government's top law officer, argued that a referendum would be "advisory" and would have no legal effect on the Union.
She told the court that while Scottish ministers might have the "subjective intention" of independence, the bill itself would be objectively neutral.
But Sir James Eadie KC, the UK government's independent barrister on legal issues of national importance, said it was "obvious" that the bill related to reserved matters and the Union.
He said that meant it would fall outside of the competence of the Scottish Parliament, and argued that the Supreme Court should not rule on the case.
When Scotland held an independence referendum in September 2014, voters backed staying in the UK by 55% to 45%.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has made repeated attempts to push for another vote, but there has been no agreement with the UK government.
In June, Ms Sturgeon unveiled what she called a "refreshed" case for independence and said her government had an "indisputable mandate" for a second referendum, which she wants to hold on 19 October 2023.
But if the Supreme Court ruling goes against her, she has said she would use the next election as a "de facto referendum" and attempt to use the result to trigger independence negotiations.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has given no indication that he is likely to grant formal consent for a second vote.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-63649795
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Autumn Statement: Who do spending cuts hit the most? - BBC News
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2022-11-16
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Ahead of the Autumn Statement, what do the 2010 austerity cuts tell us about who was worst affected?
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UK
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The government is expected to announce plans to raise £20bn in tax alongside extensive spending cuts, as part of its Autumn Statement on Thursday.
It's a bid to plug an estimated £55bn black hole in the nation's finances, and it echoes the original austerity plans unveiled back in 2010.
Over the last 12 years, I've seen the impact those cuts have had at a local level. From the lack of police in Hartlepool, to the cuts to addiction services in Barrow-in-Furness.
Perhaps most strikingly, I've also reported from more and more food banks across the UK. They once felt like a novelty, now their use is a fact of life in so many communities.
But what does the data show us about who those spending cuts will affect the most?
In June 2010, the government faced similarly tough choices to those Rishi Sunak is confronted with today. The UK's finances were in a mess following the 2008 global financial crisis. The government had spent hundreds of billions of pounds shoring up the economy, including rescuing several major banks.
The then chancellor, George Osborne, introduced a wide range of spending cuts in an emergency budget, which he called "tough, but fair."
It included cuts in most areas of public life, but in particular local government and welfare. Housing benefit was reduced, school buildings weren't repaired and Sure Start children's centres were cut, among many other measures.
At the time, Mr Osborne said the consequence of not trying to reduce the UK's deficit would be "severe" - he warned of "higher interest rates, more business failures, sharper rises in unemployment". He promised, while the process might be painful, "we are all in this together".
And while his cuts - alongside tax rises - did affect the whole country, evidence built up since 2010 is clear; the impact was not equally felt.
Take a look at this data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which shows the change in average household wealth between 2006 and 2020, after inflation.
It suggests that in London, average household wealth increased by 63%, to £340,300. By contrast, in north-east England it fell by 17%, to £168,500.
The data combines the change in the value of different sources of wealth, such as property, private pension pots and savings, and highlights how unequally England has developed in recent years.
That's something underlined in a report published by public health expert Professor Sir Michael Marmot, in 2020.
He found, since 2010, while London had become the richest area in northern Europe, the UK also contained six of the 10 poorest regions.
The North East's sluggish performance has had real-world consequences.
Since 2014, child poverty in the region grew by 46% to the highest rate in England. In an average classroom of 30 children in the North East, 11 are living in poverty.
A head teacher from Wallsend, in north Tyneside, recently told me the cuts to Sure Start centres had resulted in many children starting school well below the social and academic level of previous intakes.
Benefit cuts and an increase in unstable, often zero-hour contract work, had left more families needing a referral to a local food bank - although the more recent cost of living crisis had also been a factor.
The North East saw the greatest cuts to services for children and young people, and the largest reduction in spending per person. Life expectancy also fell in some of the North East's most deprived communities.
Indeed across the UK, some experts have made a link between austerity and some people dying younger. Last month, Glasgow University researchers suggested 335,000 excess deaths in Scotland, England and Wales between 2012 and 2019 could be largely attributed to the public spending cuts first introduced in 2010.
The study, the authors say, adds to the "growing evidence of deeply worrying changes to mortality trends in the UK" - particularly among deprived communities.
The cuts and freezes to welfare benefits during the decade after 2010 have been consistently blamed for the explosion in food banks, something I looked at earlier this year.
Less appreciated is the huge increase in another emergency provision - so called "baby banks", which supply nappies, clothing, shoes and sometimes school uniforms for little or no money.
There appears to have been little more than a handful of these in existence prior to 2010. Today there are more than 200 across the UK. The Little Village network, which compiled the map, acknowledges that the pandemic also had an impact.
This was a position largely held onto until, in 2019, then Prime Minister Boris Johnson said he had long thought austerity "was just not the right way forward for the UK".
Until then, most ministers had argued the cuts were unavoidable for the long-term economic health of the UK, and a less generous welfare system had been responsible for record levels of employment - in effect, forcing people to get a job.
The aim of the 2010 emergency budget was to "put in order the nation's finances" by cutting the UK's debt and reducing its deficit - which is the amount a country allocates to day-to-day spending versus how much it brings in.
Economically, it did have some success, and the deficit fell by 75% between 2009 and 2019, before the Coved-19 pandemic hit. But national debt actually increased over the same period by a fifth as a percentage of GDP.
Ahead of this week's Autumn Statement, Simon Clarke, the MP for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland, told me "there is scope for spending to come down".
The former levelling up secretary added: "I don't think people would say that their communities have been left scarred by those spending reductions. There is scope for it to come down without impacting on people's lives.
"The state has had to take too much of the strain precisely because the private sector hasn't been resilient enough and so people have therefore been disproportionately reliant on it."
In interviews this week, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said his plan would be fair and show both compassion and support "for the most vulnerable".
But he also didn't shy away from saying difficult decisions would have to be made for the long-term health of the country's finances. It's essentially the same argument George Osborne used 12 years ago.
Whatever the government announces on Thursday, the decisions it makes are going to have real-life consequences for millions of people. And if the 2010 budget taught us one thing - it's that public spending cuts hit poorer communities harder.
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Killamarsh murders: Damien Bendall given whole-life order - BBC News
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2022-12-21
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Damien Bendall carried out "brutal, vicious and cruel attacks" on his defenceless victims.
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Derby
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Terri Harris (bottom left) and her children John Bennett (top left) and Lacey Bennett (bottom right) were found dead along with Lacey's friend Connie Gent (top right)
A man who murdered his pregnant partner, her two children, and another child has been sentenced to a whole-life prison term.
Damien Bendall killed his four victims with a claw hammer at a house in Derbyshire in 2021.
He pleaded guilty to murdering Terri Harris, 35, her son John Bennett, 13, daughter Lacey Bennett, 11, and Lacey's 11-year-old friend Connie Gent.
He also pleaded guilty to raping Lacey.
Bendall, 32, admitted the charges at Derby Crown Court on Wednesday, where he was sentenced by Mr Justice Sweeney.
He was given a whole-life order, meaning he will never be released from prison, except in exceptional compassionate circumstances.
Mr Justice Sweeney told him: "As the prosecution have said, you carried out vicious, brutal and cruel attacks on a defenceless woman and three young children, during which you went around the house attacking them."
Ms Harris and the children were found dead at a house in Chandos Crescent, Killamarsh, on 19 September, having been killed on the evening of 18 September.
"The defendant attacked them using a claw hammer which he used to hit them over the head and on the upper body," prosecution barrister Louis Mably KC told the court.
"It was perfectly clear none of the victims stood a chance."
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Killamarsh murders: Footage shows arrest of man who murdered four
Mr Mably told the court Bendall and Ms Harris had been in a relationship, having met on a dating app after her relationship with her children's father ended.
Police arrived at the house on the morning of 19 September, having been alerted by Bendall's mother, as he told her he had stabbed himself.
In police bodycam footage played to the court, he could be seen speaking to officers outside the house, telling them calmly, "I've murdered four people", and "I'm going back to prison".
Police initially did not believe him, Mr Mably said, but an officer found all four bodies when he went inside.
He found John first, lying naked on the floor of the bathroom, as he had been due to have a shower before Bendall attacked him.
He then found Ms Harris and her daughter in the main bedroom. Terri was on the floor but Lacey was on the bed.
Forensic evidence indicates that Bendall attacked and raped Lacey downstairs before moving her upstairs, where he raped her again.
He also used some kind of ligature around her neck, and this contributed to her death along with the head injuries.
Connie, who was stopping with Lacey for a sleepover that night, was found dead in another bedroom.
Bendall, who the court heard was under the influence of cocaine and cannabis, left the house after the murders, taking John's games console with him in order to sell it for drugs.
He was arrested and taken to hospital, but the wounds he had inflicted on himself only required stitches.
He was then interviewed by police, telling them: "I used a hammer. I did not realise what I did until I walked into my room and saw my missus and my daughter."
He knew Ms Harris was pregnant when he killed her, because he also told police: "Bet you don't usually get four murders in Killamarsh do you? Well I mean five 'cause my missus was having a baby."
Damien Bendall admitted four murders and the rape of 11-year-old Lacey
Victim personal statements from relatives of the victims were read to the court by the prosecution.
Angela Smith, Ms Harris's mother, said: "Terri, Lacey and John meant the world to me and were the most precious people in my life. Not being able to give them a kiss and a hug and tell them I love them breaks my heart."
She recalled her grandchildren telling her they were scared of monsters when they were younger.
"I told them there's no such thing as monsters, but how wrong I was," she said.
John and Lacey's father, Jason Bennett, said he was living in a "continual nightmare"
Jason Bennett, John and Lacey's father, said their murders had "destroyed and taken my life away".
"I am living in a continual nightmare," his statement said. "I have a story in my head of how they died, I live their trauma and feel their pain; it feels like a recurring punishment."
He recalled how Lacey and Connie had been selling sweets for charity on the day they died, describing his daughter as "kind and caring".
"John would not hurt a fly, literally. If he saw an insect he would carefully put it outside," he said.
Charles Gent, Connie's father, said his daughter's murder had "completely torn my life apart".
"The man who carried out the crimes can only be described as truly evil and should never be free from incarceration, just like the families of the victims in this case will never be free from their life sentence as a result of the shocking and abhorrent crimes he committed on a defenceless woman and children," he said.
Connie (front) had been stopping over at her friend Lacey's house when she was murdered
During the sentencing hearing the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) made representations that the whole-life tariff was necessary.
This was agreed by Bendall's defence barrister, and Bendall himself.
Defence barrister Vanessa Marshall KC said: "His instructions are clear that nothing but a whole-life order is warranted for taking, as he did, these four young lives away, and in such awful circumstances."
Bendall previously pleaded guilty to four counts of manslaughter but denied murder and rape, meaning he was due to stand trial for these offences before he changed his pleas.
"Bendall's defence put forward theories that his judgement was psychologically impaired," said Andrew Baxter, deputy chief crown prosecutor.
"Throughout the process, the CPS instructed its own medical experts to assess whether the arguments had merit, which they did not.
"When all medical angles had been exhausted, the evidence that he had murdered all four victims with no impairment to his actions was overwhelming and Bendall admitted all charges."
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Takeoff: Police arrest man in fatal shooting of rapper - BBC News
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2022-12-03
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Takeoff, youngest of the rap group Migos, was killed last month outside a Houston bowling alley.
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US & Canada
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Takeoff, one-third of popular rap group Migos, was shot and killed on 1 November
Police have arrested a man and charged him with murder in connection with the fatal shooting of rapper Takeoff.
The 28-year-old, Grammy-nominated musician was shot and killed outside a bowling alley in Houston, Texas last month.
Houston police said the shooting was over a game of dice, but the singer was "an innocent bystander".
Takeoff was the youngest member of rap group Migos, and his death was mourned by fans and fellow musicians.
At a Friday press conference, Houston Police announced they arrested Patrick Xavier Clark, 33, with the help of surveillance footage that was obtained from the night of the shooting.
"[Clark] was there on the scene and he was in possession of a weapon," said Houston Police Chief Troy Finner.
He added that an investigation is still ongoing, and he has appealed for witnesses to come forward and share information with police.
"Don't let the fear paralyse you," Chief Finner said in his appeal. "Step up and say something."
Mayor Sylvester Turner of Houston said he hopes the arrest will bring some comfort to the family of Takeoff.
He added that Takeoff was more than an entertainer, but also a "son, brother, cousin and a friend, and a mentor to those in the music industry".
Takeoff, born Kirsnick Khari Ball, was one-third of the chart-topping Atlanta-based rap group Migos, who are known for several hits like Bad and Boujee and Stir Fry. They were nominated for two Grammy Awards - one for best rap album and one for best rap performance - in 2018.
His death was met with an outpour of tributes from fans and musicians like Drake, Kid Cudi, Dave and Rick Ross, who remembered Takeoff as "young legend" and a pioneer of a distinct style of rapping known as the "Migos flow."
The 28-year-old musician was one of three people shot outside a downtown bowling alley in Houston at 02:30 local time (07:30 GMT) on 1 November, after a dispute erupted at the end of a private party after a dice game.
Sgt. Michael Burrow with the Houston homicide division said on Friday that Takeoff was not involved in playing the dice game or the argument that took place outside the alley, and he was not armed.
"He was an innocent bystander," Sgt. Burrow said.
Another man and a woman suffered non-life-threatening injuries during the shooting.
Cameron Joshua, 22, was also arrested in connection with the shooting on 22 November and charged with unlawful carrying of a weapon.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-63829127
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Angel Lynn: Kidnap victim's home transformation begins - BBC News
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2022-12-17
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Renovations will allow woman paralysed in a botched kidnapping to live in her parents' property.
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Newsbeat
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Angel Lynn was 19 years old when she fell out of a van travelling at 60mph
A 22-year-old left brain-damaged by her ex-boyfriend's botched kidnap attempt could be back home for good by next Christmas, her family says.
Angel Lynn was 19 when Chay Bowskill bundled her into a van after an argument. She fell out of the vehicle at 60mph and was badly injured.
She has needed 24-hour care since and her parents have been fundraising to revamp their home to meet her needs.
Work has now started, and they hope it could be completed next year.
At the moment Angel, who is unable to walk, talk or feed herself, lives in a specialist home but is allowed supervised four-hour visits every day.
Mum Nikki and dad Paddy want to add a downstairs bedroom, wet room and carers' room to their house in Leicestershire.
They hope doing this will allow Angel to be cared for permanently in one place with her family nearby.
Taking shape: Work has finally begun on extending the Lynn family's home so they can welcome Angel back full-time
Angel's kidnapper Bowskill recently had his original seven-year jail sentence increased to 12 years.
He was caught on CCTV grabbing Angel and dragging her towards a van driven by his accomplice Rocco Sansome in September 2020.
The judge who increased Bowskill's prison term said Bowskill had been controlling and "vile" towards Angel during their relationship.
Nikki and Paddy say their daughter's made "quite a lot of progress" in the last two years.
"We don't worry as much as we used to," says Paddy.
"She's more aware of what's going on around her," says Nikki.
"She's using her iPad now [to communicate] - she's got pictures of her family on there so she can point to the family members."
The couple have spoken before about the support they've received from their local community and how it's helped them to realise their dream.
And Jimi King - project manager on the family's big build - agrees.
"It's absolutely huge - all the equipment we're using we've had for free, even rental companies giving us things at cost just to help us out," he says.
"We're saving a fortune on raw materials at the moment - it's really quite incredible."
Nikki looks forward to spending Christmas with Angel at home
Paddy says the family are "well excited" as the result of Project Angel - their name for their fundraising campaign - begins to take shape.
"It's just the mess you've got to put up with," he says.
And for Nikki, the dream of having her daughter back at home is a step closer to becoming a reality.
"She is the strongest person I've ever, ever met.
"To come through all that... we were told daily that Angel won't wake up, she won't make it.
"I want her to have the best life possible, obviously, and I'll make sure I'll do that whatever."
Listen to Newsbeat live at 12:45 and 17:45 weekdays - or listen back here.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leicestershire-63999346
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Tory Lanez trial over Megan Thee Stallion shooting begins - BBC News
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2022-12-13
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Tory Lanez denies shooting the rapper as they left a pool party at Kylie Jenner's house in Hollywood.
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Newsbeat
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Megan Thee Stallion was injured after a Hollywood party in July 2020
Tory Lanez told Megan Thee Stallion to "dance" as he shot at her feet during an argument, a jury has been told.
Prosecutors said the rappers got into a row as they drove away from a pool party at Kylie Jenner's house.
Jurors in Los Angeles heard Megan, 27, insulted Mr Lanez and demanded to be let out of their luxury car before he fired five rounds at her.
Lanez, 30, real name Daystar Peterson, denies multiple charges relating to a 2020 dispute with the Savage artist.
Megan - real name Megan Pete - left a trail of blood at the scene, before getting back into the vehicle, which was subsequently stopped by police.
A gun that was still warm to the touch was found on the floor near where Lanez had been sitting, prosecutor Alexander Bott said.
Minutes after the shooting, a female friend texted Megan Thee Stallion's security detail, saying: "Help... Tory shot meg."
In a later phone call, Lanez "profusely apologised for his actions" and claimed he was "just too drunk," jurors were told.
Tory Lanez has denied shooting Megan after the party
Tory Lanez's lawyer George Mgdesyan said the jury needed to keep an open mind and this was a "case about jealousy".
He told the court he would prove the accusations were lies.
Earlier hearings have been told that Megan Thee Stallion initially told doctors her injured feet had been cut on broken glass.
She initially denied Lanez had shot at her, but later said she had done so for fear he would get into trouble.
Several bullet fragments were removed from her feet, but some remain and she told investigating officers that she had difficulty walking in certain shoes.
Megan Thee Stallion then posted a video to Instagram Live in which she said "Tory shot me. You shot me and you got your publicist and your people... lying... Stop lying."
Listen to Newsbeat live at 12:45 and 17:45 weekdays - or listen back here.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-63955189
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news_newsbeat-63955189
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Cumbria coal mine proposal is indefensible, says UK climate chief - BBC News
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2022-12-07
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Lord Deben says a new coal mine in Cumbria will "not contribute anything to domestic needs".
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Cumbria
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West Cumbria Mining says the scheme would bring about 500 jobs to the Whitehaven area
A proposed new coal mine in Cumbria has been branded "absolutely indefensible" by the chairman of the government's official advisors on climate change.
Lord Deben, chair of the Climate Change Committee (CCC), was speaking at the launch of the annual report on the UK's progress in tackling greenhouse gases.
A decision on planning permission for the mine near Whitehaven to source coal for steel-making is expected soon.
Environmentalists have warned that demand for coking coal is declining.
Lord Deben, who leads the independent advisory committee, said Russia's invasion of Ukraine meant the government should be looking to protect energy supplies.
He acknowledged that the UK had done so with a focus on renewables and nuclear.
"As far as the coal mine in Cumbria is concerned, let's be absolutely clear, it is absolutely indefensible," he said.
"First of all, 80% of what it produces will be exported, so it is not something largely for internal consumption.
"It is not going to contribute anything to our domestic needs in the terms we're talking about, the cost of energy and the rest."
He said the mine's backers claimed it would provide metallurgical coal, which is currently imported, but it would not reduce the amount of coal being produced - largely in the USA.
During Prime Minister's Questions on 22 June, Boris Johnson appeared to hint that the mine may be given the go-ahead when he said that "plainly it makes no sense to be importing coal, particularly for metallurgical purposes, when we have our own domestic resources."
The mine was approved by Cumbria County Council in October 2020, but the decision was suspended weeks later following guidance from the CCC and then the Planning Inspectorate was tasked with examining the arguments.
Its report was handed to the government earlier this year and a deadline of 7 July was set for a decision by the Communities Secretary Michael Gove.
Woodhouse Colliery could be the UK's first new deep mine for three decades
However, Lord Deben warned its approval would damage the UK's leadership on climate change and "create another example of Britain saying one thing and doing another".
He said the government should find a way of ensuring the jobs that might have been created by the mine be replaced by alternative green jobs.
Lord Deben said he was not concerned about keeping a coal-fired power plant open longer than planned this winter to shore up energy supplies, despite a commitment to end UK coal power by October 2024.
"We are under serious threat because of the invasion of Ukraine by the Russians, and in those circumstances the government has to make sure that we keep the lights on," he added.
Friends of the Earth energy campaigner Tony Bosworth said Lord Deben was "right" and the case against a new coal mine was "overwhelming in climate terms".
He said the "market for its coal is declining before it even opens", adding: "Saying no to this mine should an open-and-shut case for a government serious about the climate crisis."
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Whitehaven coal mine: An almighty row only just beginning - BBC News
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2022-12-07
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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After months of ministerial prevarication a decision has been made, but the arguments will go on.
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UK Politics
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The former Marchon chemical works on the outskirts of Whitehaven is the site of the proposed mine
Governing is about difficult choices; confronting seemingly irreconcilable demands - and making a decision.
So here's the scenario: Coal that is used to make steel is under the Irish Sea off the west Cumbrian coast, one of England's most isolated spots, desperate to attract more private sector jobs, particularly ones that pay well and have a future.
The government is committed to what it calls levelling up, and has won seats in the area long held by Labour.
The government is also committed to being a champion of tackling climate change, and was wrestling with this decision about the coal mine at exactly the same time as hosting the COP climate summit in Glasgow a year ago.
And saying yes then, however comfortable they are with their arguments for doing so, would have looked… awkward.
Well, another climate summit, the recent one in Egypt, has come and gone while ministers have been making their minds up on what to do in Whitehaven.
They asked the Planning Inspectorate to take a look at the whole idea.
Meanwhile, war in Ukraine broke out.
Until then, 40% of the coal needed to make steel in the UK, metallurgical coal, the stuff this new mine will dig up, came from, you guessed it: Russia.
Since then, alternative suppliers have been found, but nonetheless the issue of energy security is a salient one.
Meanwhile plenty are saying it is bonkers to be digging coal out of the ground in 2022, let alone opening a brand new mine to do so.
How on earth do you incentivise finding alternative ways of making steel if you carry on relying on the black stuff?
So, you're the minister, what do you do?
Well, prevaricate — and they did.
And every expectation it will be appealed.
Labour say it proves Rishi Sunak is a "fossil fuel prime minister in a renewable age."
But would a Labour government shut the mine or stop it opening in a part of the world they are desperate to win back?
The government is arguing their decision is in keeping with their emissions obligations because the alternative would be importing the coal, and alternatives to using coal are a long way off.
And plenty of people in west Cumbria are delighted.
But not before an almighty row that is only just beginning.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-63895365
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Far-right groups had racism rift before Capitol riot - BBC News
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2022-12-22
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The Oath Keepers and Proud Boys had a shared love of Donald Trump, but not so much for each other.
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US & Canada
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Proud Boy Enrique Tarrio said his group didn't like the far-right Oath Keepers militia
Infighting among some of America's most well-known far-right groups was revealed in a series of transcripts released by the congressional committee investigating the 6 January 2021 Capitol riot.
They had a shared love of Donald Trump, but not so much for each other.
Oath Keepers and Proud Boys were among those who gathered at the Capitol that day, but leaders of the two groups criticised each other in sworn testimony.
Their disagreements revolved around the involvement of white nationalists in groups and protest movements in the years before the riot.
Although many of former President Donald Trump's most fervent far-right supporters refused to engage with the committee, citing constitutional protections against self-incrimination, Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes answered a number of questions over hours of testimony earlier this year.
He said his group defended peaceful protesters and aided people of many different backgrounds. During protests in Berkeley, California, in 2017, when right-wing protesters clashed with anti-fascist groups, he said he told white nationalists to "take a hike".
"We would not let them in," he told the committee. "They could not get their moment of fame."
Contrasting Oath Keepers with Proud Boys, he said members of his group were "quiet professionals". And he accused Proud Boys of failing to adequately vet its members.
"Look, I don't believe the Proud Boys are white nationalists," he told investigators. "I think they've been sloppy and let white nationalists infiltrate their group."
Enrique Tarrio, a Florida man of Afro-Cuban ancestry who led the Proud Boys at the time of the riot, was also subpoenaed by the committee and described an argument that he had with Rhodes.
"I didn't like Stewart Rhodes. I still don't like Stewart Rhodes," he said during testimony.
Stewart Rhodes faces decades in jail after being convicted for his role in the Capitol riot
The animosity between the two stems from a 2019 demonstration in Portland, Oregon, one of a number of far-right protests in the city. Oath Keepers were providing security for the event, but Rhodes says he heard that a white nationalist was part of the group, and he pulled his members out. Mr Tarrio was furious.
"After that event in Portland, I didn't want to… have anything to do with Oath Keepers or militias or anything like that," Mr Tarrio told the investigators.
The pair were shown in video footage meeting in an underground car park on the night before the Capitol riot, but Mr Tarrio said he only shook hands with Rhodes to be polite.
Rhodes was convicted of seditious conspiracy and other charges related to the Capitol riot last month, and faces a lengthy jail sentence. Mr Tarrio is currently on trial for seditious conspiracy and other charges. He was not in Washington on 6 January 2021, but prosecutors allege he was directing Proud Boys from nearby Maryland.
Megan Squire, deputy director of data analytics at the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Project, says that fractious relations are common among extremist groups.
"These groups devolve into infighting, mismanagement and bickering more than they stay together," she says.
Since the riot, increased scrutiny and criminal cases have hampered some of the country's most well-known far-right organisations.
"On the whole, it's not been a great year for these groups," Squire says.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-64071724
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Killamarsh murders: Damien Bendall given whole-life order - BBC News
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2022-12-22
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Damien Bendall carried out "brutal, vicious and cruel attacks" on his defenceless victims.
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Derby
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Terri Harris (bottom left) and her children John Bennett (top left) and Lacey Bennett (bottom right) were found dead along with Lacey's friend Connie Gent (top right)
A man who murdered his pregnant partner, her two children, and another child has been sentenced to a whole-life prison term.
Damien Bendall killed his four victims with a claw hammer at a house in Derbyshire in 2021.
He pleaded guilty to murdering Terri Harris, 35, her son John Bennett, 13, daughter Lacey Bennett, 11, and Lacey's 11-year-old friend Connie Gent.
He also pleaded guilty to raping Lacey.
Bendall, 32, admitted the charges at Derby Crown Court on Wednesday, where he was sentenced by Mr Justice Sweeney.
He was given a whole-life order, meaning he will never be released from prison, except in exceptional compassionate circumstances.
Mr Justice Sweeney told him: "As the prosecution have said, you carried out vicious, brutal and cruel attacks on a defenceless woman and three young children, during which you went around the house attacking them."
Ms Harris and the children were found dead at a house in Chandos Crescent, Killamarsh, on 19 September, having been killed on the evening of 18 September.
"The defendant attacked them using a claw hammer which he used to hit them over the head and on the upper body," prosecution barrister Louis Mably KC told the court.
"It was perfectly clear none of the victims stood a chance."
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Killamarsh murders: Footage shows arrest of man who murdered four
Mr Mably told the court Bendall and Ms Harris had been in a relationship, having met on a dating app after her relationship with her children's father ended.
Police arrived at the house on the morning of 19 September, having been alerted by Bendall's mother, as he told her he had stabbed himself.
In police bodycam footage played to the court, he could be seen speaking to officers outside the house, telling them calmly, "I've murdered four people", and "I'm going back to prison".
Police initially did not believe him, Mr Mably said, but an officer found all four bodies when he went inside.
He found John first, lying naked on the floor of the bathroom, as he had been due to have a shower before Bendall attacked him.
He then found Ms Harris and her daughter in the main bedroom. Terri was on the floor but Lacey was on the bed.
Forensic evidence indicates that Bendall attacked and raped Lacey downstairs before moving her upstairs, where he raped her again.
He also used some kind of ligature around her neck, and this contributed to her death along with the head injuries.
Connie, who was stopping with Lacey for a sleepover that night, was found dead in another bedroom.
Bendall, who the court heard was under the influence of cocaine and cannabis, left the house after the murders, taking John's games console with him in order to sell it for drugs.
He was arrested and taken to hospital, but the wounds he had inflicted on himself only required stitches.
He was then interviewed by police, telling them: "I used a hammer. I did not realise what I did until I walked into my room and saw my missus and my daughter."
He knew Ms Harris was pregnant when he killed her, because he also told police: "Bet you don't usually get four murders in Killamarsh do you? Well I mean five 'cause my missus was having a baby."
Damien Bendall admitted four murders and the rape of 11-year-old Lacey
Victim personal statements from relatives of the victims were read to the court by the prosecution.
Angela Smith, Ms Harris's mother, said: "Terri, Lacey and John meant the world to me and were the most precious people in my life. Not being able to give them a kiss and a hug and tell them I love them breaks my heart."
She recalled her grandchildren telling her they were scared of monsters when they were younger.
"I told them there's no such thing as monsters, but how wrong I was," she said.
John and Lacey's father, Jason Bennett, said he was living in a "continual nightmare"
Jason Bennett, John and Lacey's father, said their murders had "destroyed and taken my life away".
"I am living in a continual nightmare," his statement said. "I have a story in my head of how they died, I live their trauma and feel their pain; it feels like a recurring punishment."
He recalled how Lacey and Connie had been selling sweets for charity on the day they died, describing his daughter as "kind and caring".
"John would not hurt a fly, literally. If he saw an insect he would carefully put it outside," he said.
Charles Gent, Connie's father, said his daughter's murder had "completely torn my life apart".
"The man who carried out the crimes can only be described as truly evil and should never be free from incarceration, just like the families of the victims in this case will never be free from their life sentence as a result of the shocking and abhorrent crimes he committed on a defenceless woman and children," he said.
Connie (front) had been stopping over at her friend Lacey's house when she was murdered
During the sentencing hearing the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) made representations that the whole-life tariff was necessary.
This was agreed by Bendall's defence barrister, and Bendall himself.
Defence barrister Vanessa Marshall KC said: "His instructions are clear that nothing but a whole-life order is warranted for taking, as he did, these four young lives away, and in such awful circumstances."
Bendall previously pleaded guilty to four counts of manslaughter but denied murder and rape, meaning he was due to stand trial for these offences before he changed his pleas.
"Bendall's defence put forward theories that his judgement was psychologically impaired," said Andrew Baxter, deputy chief crown prosecutor.
"Throughout the process, the CPS instructed its own medical experts to assess whether the arguments had merit, which they did not.
"When all medical angles had been exhausted, the evidence that he had murdered all four victims with no impairment to his actions was overwhelming and Bendall admitted all charges."
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World Cup 2022: 'Lionel Messi on brink of making Qatar tournament his' - BBC Sport
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2022-12-14
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Argentina winning the World Cup will see Qatar 2022 become known as Lionel Messi's World Cup, writes BBC Sport's Phil McNulty.
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Host nation:Dates: Coverage: Live on BBC TV, BBC iPlayer, BBC Radio 5 Live, BBC Sounds and the BBC Sport website and app.
Lionel Messi's last dance will continue until the music stops in Qatar on Sunday as he now stands just 90 minutes away from the ultimate accolade of having a World Cup forever attached to his name.
Just like Diego Maradona stamped himself indelibly on Argentina's 1986 win in Mexico and Brazil striker Ronaldo wrote a redemption story in Yokohama in their 2002 triumph, this will be known as Messi's World Cup if he inspires victory against either France or Morocco in the final.
Argentina's campaign in Qatar opened with the ignominy of what is still this World Cup's biggest shock, when they lost to Saudi Arabia.
But the manner in which the master Messi and his apprentice Julian Alvarez swept aside Croatia in their 3-0 semi-final win delivered an ominous warning that they are reaching the sort of perfect crescendo their fans were still hitting in Lusail Stadium long after the final whistle.
So it is all back to the space-age Lusail on Sunday to see if Argentina can win a third World Cup in their sixth final, and whether the player some label the greatest the game has ever seen can finally get his hands on the prize that has remained tantalisingly out of his reach.
• None This will be my last World Cup - Messi
• None 'Best ever' & 'magic' - reaction to 'the true Messi'
It seemed, for a while at least, that the perfect ending the romantics and those who support Argentina crave would be transformed into a nightmare as a grimacing Messi bent over in the 19th minute, stretching and feeling the top of his left hamstring.
Messi, who equalled Lothar Matthaus' World Cup record of 25 matches played, moved at walking pace, which the 35-year-old does quite a lot in his current mode of operation, clearly feeling discomfort.
But he received the biggest tonic of all after 34 minutes when he lashed the opener past Dominik Livakovic from the penalty spot after Croatia's keeper had fouled Alvarez.
Alvarez then took Messi's header just inside the Croatia half five minutes later before embarking a long and winding road to goal, aided by rebounds off Josip Juranovic and Borna Sosa, before beating Livakovic.
The high point of this duo's masterclass came after 69 minutes when Messi, the magician from Rosario, more or less made one of the tournament's outstanding defenders disappear.
Messi looked to be trapped by the touchline but a twist and sleight of foot took him away from Josko Gvardiol, now regarded as an 'A-List' defender and touted for a £70m move away from RB Leipzig, to set up the predatory Alvarez.
In that moment, Messi did not just mesmerise Gvardiol once, but on a couple more occasions for good measure.
It was pitched as Messi for Argentina against Luka Modric for Croatia, two magnificent players who have World Cup history stretching back to Germany in 2006.
It was not to be Modric's night. He will not have the chance to make amends for defeat by France in the 2018 final in Moscow, but received warm applause from all around the stadium when he was substituted with nine minutes left.
At the final whistle, Argentina coach Lionel Scaloni slumped tearfully into Messi's arms in a gesture of thanks for the performance that has taken them both to the brink of the crowning glory of their careers.
The Messi story goes on to Sunday, when he will have the opportunity to finally erase the memories of his very obvious distress and disappointment when he failed to stop Argentina losing 1-0 to Germany in Rio's iconic Maracana in 2014.
And as an indicator of his longevity and enduring talent, his contribution against Croatia meant he has become the first player to score and assist in four separate World Cup matches since 1966 - against Serbia in 2006 and Mexico, the Netherlands and Croatia here in Qatar.
Argentina have scored 12 goals at this World Cup. Messi has netted five and assisted three - he was not given another assist for the header which set Alvarez on his way to goal to double Argentina's lead.
He has 11 goals at World Cups in total, which is the Argentina record.
And Messi is now level with Kylian Mbappe in the race for the Golden Boot at Qatar with five goals. Could that contest also be settled on the biggest global sporting stage of all on Sunday?
• None Fifa World Cup: Schedule and route to the final
BBC Sport pundit and former England captain Alan Shearer suggests Argentina lifting the World Cup on Sunday could have a wider significance when it comes to the argument of who is the greatest footballing product from that country - Messi or Maradona?
Shearer said: "What a story it would be if Argentina win the World Cup. Would it put an end to the debate of Messi or Maradona?
"We said if Messi wins the World Cup here it might have to be him. That has been the difference [in the past], that has been the splitting point - Maradona has won the World Cup. If Messi were to win it here my view would change."
For club and country, Messi has won it all and done it all - except for winning the World Cup.
Could that moment of destiny arrive at Lusail Stadium on Sunday? If it does this will always be known as Lionel Messi's World Cup.
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World Cup 2022: Why Senegal have nothing to lose against England - Jermaine Jenas - BBC Sport
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2022-12-04
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BBC pundit Jermaine Jenas explains why Senegal have a winning mentality after enjoying two huge triumphs already this year.
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Host nation:Dates: Coverage: Live on BBC TV, BBC iPlayer, BBC Radio 5 Live, BBC Radio Wales, BBC Radio Cymru, BBC Sounds and the BBC Sport website and app.
Senegal have some very talented players but the biggest weapon the African champions will have against England on Sunday is their mindset.
Aliou Cisse's side are winners, and they have crossed the line twice on two huge occasions already this year.
This team did the biggest thing they can do for their country when they beat Egypt in February to win the Africa Cup of Nations for the first time, and then they followed it up a few weeks later by beating the same opposition in their play-off to reach this World Cup.
So they have a manager who is loved, and a very confident group of players.
Whatever happens to them in this tournament now, they will still be celebrated, so they go into this last-16 tie with no fear of failure whatsoever - the pressure is all on England.
A team who don't rely on one superstar
I covered the Afcon for the BBC at the start of 2022 and it was really interesting to follow the tournament and understand the dynamics of the different African teams.
I spoke a lot to Yaya Toure and his brother Kolo, who used to play for the Ivory Coast, and former Arsenal right-back Lauren, who is from Cameroon.
They explained that some of the traditionally strong teams, like Ivory Coast or Nigeria, struggled against the north African sides like Egypt, Morocco or Tunisia, because they did not have the same organisation and were more reliant on good individuals on the pitch.
To win things, you need that team ethic - you have to become an organised side is that is less reliant on one superstar and more reliant on the group.
Senegal have clearly done that. Yes, they would be stronger if Bayern Munich's former Liverpool star Sadio Mane had been fit to play in Qatar, and Everton midfielder Idrissa Gueye's suspension for this game is a blow to them, but they have got players who can step up.
Look down the spine of their team, starting with Eduoard Mendy in goal and his Chelsea team-mate Kalidou Koulibaly at the heart of their defence, and they have got quality and experience.
I still think England will dominate the game, and have a lot more possession, but I see Senegal as a much bigger threat than anyone we have faced so far at this tournament.
The United States were dangerous because we didn't play very well whereas this Senegal team will not just look to frustrate England like Iran and Wales did, they can also cause Gareth Southgate's side problems on the counter-attack.
England have to focus on themselves and remember they put in a really positive performance against Wales. One of the things Senegal will definitely be talking about is how to stop all of our talented players, and Gareth Southgate has to keep this momentum going.
I feel like we have to get up speed now anyway, because France are probably up next in the quarter-finals if we do get through this game. That kind of allowance we had in the group stage of being able to have a bad game or even a bad half is over now we are into the knockout rounds.
We are a good enough team to bounce back from a bad first 45 minutes, especially with the options we will have on the bench, but I'd much rather we started this game like we started the second half against Wales - by trying to blow them away from the first minute.
That is what I want to see but as pundits we are torn between the prediction of what is going to happen, and what we would like to do.
Personally, I'd get Phil Foden in the team instead of Mason Mount, because I don't see what he does that Foden can't. Yes, he tracks back - but so does Foden.
And I feel like he really has to play Marcus Rashford because, just looking at him, he is razor sharp and will strike fear into any team.
I am not so sure Southgate will see things the same way, though - this could be the game where he reverts to type.
I feel like he is more likely to see Rashford and Foden as game-changers from the bench and go back to the team he started the tournament with.
There is an argument for including Raheem Sterling because he has got tournament pedigree and 80-odd caps, and we are at the stage of this World Cup where you need that experience.
So I would not blame Southgate for doing that but I just think we have got a lot of players who are in good form, so why not let them go and play - and Rashford and Foden are two of them.
Jermaine Jenas was speaking to Chris Bevan in Doha.
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World Cup final: Argentina beat France on penalties in dramatic Qatar showpiece - BBC Sport
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2022-12-18
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Lionel Messi leads Argentina to World Cup glory, beating France on penalties in one of the most thrilling climaxes in final history.
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Last updated on .From the section World Cup
Lionel Messi finally achieved his World Cup dream as Argentina won their third crown on penalties in one of the greatest finals in the tournament's history.
Argentina won the shootout 4-2 after a spectacular game which developed into the much-anticipated confrontation between the 35-year-old maestro Messi and his France opposite number Kylian Mbappe.
France's own superstar scored a hat-trick - the first in a Fifa World Cup final since 1966 - but still ended up on the losing side at Lusail Stadium.
Messi looked to be securing the one major honour missing from his glittering collection in comfort as Argentina cruised into a two-goal lead.
This all changed when an explosive intervention from Mbappe, who scored two goals inside two minutes late on, turned this frantic, magnificent match for the ages on its head.
Messi had given Argentina the lead from the penalty spot in the 23rd minute following Ousmane Dembele's foul on Angel di Maria. It made him the first player in World Cup history to score in the group stage, last 16, quarter-final, semi-final and final of a single tournament.
He then contributed a delicate touch within a magnificent counter-attack that ended with Brighton's Alexis Mac Allister setting up Di Maria for the second 13 minutes later.
• None 'Now hard to argue against Messi being football's greatest'
• None 'Breathless, staggering and magnificent' - was final one of best ever?
Argentina were untroubled until the closing stages, only for Mbappe to give France a lifeline from the penalty spot with nine minutes left - then restore equality with a magnificent volley moments later.
Messi bundled Argentina back in front in extra time, but Mbappe completed his treble from the spot two minutes from the end of a frantic, chaotic added spell.
And so it went to penalties, with the two greats opening the scoring. But Argentina and Aston Villa goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez saved from Kingsley Coman, before Aurelian Tchouameni missed, leaving Gonzalo Montiel to win the World Cup.
Messi, a World Cup winner at last, collapsed to his knees in the centre circle and was engulfed by jubilant Argentina team-mates.
• None World Cup Daily podcast: Argentina champions after 'best game ever'
• None Reaction to one of the most dramatic World Cup finals
Messi stood at the pinnacle of his career as Argentina closed out time in the World Cup final, only for great rival Mbappe to threaten to knock him off and leave him in despair.
Instead, this World Cup - which will now have Messi's name attached to it forever, along with a final that will rank alongside the greats - gave the iconic Argentine the conclusion he wanted.
Messi was imperious for 80 minutes in his final World Cup game as Argentina exerted complete control over a strangely laboured France, scoring his penalty with ease before contributing crucially to a second goal which was a team creation of beauty finished off by Di Maria.
And then came Mbappe. And then came France.
In an atmosphere of disbelief among the massed ranks of Argentina fans who were starting to celebrate victory, Lionel Scaloni's team had to lift themselves once more from the double blow inflicted by Mbappe.
Inevitably it was Messi who gave them hope again, showing he was happy to do the dirty work by turning home a scrambled finish in the box in the second period of extra time - only for Mbappe to answer again.
But Argentina prevailed on penalties and Messi was the centre of attention when Montiel sent the decisive penalty past France keeper Hugo Lloris.
Amid wild scenes of celebration, Messi fell to his knees in tears and raised his arms to the skies, before disappearing beneath a mountain of team-mates.
Messi then took to the microphone to address Argentina's jubilant fans, his Holy Grail reached, another piece of evidence assembled in the argument that would have many declare him the game's greatest player.
Mbappe cemented his status as one of the game's modern greats with only the second hat-trick in a World Cup final, following Sir Geoff Hurst's when England beat West Germany in 1966. But the 23-year-old still suffered the pain of defeat.
Mbappe was as anonymous as most of his team for the first 80 minutes, ill-served amid an unfathomably poor France display - which they put in despite seeking to become the first side to retain the trophy since Brazil did so 60 years ago, and only the third ever after Italy won in 1934 and 1938.
Manager Didier Deschamps even made two substitutions before half-time, replacing Olivier Giroud and Dembele with Marcus Thuram and Randal Kolo Muani.
And yet it was Mbappe who revived France in those sensational seconds when they went from looking like timid losers to potential winners, then getting his third from the spot after Messi had put Argentina back in front.
In a stunning period of extra time during which both sides exchanged chances, France could have won but for a superb last-gasp save by Martinez with his outstretched boot from Muani.
Instead, Mbappe will find history no consolation as he was embraced by his team-mates and French President Emmanuel Macron at the end of this enthralling spectacle.
• None How you rated the Argentina and France players
• None Goal! Argentina 3(4), France 3(2). Gonzalo Montiel (Argentina) converts the penalty with a right footed shot to the bottom left corner.
• None Goal! Argentina 3(3), France 3(2). Randal Kolo Muani (France) converts the penalty with a right footed shot to the high centre of the goal.
• None Goal! Argentina 3(3), France 3(1). Leandro Paredes (Argentina) converts the penalty with a right footed shot to the bottom left corner.
• None Penalty missed! Bad penalty by Aurélien Tchouaméni (France) right footed shot is close, but misses to the left. Aurélien Tchouaméni should be disappointed.
• None Goal! Argentina 3(2), France 3(1). Paulo Dybala (Argentina) converts the penalty with a left footed shot to the centre of the goal.
• None Penalty saved! Kingsley Coman (France) fails to capitalise on this great opportunity, right footed shot saved in the bottom left corner.
• None Goal! Argentina 3(1), France 3(1). Lionel Messi (Argentina) converts the penalty with a left footed shot to the bottom left corner.
• None Goal! Argentina 3, France 3(1). Kylian Mbappé (France) converts the penalty with a right footed shot to the bottom left corner.
• None Attempt missed. Lautaro Martínez (Argentina) header from the centre of the box misses to the right. Assisted by Gonzalo Montiel following a fast break.
• None Attempt saved. Randal Kolo Muani (France) right footed shot from the centre of the box is saved in the bottom right corner. Assisted by Ibrahima Konaté with a through ball.
• None Offside, Argentina. Lionel Messi tries a through ball, but Lautaro Martínez is caught offside.
• None Goal! Argentina 3, France 3. Kylian Mbappé (France) converts the penalty with a right footed shot to the bottom left corner. Navigate to the next page Navigate to the last page
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World Cup final: Lionel Messi leads Argentina to glory - is he now football's greatest? - BBC Sport
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2022-12-18
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After Lionel Messi led Argentina to World Cup glory, no-one can now deny he belongs in the same pantheon as Pele and Diego Maradona.
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Lionel Messi strode alone into a single spotlight amid the darkness at Lusail Stadium to finally take possession of the one prize that has remained painfully out of reach throughout his silver-lined career.
The 35-year-old Argentina maestro rubbed his hands together in glorious anticipation of his crowning glory, donning the traditional Arab robe known as a bisht, before finally lifting the World Cup to the sky amid an explosion of flashlights and pyrotechnics.
Messi had achieved his dream. The gap in his glittering collection had been filled - the set complete after arguably the most spectacular World Cup final in history, a game for the ages that tore at the emotions and played havoc with the pulse rates before Argentina's icon reached his summit.
He can now add the World Cup to seven Ballons d'Or, four Champions Leagues, one Copa America, 10 La Liga titles with Barcelona and a Ligue 1 crown in France with Paris St-Germain.
This was the one. This was the trophy that Messi's millions of advocates will now use as 'Exhibit A' in their argument that he is the greatest to have played the game.
This is a trophy, almost 15 inches of solid gold, that will now have many saying Messi is the greatest - and those with a counter-argument will have an added degree of difficulty presenting their case.
Comparisons are expanded over generations, which adds a different frame to all the arguments, but no-one can now deny Messi belongs in the same pantheon as Pele and another whose image was across many Argentina banners at Lusail Stadium on Sunday.
Inevitably, Diego Maradona, his legendary predecessor in Argentina's number 10 shirt, had a forceful case for the best. The point of difference was always his World Cup triumph in Mexico 36 years ago - a triumph Messi did not have. It has now been removed.
Messi will always be in any conversation about the greatest, and the fact he now has the biggest honour the global game has to offer makes for a more powerful discussion as to his merits.
How do you even begin to tell the tale of how Messi reached his pinnacle? How do you recount events that eventually led to Argentina's World Cup win and the climax of a tournament that will have the name Lionel Messi attached to it forever?
• None Reaction to one of the most dramatic World Cup finals
• None World Cup Daily podcast: Argentina champions after 'best game ever'
Messi should have known, given his history of World Cup heartache and disappointment stretching back to 2006 and including a losing final to Germany at Rio's Maracana in 2014, that this was an honour which would not be won easily.
The fact that this spectacular night at Lusail Stadium contained so much suffering before Argentina and Messi hit the heights of their third World Cup win may make it even sweeter.
And it was all done in the face of brilliance from the 23-year-old who will, if he is not there already, join Messi in any debate about the sport's true elite in years to come: France's Kylian Mbappe.
France appeared to be rolling out the red carpet for Messi's coronation as they barely threatened for 80 minutes. Lusail was Messi's playground as he scored Argentina's opener from the penalty spot, making him the first player in World Cup history to score in the group stage, round of 16, quarter-final, semi-final and final in a single tournament.
Messi then helped to create Angel di Maria's second, the game taking a routine course with celebrations started among Argentina fans until the much-anticipated battle with Mbappe was joined in stunning fashion.
Mbappe pulled one back from the spot with 10 minutes left, then fired in a brilliant volley seconds later. Messi's smile that stretched across the giant screens in each corner of the stadium was one of "not again" disbelief.
• None 'Breathless, staggering and magnificent' - was final one of best ever?
Argentina coach Lionel Scaloni pulled off a masterstroke of selection with the inclusion of 34-year-old Di Maria, who ran Jules Kounde ragged, but then appeared to give way to fatal conservatism by taking him off with his side on top after 64 minutes for the workmanlike Marcos Acuna.
Messi, of course, pulled Argentina round with his second in extra time but France, revived from the earlier mediocrity, were level again through Mbappe's penalty.
In an atmosphere of near hysteria, Argentina keeper Emiliano Martinez saved with his foot from Randal Kolo Muani with the World Cup at his mercy in the closing seconds, although there was still time for Lautaro Martinez to head wide of an unguarded goal at the other end.
To say extra time was highly charged would be an understatement, with some fans even tearing their gaze away from the action, such was the unbearable tension.
Magnificently stressful, it went to penalties which Argentina won 4-2, a painful way to settle a game that will now be talked about whenever the World Cup is discussed.
When Gonzalo Montiel scored the decisive kick, Messi slumped to his knees in tears in the centre circle, arms raised to the heavens before he was buried under an avalanche of light blue and white striped shirts.
He then claimed a microphone to address Argentina's supporters amid scenes of celebratory mayhem.
Messi picked up the Golden Ball for player of the tournament, the first player to win it twice since it was introduced in 1982, after also winning the honour in 2014.
He has now been involved in 21 goals for Argentina at World Cups - 13 goals and eight assists, the most by any player for any nation. The goals in this World Cup final give him 793 in his career. He was also the first player to score in every round in the same men's World Cup tournament.
There was one statistic that mattered above all others on this night: Messi was a World Cup winner - at last.
He sat astride the figure-of-eight stage on which he had received the World Cup with his team, basking in the fact he can at last fill that one space in his trophy cabinet. It was a stage later filled with friends and family of the Argentina squad, their country now back on top of the football world for the first time since 1986.
Argentina's supporters stayed in their seats for well over an hour, going through the songbook that has been the soundtrack to their World Cup campaign, paying homage to the man they counted on. The man who had delivered.
The seismic shock of that opening loss to Saudi Arabia seemed an age away. It was Messi who got Argentina's World Cup into gear with a brilliant goal against Mexico and he was unstoppable as he carried it through to the finish.
Messi had the golden trophy in his hands. It was mission accomplished - a mission stretching back more than 16 years to when he came on as a scoring substitute in a 6-0 win over Serbia and Montenegro in Germany.
The final chapter of Messi's World Cup story was a thriller from first to last against France, with the plot taking so many twists. It delivered the perfect ending on a never to be forgotten night in Qatar.
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Stormont stalemate: MLAs' wages cut by £14,000 from January - BBC News
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2022-12-08
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Stormont's political stalemate is delaying a £600 energy payment to homes, suggests the NI secretary.
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Northern Ireland
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The cut will reduce annual incomes of Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) by 27.5%
Stormont's 90 assembly members will have their salaries cut by more than £14,000 from 1 January, Secretary of State Chris Heaton-Harris has said.
Further cuts may come if the political stalemate continues, he added.
Assembly members have not governed for 10 months due to a boycott by the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP).
Mr Heaton-Harris also told BBC News NI he could not confirm a date for a delayed £600 energy bill discount to be issued to Northern Ireland households.
He said the best way for this to be delivered was through a functioning power-sharing executive.
However, he insisted: "Everyone in Northern Ireland will get the complete payment before everybody in the rest of Great Britain."
In Great Britain, payments began being released in six monthly instalments from October.
Northern Ireland has been without a functioning government since February, when the DUP walked out of the executive in protest against the Northern Ireland Protocol.
Unionists argue the post-Brexit trading arrangement undermines Northern Ireland's position in the UK, as it keeps the nation aligned with some EU trade rules to ensure goods can move freely across the Irish land border.
A motion called on the DUP to end its boycott to help deal with the cost-of-living crisis, but the party again refused to vote for a new Speaker - a position that must be filled before any other business can be heard.
Earlier this week, Mr Heaton-Harris was granted new legal powers to cut by 27.5% the annual incomes of Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs).
The pay cut will reduce their salaries by £14,163 - from £51,500 to £37,337.
It will mean a cut of about £800 to their pay packet in January.
The lack of a functioning executive is complicating the delivery of a £600 energy support scheme
Mr Heaton-Harris said there was a strong argument to keep the matter under review.
"I've asked my officials to give me some more legal basis and check if they can do more," he told BBC News NI.
"People will also have seen that when this was being debated in the House of Commons, there was a big push to go further so I'm going to keep it under review."
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Chris Heaton-Harris says MLAs' pay will stay under a review after a 27% cut in January
Asked if he was doing enough to try to restore power sharing, the secretary of state said he would convene talks with the parties next week.
It will be the first series of round-table discussions he has held since taking on the job in September.
"I'm putting as much pressure on all parties to go back into the executive, and I do that whenever I see them, and I see them a lot," he said.
"I'm talking to the parties all the time but they could do this themselves."
Mr Heaton-Harris also confirmed the government was "taking soundings" on whether to change the date of next year's scheduled local government election.
The election is due to happen on 4 May, but there have been calls to move it so that the counting of votes does not clash with the coronation of King Charles III, which is happening two days later.
In a letter to all MLAs on Thursday, the secretary of state said he was also increasing the required number of days they must attend Stormont in order to claim travel allowances.
He said it will increase from a minimum of 72 days to 100 with effect from 1 April.
For each working day less than this that an MLA attends the assembly the allowance will be cut by 1%.
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NI state papers: Flying union flag shows 'patriotic exuberance' - BBC News
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2022-12-08
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Almost 500 internal Northern Ireland Office memos from the 1990s are now online for the first time.
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Northern Ireland
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Northern Ireland Office officials were debating flag policies in the 1990s, archived memos reveal
An end to flying the union flag from government buildings on 12 July would "redress the effects of patriotic exuberance" by a unionist government in NI, a government memo from 1994 says.
The note is among almost 500 documents from the 1990s now published online.
In it, Northern Ireland Office (NIO) officials were debating whether to bring government flag policy into line with that in England and Wales.
The files were previously available at the Public Record Office of NI (PRONI).
Another memo notes that "only one (Irish) chair had been smashed up by a guest in the early hours" at a St Patrick's Day party for Irish and British diplomats.
The documents are available on the Conflict Archive on the Internet (CAIN) website, as part of a partnership between PRONI and Ulster University.
At one point, it had been under threat of closure but its future was secured by new funding in 2021.
The decision to fly the union flag on government buildings on the Twelfth had originally been taken by the Northern Ireland cabinet in April 1933.
In 1994, both the IRA and Combined Loyalist Military Command (CLMC) declared ceasefires.
It was in that context that NIO officials debated whether the policy on flying the union flag should change.
They also considered some designs for a new Northern Ireland flag suggested by an academic called Dr Martin Ball.
An artistic impression of the "proposed new flag for Northern Ireland" based on a design suggested in the 1995 memo
"There is much to be said for an early initiative to demonstrate government's readiness to grasp the nettle of identity issues rather than appearing to concede to pressure from Sinn Féin at a later stage," one NIO memo stated.
"Regrettably, the union flag lacks in Northern Ireland the politically neutral connotations which it enjoys in the rest of the United Kingdom.
"However, any decision to remove 12 July from the list of prescribed days - even though the day itself would continue to be a bank and public holiday - may be expected to provoke some strong unionist reaction.
"The day is redolent with unionist political overtones and the delisting of it for flag-flying purposes would be interpreted as a dissociation by the state from the unionist tradition."
Another memo also warned that not flying the union flag on government buildings on 12 July "would undoubtedly provoke unionist ire".
Another official, though, asked: "Is this what we want? Now?
"Surely there are better arguments than to say we are kicking unionists before Sinn Féin ask us to?"
An artistic impression of the "South African-style proposal" which was among the suggestions for a new NI flag in the 1995 memo
Nevertheless, the writer of that memo, an official called PN Bell, said the move was a "courageous (in the 'yes, minister' sense) proposal".
"Slán agus beannacht," he signed off his memo, an Irish-language phrase often translated as goodbye and God bless.
In the event, the Flags (Northern Ireland) Order 2000 eventually brought official flag-flying in Northern Ireland more closely into line with the rest of the UK with little fanfare or protest.
However, there were widespread loyalist protests following a later decision by Belfast City Council in 2012 to fly the union flag at City Hall only on designated days.
A vote to reduce flag-flying at Belfast City Hall led to protest marches and rallies in 2012
A later memo from March 1997 lauds the success of a St Patrick's Day reception held for NIO and Irish government officials at the Anglo-Irish Secretariat building outside Belfast.
"The Irish side reckoned that, although the numbers were slightly down on the last Christmas reception, approximately 250 people had attended, and only one (Irish) chair had been smashed up by a guest in the early hours," it recorded.
Other NIO memos from the time include the government's responses to Orange Order requests for "confidence-building measures", including that the Order was "a cultural group worthy of funding on the same scale as Gaelic language groups, Gaelic schools, Gaelic Athletic Association etc".
"By and large, the requests cannot be met to any great extent," the NIO memo stated.
Many of the state papers reflect the run-up to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998 and the politics of the time.
But some now published online reflect other events.
For instance, minutes of a meeting between the then secretary of state Peter Brooke and Catholic bishops in 1989 reflected the bishops' concern that education reform would favour integrated schools over Catholic schools.
There is also a letter from the former owner of Harrods department store Mohamed Al-Fayed to the former Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) MLA Sir John Gorman.
Sir John was the chair of the Northern Ireland Forum for Political Dialogue, a body set up in 1996 to try to bring politicians together before the Good Friday Agreement.
Sir John had written to Mr Al-Fayed to offer condolences after his son Dodi was killed alongside Diana, Princess of Wales, and their driver in a car crash in Paris in 1997.
A tribute to the late Princess Diana and Dodi Al-Fayed was erected in Harrods in the late 1990s
"Dodi was always kind, gentle and decent," Mr Al-Fayed wrote in reply.
"The whole family loved Princess Diana but Dodi cherished her friendship more dearly than his own existence.
"As his father, of course I think he was special.
"But I am sure that a wonderful woman like Princess Diana, with that unique star-bright quality, would never have given her affection to anyone outside that part of the heavens that is set aside for the truly exceptional.
"I take some comfort from my absolute belief that God has taken their souls to live together in paradise."
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Whitehaven coal mine: An almighty row only just beginning - BBC News
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2022-12-08
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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After months of ministerial prevarication a decision has been made, but the arguments will go on.
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UK Politics
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The former Marchon chemical works on the outskirts of Whitehaven is the site of the proposed mine
Governing is about difficult choices; confronting seemingly irreconcilable demands - and making a decision.
So here's the scenario: Coal that is used to make steel is under the Irish Sea off the west Cumbrian coast, one of England's most isolated spots, desperate to attract more private sector jobs, particularly ones that pay well and have a future.
The government is committed to what it calls levelling up, and has won seats in the area long held by Labour.
The government is also committed to being a champion of tackling climate change, and was wrestling with this decision about the coal mine at exactly the same time as hosting the COP climate summit in Glasgow a year ago.
And saying yes then, however comfortable they are with their arguments for doing so, would have looked… awkward.
Well, another climate summit, the recent one in Egypt, has come and gone while ministers have been making their minds up on what to do in Whitehaven.
They asked the Planning Inspectorate to take a look at the whole idea.
Meanwhile, war in Ukraine broke out.
Until then, 40% of the coal needed to make steel in the UK, metallurgical coal, the stuff this new mine will dig up, came from, you guessed it: Russia.
Since then, alternative suppliers have been found, but nonetheless the issue of energy security is a salient one.
Meanwhile plenty are saying it is bonkers to be digging coal out of the ground in 2022, let alone opening a brand new mine to do so.
How on earth do you incentivise finding alternative ways of making steel if you carry on relying on the black stuff?
So, you're the minister, what do you do?
Well, prevaricate — and they did.
And every expectation it will be appealed.
Labour say it proves Rishi Sunak is a "fossil fuel prime minister in a renewable age."
But would a Labour government shut the mine or stop it opening in a part of the world they are desperate to win back?
The government is arguing their decision is in keeping with their emissions obligations because the alternative would be importing the coal, and alternatives to using coal are a long way off.
And plenty of people in west Cumbria are delighted.
But not before an almighty row that is only just beginning.
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Cumbria coal mine proposal is indefensible, says UK climate chief - BBC News
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2022-12-08
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Lord Deben says a new coal mine in Cumbria will "not contribute anything to domestic needs".
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Cumbria
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West Cumbria Mining says the scheme would bring about 500 jobs to the Whitehaven area
A proposed new coal mine in Cumbria has been branded "absolutely indefensible" by the chairman of the government's official advisors on climate change.
Lord Deben, chair of the Climate Change Committee (CCC), was speaking at the launch of the annual report on the UK's progress in tackling greenhouse gases.
A decision on planning permission for the mine near Whitehaven to source coal for steel-making is expected soon.
Environmentalists have warned that demand for coking coal is declining.
Lord Deben, who leads the independent advisory committee, said Russia's invasion of Ukraine meant the government should be looking to protect energy supplies.
He acknowledged that the UK had done so with a focus on renewables and nuclear.
"As far as the coal mine in Cumbria is concerned, let's be absolutely clear, it is absolutely indefensible," he said.
"First of all, 80% of what it produces will be exported, so it is not something largely for internal consumption.
"It is not going to contribute anything to our domestic needs in the terms we're talking about, the cost of energy and the rest."
He said the mine's backers claimed it would provide metallurgical coal, which is currently imported, but it would not reduce the amount of coal being produced - largely in the USA.
During Prime Minister's Questions on 22 June, Boris Johnson appeared to hint that the mine may be given the go-ahead when he said that "plainly it makes no sense to be importing coal, particularly for metallurgical purposes, when we have our own domestic resources."
The mine was approved by Cumbria County Council in October 2020, but the decision was suspended weeks later following guidance from the CCC and then the Planning Inspectorate was tasked with examining the arguments.
Its report was handed to the government earlier this year and a deadline of 7 July was set for a decision by the Communities Secretary Michael Gove.
Woodhouse Colliery could be the UK's first new deep mine for three decades
However, Lord Deben warned its approval would damage the UK's leadership on climate change and "create another example of Britain saying one thing and doing another".
He said the government should find a way of ensuring the jobs that might have been created by the mine be replaced by alternative green jobs.
Lord Deben said he was not concerned about keeping a coal-fired power plant open longer than planned this winter to shore up energy supplies, despite a commitment to end UK coal power by October 2024.
"We are under serious threat because of the invasion of Ukraine by the Russians, and in those circumstances the government has to make sure that we keep the lights on," he added.
Friends of the Earth energy campaigner Tony Bosworth said Lord Deben was "right" and the case against a new coal mine was "overwhelming in climate terms".
He said the "market for its coal is declining before it even opens", adding: "Saying no to this mine should an open-and-shut case for a government serious about the climate crisis."
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Labour promise biggest ever transfer of powers - BBC News
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2022-12-05
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Sir Keir Starmer says sweeping constitutional change would free up £200m a year and restructure the economy.
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UK Politics
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Watch: The Labour leader says the first five years of a Labour government would see the House of Lords abolished
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has promised "the biggest ever transfer of power from Westminster to the British people" if elected.
Labour published a report on Monday by former prime minister Gordon Brown setting out plans for sweeping constitutional change, including abolishing the House of Lords.
The plans would release £200m a year and change the economy, Sir Keir said.
He called the reforms an end to short-term "sticking plaster politics".
Sir Keir told BBC Breakfast the unelected second chamber was "indefensible", and added that a Labour government would abolish it and replace it with an elected body "with a strong mission" - but did not provide an exact timeframe.
"I'm very keen that all of the recommendations in the report are carried out as quickly as possible," he said, adding the proposals could be implemented within five years of a Labour administration.
The report, entitled A New Britain, put forward 40 recommendations, including proposals for handing new economic powers to English mayors, local authorities and devolved governments.
Sir Keir said he commissioned the report "because I profoundly think that the fact we hold too much power in Whitehall is holding us back, not only politically - with people feeling more distant form politics - but economically".
"Amongst the reasons we have failed to grow our economy in the last 12 years is we're not allowing every part of the UK to play its part economically," he told the BBC.
Keir Starmer is making a big pledge: a massive transfer of power away from London to the rest of the UK.
Is it the biggest priority facing the country? Not everyone will think so. But Labour is adamant it is a way of making sure better decisions are made that work for local people in different parts of the UK.
Gordon Brown has been working on this report for two years. It's a chunky read and there is a lot in there.
At the moment though, Labour isn't endorsing everything. It's a direction of travel, Sir Keir says, but he wants to now go away and discuss the detail and a timetable.
Will it actually happen? Scrapping the Lords has been on Labour's agenda for quite some time. Some are sceptical it is the best use of time for a new Labour Govt, if there is one.
But the hope in the Labour party is this starts a process that will end in a rewiring of the UK's political system.
The report argues the "continuing over-concentration of power in Westminster and Whitehall is undermining our ability to deliver growth and prosperity for the whole country", creating a "vicious circle".
One of its most eye-catching recommendations is the proposal to scrap the Lords, but other recommendations include:
The government is "doing a great deal to devolve power to local areas" and has relocated "thousands of jobs", the prime minister's official spokesperson said.
Responding to Labours plans to restrict second jobs for MPs, the prime minister's spokesman said "outside interests and experience outside Westminster can bring benefits".
Labour is expected to confirm the plans in the next manifesto
The size and role of the Lords has come under scrutiny in recent years, amid warnings that unelected membership has grown excessive, with about 800 sitting members.
The Observer reported last month that Sir Keir told Labour peers part of the argument for reform was the public having "lost faith in the ability of politicians and politics to bring about change".
However, Labour peer Lord Mandelson warned that, without agreement from other parties, Labour's plans risked dragging the party into a "quagmire of disagreement".
"It's going to soak up acres of time and energy, which, frankly, a Labour government would be better devoting to other priorities and other needs in the country," he told BBC Newsnight.
"Don't imagine that you're going to be able to pull it off simply by the Labour Party agreeing with itself and imposing some outcome on everyone else."
Director of the Institute for Government, Dr Hannah White, said the plans were "certainly ambitious".
"It would require the House of Lords to agree to itself being abolished or at least significantly reformed," she said.
"We have had multiple efforts in the past to reform the House of Lords in the past which have fallen foul of the politics, which have failed to achieve consensus."
Speaking to Times Radio, Conservative peer Lord Norton argued the Lords should remain unelected and urged caution over "Big Bang reform".
He said the "detailed legislative scrutiny" done by the Lords "improves the law of this country".
Former Cabinet minister, Tory MP Simon Clarke criticised the move, saying: "Anyone who has looked at the institutionalised gridlock in US politics can see the utter stupidity it would be to create an elected upper house."
But Labour sources insist the party remains committed to abolishing the Lords.
The party will consult on the report's proposals and the timeframe in which they can be delivered before deciding whether to put them in its next election manifesto.
One Labour source said "everything in our manifesto we will seek to deliver in a parliamentary term".
The report comes as Labour enjoys a handsome lead in the polls over the Conservatives, who lost a by-election in Chester by a large margin this week.
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England: 'A brutal outcome as Three Lions exit feels even more painful' - BBC Sport
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2022-12-11
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As England exit the World Cup at the quarter-final stage, BBC Sport's Phil McNulty says this loss feels even more painful than those of previous tournaments.
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Host nation:Dates: Coverage: Live on BBC TV, BBC iPlayer, BBC Radio 5 Live, BBC Sounds and the BBC Sport website and app.
England manager Gareth Southgate and his players nursed a familiar sense of missed opportunity as that elusive major tournament triumph escaped them once more.
Watching the post-match scene at the Al Bayt Stadium brought flashbacks - to the World Cup semi-final defeat against Croatia in Moscow in 2018, to the European Championship final loss to Italy at Wembley 16 months ago.
Amid the pain of their latest defeat, Southgate offered consolation to devastated England players who inspired hope, only to see potential glory wrenched from their grasp.
A 2-1 World Cup quarter-final loss to holders France, here in Qatar, was a brutal outcome. England's display deserved at least to drag the game into extra time.
Perhaps this is why it felt different, even more painful, for England this time. A genuine opportunity to win this World Cup had opened up for Southgate's team, an emerging blend of youth and experience.
• None Anguish for Kane on night he equals England scoring record
• None Fifa World Cup: Schedule and route to the final
The prize for the winners here was a semi-final against Morocco. And for all the World Cup surprise packages have to offer, their brilliant defending and potent counter-attacking style, England would have gone into that match as hot favourites to make next weekend's final in Lusail.
This is why Southgate clasped Harry Kane's face in his hands and offered words of consolation; the captain's uncharacteristically wild late penalty had been England's best chance to force extra time.
Kane's tearful expression revealed what a cruel game this can be; his was the face of a man shouldering the responsibility after giving England so much. Goalkeeper Jordan Pickford made his way down the length of the pitch to offer more comfort to the desolate captain.
The old question will be asked as to why England cannot force their way past elite opposition at major tournaments. But on this occasion, at least, there can be no complaints about the approach.
Southgate spoke of "fine margins" - and they proved decisive. One team took their chances and the other could not. England had no cause for reproach about their efforts.
In the past, England have been justifiably criticised for timid World Cup and Euro exits, and Southgate has not been immune from that - but this was not the case here.
Southgate, who gazed to the skies in disappoinment at the final whistle, refused to alter his line-up or formation, or opt for conservatism in an attempt to combat Kylian Mbappe. France's superstar always carried the hint of menace but England managed to keep him relatively subdued.
England had the majority of the chances but fell foul to France's more clinical finishing, accompanied by some justified frustration with Brazilian referee Wilton Sampaio.
The official appeared to miss two fouls on Bukayo Saka by Dayot Upamecano in the build-up to Aurelien Tchouameni's 17th-minute strike, the start of an erratic display, but England were deservedly level shortly after the break when Kane rammed a spot-kick past Tottenham team-mate Hugo Lloris after a foul on Saka.
England had the force with them and Harry Maguire's header glanced the outside of the post. So near.
While they could not beat Lloris, danger lurked. And so it proved when 36-year-old Olivier Giroud, having just been denied superbly by Pickford, stole in ahead of Harry Maguire to head in Antoine Griezmann's cross with only 12 minutes left.
And then came Kane's penalty miss.
England have suffered penalty pain before in World Cups and Euros. Here it was again, only in a different form - inside the regulation 90 minutes instead of in a shootout.
Was it the fact it was a second penalty against a keeper who knows him so well? Was it simply the pressure of the situation, even for such a consummate penalty expert? Whatever the reason, Kane's penalty was awful, skied into disbelieving England fans behind the goal.
It was all over. England were coming home early again.
So how will this campaign be reflected upon?
The irony is that while a quarter-final exit represents a regression from the last-four place achieved in 2018, this squad carries much more promise for the future than the one in Russia.
Saka and Declan Rice were truly outstanding and while Bellingham and Phil Foden were not as influential as in previous games, especially against Senegal, this quartet will be an integral part of England's long-term future.
The arguments will be pushed forward that England won against those they should have beaten and lost to the first elite team they met but this was a different performance to those that have fallen into that category before. Southgate's team were not hiding behind the door here. They were the primary attacking force. Their fault was a failure to take chances.
Kane's penalty was the decisive moment. This was a night when it was not to be for this high-class striker. He was denied twice by Lloris in the first half, once at his feet and then again from a deflected long-range effort. He may be level with Rooney's record but history must wait for another day.
England were impressive against Iran, Wales and Senegal but drab against the USA. Their 13 goals came from eight different players. It was their highest number at a World Cup.
Sadly, other statistics do not make as comfortable reading.
England have been knocked out of the World Cup quarter-finals seven times, more than any other country. Kane's penalty record for his country is not perfect - 17 conversions from 21. What he and England would have given for that to read 18.
There are elements of a bright future for England - but will their manager be part of it?
The Football Association would like Southgate to serve every day of the contract that takes him to December 2024 but ultimately the decision rests with him. Will he feel a three-tournament span is enough? Will he want another crack at club management?
He was keeping his counsel as he told BBC Sport: "These tournaments take a lot out of you and I need a bit of time to reflect. We've done that after every tournament and I think that's the right thing to do."
Once again, England and Southgate will be reflecting on what might have been, as a very good chance to win the World Cup slipped agonisingly through their clutches.
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Timeline: Lockerbie bombing - BBC News
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2022-12-11
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Key moments in the story of the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie in 1998.
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Scotland
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A Libyan man accused of making the bomb which destroyed Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie has been taken into United States custody.
The explosion on board the Boeing 747 on 21 December 1988 left 270 people dead, making it the deadliest terrorist incident to have taken place on British soil.
Another Libyan, Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, is the only man ever convicted in connection with the atrocity.
He was found guilty of the murders in 2001, but always protested his innocence. He died in 2012 after being allowed to return home when it emerged that he had terminal cancer.
Here is a timeline of the key developments in the case.
Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi and Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah were accused of carrying out the bombing
21 December 1988: Pan Am Flight 103 from London to New York explodes 31,000 feet over Lockerbie, 38 minutes after take-off from London.
The 259 people on board the Boeing 747 are killed, along with 11 people on the ground.
13 November 1991: US and British investigators indict Libyans Abdelbaset al-Megrahi and Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah on 270 counts of murder, conspiracy to murder and violating Britain's 1982 Aviation Security Act.
The men were accused of being Libyan intelligence agents.
15 April 1992: The UN Security Council imposes sanctions on air travel and arms sales over Libya's refusal to hand the suspects over for trial in a Scottish court.
August 1998: Britain and the United States propose trying the suspects in the Netherlands under Scottish law.
5 April 1999: The suspects are taken into Dutch custody after flying from Tripoli to an airbase near the Hague and are formally charged with the bombing. UN sanctions against Libya are suspended as agreed.
The Scottish court at Camp Zeist in the Netherlands
3 May 2000: The trial of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, 48, and Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah, 44, opens at Camp Zeist, a specially convened Scottish court sitting in the Netherlands. Both of the accused deny murder.
31 January 2001: Megrahi is found guilty of murder after the historic trial under Scottish law in the Netherlands.
The judges recommend a minimum of 20 years "in view of the horrendous nature of this crime".
Megrahi's co-accused, Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah, is found not guilty and told he is free to return home.
14 March 2002: Megrahi loses his appeal against the conviction.
15 March 2002: Megrahi spends his first night at a prison in Glasgow after being flown by helicopter to HMP Barlinnie.
14 August 2003: Lawyers acting for families of the Lockerbie bombing victims say they have reached agreement with Libya on the payment of compensation.
The deal to set up a $2.7bn (£1.7bn) fund was struck with Libyan officials after negotiations in London.
24 November 2003: Megrahi is told he must serve at least 27 years in jail.
His sentence was increased after a change in the law meant he had to again come before the Scottish courts so that the punishment period could be set.
28 June 2007: The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission, which has been investigating the case since 2003, recommends Megrahi is granted a second appeal against his conviction.
21 October 2008: Megrahi's lawyer reveals the 56-year-old former Libyan intelligence agent has been diagnosed with "advanced stage" prostate cancer.
31 October 2008: The father of one of the victims of the Lockerbie bombing reiterates his call for Megrahi to be released.
Jim Swire, whose daughter was killed, criticised the slow appeal process faced by the man convicted of the attack and said the question of whether Megrahi should be released was one of "common humanity".
14 November 2008: A court rules that Megrahi will remain in jail while he appeals against his conviction.
25 July 2009: Megrahi asks to be released from jail on compassionate grounds due to his illness.
18 August 2009: Judges accept an application by the Lockerbie bomber to drop his second appeal against conviction.
The permission of the High Court in Edinburgh was required before the proceedings could be formally abandoned.
Megrahi was met on his return to Libya by Muammar Gaddafi's son Seif al-Islam
20 August 2009: The Scottish government releases Megrahi on compassionate grounds. He returns home to Libya aboard a jet belonging to Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
24 August 2009: The Scottish Parliament is recalled to discuss the release of the Lockerbie bomber.
Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill faces questioning from MSPs over his decision but says he stands by his decision and will "live with the consequences".
29 August 2011: Megrahi falls into a coma at his Tripoli home with CNN reporting he appeared to be "at death's door".
20 October 2011: Libyan leader Colonel Gaddafi is overthrown by an uprising in Libya, and is killed by rebels.
20 May 2012: Abdelbaset al-Megrahi dies at his home in Tripoli, aged 60.
Eleven people were killed on the ground in Lockerbie
20 December 2014: Scotland's top prosecutor, Lord Advocate Frank Mulholland, reaffirms his belief that Megrahi is guilty of the Lockerbie bombing and says no Crown Office investigator or prosecutor ever raised concerns about the evidence used to convict him.
He also pledges to continue tracking down Megrahi's accomplices.
3 July 2015: Scottish judges rule that relatives of the Lockerbie bombing victims should not be allowed to pursue an appeal on Megrahi's behalf. Courts had previously ruled that only next of kin could proceed with a posthumous application.
4 July 2017: The family of Lockerbie bomber Megrahi lodges a new bid to appeal against his conviction, five years after his death.
11 March 2020: The Scottish Criminal Case Review Commissionrules that there can be a fresh appeal and refers the case to the High Court of Justiciary.
The commission says it considered six grounds of review and concluded that a miscarriage of justice may have occurred by reason of "unreasonable verdict" and "non-disclosure".
The family of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi attenpted to appeal against his conviction
22 December 2020: On the 32nd anniversary of the atrocity, the US announces it has filed charges against a Libyan suspected of making the bomb.
Attorney General William Barr says Abu Agila Mohammad Masud was accused of terrorism-related crimes.
15 January 2021: Scottish judges reject the appeal from the family of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi as the Court of Criminal Appeal upholds the verdict of the original trial.
The court rejected the argument that the original trial had come to a verdict that no reasonable court could have reached.
11 December 2022: It emerges that Abu Agila Mohammad Masud, the Libyan man accused of making the bomb which destroyed Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, is in United States custody.
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Strikes: Will the clash between workers and firms ever end? - BBC News
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2022-12-11
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Millions of workers across the public and private sector are demanding higher pay rises as prices soar.
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Business
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In all my years covering business, I've never witnessed a collision between workers and employers like this.
This winter is seeing one of the highest levels of walkouts in recent memory as millions of workers across both the public and private sector are demanding higher pay rises to match the soaring cost of living.
More than one million working days will be lost to strike action by the end of December, according to projections by the Financial Times. The next three weeks running up to the New Year resemble an advent calendar of disruption as nurses, transport workers, postal workers, baggage handlers and others have scheduled strikes.
The stoppages are disrupting people's daily lives but also hitting businesses that rely on commuters for most of their sales. The boss of pub chain Fuller's recently told the BBC rail strikes could hit trade in the "vital" Christmas period and see customers cancel parties and staff lose out on tips.
The collision course between workers and employers is not hard to understand. Rates of pay growth in both the public and private sector have been outstripped by the rising cost of living, meaning most workers are getting poorer every day.
The cost of living is currently rising at its fastest rate in almost 40 years, largely due to the war in Ukraine and the fallout of the pandemic.
Energy and food prices have shot up, leaving many people struggling to pay their bills.
In fact, this year has seen the sharpest fall in living standards on record. Public sector workers have been hardest hit with an average annual basic pay rise of 2.2% languishing miles behind inflation, the rate at which prices rise, of 11.1%. Those on lower incomes have felt the impact the most as they spend more of their take-home pay on heating and food, which have seen some of the most eye-watering rises.
Public sector workers tend to benefit from greater job security and more generous pension arrangements but that may feel like little comfort when paying bills here and now.
Private sector employers have also been squeezed as the same rampant inflation pushing up their costs has also emptied the pockets of their customers leaving reduced room to afford staff pay rises.
ManpowerGroup, one of the UK's biggest recruiters, told the BBC that the gap between wages and prices was "putting more and more pressure on households".
But when the employer is the government and the staff are in critical public services delivery - as with nurses and ambulance workers - the social and political stakes are high.
The government has two arguments as to why it can't award inflation-matching pay rises.
The first is that it would be unaffordable. Government debt as a percentage of national income at 97.5% is already near its highest level since the 1960s and is expected to increase over the next two years as the government is expected to spend more than it receives in tax for the foreseeable future.
Health Secretary Steve Barclay said this week that the cost of offering all public sector workers an inflation-matching pay rise would be £28bn - roughly half the entire defence budget. However, IFS analysis suggests the figure would be closer to £18bn.
Although that is still a significant amount of expenditure, the government would expect to recoup about 30% of that in higher tax and National Insurance payments from those higher pay packets.
It would still push up government borrowing, but the UK has one of the lowest debt burdens in the G7 group of leading global economies, based on data from the International Monetary Fund, so arguably has room to accommodate a bit more spending.
The government's second argument is that putting more money into people's pockets could keep inflation higher for longer. This would make everyone worse off over time and increase the pressure on the Bank of England to use its powers to dampen price rises by raising interest rates, which affects borrowing costs for consumers, homeowners and businesses.
All of these many disputes are different and short of offering everyone an inflation-matching (and potentially inflation-stoking) pay rise, there is no simple solution. One worker's frustration at their falling standard of living is another person's frustration at the disruption that looks set to dominate the Christmas headlines.
How are you and your family affected by the strikes? Share your experiences by emailing haveyoursay@bbc.co.uk.
Please include a contact number if you are willing to speak to a BBC journalist. You can also get in touch in the following ways:
If you are reading this page and can't see the form you will need to visit the mobile version of the BBC website to submit your question or comment or you can email us at HaveYourSay@bbc.co.uk. Please include your name, age and location with any submission.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-63910573
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Ana de Armas fans told they can sue over Yesterday trailer - BBC News
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2022-12-23
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Two fans complained after the actress was cut from a film despite featuring in the trailer.
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Entertainment & Arts
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Ana de Armas featured in the trailer for Yesterday, but was cut from the final film
Film studio Universal can be sued for false advertising after fans complained a movie trailer was misleading, a US judge has ruled.
Two fans of the actress Ana de Armas filed a lawsuit in January after renting the 2019 film Yesterday.
The actress was seen in the trailer, but the pair were disappointed to find she had been cut from the final film.
The plaintiffs, Conor Woulfe and Peter Michael Rosza, each paid $3.99 (£3.31) to rent Yesterday on Amazon Prime.
Woulfe and Rosza are seeking at least $5 million (£4.1m) from Universal in the case, which has been filed as a class action on behalf of other disappointed fans.
The pair argued they would not have paid the money to rent the film if they had known the actress did not feature in it.
California US district judge Stephen Wilson ruled that their legal action can go ahead.
Yesterday starred Ed Sheeran, Lily James and Himesh Patel (pictured at the film's London premiere)
Universal, the studio behind the film, sought to throw out the lawsuit, arguing that movie trailers are entitled to broad protection under the First Amendment, which protects free speech rights and the press.
The studio's lawyers argued that a trailer is an "artistic, expressive work" that tells a three-minute story conveying the theme of the movie, and should therefore be considered "non-commercial" speech.
But the judge rejected that argument, ruling that a trailer is commercial speech and is subject to the California False Adverting Law and the state's Unfair Competition Law.
"Universal is correct that trailers involve some creativity and editorial discretion, but this creativity does not outweigh the commercial nature of a trailer," Wilson wrote in his ruling.
"At its core, a trailer is an advertisement designed to sell a movie by providing consumers with a preview of the movie."
In their briefing on the issue, Universal's lawyers argued that it is not unusual for movie trailers to feature clips that do not appear in the finished film.
They referred to Jurassic Park, another Universal film, one trailer for which they said was comprised entirely of footage that is not in the movie.
Ana de Armas featured in the trailer for Yesterday, but was cut from the final film
Universal also argued that classifying trailers as "commercial speech" could open the door to many more lawsuits from dissatisfied filmgoers, who could make a subjective claim that a film did not live up to the expectations created by the trailer.
Wilson sought to address that concern, saying the false advertising law applies only when a "significant portion" of "reasonable consumers" could be misled.
The judge said the court's holding was limited to cases where an actor or scene from the trailer does not feature in the finished film.
In the case of the Yesterday trailer, he said, it was plausible that viewers would expect de Armas to have a significant role in the film.
De Armas, a Cuban-Spanish actress who starred in Knives Out, was originally set to appear as a love interest for the film's protagonist, played by Himesh Patel.
Patel's character was to have met her on the set of James Corden's talk show, where Patel would serenade her with the Beatles song Something. Some footage of these scenes featured in the trailer.
Patel (pictured in the film with Sheeran) played Jack Malik, who uses The Beatles' songs to find fame and fortune
Richard Curtis, the screenwriter, explained that de Armas was cut because audiences did not like the idea of Patel's character straying from his primary love interest, played by Lily James.
In 2019, he said it had been a "very traumatic cut", because de Armas was "brilliant" in the role.
Yesterday tells the story of a young man who wakes up after a bicycle crash to find nobody on earth seems to remember The Beatles.
He goes on to find fame and fortune by performing the songs himself, and faces a moral dilemma when he is credited as the writer.
Woulfe and Rosza's lawsuit will now proceed to discovery and a motion for class certification.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-64076747
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news_entertainment-arts-64076747
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Far-right groups had racism rift before Capitol riot - BBC News
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2022-12-23
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The Oath Keepers and Proud Boys had a shared love of Donald Trump, but not so much for each other.
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US & Canada
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Proud Boy Enrique Tarrio said his group didn't like the far-right Oath Keepers militia
Infighting among some of America's most well-known far-right groups was revealed in a series of transcripts released by the congressional committee investigating the 6 January 2021 Capitol riot.
They had a shared love of Donald Trump, but not so much for each other.
Oath Keepers and Proud Boys were among those who gathered at the Capitol that day, but leaders of the two groups criticised each other in sworn testimony.
Their disagreements revolved around the involvement of white nationalists in groups and protest movements in the years before the riot.
Although many of former President Donald Trump's most fervent far-right supporters refused to engage with the committee, citing constitutional protections against self-incrimination, Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes answered a number of questions over hours of testimony earlier this year.
He said his group defended peaceful protesters and aided people of many different backgrounds. During protests in Berkeley, California, in 2017, when right-wing protesters clashed with anti-fascist groups, he said he told white nationalists to "take a hike".
"We would not let them in," he told the committee. "They could not get their moment of fame."
Contrasting Oath Keepers with Proud Boys, he said members of his group were "quiet professionals". And he accused Proud Boys of failing to adequately vet its members.
"Look, I don't believe the Proud Boys are white nationalists," he told investigators. "I think they've been sloppy and let white nationalists infiltrate their group."
Enrique Tarrio, a Florida man of Afro-Cuban ancestry who led the Proud Boys at the time of the riot, was also subpoenaed by the committee and described an argument that he had with Rhodes.
"I didn't like Stewart Rhodes. I still don't like Stewart Rhodes," he said during testimony.
Stewart Rhodes faces decades in jail after being convicted for his role in the Capitol riot
The animosity between the two stems from a 2019 demonstration in Portland, Oregon, one of a number of far-right protests in the city. Oath Keepers were providing security for the event, but Rhodes says he heard that a white nationalist was part of the group, and he pulled his members out. Mr Tarrio was furious.
"After that event in Portland, I didn't want to… have anything to do with Oath Keepers or militias or anything like that," Mr Tarrio told the investigators.
The pair were shown in video footage meeting in an underground car park on the night before the Capitol riot, but Mr Tarrio said he only shook hands with Rhodes to be polite.
Rhodes was convicted of seditious conspiracy and other charges related to the Capitol riot last month, and faces a lengthy jail sentence. Mr Tarrio is currently on trial for seditious conspiracy and other charges. He was not in Washington on 6 January 2021, but prosecutors allege he was directing Proud Boys from nearby Maryland.
Megan Squire, deputy director of data analytics at the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Project, says that fractious relations are common among extremist groups.
"These groups devolve into infighting, mismanagement and bickering more than they stay together," she says.
Since the riot, increased scrutiny and criminal cases have hampered some of the country's most well-known far-right organisations.
"On the whole, it's not been a great year for these groups," Squire says.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-64071724
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World Cup 2022: 'England's only problems right now are good ones' - BBC Sport
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2022-12-01
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Teams will be wondering how they can stop England - the World Cup's top scorers - following their impressive passage to the knockout stages, says Alan Shearer.
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Host nation:Dates: Coverage: Live on BBC TV, BBC iPlayer, BBC Radio 5 Live, BBC Radio Wales, BBC Radio Cymru, BBC Sounds and the BBC Sport website and app.
This World Cup is only just getting started, but England are where we want them to be - comfortably into the last 16, and the only problems Gareth Southgate has right now are good ones.
It gets everyone buzzing when we play like we did in the second half against Wales. Yes, there are bigger tests to come, but let's enjoy a good performance which sets us up perfectly for Sunday, and Senegal.
We talk about different sides having an identity, and that was a great example of what I want England's identity to be: we had a high press, lots of energy and we were on the front foot.
That won't work in every game, but we are a much better team when we play that way.
We looked lively in the forward positions and our midfield was strong, plus the defence did whatever was asked of them - the same as in each of our three games in Group B.
The team are full of belief, which is great to see, and we look like we are in a good place in every way.
I am happy with what I've seen - and excited about what is to come.
It is fantastic for Southgate that he has so many options in our frontline, and choosing who should play is a nice problem to have.
We have got lots of attacking talent, so when any of them get an opportunity in this England team, they have to make the most of it.
When Southgate brought in Phil Foden and Marcus Rashford for the Wales game, he was basically saying 'Over to you, I want to see what you can do'.
They certainly showed him that.
There are still arguments for Raheem Sterling and Bukayo Saka to play, and Jack Grealish too, but I would expect Foden and Rashford to start against Senegal on Sunday too - they definitely did enough.
Both Rashford's goals were fantastic and I am so pleased Foden got on the scoresheet too. Lots of people, including myself, were shouting for him to play and he justified that with his performance.
Southgate got some big calls right too
I am delighted for Southgate that his decisions came off.
He gets plenty of stick for not making the right tactical or selection decisions, or using the right substitutes at the correct time, so we have to give him credit for being spot on against Wales.
He not only brought Foden and Rashford in on the flanks, but at half-time he decided to switch their positions around and it made a big difference - they looked happier like that, and they got our goals.
It was not just Southgate's selection that worked, though. It was his tactics too.
We were measured and mature in the first half, but we upped the tempo after the break and got our reward. Once we went 1-0 up, the game was over, and it was just a question of how many we would get.
This win was not down to individuals; the balance of the whole team was right.
I loved the energy Jude Bellingham gave us in midfield - he has got some engine on him. He kept driving us forward for more goals, and was always trying to get up there to get on the end of things.
We got our second goal by pressing Wales, virtually from the kick-off after the first goal, and the whole team did it together, high up the pitch.
Harry Kane still hasn't had a shot on target at this World Cup, but he now has three assists, and his cross for Foden to score was ridiculously good - he put the ball exactly where he would have wanted it to put it away himself.
Rashford's third goal was probably the one I enjoyed the most, because it happened at high speed and it was lovely to see him work it on to his left foot and put it away. By the time the Wales defender adjusts to his run, it is too late.
They were all really good goals, and scoring them is clearly not a problem - we are currently top scorers in the tournament with nine. From open play or set-pieces, other teams will be wondering how they can keep us out.
This is not the time to get carried away, but what we do have after that is some momentum and that is so important now.
I don't think England would have been affected too much by their disappointing draw with the United States, but this performance had everything which was missing from that game and we can take all of it forward.
Senegal will still be dangerous opponents, even without the injured Sadio Mane, but I am really confident that England will have enough to beat them and reach the quarter-finals.
Alan Shearer was speaking to Chris Bevan in Doha, Qatar.
Get the latest results and goal notifications for any team at the Fifa World Cup by downloading the BBC Sport app: Apple - Android - Amazon
Get your daily dose of Fifa World Cup reaction, debate & analysis with World Cup Daily on BBC Sounds
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/63808775
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Stormont stalemate: MLAs' wages cut by £14,000 from January - BBC News
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2022-12-09
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Stormont's political stalemate is delaying a £600 energy payment to homes, suggests the NI secretary.
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Northern Ireland
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The cut will reduce annual incomes of Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) by 27.5%
Stormont's 90 assembly members will have their salaries cut by more than £14,000 from 1 January, Secretary of State Chris Heaton-Harris has said.
Further cuts may come if the political stalemate continues, he added.
Assembly members have not governed for 10 months due to a boycott by the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP).
Mr Heaton-Harris also told BBC News NI he could not confirm a date for a delayed £600 energy bill discount to be issued to Northern Ireland households.
He said the best way for this to be delivered was through a functioning power-sharing executive.
However, he insisted: "Everyone in Northern Ireland will get the complete payment before everybody in the rest of Great Britain."
In Great Britain, payments began being released in six monthly instalments from October.
Northern Ireland has been without a functioning government since February, when the DUP walked out of the executive in protest against the Northern Ireland Protocol.
Unionists argue the post-Brexit trading arrangement undermines Northern Ireland's position in the UK, as it keeps the nation aligned with some EU trade rules to ensure goods can move freely across the Irish land border.
A motion called on the DUP to end its boycott to help deal with the cost-of-living crisis, but the party again refused to vote for a new Speaker - a position that must be filled before any other business can be heard.
Earlier this week, Mr Heaton-Harris was granted new legal powers to cut by 27.5% the annual incomes of Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs).
The pay cut will reduce their salaries by £14,163 - from £51,500 to £37,337.
It will mean a cut of about £800 to their pay packet in January.
The lack of a functioning executive is complicating the delivery of a £600 energy support scheme
Mr Heaton-Harris said there was a strong argument to keep the matter under review.
"I've asked my officials to give me some more legal basis and check if they can do more," he told BBC News NI.
"People will also have seen that when this was being debated in the House of Commons, there was a big push to go further so I'm going to keep it under review."
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Chris Heaton-Harris says MLAs' pay will stay under a review after a 27% cut in January
Asked if he was doing enough to try to restore power sharing, the secretary of state said he would convene talks with the parties next week.
It will be the first series of round-table discussions he has held since taking on the job in September.
"I'm putting as much pressure on all parties to go back into the executive, and I do that whenever I see them, and I see them a lot," he said.
"I'm talking to the parties all the time but they could do this themselves."
Mr Heaton-Harris also confirmed the government was "taking soundings" on whether to change the date of next year's scheduled local government election.
The election is due to happen on 4 May, but there have been calls to move it so that the counting of votes does not clash with the coronation of King Charles III, which is happening two days later.
In a letter to all MLAs on Thursday, the secretary of state said he was also increasing the required number of days they must attend Stormont in order to claim travel allowances.
He said it will increase from a minimum of 72 days to 100 with effect from 1 April.
For each working day less than this that an MLA attends the assembly the allowance will be cut by 1%.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-63880069
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news_uk-northern-ireland-63880069
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NI state papers: Flying union flag shows 'patriotic exuberance' - BBC News
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2022-12-09
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Almost 500 internal Northern Ireland Office memos from the 1990s are now online for the first time.
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Northern Ireland
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Northern Ireland Office officials were debating flag policies in the 1990s, archived memos reveal
An end to flying the union flag from government buildings on 12 July would "redress the effects of patriotic exuberance" by a unionist government in NI, a government memo from 1994 says.
The note is among almost 500 documents from the 1990s now published online.
In it, Northern Ireland Office (NIO) officials were debating whether to bring government flag policy into line with that in England and Wales.
The files were previously available at the Public Record Office of NI (PRONI).
Another memo notes that "only one (Irish) chair had been smashed up by a guest in the early hours" at a St Patrick's Day party for Irish and British diplomats.
The documents are available on the Conflict Archive on the Internet (CAIN) website, as part of a partnership between PRONI and Ulster University.
At one point, it had been under threat of closure but its future was secured by new funding in 2021.
The decision to fly the union flag on government buildings on the Twelfth had originally been taken by the Northern Ireland cabinet in April 1933.
In 1994, both the IRA and Combined Loyalist Military Command (CLMC) declared ceasefires.
It was in that context that NIO officials debated whether the policy on flying the union flag should change.
They also considered some designs for a new Northern Ireland flag suggested by an academic called Dr Martin Ball.
An artistic impression of the "proposed new flag for Northern Ireland" based on a design suggested in the 1995 memo
"There is much to be said for an early initiative to demonstrate government's readiness to grasp the nettle of identity issues rather than appearing to concede to pressure from Sinn Féin at a later stage," one NIO memo stated.
"Regrettably, the union flag lacks in Northern Ireland the politically neutral connotations which it enjoys in the rest of the United Kingdom.
"However, any decision to remove 12 July from the list of prescribed days - even though the day itself would continue to be a bank and public holiday - may be expected to provoke some strong unionist reaction.
"The day is redolent with unionist political overtones and the delisting of it for flag-flying purposes would be interpreted as a dissociation by the state from the unionist tradition."
Another memo also warned that not flying the union flag on government buildings on 12 July "would undoubtedly provoke unionist ire".
Another official, though, asked: "Is this what we want? Now?
"Surely there are better arguments than to say we are kicking unionists before Sinn Féin ask us to?"
An artistic impression of the "South African-style proposal" which was among the suggestions for a new NI flag in the 1995 memo
Nevertheless, the writer of that memo, an official called PN Bell, said the move was a "courageous (in the 'yes, minister' sense) proposal".
"Slán agus beannacht," he signed off his memo, an Irish-language phrase often translated as goodbye and God bless.
In the event, the Flags (Northern Ireland) Order 2000 eventually brought official flag-flying in Northern Ireland more closely into line with the rest of the UK with little fanfare or protest.
However, there were widespread loyalist protests following a later decision by Belfast City Council in 2012 to fly the union flag at City Hall only on designated days.
A vote to reduce flag-flying at Belfast City Hall led to protest marches and rallies in 2012
A later memo from March 1997 lauds the success of a St Patrick's Day reception held for NIO and Irish government officials at the Anglo-Irish Secretariat building outside Belfast.
"The Irish side reckoned that, although the numbers were slightly down on the last Christmas reception, approximately 250 people had attended, and only one (Irish) chair had been smashed up by a guest in the early hours," it recorded.
Other NIO memos from the time include the government's responses to Orange Order requests for "confidence-building measures", including that the Order was "a cultural group worthy of funding on the same scale as Gaelic language groups, Gaelic schools, Gaelic Athletic Association etc".
"By and large, the requests cannot be met to any great extent," the NIO memo stated.
Many of the state papers reflect the run-up to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998 and the politics of the time.
But some now published online reflect other events.
For instance, minutes of a meeting between the then secretary of state Peter Brooke and Catholic bishops in 1989 reflected the bishops' concern that education reform would favour integrated schools over Catholic schools.
There is also a letter from the former owner of Harrods department store Mohamed Al-Fayed to the former Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) MLA Sir John Gorman.
Sir John was the chair of the Northern Ireland Forum for Political Dialogue, a body set up in 1996 to try to bring politicians together before the Good Friday Agreement.
Sir John had written to Mr Al-Fayed to offer condolences after his son Dodi was killed alongside Diana, Princess of Wales, and their driver in a car crash in Paris in 1997.
A tribute to the late Princess Diana and Dodi Al-Fayed was erected in Harrods in the late 1990s
"Dodi was always kind, gentle and decent," Mr Al-Fayed wrote in reply.
"The whole family loved Princess Diana but Dodi cherished her friendship more dearly than his own existence.
"As his father, of course I think he was special.
"But I am sure that a wonderful woman like Princess Diana, with that unique star-bright quality, would never have given her affection to anyone outside that part of the heavens that is set aside for the truly exceptional.
"I take some comfort from my absolute belief that God has taken their souls to live together in paradise."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-63893666
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World Cup final: Lionel Messi leads Argentina to glory - is he now football's greatest? - BBC Sport
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2022-12-19
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After Lionel Messi led Argentina to World Cup glory, no-one can now deny he belongs in the same pantheon as Pele and Diego Maradona.
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Lionel Messi strode alone into a single spotlight amid the darkness at Lusail Stadium to finally take possession of the one prize that has remained painfully out of reach throughout his silver-lined career.
The 35-year-old Argentina maestro rubbed his hands together in glorious anticipation of his crowning glory, donning the traditional Arab robe known as a bisht, before finally lifting the World Cup to the sky amid an explosion of flashlights and pyrotechnics.
Messi had achieved his dream. The gap in his glittering collection had been filled - the set complete after arguably the most spectacular World Cup final in history, a game for the ages that tore at the emotions and played havoc with the pulse rates before Argentina's icon reached his summit.
He can now add the World Cup to seven Ballons d'Or, four Champions Leagues, one Copa America, 10 La Liga titles with Barcelona and a Ligue 1 crown in France with Paris St-Germain.
This was the one. This was the trophy that Messi's millions of advocates will now use as 'Exhibit A' in their argument that he is the greatest to have played the game.
This is a trophy, almost 15 inches of solid gold, that will now have many saying Messi is the greatest - and those with a counter-argument will have an added degree of difficulty presenting their case.
Comparisons are expanded over generations, which adds a different frame to all the arguments, but no-one can now deny Messi belongs in the same pantheon as Pele and another whose image was across many Argentina banners at Lusail Stadium on Sunday.
Inevitably, Diego Maradona, his legendary predecessor in Argentina's number 10 shirt, had a forceful case for the best. The point of difference was always his World Cup triumph in Mexico 36 years ago - a triumph Messi did not have. It has now been removed.
Messi will always be in any conversation about the greatest, and the fact he now has the biggest honour the global game has to offer makes for a more powerful discussion as to his merits.
How do you even begin to tell the tale of how Messi reached his pinnacle? How do you recount events that eventually led to Argentina's World Cup win and the climax of a tournament that will have the name Lionel Messi attached to it forever?
• None Reaction to one of the most dramatic World Cup finals
• None World Cup Daily podcast: Argentina champions after 'best game ever'
Messi should have known, given his history of World Cup heartache and disappointment stretching back to 2006 and including a losing final to Germany at Rio's Maracana in 2014, that this was an honour which would not be won easily.
The fact that this spectacular night at Lusail Stadium contained so much suffering before Argentina and Messi hit the heights of their third World Cup win may make it even sweeter.
And it was all done in the face of brilliance from the 23-year-old who will, if he is not there already, join Messi in any debate about the sport's true elite in years to come: France's Kylian Mbappe.
France appeared to be rolling out the red carpet for Messi's coronation as they barely threatened for 80 minutes. Lusail was Messi's playground as he scored Argentina's opener from the penalty spot, making him the first player in World Cup history to score in the group stage, round of 16, quarter-final, semi-final and final in a single tournament.
Messi then helped to create Angel di Maria's second, the game taking a routine course with celebrations started among Argentina fans until the much-anticipated battle with Mbappe was joined in stunning fashion.
Mbappe pulled one back from the spot with 10 minutes left, then fired in a brilliant volley seconds later. Messi's smile that stretched across the giant screens in each corner of the stadium was one of "not again" disbelief.
• None 'Breathless, staggering and magnificent' - was final one of best ever?
Argentina coach Lionel Scaloni pulled off a masterstroke of selection with the inclusion of 34-year-old Di Maria, who ran Jules Kounde ragged, but then appeared to give way to fatal conservatism by taking him off with his side on top after 64 minutes for the workmanlike Marcos Acuna.
Messi, of course, pulled Argentina round with his second in extra time but France, revived from the earlier mediocrity, were level again through Mbappe's penalty.
In an atmosphere of near hysteria, Argentina keeper Emiliano Martinez saved with his foot from Randal Kolo Muani with the World Cup at his mercy in the closing seconds, although there was still time for Lautaro Martinez to head wide of an unguarded goal at the other end.
To say extra time was highly charged would be an understatement, with some fans even tearing their gaze away from the action, such was the unbearable tension.
Magnificently stressful, it went to penalties which Argentina won 4-2, a painful way to settle a game that will now be talked about whenever the World Cup is discussed.
When Gonzalo Montiel scored the decisive kick, Messi slumped to his knees in tears in the centre circle, arms raised to the heavens before he was buried under an avalanche of light blue and white striped shirts.
He then claimed a microphone to address Argentina's supporters amid scenes of celebratory mayhem.
Messi picked up the Golden Ball for player of the tournament, the first player to win it twice since it was introduced in 1982, after also winning the honour in 2014.
He has now been involved in 21 goals for Argentina at World Cups - 13 goals and eight assists, the most by any player for any nation. The goals in this World Cup final give him 793 in his career. He was also the first player to score in every round in the same men's World Cup tournament.
There was one statistic that mattered above all others on this night: Messi was a World Cup winner - at last.
He sat astride the figure-of-eight stage on which he had received the World Cup with his team, basking in the fact he can at last fill that one space in his trophy cabinet. It was a stage later filled with friends and family of the Argentina squad, their country now back on top of the football world for the first time since 1986.
Argentina's supporters stayed in their seats for well over an hour, going through the songbook that has been the soundtrack to their World Cup campaign, paying homage to the man they counted on. The man who had delivered.
The seismic shock of that opening loss to Saudi Arabia seemed an age away. It was Messi who got Argentina's World Cup into gear with a brilliant goal against Mexico and he was unstoppable as he carried it through to the finish.
Messi had the golden trophy in his hands. It was mission accomplished - a mission stretching back more than 16 years to when he came on as a scoring substitute in a 6-0 win over Serbia and Montenegro in Germany.
The final chapter of Messi's World Cup story was a thriller from first to last against France, with the plot taking so many twists. It delivered the perfect ending on a never to be forgotten night in Qatar.
Get your daily dose of Fifa World Cup reaction, debate & analysis with World Cup Daily on BBC Sounds
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World Cup final: Argentina beat France on penalties in dramatic Qatar showpiece - BBC Sport
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2022-12-19
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Lionel Messi leads Argentina to World Cup glory, beating France on penalties in one of the most thrilling climaxes in final history.
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Last updated on .From the section World Cup
Lionel Messi finally achieved his World Cup dream as Argentina won their third crown on penalties in one of the greatest finals in the tournament's history.
Argentina won the shootout 4-2 after a spectacular game which developed into the much-anticipated confrontation between the 35-year-old maestro Messi and his France opposite number Kylian Mbappe.
France's own superstar scored a hat-trick - the first in a Fifa World Cup final since 1966 - but still ended up on the losing side at Lusail Stadium.
Messi looked to be securing the one major honour missing from his glittering collection in comfort as Argentina cruised into a two-goal lead.
This all changed when an explosive intervention from Mbappe, who scored two goals inside two minutes late on, turned this frantic, magnificent match for the ages on its head.
Messi had given Argentina the lead from the penalty spot in the 23rd minute following Ousmane Dembele's foul on Angel di Maria. It made him the first player in World Cup history to score in the group stage, last 16, quarter-final, semi-final and final of a single tournament.
He then contributed a delicate touch within a magnificent counter-attack that ended with Brighton's Alexis Mac Allister setting up Di Maria for the second 13 minutes later.
• None 'Now hard to argue against Messi being football's greatest'
• None 'Breathless, staggering and magnificent' - was final one of best ever?
Argentina were untroubled until the closing stages, only for Mbappe to give France a lifeline from the penalty spot with nine minutes left - then restore equality with a magnificent volley moments later.
Messi bundled Argentina back in front in extra time, but Mbappe completed his treble from the spot two minutes from the end of a frantic, chaotic added spell.
And so it went to penalties, with the two greats opening the scoring. But Argentina and Aston Villa goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez saved from Kingsley Coman, before Aurelian Tchouameni missed, leaving Gonzalo Montiel to win the World Cup.
Messi, a World Cup winner at last, collapsed to his knees in the centre circle and was engulfed by jubilant Argentina team-mates.
• None World Cup Daily podcast: Argentina champions after 'best game ever'
• None Reaction to one of the most dramatic World Cup finals
Messi stood at the pinnacle of his career as Argentina closed out time in the World Cup final, only for great rival Mbappe to threaten to knock him off and leave him in despair.
Instead, this World Cup - which will now have Messi's name attached to it forever, along with a final that will rank alongside the greats - gave the iconic Argentine the conclusion he wanted.
Messi was imperious for 80 minutes in his final World Cup game as Argentina exerted complete control over a strangely laboured France, scoring his penalty with ease before contributing crucially to a second goal which was a team creation of beauty finished off by Di Maria.
And then came Mbappe. And then came France.
In an atmosphere of disbelief among the massed ranks of Argentina fans who were starting to celebrate victory, Lionel Scaloni's team had to lift themselves once more from the double blow inflicted by Mbappe.
Inevitably it was Messi who gave them hope again, showing he was happy to do the dirty work by turning home a scrambled finish in the box in the second period of extra time - only for Mbappe to answer again.
But Argentina prevailed on penalties and Messi was the centre of attention when Montiel sent the decisive penalty past France keeper Hugo Lloris.
Amid wild scenes of celebration, Messi fell to his knees in tears and raised his arms to the skies, before disappearing beneath a mountain of team-mates.
Messi then took to the microphone to address Argentina's jubilant fans, his Holy Grail reached, another piece of evidence assembled in the argument that would have many declare him the game's greatest player.
Mbappe cemented his status as one of the game's modern greats with only the second hat-trick in a World Cup final, following Sir Geoff Hurst's when England beat West Germany in 1966. But the 23-year-old still suffered the pain of defeat.
Mbappe was as anonymous as most of his team for the first 80 minutes, ill-served amid an unfathomably poor France display - which they put in despite seeking to become the first side to retain the trophy since Brazil did so 60 years ago, and only the third ever after Italy won in 1934 and 1938.
Manager Didier Deschamps even made two substitutions before half-time, replacing Olivier Giroud and Dembele with Marcus Thuram and Randal Kolo Muani.
And yet it was Mbappe who revived France in those sensational seconds when they went from looking like timid losers to potential winners, then getting his third from the spot after Messi had put Argentina back in front.
In a stunning period of extra time during which both sides exchanged chances, France could have won but for a superb last-gasp save by Martinez with his outstretched boot from Muani.
Instead, Mbappe will find history no consolation as he was embraced by his team-mates and French President Emmanuel Macron at the end of this enthralling spectacle.
• None How you rated the Argentina and France players
• None Goal! Argentina 3(4), France 3(2). Gonzalo Montiel (Argentina) converts the penalty with a right footed shot to the bottom left corner.
• None Goal! Argentina 3(3), France 3(2). Randal Kolo Muani (France) converts the penalty with a right footed shot to the high centre of the goal.
• None Goal! Argentina 3(3), France 3(1). Leandro Paredes (Argentina) converts the penalty with a right footed shot to the bottom left corner.
• None Penalty missed! Bad penalty by Aurélien Tchouaméni (France) right footed shot is close, but misses to the left. Aurélien Tchouaméni should be disappointed.
• None Goal! Argentina 3(2), France 3(1). Paulo Dybala (Argentina) converts the penalty with a left footed shot to the centre of the goal.
• None Penalty saved! Kingsley Coman (France) fails to capitalise on this great opportunity, right footed shot saved in the bottom left corner.
• None Goal! Argentina 3(1), France 3(1). Lionel Messi (Argentina) converts the penalty with a left footed shot to the bottom left corner.
• None Goal! Argentina 3, France 3(1). Kylian Mbappé (France) converts the penalty with a right footed shot to the bottom left corner.
• None Attempt missed. Lautaro Martínez (Argentina) header from the centre of the box misses to the right. Assisted by Gonzalo Montiel following a fast break.
• None Attempt saved. Randal Kolo Muani (France) right footed shot from the centre of the box is saved in the bottom right corner. Assisted by Ibrahima Konaté with a through ball.
• None Offside, Argentina. Lionel Messi tries a through ball, but Lautaro Martínez is caught offside.
• None Goal! Argentina 3, France 3. Kylian Mbappé (France) converts the penalty with a right footed shot to the bottom left corner. Navigate to the next page Navigate to the last page
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Rwanda asylum seekers: 'Fighting to survive' - BBC News
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2022-12-19
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The BBC goes to Rwanda as a court rules on the UK's plan to send asylum seekers there.
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Africa
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The BBC is not disclosing the identity of Mohammed, an asylum seeker in Rwanda
"I'm fighting just to survive," a nervous looking man tells me in a slightly trembling voice.
We're standing on a patch of wasteland in Rwanda's capital Kigali. It's surrounded by trees to hide us from prying eyes.
Mohammed came to this country seeking asylum. He says he fled to Rwanda from Ethiopia, where he had been taking refuge until agents from his home country attempted to kidnap him.
Mohammed says life in Kigali has been difficult, but he is so scared of reprisals for speaking to a journalist that he's asked me not to disclose his real name or the name of his home country, except that it is in Africa.
For days we've been trying to get an asylum seeker living in Rwanda to speak to us on the record. Time and again people agree, and then mysteriously become unavailable, often after being visited by a "community leader".
"The authorities don't say no, but everything is 'tomorrow', or 'come back next month'. It's been almost one year that they haven't given it to me."
I had been speaking to Mohammed as the High Court in London was considering the legality of the UK government's controversial plan to send some asylum seekers to Rwanda.
Earlier on Monday, the judges ruled that the UK government's policy is lawful and any relocations there would be "consistent with the (UN) Refugee Convention", although the cases of eight individual asylum seekers had not been properly considered.
The UK government believes the prospect of being sent to Rwanda to have asylum cases processed will act as a deterrent to people crossing the English Channel on small boats.
But opposition critics say the policy is cruel, unworkable and expensive.
Previously, campaign group Human Rights Watch (HRW) had expressed concern about conditions in Rwanda saying there was "repression of free speech, arbitrary detention, ill-treatment, and torture".
In its assessment published earlier this year, the UK government had said that "notwithstanding some restrictions on freedom of speech and/or freedom of association" it was unlikely that someone being relocated from the UK would face ill-treatment.
The plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda has proved controversial in the UK
The United Nations' refugee agency had told the court that Rwanda lacked the "minimum components for an accessible, reliable, fair and efficient asylum system".
It was concerned that people could be sent back to countries where they face torture.
And in a report in June the UN agency said that "the efficiency and timeliness of the asylum procedure is of concern, with decisions taking up to one to two years to be issued in some cases".
Mohammed says he feels like his life is in limbo. He is unable to work legally because he doesn't have proper papers.
"Friends and relatives help," he tells me, adding that odd jobs give him a little income.
But with a wife and children to support, the uncertainty is taking its toll.
He says he'd like to leave Rwanda, and go "anywhere there is peace, like Canada or Australia".
Among the concerns raised by campaigners opposed to the UK plan is the treatment of LGBT people in Rwanda.
Unlike in some neighbouring countries, homosexual acts are not illegal in Rwanda. But in an open letter to the UK Home Office, HRW said that "in practice, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people face stigma in Rwanda".
In 2021, it documented how the authorities "arbitrarily detained, harassed, insulted and beat" nine transgender or gay people at Kigali's Gikondo Transit Centre, an unofficial detention facility, HRW said.
HRW has criticised the Gikondo Transit Centre in Rwanda's capital, shown above in a file photo
"Those interviewed said they had been targeted due to their sexual orientation or gender identity and treated worse than other detainees. Police officers or guards accused them of being homeless, thieves, or delinquents and held them in a room reserved for "delinquent" men, the campaign group said.
One person who understands the stigma associated with homosexuality in Rwanda is Patrick Uwayezu.
He's a gay member of the Evangelical Church of God in Africa in Rwanda, the only one in Kigali which welcomes LGBT members.
A slight man, with a powerful singing voice, he leads the choir on the Sunday that we visit the church.
Afterwards he tells me that LGBT people often find it difficult to access services such as healthcare because of attitudes towards them. It can even affect people's chances of employment.
"If you hide your identity they can give you a job. But if [employers find out] your identity they'll tell you: 'Go, go, we can't work with you.'"
"I think many people don't understand us in this country," he says.
Patrick Uwayezu says LGBT people often find it hard to access services like healthcare in Rwanda
During our six-day visit we repeatedly asked for an interview with the government. Although a spokesperson agreed to do it, the promised interview never materialised.
We did however get a statement in which a spokesperson said: "Discrimination in all its forms is outlawed by our constitution and Rwanda is welcoming to everyone."
It added that the UN's position was "clearly contradictory" as it criticised Rwanda while still sending asylum seekers to the country, including more than 100 from Libya earlier this year.
But responding to the London High Court ruling that the UK government's plan was legal, the Rwandan government welcomed the decision and said it stood "ready to offer asylum seekers and migrants safety and the opportunity to build a new life in Rwanda".
There are also refugee success stories in Rwanda. Teklay Teame arrived here from Eritrea almost 25 years ago, in 1998.
He now runs a chain of wholesale shops and supermarkets.
His staff are busy unloading a truck with big boxes and carrying them into one of his many shops when I meet him.
Teklay Teame came to Rwanda from Eritrea in 1998
"When I arrived here, everything was new to me. But the people were so friendly it didn't take me long to integrate. I started with four staff. Now I have more than 600," he says.
Unlike many refugees, Mr Teklay had the money needed to start up his business.
Still, he says, Rwanda offers opportunities for all, as long as you play by the rules.
Mr Teklay says he knows Eritreans who "came here with nothing as refugees. But they've started their own life and businesses."
I ask him if he understands the fears of those opposed to the plan to send asylum seekers from the UK to Rwanda.
"I don't know what they're afraid of, but I don't see any need to be afraid here," he replies.
The view as the sun sets over Kigali is spectacular: a bright red sun disappearing behind lush green hills.
Both the traffic and city below are orderly and efficient, something countries around the world would envy.
Those who opposed the UK government deal had said that beneath the surface lies a real sense of fear.
That is why - as was widely expected - opponents to this plan are likely to appeal.
It means the argument about whether Rwanda is safe for those seeking refuge will not end today.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-62834946
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news_world-africa-62834946
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Trump Organization found guilty of tax crimes after New York trial - BBC News
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2022-12-06
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The business is synonymous with the former president, but neither he or his family were on trial.
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US & Canada
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Prosecutors accused the company of having a "culture of fraud and deception" during the trial in Manhattan
Former US President Donald Trump's family real estate company has been found guilty of tax crimes.
The Trump Organization was convicted on all counts on Tuesday after two days of jury deliberations in New York.
The business is synonymous with the former president, but neither Mr Trump nor his family members were personally on trial.
Vowing to appeal against the verdict, Mr Trump said he was "disappointed" and again called the case a "witch hunt".
The company was convicted of enriching its top executives with off-the books benefits for more than a decade.
Untaxed perks included luxury cars and private school fees, prosecutors said, which made up for lower salaries and therefore reduced the amount of tax the business was required to pay.
The company is expected to face a fine of around $1.6m (£1.3m) and may also face difficulty in securing loans and financing in the future.
Mr Trump previously criticised the trial as being politically motivated. He also attacked his long-serving former chief financial executive Allen Weisselberg after he pleaded guilty in August and testified against the business.
In his most recent statement, attacking the verdict, the former Republican leader asked why the Trump Organization should be prosecuted for Mr Weisselberg's "personal conduct" - accusing him of "committing tax fraud on his personal tax returns".
"There was RELIANCE by us on a then highly respected and expensive accounting firm, and law firm, to do this work," Mr Trump said in the statement issued by his office.
"This case is unprecedented and... is a continuation of the Greatest Political Witch Hunt in the History of our Country," he said, adding that New York City was now a "hard place to be a Trump".
Prosecutors accused the Trump Organization - which operates hotels, golf courses and other properties around the world - of having a "culture of fraud and deception" during the six-week trial.
They said it ran a scheme that allowed some executives to "understate their compensation" so that their taxes "were significantly less than the amounts that should have been paid".
"The smorgasbord of benefits is designed to keep its top executives happy and loyal," prosecutor Joshua Steinglass told the jury during closing arguments.
Two subsidiaries of the Trump Organization - Trump Corp and Trump Payroll Corp - were convicted on all 17 charges of tax fraud and falsifying business records.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg praised the verdict on Tuesday, saying the case was "about greed and cheating".
"For 13 years the Trump Corporation and the Trump Payroll Corporation got away with a scheme that awarded high-level executives with lavish perks and compensation while intentionally concealing the benefits from the taxing authorities," he said.
Allen Weisselberg, who worked for Donald Trump for decades, pleaded guilty to tax crimes in August (file image)
Mr Weisselberg, 75, testified against the company as part of a plea deal he struck with prosecutors that will mean he spends no more than five months in jail.
He will be jailed at the notorious Rikers Island prison and must pay back more than $1.7m (£1.4m) in concealed income.
Following the verdict, the judge set a sentencing date of 13 January.
Mr Trump and his three eldest children are facing a separate civil lawsuit which could see them banned from doing business in the state.
New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is leading that civil case, issued a statement hailing Tuesday's verdict as a "big victory".
"[It] shows that we will hold individuals and organisations accountable when they violate our laws to line their pockets," she said.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-63882140
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Wes Streeting: I won't pretend NHS is envy of world - BBC News
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2022-12-16
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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The shadow health secretary says the NHS needs reform as he attacks left-wing critics of his ideas.
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UK Politics
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Wes Streeting says left-wing critics of his proposals for the NHS are "the true Conservatives".
Shadow health secretary Wes Streeting has said he would not "pretend the NHS is the envy of the world" as he promised reforms under a Labour government.
He gave a speech setting out Labour's plan to fix the NHS in England, which he said was in "existential" crisis.
Labour would train more staff and use the private sector to bring down waiting lists, he said.
He branded left-wing critics of his proposals "the true Conservatives".
Speaking at the right-leaning Policy Exchange think tank, Mr Streeting suggested the NHS was not "delivering a standard of care that patients should be satisfied with".
Labour, he said, "will give the NHS the investment and staff it needs, but that has to result in better standards for patients".
Mr Streeting's reformist agenda has thrust him into the centre of a fractious debate about the future of the NHS at the time when nurses are locked in a dispute over pay with the government.
The shadow health secretary said Thursday's unprecedented strike by nurses was the result of "12 years of failure to get our economy growing", pay freezes and funding cuts.
But in wide-ranging speech lasting about 15 minutes, Mr Streeting said the NHS's problems went beyond the strikes and laid out what a Labour government would do to address them.
In recent years, the NHS - which was founded under a Labour government in the 1940s - has faced significant financial and workforce challenges, made worse by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The care backlog is at a record high, with NHS England figures showing 7.2 million people were waiting to start routine treatment at the end of October.
Mr Streeting said it was clear NHS staff were "working as hard as they can", but added: "We cannot continue pouring money into a 20th-century model of care that delivers late diagnosis and more expensive treatment".
The shadow health secretary, who was last year treated successfully for cancer in an NHS hospital, said reform was the only option.
He said he endorsed a report by Policy Exchange, which lays out a roadmap for how Labour could achieve its target of training 15,000 medical students a year, if it wins the next general election.
On top of this, Mr Streeting said Labour's plan would involve:
Attempts to reform the NHS have proved politically contentious, especially for Labour, some of whose MPs are ideologically opposed to private-sector involvement in the health service.
But Mr Streeting said Labour would not shy away from reform under the leadership of Sir Keir Starmer, who had planted the party "firmly in the centre-ground".
"It is plain to see for anyone who uses the NHS that it is failing patients on a daily basis," Mr Streeting said. "So yes, we are going to reform it and make the NHS fit for the future."
"Ironically, it is those voices from the left who oppose reform, who prove themselves to be the true conservatives."
Momentum, the left-wing group set up to support Jeremy Corbyn's leadership, criticised Mr Streeting's speech as a "deeply worrying and self-defeating intervention".
"His refusal to back nurses' demands for fair wages or a public NHS free from private-sector involvement fly in the face of public opinion and Labour's own mission and history," said Momentum's co-chair Hilary Schan.
In a recent interview with the Sunday Telegraph, Mr Streeting was quoted as saying the NHS must "reform or die".
Mr Streeting said some "online bad-faith actors" had suggested he was "ambivalent about which my preferred option would be".
"I do believe the crisis is existential for the NHS," he said.
"And it is in defence of the NHS's founding principles, funded through progressive taxation, free at the point of use, that I make the reform argument."
The shadow health secretary was keen to distance himself not only from the current government, but also from Labour's recent past.
He denounced opponents of reform as "Conservatives" - including Momentum.
The line echoed Tony Blair's conference speech more than two decades ago, when he described New Labour as "progressive politics distinguishing itself from the conservatism of left or right".
Indeed, if Momentum respond to their tail being tweaked this would further illustrate the growing gulf between the current leadership and the previous one.
Usually, even the most moderate of Labour politicians won't say a word against the NHS and those who work in it.
But Mr Streeting felt comfortable telling what he would see as home truths about Labour's relationship with the NHS.
His political positioning was not exactly subtle, speaking to a centre-right think tank and describing the NHS not just as his party's finest achievement, but Britain's.
All this was designed to make people who don't usually vote Labour sit up and listen. But there is little doubt that some who usually back his party won't entirely like what they are hearing.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-64002936
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news_uk-politics-64002936
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Takeoff: Police arrest man in fatal shooting of rapper - BBC News
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2022-12-02
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https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews
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Takeoff, youngest of the rap group Migos, was killed last month outside a Houston bowling alley.
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US & Canada
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Takeoff, one-third of popular rap group Migos, was shot and killed on 1 November
Police have arrested a man and charged him with murder in connection with the fatal shooting of rapper Takeoff.
The 28-year-old, Grammy-nominated musician was shot and killed outside a bowling alley in Houston, Texas last month.
Houston police said the shooting was over a game of dice, but the singer was "an innocent bystander".
Takeoff was the youngest member of rap group Migos, and his death was mourned by fans and fellow musicians.
At a Friday press conference, Houston Police announced they arrested Patrick Xavier Clark, 33, with the help of surveillance footage that was obtained from the night of the shooting.
"[Clark] was there on the scene and he was in possession of a weapon," said Houston Police Chief Troy Finner.
He added that an investigation is still ongoing, and he has appealed for witnesses to come forward and share information with police.
"Don't let the fear paralyse you," Chief Finner said in his appeal. "Step up and say something."
Mayor Sylvester Turner of Houston said he hopes the arrest will bring some comfort to the family of Takeoff.
He added that Takeoff was more than an entertainer, but also a "son, brother, cousin and a friend, and a mentor to those in the music industry".
Takeoff, born Kirsnick Khari Ball, was one-third of the chart-topping Atlanta-based rap group Migos, who are known for several hits like Bad and Boujee and Stir Fry. They were nominated for two Grammy Awards - one for best rap album and one for best rap performance - in 2018.
His death was met with an outpour of tributes from fans and musicians like Drake, Kid Cudi, Dave and Rick Ross, who remembered Takeoff as "young legend" and a pioneer of a distinct style of rapping known as the "Migos flow."
The 28-year-old musician was one of three people shot outside a downtown bowling alley in Houston at 02:30 local time (07:30 GMT) on 1 November, after a dispute erupted at the end of a private party after a dice game.
Sgt. Michael Burrow with the Houston homicide division said on Friday that Takeoff was not involved in playing the dice game or the argument that took place outside the alley, and he was not armed.
"He was an innocent bystander," Sgt. Burrow said.
Another man and a woman suffered non-life-threatening injuries during the shooting.
Cameron Joshua, 22, was also arrested in connection with the shooting on 22 November and charged with unlawful carrying of a weapon.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-63829127
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news_world-us-canada-63829127
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Climate change: Wind farms must benefit locals, campaigners say - BBC News
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2023-01-03
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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Residents say wind farms should be owned by the community if they are visible and affect wildlife.
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Wales
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Part of the Twyn Hywel energy farm would be on hills above Llanbradach in Caerphilly county
A major wind farm plan touted as a key part of Wales' transition to green energy must deliver local benefits, campaigners have said.
Bute Energy wants to build about 14 turbines on hills above Senghenydd and Llanbradach in Caerphilly and Cilfynydd and Pontypridd in Rhondda Cynon Taf.
It could power the equivalent of 81,000 houses a year from 2025.
But people in the nearby communities said the turbines would be too close to homes.
"If we can see and hear [the wind turbines] and if our wildlife and biodiversity is affected, we should at least benefit," said Pontypridd councillor Dawn Wood.
Bute Energy said it had already reduced the number of planned turbines, each 200m (656ft) high, in response to concerns.
It said the wind farm would help build a low-carbon, prosperous Wales, with most turbines within an area approved for wind farms in Welsh government plans for 2040.
Ms Wood, whose home overlooks a field where some of the turbines would be, said she was "positive about alternative energy and wind farms".
"Although the plans have been reduced as regards the number of turbines," she said, "we are concerned about the height and how visible they will be".
Pontypridd councillor Dawn Wood says the turbines should be owned by the communities they affect
"We accept that there are good arguments for exploring alternative energy," she added. "But if our communities are affected by wind farms we feel they should be community owned."
The developer said it was talking about a community investment fund and supporting local economies .
Bute Energy's Aled Rowlands said: "Society is facing three crises: climate, cost of living and rebuilding the economy.
"Projects like this can help with all three," he said. "But there are a number of other different benefits that could come to this community.
Aled Rowlands, external affairs director for Bute Energy, says the wind farm will create local jobs and a community investment fund
"We are talking partly about jobs, skills and investment," he said. "On top of that we have a community benefit fund which is worth over £30m over the next 45 years going directly to communities around this plan."
The possibility of extra funding is important to local charities like Little Lounge, which supports children in their early years, and their families in Cilfynydd.
Katie Hadley, from Little Lounge, said: "I want to find out more about what [the wind farm] could offer us as a small community.
"I can understand that people will have questions about the development, because this is our village and we want to keep our beautiful surroundings.
Katie Hadley, who runs a children's charity in Cilfynydd, says she is interested in what financial support the developer could offer
"Valleys people are very proud and very protective over our communities," she said.
"We have to weigh that up with looking at alternative energy resources for the future.
"We know of the problems with fossil fuels, so there has to be a compromise but we don't want to compromise our community so we need more information," she added.
Bute Energy said a survey would take place to avoid historic monuments.
The developer wants to build 14 wind turbines on high ground in Caerphilly and Rhondda Cynon Taf counties
The Welsh government said: "We need a range of technologies, at different scales, to meet our future electricity needs as we move towards a net-zero energy system. Wind and solar are cost-effective options to generate electricity and have a clear role to play.
"We want to ensure local communities and people in Wales directly benefit from energy generated in Wales. We are taking action to support local and shared ownership and developing strong, local supply chains."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-64141861
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news_uk-wales-64141861
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Elon Musk trial: Prospective jurors call him narcissistic, smart - BBC News
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2023-01-17
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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He could be ordered to pay billions of dollars in damages if he loses the fraud lawsuit over a tweet.
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US & Canada
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If a jury rules in favour of Tesla's shareholders, Mr Musk may be ordered to pay billions of dollars in damages
Prospective jurors in a civil lawsuit against Elon Musk have a range of opinions of him, from "smart, successful" to "off his rocker".
Mr Musk, who is being sued by Tesla shareholders arguing he manipulated the firm's share price, has said he cannot get a fair trial in San Francisco.
He wanted the trial to take place in Texas - where he has moved Tesla's headquarters - but that was rejected.
A jury has been selected, after jurors completed a pre-trial questionnaire.
The case centres on 2018 tweets, saying that he would take Tesla private. US regulators removed Mr Musk as Tesla chairman because of the posts.
On 7 August 2018, he tweeted that he had "funding secured" to take the carmaker private in what would be a $72bn (£58.7bn) buyout.
In a second tweet, Musk added that "investor support is confirmed," and that the deal was only awaiting a vote by shareholders. No such deal went ahead.
"The claim is that the investors felt that they were defrauded by Musk's tweet, that he was considering taking Tesla private and critically, that he had funding secured for it," Robert Bartlett, law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, told Reuters.
"That turned out not to be the case. So when the stock price rose after the news, they allegedly bought, and then it collapsed when the truth came out. They claimed that that was fraud."
The Tesla chief executive, however, argued that he believed he had secured funding from Saudi Arabia's Investment Fund, and did not commit securities fraud.
"I think he's a little off his rocker, on a personal level," one possible juror wrote on a questionnaire asking whether they could be impartial.
"I truly believe you can't judge a person until you walk in their shoes," said another possible juror, who added that Mr Musk seemed "narcissistic".
Another person said Mr Musk had a "mercenary" personality because he's "willing to take risks… that's my image of him".
Another called him a "fast-rising business man", while yet another said he was a "smart, successful pioneer".
"I think he is not a very likable person," said one person, according to Yahoo.
When asked by the judge whether that meant she would not be impartial towards him, the woman responded: "A lot of people are not necessarily likable people…. sometimes I don't like my husband."
Ultimately a jury of nine people was chosen, and opening arguments are set to begin on Wednesday.
Mr Musk argued that mass sackings at Twitter, a company he bought last year, affected many employees in the Californian city, and a fair trial couldn't take place there.
However, on Friday the judge said the trial would go ahead in California.
If a San Francisco jury rules in the shareholders' favour, Mr Musk could be ordered to pay billions of dollars in damages.
He has already paid $20m to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for the tweet, while Tesla had to pay another $20m.
His tweet has become legendary in Silicon Valley, as it showed the sheer power that Twitter can have.
Legal experts said they believe it will be a difficult case for Mr Musk to win, and that the fine he paid to the SEC will be used against him in the case. However, jury trials in cases of fraud are notoriously difficult to predict.
The case may see Mr Musk give evidence under oath. The witness list includes Oracle's CEO Larry Ellison and media tycoon James Murdoch. It is expected to last around three weeks.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-64293744
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UK government is not blocking Scotland gender reform bill lightly - minister - BBC News
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2023-01-17
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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Scottish Secretary Alister Jack tells MPs trans people deserve respect - but Scotland's bill could undermine UK equalities law.
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Scotland
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Downing Street insists that using Section 35 of the Scotland Act to veto this Holyrood bill is not a political choice but a legal necessity.
That argument is complicated by the fact that when the mechanism was proposed in 1998, the Conservatives’ Constitutional Affairs Spokesman Michael Ancram was highly critical of it.
The MP for Devizes invoked the notion of colonialism by referring to it as a “governor-general clause” which appeared “to place draconian powers in the hands of the Secretary of State”.
Nicola Sturgeon is now trying to frame the decision to use Section 35 (confusingly known at the time as Clause 33) as an attack on devolution itself.
But her position is complicated by the fact that SNP MPs voted for the Scotland Act after abstaining on Ancram’s amendment
It sought to raise the bar for invoking Section 35 albeit in a way that would probably not have made a difference in this case as it simply required the minister to seek legal advice before making a decision, which the Scottish Secretary Alister Jack appears to have done.
Labour, which designed the devolutionary framework, is in more of a pickle about the gender law itself. UK leader Sir Keir Starmer expressed concerns about it on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg even though Scottish Labour MSPs had voted for it.
So we are now heading for the courts. In the meantime, you might want to ask Ancram for his lottery numbers because, in the House of Commons debate on 12 May 1998, he made this prediction:
“…the purpose of the Opposition throughout the passage of the Bill has been to try to identify the areas in it that could lead to dramatic confrontation between the Parliament and Government in Edinburgh and the Parliament and Government in London.
"I can see within this draconian power—were it used in a way that ran counter to the wishes of the Scottish Parliament—the epitome of such a confrontation.”
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-scotland-64294059
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Nicola Sturgeon and Rishi Sunak's smiles mask a deep political divide - BBC News
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2023-01-13
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There were cordial talks on the PM's visit to Scotland, but battles could be looming on a number of issues.
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Scotland
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Rishi Sunak toasted marshmallows with Sea Scouts in the Highlands
Legend has it that my brilliant, late colleague Kenny Macintyre once secured an interview with Margaret Thatcher by jumping out of a broom cupboard in her hotel.
These days most journalists are lucky to get within a mile of a prime minister on a political visit.
Rishi Sunak's trip to Scotland was no exception. It was carefully choreographed and tightly controlled.
Watched by a very small band of invited media, he began his visit to the Highlands by toasting marshmallows with Sea Scouts, and chatting about search and rescue with emergency workers.
The man who famously loves Coca-Cola fizzed with energy and seemed extraordinarily enthused about it all.
Not that any passing member of the public would be likely to witness that for themselves.
When Mr Sunak arrived for dinner with First Minister Nicola Sturgeon a flashy Land Rover with an official driver shuffled backwards and forwards blocking our cameraman's valiant efforts - legal and on public land - to film him entering the hotel.
Photographs issued later by Number 10 showed the two leaders shaking hands and smiling broadly.
Rishi Sunak and Nicola Sturgeon met in Inverness on Thursday
The leader of the Conservative and Unionist Party had dinner with the leader of the party committed to ending the union, and the River Ness continued to rush to the sea.
You might think that such adult interaction is a low bar, the absolute minimum we could expect from our political leaders. After all, regardless of their differences, both politicians run governments which simply must work together day in day out.
Maybe, but in truth that bar has not always been cleared in recent years.
The first minister struggled to hide her contempt for Boris Johnson. Liz Truss promised to ignore Ms Sturgeon and, during her brief tenure in Downing Street, was as good as her word.
Still, the Sunak/Sturgeon love-in only goes so far.
It was striking that both went out of their way to avoid being seen in public together.
One of the green freeports will be craeted on the Firth of Forth
Although a deal to create two "green freeports" on the firths of Cromarty and Forth was billed as a joint announcement between the UK and Scottish governments, only one of the two - Mr Sunak - was present for the formalities in Invergordon.
Ms Sturgeon was back in the central belt chairing a crisis meeting about the emergency in the NHS.
In fact after Thursday night's dinner, which lasted abour an hour and a quarter, the first minister was off like a rocket, giving the most perfunctory of interviews to the BBC in the murk outside the hotel, her breath frosting on the chilly Highland air, before heading back down the A9.
A senior member of her retinue who complained about the cold was given short shrift by a journalist (OK, me) who had been standing outside for several hours.
Both sides described their chat as "cordial", but let's not get carried away. The wide grins in the official pictures belie deep political differences.
I'm told that topics which came up at the meeting included public sector strikes, where the Conservatives and the SNP are sharply at odds.
The UK government has tabled legislation which would give its ministers the power to ensure minimum service levels during industrial action in certain critical sectors - such as hospitals, firefighting and the railways - which would curtail the right of some workers to strike.
It says the proposed law - which would apply in England, Scotland and Wales - is necessary to "ensure the safety of the British public".
Labour call it a bill for sacking nurses. The Scottish government says Westminster already has some of the most restrictive anti-strike legislation of any democracy and describes the proposals as a further attack on workers' rights.
There is also disagreement about NHS funding.
Ms Sturgeon wants more money from Westminster. Doesn't she always, say her critics.
Mr Sunak says funding is already at a record level - and rising. The topic of the current emergency in the NHS reportedly took up more than half of the talks.
Nicola Sturgeon insists she has a mandate for another independence referendum
Another area of dispute is Brexit. The pair remain at odds over the economic impact of the UK's exit from the European Union, which was opposed by 62% of Scottish voters in the 2016 referendum.
Then - you knew it was coming - there is independence, on which subject, I am told, there was a "robust" exchange of views at the dinner table.
The arguments are well-rehearsed. The SNP leader insists she has a cast-iron mandate for another referendum because in 2021 Scottish voters returned a majority of MSPs (SNP and Greens) to the Scottish Parliament who had made manifesto pledges to hold one.
Mr Sunak says the people of Scotland would prefer a "relentless focus" on the rising cost of living. His allies say the last thing anyone needs right now is more divisive constitutional upheaval.
The national question is not going away though. Polls suggest Scotland is split more or less down the middle on whether or not to leave the UK and become an independent country.
Expect to hear a lot more about this as winter turns to spring, with the SNP holding a special conference to discuss Ms Sturgeon's attempt to turn the next general election into a de facto referendum on the subject.
And finally there is probably the most contentious issue of the hour - gender.
Last month the Scottish Parliament voted in favour of making it easier to legally change gender, clearing away medical and administrative barriers in favour of a process of self-declaration.
But before any Holyrood legislation can receive royal assent, the UK government has a window in which to decide whether it wants to object.
One means of doing so is set out in Section 35 of the Scotland Act 1998 (the law which sets out the framework of devolution) which allows for the Scottish Secretary Alister Jack to block the bill from receiving royal assent if he has "reasonable grounds to believe" that it "would have an adverse effect" on the operation of the law as it applies to matters reserved to Westminster, rather than devolved to Holyrood.
That nuclear option has never been used - but Number 10 is said to be considering it this time on the grounds that the new Scottish law might be said to interfere with UK-wide equalities legislation, which provides for the provision of female-only services.
The first minister insists it does nothing of the sort, saying the bill is both the right thing to do and within Holyrood's legislative competence.
The gender reform legislation was approved by the Scottish Parliament last month
Apparently the two leaders focused on the legislative process rather than debating the substantive issue on Thursday night.
Hours later, the prime minster told Good Morning Scotland on BBC Radio Scotland that the Gender Recognition Reform Bill may indeed have "impacts across the UK".
He added that his government was awaiting final advice on the matter before deciding how to proceed, a practice he described as "entirely standard".
Ms Sturgeon's official spokesman told me the Scottish government would "vigorously contest any attempt to undermine the democratic will of the Scottish Parliament".
The deadline for a decision is next week, setting the stage for a potential battle, encompassing not just the culture wars but the highly-charged issue of the constitution.
Kenny, who loved nothing more than an almighty controversy, would have been all over it.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-64266046
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Germany confirms it will provide Ukraine with Leopard 2 tanks - BBC News
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2023-01-25
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Russia has downplayed the impact of the move, saying Western tanks will "burn like all the rest".
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Europe
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German Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced the decision after weeks of reluctance and international pressure
After weeks of reluctance, Germany has agreed to send Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine, in what Kyiv hopes will be a game-changer on the battlefield.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced the decision to send 14 tanks - and allow other countries to send theirs too - at a cabinet meeting on Wednesday.
US President Joe Biden's administration is also expected to announce plans to send at least 30 M1 Abrams tanks.
A Kremlin spokesman earlier said the tanks would "burn like all the rest".
Dmitry Peskov said there was an overestimation of the potential the tanks would bring to the Ukrainian army, and called the move a "failed plan".
But Ukrainian officials insist they are urgently in need of heavier weapons, and say sufficient battle tanks could help Kyiv's forces seize back territory from the Russians.
A German government spokesperson said the decision to supply the tanks "follows our well-known line of supporting Ukraine to the best of our ability".
Germany also permitted other countries to send their Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine - which was restricted until now under export regulations.
The US and Germany had resisted internal and external pressure to send their tanks to Ukraine for some time.
Washington cited the extensive training and maintenance required for the high-tech Abrams.
Germans endured months of political debate about concerns that sending tanks would escalate the conflict and make Nato a direct party to the war with Russia.
US media is reporting that an announcement regarding Abrams shipments to Ukraine could come as soon as Wednesday, with unnamed officials cited as saying at least 30 could be sent.
However the timing remains unclear, and it could take many months for the US combat vehicles to reach the battlefront.
German officials had reportedly been insisting they would only agree to the transfer of Leopard 2s to Ukraine if the US also sent M1 Abrams.
"If the Germans continue to say we will only send or release Leopards on the conditions that Americans send Abrams, we should send Abrams," Democratic Senator Chris Coons, a Biden ally, told Politico on Tuesday.
Britain has already said it will send Challenger Two tanks to Ukraine.
Ukraine is still unlikely to get the 300 modern main battle tanks it says it needs to win the war.
But if half a dozen Western nations each provide 14 tanks, then that would bring the total to nearly 100 - which could make a difference.
Western tanks - including the UK's Challenger 2, Germany's Leopard 2 and the US-made Abrams - are all seen as superior to their Soviet-era counterparts, like the ubiquitous T-72.
They will provide Ukrainian crews with more protection, speed and accuracy.
But Western modern main battle tanks are not a wonder weapon or game-changer on their own. It's also what's being supplied alongside them.
In recent weeks, there's been a step change in heavy weapons being supplied by the West - including hundreds more armoured vehicles, artillery systems and ammunition.
Combined together, they are the kind of military hardware needed to punch through Russian lines and to retake territory.
If Ukrainian troops can be trained and the weapons delivered in time, they could form key elements of any spring offensive. A missing element for offensive operations is still air power.
Ukraine has been asking for the West to provide modern fighter jets since the war began. So far, none has been delivered.
Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann of the liberal FDP party, who chairs the defence committee of the German parliament had previously described reports that Germany had approved the tanks as a relief to "the battered and brave Ukrainian people."
"The decision was tough, it took far too long, but in the end it was unavoidable," she said.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Watch: Poland's PM: "Free world cannot afford not to send Leopard tanks"
Allied nations had become frustrated at what they perceived as German reluctance to send the armoured vehicles in recent days.
The Ukrainian president's chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, on Tuesday called on Western countries to give Kyiv hundreds of tanks to form a "crushing fist" against Russia.
"Tanks are one of the components for Ukraine to return to its 1991 borders," he wrote on Telegram.
Anatoly Antonov, the Russian ambassador to Washington, wrote on Telegram: "If the United States decides to supply tanks, then justifying such a step with arguments about 'defensive weapons' will definitely not work.
"This would be another blatant provocation against the Russian Federation."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-64391272
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Aquind: Government loses bid to block cross-Channel electricity cable - BBC News
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2023-01-25
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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Kwasi Kwarteng's rejection of electricity link from Portsmouth to France is overturned in High Court.
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UK Politics
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The Stop Aquind campaign, pictured here in Portsmouth in 2021, is "disappointed" by the ruling
The UK government's decision to refuse permission for a £1.2bn electricity link between England and France has been overturned in the High Court.
Aquind Ltd wants to lay cables through Portsmouth, Hampshire, to Normandy.
Last year's decision to block the scheme was made by then Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng.
Aquind challenged the decision in the High Court after being granted a judicial review.
In a statement, the government said it was "disappointed by the outcome but we will be considering the judgment carefully before deciding next steps".
The project is now expected to be referred back to Mr Kwarteng's successor as Business Secretary, Grant Shapps, to make a final decision.
Aquind's proposal has faced objections from residents, campaigners and local MPs, including Commons leader and Portsmouth North MP Penny Mordaunt.
Ms Mordaunt said: "The plan will never happen. It is hard to imagine why any investor would want to be associated with it.
"I believe the government's decision was the right one and that it will stand."
The Stop Aquind campaign group argue the cable could cause damage to "onshore and shoreline wildlife", threatening the habitats of birds and insects.
The campaigners also express concern about "pollution resulting from the construction traffic".
In his January 2022 ruling, Mr Kwarteng said he was not satisfied that "more appropriate alternatives to the proposed route" for the interconnector cable had been fully considered.
But lawyers for Aquind argued in the High Court that Mr Kwarteng had "misunderstood the evidence" when making his decision.
The interconnector, allowing electricity to flow between the two countries, will make landfall at Eastney beach in Portsmouth
Aquind director Richard Glasspool said Mrs Justice Lieven's decision to rule against the business secretary and Portsmouth City Council was "wonderful news" for the interconnector project.
"We look forward to re-engaging with local residents, stakeholders, environmental experts, and energy professionals in order to pursue the commitment to meeting the UK's net zero energy target," he added.
But Portsmouth South MP Stephen Morgan said the court's decision "will be a bitter blow to Portsmouth people".
"Aquind's desperate attempt to re-run the argument through the High Court doesn't change the facts, and it shouldn't change the outcome," he said.
"I've been clear from the outset that this project would bring untold disruption to our daily lives and our city's natural environment, with no clear benefits."
The MP added he would "continue to do everything in my power to ensure this project is stopped once and for all".
Paula-Ann Savage, of the Stop Aquind campaign group, said she was "disappointed" with the court's decision.
But she added: "We will continue to raise awareness of the dangers to the environment and our national security.
"Aquind are not an appropriate company to carry out any energy infrastructure project in the UK."
Aquind Ltd is led by Ukrainian-born British businessman Alexander Temerko
In October 2021, the BBC's Panorama programme revealed that Aquind is part-owned by Russian-born former oil executive Victor Fedotov.
The company has donated more than £700,000 to 34 Conservative MPs since the Aquind project began.
Aquind's co-owner, Ukrainian-born businessman Alexander Temerko, has donated a further £700,000 to the party.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-64388577
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news_uk-politics-64388577
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Wales weather: Warning of more flooding without investment - BBC News
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2023-01-14
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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The warning comes from a leading councillor as heavy rain causes flooding and disruption.
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Wales
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The Tywi Valley remained flooded on Saturday after weeks of rain
More money is needed for flood prevention in order to prevent further devastation and cut clean-up costs, a council leader has said.
Wales has been hit by disruption following days of continued heavy rain.
Flood warnings are in place, with river levels set to peak on Saturday after weather warnings for heavy rain.
Andrew Morgan, leader of Rhondda Cynon Taf council, said "sustained investment" was needed as responding to flooding "drains" councils' resources.
The flood warnings are in effect in south and mid Wales after days of heavy rain.
Flooding has led to disruption on the trains between Cardiff and Bridgend county on Saturday, Transport for Wales said.
Traffic Wales said the A470 between Llangurig to Rhayader in Powys had been closed due to flooding.
And the A4042 between Hardwick Roundabout and Llanellen Bridge in Abergavenny, Monmouthshire, was also closed due to flooding.
On Thursday, homes lost power, people were rescued from cars and properties were damaged after persistent rain.
Mr Morgan, who is also head of the Welsh Local Government Association (WLGA), said although work done in the past few years had been successful there was "an awful lot" of culverts that need improvement.
"Over 20 properties were flooded unfortunately, through either culverts being overwhelmed because of the volume of water, because of debris washed off the mountain. So it goes to show, we still need to do that investment," he said.
"Climate change is happening and we're seeing floods more frequently. But in particular, the intensity of the weather is really changing."
Flood waters continue to cause problems for motorists in Cardiff on Saturday morning
Although Rhondda Cynon Taf (RCT) was one of the worst hit areas, much of Wales experienced heavy rain.
Mr Morgan said the clean up was "relatively small" on this occasion, with 26 homes in his area affected.
"It will probably be tens of thousands [of pounds worth of damage]," he said.
"What we've had to do is redirect a lot of our contractors and our highway staff who would have been working on other things. So staff yesterday, who should have been filling potholes, or should be carrying out new footway schemes or resurfacing roads."
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He said the first thought during a serious flooding event is to respond to the emergency situation, but the fact this meant less funding available for other important services was a "concern".
Mr Morgan said that, although more than £14m had been spent on infrastructure upgrades in RCT since Storm Dennis in 2020, £20m has been spent on storm repairs over the same time period.
He said more than £6.4m of Welsh government funding was secured for RCT after Storm Dennis, plus about £3.9m for flood alleviation works.
The council has also secured more than £8m from the Resilient Roads Grant over the past three years for targeted flood works.
Flooding in Peterston Super Ely, just outside of Cardiff, made roads impassable on Thursday
Mr Morgan said pre-emptive investment was "vital", adding: "What we don't want to do is be sending crews to clean up the mess.
"What we need to do is flip the money and spend more on the preventative and the upgrading. It can't be about a short-term fix."
Mike Evans, of Natural Resources Wales, said climate change was "no longer a matter of argument... it's happening".
"We had the biggest floods we've ever experienced during 2020. 2022 has been the hottest year on record and it was also the biggest drought in Wales," Mr Evans said.
"The storms we're having are more frequent and they're bigger. So we're going to get more frequent flooding and we're going to have to cope with it because we can't be expected to build higher and higher flood defences.
"We will build defences to protect people at the highest risk. But as climate change increases it's practically impossible for funding and the interventions to keep up with the increased risk."
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Many areas across Wales experienced storm disruption on Thursday following high winds and heavy rain
The WLGA said the past decade had seen "unprecedented weather extremes" which had put "enormous strain on our communities, services, and infrastructure".
It said: "The resources implications on local government and partner organisations are huge, not only before and during an event but for many months afterwards.
"There is no doubt that future budget squeeze will likely put more pressure on technical services which are already stretched to the limit.
"It is important to note that keeping pace with climate change would require huge amount of funding which in itself is not sustainable.
"As a collective we are therefore looking at new ways of building resilience and adapting to these impacts."
The River Taff in Pontypridd was one of many to swell due to flood water
The Welsh government said it had invested more than £390m in flood and coastal erosion risk management through two programmes, reducing the risks faced by more than 47,000 properties across Wales.
It added that a further £71m is being spent on such works across Wales this financial year, through local authorities and Natural Resources Wales.
A spokesman added: "This includes work building new flood assets, maintenance of existing assets, development of future schemes, natural flood management, property flood resilience measures, mapping, modelling and awareness raising."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-64263107
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Uranium in cargo sparked alert at Heathrow Airport - BBC News
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2023-01-10
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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Counter-terrorism officers are investigating the shipment, which originated from Pakistan.
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UK
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Police are investigating after metal contaminated with uranium was found at London's Heathrow Airport last month.
Officers of the Metropolitan Police's Counter Terrorism Command responded to the security alert which was triggered on 29 December.
The Sun, which first reported the news, said the uranium came from Pakistan.
One line of inquiry is whether it was the result of "poor handling" in the country, the BBC was told. Police say there was no threat to the public.
It was found in a shipment of scrap metal, a source said.
A Pakistan foreign ministry spokesperson told BBC News that the reports were "not factual", adding that no information to this effect had been shared with Pakistan officially.
A former commander of the UK's defence forces said "a very small sample" was found and offered assurances that "there are people looking out for this 24 hours a day".
Colonel Hamish De Bretton-Gordon said the incident "should not worry the public".
However, he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that, in light of recent nuclear threats, he could see why the public was concerned.
He said uranium could potentially be used for nuclear fuel in power stations and, when highly enriched, it could be used for nuclear weapons.
Alarms were triggered at Heathrow after specialist scanners detected the substance as it was ferried to a freight shed owned by handling firm Swissport, the Sun said.
The shipment's intended destination is not clear. No-one has been arrested.
The Metropolitan Police said: "We can confirm officers from the Met's Counter Terrorism Command were contacted by Border Force colleagues at Heathrow after a very small amount of contaminated material was identified after routine screening within a package incoming to the UK."
Commander Richard Smith from the force's counter terrorism team separately told the BBC: "Although our investigation remains ongoing, from our inquiries so far, it does not appear to be linked to any direct threat.
"As the public would expect, however, we will continue to follow up on all available lines of inquiry to ensure this is definitely the case."
Strict protocols must be followed in order to fly dangerous cargo, including uranium, being loaded onto the base of units in the cargo hold and ensuring a minimum distance is kept between the nuclear material and cabin above.
Uranium is an element which occurs naturally. It can have nuclear-related uses once it has been refined, or enriched. This is achieved by the use of centrifuges - machines which spin at supersonic speeds.
Low-enriched uranium can be used to produce fuel for commercial nuclear power plants.
Highly enriched uranium has a purity of 20% or more and is used in research reactors. Weapons-grade uranium is 90% enriched or more.
Cabinet minister Steve Barclay said he hoped for more information in "due course" and it was right an investigation "looks at all the issues".
"I'm learning about this this morning," he told Sky News.
The Home Office said: "We do not comment on live investigations."
• None The element that causes arguments
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Prince Harry says Diana would be 'heartbroken' over Royal Family rift - BBC News
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2023-01-10
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Prince Harry tells a US interviewer his mother would have been upset at the fallout between her sons.
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UK
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Prince Harry has ruled out a return to the UK as a working royal
Princess Diana would have been "heartbroken" about the conflict with his brother Prince William, Prince Harry has told a US television interview.
He told Good Morning America their mother would have been saddened at the arguments, which he said were fuelled by briefings to a divisive press.
Prince Harry said there had to be "accountability" before reconciliation.
He also ruled out a return to the UK as a working royal.
Prince Harry told ABC News TV interviewer Michael Strahan a return to such a life within the Royal Family in the UK would be "unsurvivable".
"That's really sad, because that's essentially breaking the relationship between us," said Prince Harry, in an interview about his memoir, Spare.
In the book Prince Harry speaks about the traumatic legacy of his mother's death in a car accident in 1997 - but says Diana would now be sad to see the dispute between her sons, with Prince Harry seeing William as his "arch nemesis" as well as "beloved brother" and describing a physical altercation between them.
"I think she would be looking at it long term to know that there are certain things that we need to go through to be able to heal the relationship," he said in the interview.
He also spoke about his relationship with Camilla, the Queen Consort, saying they hadn't spoken for a long time, but he didn't think of her as an "evil stepmother".
Prince Harry said he had compassion for her as the "third person within my parents' marriage".
It was soon presented as "Meghan versus Kate", says Prince Harry about the sisters-in-law
"She had a reputation and an image to rehabilitate. And whatever conversations happened, whatever deals or trading was made right at the beginning, she was led to believe that would be the best way of doing it," he told the US news show.
These claims, presenting Prince Harry's view of events, have so far not drawn a response from Buckingham Palace or Kensington Palace.
In an ITV interview on Sunday, Prince Harry had accused the Royal Family of failing to defend his wife Meghan - with overnight viewing figures showing it had been seen by an audience of 4.1 million viewers, behind Call the Midwife and Happy Valley which drew over 5 million that evening.
Prince Harry highlighted the controversy over a Jeremy Clarkson newspaper column, saying the "silence is deafening" from the Royal Family about what he called the "horrific" Sun article.
He contrasted this with the quick action taken after a race row at a Buckingham Palace reception.
The Clarkson article about Meghan had described how the columnist was "dreaming of the day when she is made to parade naked through the streets of every town in Britain while the crowds chant 'Shame!' and throw lumps of excrement at her".
Later taken down by the Sun and prompting an apology from the paper and Mr Clarkson, the article was described by Prince Harry as "horrific and hurtful and cruel towards my wife".
"The world is asking for some form of comment from the monarchy. But the silence is deafening. To put it mildly," he said.
"Everything to do with my wife, after six years, they haven't said a single thing.
He also said he believed that stereotyping about Meghan - as an "American actress, divorced, biracial" - had been a barrier to Prince William and Catherine "welcoming her in" to the family.
"Very quickly it became Meghan versus Kate," he said of how the relationship was presented in the media, also saying it was fair to say "almost from the get-go" that the sisters-in-law did not "get on".
Prince Harry accused the Royal Family of "getting into bed with the devil" to improve its image - which he linked to relationships between "certain members of the family and the tabloid press".
The prince contrasted the lack of a royal response to the Clarkson article with the events that followed an encounter at Buckingham Palace between Lady Susan Hussey and Ngozi Fulani, just three weeks earlier.
While attending an event, Ms Fulani - a black British charity founder - was challenged repeatedly by Lady Hussey about where she was "really from".
The controversy that followed produced a rapid apology.
Prince Harry defended Lady Hussey, saying "she had never meant any harm at all". But he contrasted the reconciliatory meeting held between her and Ms Fulani at Buckingham Palace with the response to Prince Harry and Meghan's complaints.
Prince Harry also gave an interview to Anderson Cooper for 60 Minutes on CBS News, which aired a few hours after ITV's show, and saw him speaking about Camilla, the Queen Consort, and her relationship with the media.
Cooper asked the duke about comments he made in his memoir suggesting that Camilla would be "less dangerous" if she was happy.
Prince Harry said Camilla's need to "rehabilitate her image" and her "willingness" to forge relationships with the British press made her dangerous.
"And with a family built on hierarchy, and her on the way to being Queen Consort, there was going to be people or bodies left in the street because of that."
The ITV interview had also returned to Prince Harry and Meghan's previous claim - made in a 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey - that a member of the Royal Family had raised questions about the skin colour of their future child.
Prince Harry again did not name the individual - and suggested this might have been a case of "unconscious bias" rather than racism.
Asked if he would see the questioning as racist, he said: "I wouldn't, not having lived within that family."
He rejected that he had accused members of the Royal Family of racism in the Oprah interview, saying the "British press had said that".
Prince Harry made repeated criticisms of the tabloid press - saying that it was his "life's work" to change the media landscape.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-64211977
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What do the Bolsonaro protesters in Brazil want? - BBC News
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2023-01-10
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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While much has been said about Bolsonaro's loss, this is more about the man he lost to - Lula.
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Latin America & Caribbean
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Brazilians have woken up today still processing what on earth went on in their country's capital on Sunday.
The scenes of chaos shouldn't have come as a surprise, though.
Throughout Jair Bolsonaro's term, he has repeatedly questioned the efficacy of Brazil's institutions - accusing the Supreme Federal Court of being politically against him, and the voting system of being prone to fraud, despite no evidence to support those claims.
In short, he may not have masterminded the invasion, but he cannot be separated from it. His supporters took on his narrative wholeheartedly.
Since he lost the elections in October, Mr Bolsonaro has gone very quiet. He has not publicly conceded defeat - he flew off to Florida to avoid having to hand over the presidential sash to Lula - and he's allowed his most ardent supporters to remain angry over a democratic election that he legitimately lost.
Last week, his former vice president said the silence of leaders sowed chaos in society - and that is what Jair Bolsonaro is guilty of, at the very least.
One Bolsonaro supporter shields another in Brasilia on Sunday
Tension has definitely been building these past few months. Camps were set up across the country in front of army headquarters, with protesters loyal to Mr Bolsonaro calling for military intervention.
And then in December, supporters set fire to Federal Police headquarters in Brasilia. Another supporter was arrested for allegedly trying to set off a bomb before Lula's inauguration on 1 January.
Brazilians feared what happened on Sunday was only a matter of time. Perhaps more worrying is the role the authorities played in allowing this to happen.
It's no secret that many security forces are more on the side of Mr Bolsonaro than Lula. Mr Bolsonaro's narrative throughout his term about security in Brazil - and keeping people safe - made sure he had allies within the police and the armed forces.
Brasilia's governor, Ibaneis Rocha - a long-time ally of Jair Bolsonaro - has been suspended for 90 days. The Security Secretary of Brasilia, Anderson Torres, was also dismissed over yesterday's events.
To what point, then, were authorities working with protesters to allow such an invasion of top-security government buildings?
And pressure is building outside Brazil too - with Mr Bolsonaro still in Florida, Joe Biden has already been asked to extradite the former Brazilian president to face questions back home.
While Lula's administration tries to get to the bottom of where it all went wrong, the challenge remains - he has formidable opposition in these protesters, so could this happen again?
While much has been said about the protesters' anger over Mr Bolsonaro's loss in October, this is more about the man he lost to - Lula.
For them, the current president - who was jailed in 2017 for corruption, and spent 18 months in prison before the convictions were annulled - is a corrupt politician who belongs in prison, not the presidential palace.
They falsely accuse him of being a communist, wanting to impose a regime like Venezuela or Cuba. They won't be convinced by anything else - and they won't give up their fight for "democracy" as they call it.
But there's a massive flaw in their argument in wanting freedom and democracy.
They are calling for a very undemocratic military intervention to "save" Brazil - an intervention that despite their best efforts, doesn't look forthcoming.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-64212627
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Anti-strike law sets up battle over principles - BBC News
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2023-01-10
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Ministers hope their plan will be seen as pragmatic - but Labour has already set itself against them.
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UK Politics
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Railway workers would be obliged to maintain a specified minimum service level under the new laws
The government wants to lessen the impact of strikes in half a dozen public services.
But what difference will its planned new law make, and by when?
Ministers picked their moment to set out their plans: on a day when train drivers had walked out, and within hours of the Labour leader's new year speech, poaching some of Keir Starmer's limelight.
The planned new law will see the light of day early next week, I'm told, when it is given what's called its first reading in the Commons.
It is then expected that it will have its second reading - when MPs get a chance to debate it - the week after next.
Ministers don't anticipate their plans encountering any significant problems in the Commons, where the government has a sizeable majority, but that is far from the end of it.
That's because its next stop will be the House of Lords, where the numbers are much less favourable for the government.
And then there is the possibility of legal challenges too. The trades unions are incensed by the plans.
So, in short, these ideas, even if they do become law, won't make any difference as far as this winter's strikes are concerned - and they might not make any difference for rather a while.
In the short term at least, they represent a battle over principles rather than a battle over consequences.
And it is a battle where the Conservatives and Labour have very different instincts.
Keir Starmer told me if Labour wins the next election he would get rid of this new law. Ministers, though, hope their argument will be seen as pragmatic.
They have decided against outright bans on strikes in any new sector. One senior figure said such a move would have been "very draconian".
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Instead, they want minimum service levels in crucial public services - you can read more of the detail here.
Crucially, what we don't know yet is precisely what those minimum service levels might be.
How many trains would run on a day when rail workers were on strike? What category of emergency would justify an ambulance being sent to you, when ambulance workers are on strike?
These details will be worked through in consultations, due to start imminently.
Meanwhile, minsters in relevant departments are inviting union leaders in to see them, about the next financial year's pay settlements.
Again, they hope to be seen to be pragmatic, but union leaders say there is nothing pragmatic about saying your door is open but having nothing to offer on the table once you're sat around it.
But the view in government is they have no option but to be tough on the strikes, because there isn't any money left.
The argument goes that ministers can't borrow the money, for fear of spooking the markets as former prime minister Liz Truss did, there is no appetite to put up taxes, they think, and there's no spare money in existing budgets.
Yes, it is projected the rate of inflation could fall considerably before too long.
But we should still expect, given everything you have just read, that relations between the government and trades unions will, probably, show little sign of vast improvement any time soon.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-64182493
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Rishi Sunak's speech will set out ambitions for year ahead - BBC News
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2023-01-04
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The pressures faced by the NHS are uppermost in Rishi Sunak's mind, as he lays out his ambitions for 2023.
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UK Politics
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Politics, like so many of us, is spluttering back towards its regular rhythm this week, ahead of Parliament returning next.
So political leaders are trying to tap into that early January window of reflection, renewal, and that all too often rather brief collective desire for some sort of self-improvement.
Today it is the prime minister's turn to set out his ambitions for 2023. Then tomorrow it will be the Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer doing the same thing.
What we'll get from Rishi Sunak is an attempt to speak to some of his broader interests beyond the day to day firefighting of government.
Those around Mr Sunak say his instinct is that to have more than a few priorities at any one time is to have no priorities at all, and the situation in the NHS is uppermost in his mind.
And so he will address the importance of dealing with backlogs in the health service.
Problems getting an ambulance, waiting times for planned operations and social care in England are all likely to be referred to later, as critics demand immediate answers to what is widely seen as a crisis in the NHS this winter.
But it won't be the only theme in his speech - widely trailed was the idea to ensure all young people in England up to age of 18 are studying maths in some form.
It appears to be an aspiration rather than a policy idea that is fully developed - the precise mechanics for making it happen are not clear and the government acknowledges it wouldn't be possible to implement before the general election.
The PM's argument is that a growing number of jobs rely on mathematical ability and the education system needs to change to reflect that.
But critics, including the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats, point to a failure to recruit enough maths teachers.
Labour say ministers have failed to recruit enough maths teachers in every year of the last decade bar one.
On the provision of childcare to pre school children in England, I understand there is nothing imminent coming from the government, but the prime minister accepts it is a difficult issue for many families.
There is irritation in Downing Street at the intervention of the former Prime Minister Liz Truss - with those around her saying the abandoning of her plans to expand the provision of free childcare and allow nursery staff to look after a greater number of children is "economically and politically counterproductive".
No10 sources point out Ms Truss's plans were not fully developed and would be very expensive - particularly the expansion of free childcare.
And yes, like much of Liz Truss's agenda, it never developed beyond the embryonic, let alone reaching the toddler stage.
But this is a pointed intervention from her, after a few months of near public silence since she left Downing Street.
Expect to hear more from her publicly this month or next, as she carves out a new role after the humiliation of her brief stint as prime minister.
How will she calibrate her public interventions? How helpful or otherwise will she be to Rishi Sunak? And how much attention will she generate, given her disastrous time in the highest office?
The issue of childcare though is a fascinating one - because it matters to millions of families, and plenty of Conservatives fret that they have nowhere near enough to offer the under 40s.
We saw a similar row blow up before Christmas when it comes to house building, we see it again now with childcare.
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Senior Tories urge Rishi Sunak to prioritise childcare reform - BBC News
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2023-01-04
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Former prime minister Liz Truss is among those concerned plans to overhaul the system could be scrapped.
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UK Politics
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Senior Conservative MPs are urging Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to prioritise childcare reforms, arguing it is too expensive for parents.
Robin Walker, chairman of the Commons education committee, said his party needed "a serious set of policies" on the issue.
A source close to former PM Liz Truss has urged her successor not to scrap her plans to overhaul the system.
No 10 sources have denied Mr Sunak has shelved plans for reform.
The UK is among the most expensive countries for childcare in the world, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.
Ms Truss, a former childcare minister, had made the issue a focus of her short premiership.
She had reportedly been looking at options to overhaul the system in England, including increasing free childcare support and scrapping mandatory staff-child ratios, which limit the number of children one adult can look after.
However, since Ms Truss was only in office for a few weeks, no new childcare policies were formally announced.
A source close to Ms Truss told The Times: "Excessive bureaucracy is making childcare in England increasingly unaffordable for many parents. The system needs to be reformed in order to boost growth and opportunity.
"Junking Liz's plans for this critical policy area seems economically and politically counterproductive."
BBC political editor Chris Mason said there was irritation in Downing Street at the intervention by Ms Truss.
Downing Street sources point out Ms Truss's plans were not fully developed and would be very expensive - particularly the expansion of free childcare.
Sources have said Mr Sunak is working on a series of options with the education secretary to improve the system.
The prime minister will set out the priorities for his premiership in a speech later but no policy announcements on childcare are expected imminently.
Surveys suggest the idea of scrapping ratios is unpopular with parents and nurseries, with many concerned about the impact on safety and the quality of childcare.
But reports in the Telegraph that Mr Sunak has shelved plans for a major overhaul of childcare have prompted concern from some Conservative MPs.
Mr Walker, a former education minister, said there was a strong economic argument for making childcare reform a priority, as it allowed parents to return to work more easily.
He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that if children were better prepared for school, this could also address any issues with speech and language development early on.
"I think any party which is aspiring to run the country now needs to set out a serious set of policies as to how we better support parents, particularly in the early years," he said.
He added that he believed the prime minister was "genuinely interested in this area" but there needed to be "policy detail".
Mr Walker said he did not believe scrapping staff-child ratios was "the right way of pursuing this" but "we have to look at other mechanisms to better support the sector, better support parents with the cost of childcare".
Other Tory MPs have also expressed concerns about reports childcare reforms could be shelved.
Simon Clarke, a former minister and ally of Ms Truss, said in a tweet earlier this week: "Childcare is hugely and unnecessarily expensive in England and we should do all we can to support working mums."
Siobhan Baillie, Conservative MP for Stroud, also said the "complex and expensive childcare system" needed reform.
She said Ms Truss was right to be "bold" on childcare, although she was not convinced changing ratios and expanding existing schemes was the right approach.
The prime minister's spokesperson said: "We continue to review all options to improve the cost, choice and availability of high-quality childcare for working parents. It's very important for this prime minister, as is education.
"We have spent £20bn over the past five years to support families with the cost of childcare."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-64161139
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news_uk-politics-64161139
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Ukraine hit by Russian missiles day after West's offer of tanks - BBC News
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2023-01-26
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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Eleven people have been killed and 11 others injured after strikes hit buildings in several regions.
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Europe
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The aftermath of a Russian strike was seen on Thursday in the town of Hlevakha, outside Kyiv
Russia launched a wave of missiles at Ukraine on Thursday, a day after Germany and the US pledged tanks to aid Kyiv's fight against the invasion.
Eleven people died and 11 others were injured after 35 buildings were struck across several regions, the state's emergency service said.
It added the worst damage to residential buildings was in the Kyiv region.
Officials also reported strikes on two energy facilities in the Odesa region.
The barrage came as Russia said it perceived the new offer of military support, which followed a UK pledge to send Challenger 2 battle tanks, as "direct" Western involvement in the conflict.
In what was a sustained and wide-ranging attack, the head of the Ukrainian army said Moscow launched 55 air and sea-based missiles on Thursday.
Valery Zaluzhny added that 47 of them were shot down, including 20 around Kyiv.
Earlier, Ukraine's air force said it had downed a cluster of Iranian-made attack drones launched by Russian forces from the Sea of Azov in the south of the country.
A 55-year-old man was killed and two others wounded when non-residential buildings in the south of the capital were struck, officials reported.
The offensive was a continuation of Russia's months-long tactic of targeting Ukraine's infrastructure. The freezing winter has seen power stations destroyed and millions plunged into darkness.
After Thursday's strikes, emergency power cuts were enforced in Kyiv and several other regions to relieve pressure on the electricity grid, said DTEK, Ukraine's largest private power producer.
A day earlier, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz promised to provide Ukraine with 14 Leopard 2 tanks, following weeks of international pressure. They are widely seen as some of the most effective battle tanks available.
The heavy weaponry is expected to arrive in late March or early April.
President Joe Biden later announced the US would send 31 M1 Abrams battle tanks, marking a reversal of longstanding Pentagon arguments that they are a poor fit for the Ukrainian battlefield.
Canada has also promised to supply Ukraine with four "combat-ready" Leopard tanks in the coming weeks, together with experts to train Ukrainian soldiers in how to operate them.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Thursday that 12 countries had now joined what he called the "tank coalition".
But for tanks to be "game-changer", 300 to 400 of them would be needed, an adviser to Ukraine's defence minister told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.
"The sooner we defeat Russia on the battlefield using Western weapons, the sooner we will be able to stop this missile terror and restore peace," Yuriy Sak said.
Speaking on the same programme, Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said sending tanks to Ukraine would make a big difference to the country's ability to win the war.
He also warned that Russia was planning a fresh offensive, just as reports began emerging from Ukraine of missile strikes following drone attacks overnight.
On Thursday, the US designated Russia's Wagner group, which is believed to have thousands of mercenaries in Ukraine, a transnational criminal organisation.
It also imposed fresh sanctions on the group and their associates to "further impede [Russian President Vladimir] Putin's ability to arm and equip his war machine", Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said in the statement.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-64411259
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Gareth Southgate: England manager on decision to stay, World Cup & human rights - BBC Sport
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2023-01-26
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Gareth Southgate talks to BBC sports editor Dan Roan about his decision to remain England manager, the team's performance in Qatar and why he has no regrets.
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Gareth Southgate considered stepping down as England boss because of criticism he faced before the World Cup, saying: "The last thing you want as a manager is that your presence is divisive and inhibits performance."
England were knocked out of the tournament by France in the quarter-finals, 18 months after losing the Euro 2020 final to Italy on penalties at Wembley.
The team were booed off in June following a 4-0 defeat against Hungary at Molineux in the Nations League - part of a generally poor series of results leading into the winter World Cup.
Explaining for the first time how he reached the decision to stay in his job, he told BBC Sport: "I never want to be in a position where my presence is affecting the team in a negative way.
"I didn't believe that was the case, but I just wanted a period after the World Cup to reflect and make sure that was still how it felt."
The 52-year-old said he asked himself: "Is it the right thing to keep taking this project on? I wanted to make sure I'm still fresh and hungry for that challenge."
Describing his role as "the greatest privilege of my life", he said the decision to stay was ultimately "not difficult" because of "the quality of performances and the progress that we're making".
"The team are still improving. We're all gaining belief in what we're doing," he said.
In a wide-ranging interview conducted at the team's training base St George's Park, Southgate:
• None strongly suggested he considered announcing last year that Qatar would be his final tournament to "free that narrative up so the support is behind the team, and not debating whether the manager should be there or not"
• None said getting knocked out in the quarter-final was "really difficult to take" but the support from players and fans "definitely lifts you"
• None revealed he was "comfortable" with his tactics during the and had no regrets
• None insisted England are "really competitive against everybody now" and is "very confident" about their chances at next year's European Championship in Germany
In the immediate aftermath of his team's defeat to France six weeks ago, Southgate said he felt "conflicted" about his future, having "found large parts of the last 18 months difficult".
England went into the World Cup on the back of relegation from their Nations League group and during the Hungary defeat some England fans chanted "you don't know what you're doing" at the manager.
After failing to match both the semi-final he led England to in the 2018 World Cup and the final of Euro 2020, Southgate said he would "review and reflect".
But a week later the FA announced he would see out the remaining two years of his contract.
Now, in his first public comments since that decision, Southgate has opened up on the effect the criticism he received following the Hungary defeat had on him.
"I was worried after that game the team would be affected by the narrative about whether the manager stay or go, and when we went into the games in September we were a little bit anxious.
"At Wembley against Germany the crowd weren't against their team but they were waiting to see what happened.
"I've been around teams where that can inhibit performance, and the last thing you want as a manager is that your presence is divisive and inhibits performance.
"I knew I had support with the players and [the FA], there are bigger things at stake with England than just [that].
"My only concern… was when it feels like there might be division between what the fans want and where my position might have been, that can affect the team, and I was conscious of that leading into the World Cup.
"I felt we had great support, but I was conscious… how would things be during and after?"
Southgate says his team recovered before the World Cup, but that he wanted to be sure after the tournament that staying was the right thing for his side.
"You need to give yourself time in these situations to make good decisions," he said.
"I think it's easy to rush things when emotions are high, and very often you have to sleep a little bit more and come to the right conclusions.
"The question for me was… 'is it the right thing to keep taking this project on?' Because it's not just the six years I've been with the seniors - I've been here 10 years with developing everything as well. So I wanted to make sure I'm still fresh and hungry for that challenge."
'Trying to break through history'
In an indication of how close he had come to announcing before the World Cup that he would step down following the tournament, Southgate said: "My thinking is always around, 'How does this affect the team?'
"Is this going to give the team the best chance going into the World Cup?" he added.
"Do we need to free that narrative up so the support is behind the team, and not debating whether the manager should be there or not? But I think we came through that period."
Asked whether he wavered as he weighed up whether to stay, Southgate said: "Not after the World Cup. In the lead-in that was a little bit different.
"I wasn't quite sure how things would play out, and I think it's always right to judge an international manager on their tournaments.
"Our performances were good. With France, across the flow of the game, we should win. But football is a low-scoring game where small margins make a difference.
"And we have to make sure now those small margins are turned in our favour. We're much closer now to really having that belief to win. We've still got a small step to take - I saw progress in the team from our performances in the Euros.
"We're trying to break through history here as well as against opponents that are high-level. I feel we're really competitive against everybody now.
"Outside of France, and you could argue Croatia, we've probably been as consistent as any team in terms of our finishes. And I think people have enjoyed that journey with us."
Asked how it would have felt to see someone else take over, Southgate replied: "I'm never worried about somebody else taking over and benefiting, that's how it should work.
"We're talking about building a future for England for now, for the next tournament, but also beyond that."
'Exit was difficult to take'
Southgate said the support he received from players and fans after the France defeat "definitely lifts you".
"The moment you depart is really difficult to take, and you know the steps you have to take for the next one," he said.
"But I don't think you can make decisions as a manager just on having support from everybody because you're never going to have support of everybody."
While most of Southgate's selections paid off in Qatar, and his team showed more attacking intent than previously, there was some criticism that he waited until the 85th minute against France to introduce in-form Manchester United striker Marcus Rashford.
When asked if he had any regrets about the match, he said: "I don't really. What I've learned in this job, whenever the result doesn't go as you hope then the solution is always the things you didn't do, because of course nobody knows what they might look like.
"So I'm comfortable with that. I think we used the squad well. There can always be an argument for a different player providing something at a different time."
When it was suggested to Southgate that some fans feel a new manager is needed to help deliver silverware for England, he said: "I think if our performances weren't at the level they had been, then I think there would be a little bit more legitimacy in that argument.
"We're all gaining belief in what we're doing.
"We're really competitive against everybody now and the game with France showed we can dominate the ball against those big teams."
In the build-up to the World Cup Southgate was regularly asked to comment on the human rights issues that surrounded Qatar's controversial hosting of the tournament.
"There are moments where life would be more straightforward for me if it was just focusing on football," he said.
"You are very conscious of the impact of your words and you have got to be representing your country on a global stage.
"So there might be a view in our country of certain things, but you've also got to be an ambassador when you travel and when you're dealing with other people.
"So it is complex, but it's also been the greatest privilege of my life to lead my country and I'm very conscious of that honour. It's allowed me to have life experiences I could never have expected."
Southgate was speaking before the FA Cup 4th round and said the matches would play a part in helping him select his squad for the upcoming Euro 2024 qualifiers against champions Italy and Ukraine in March.
"A lot of the teams have been playing young English players and for a lot it's their first experience of competitive football," he said.
"So that's great to see young players breaking through.
"We have several players playing well. And it's interesting to watch this period because it's the first time players have had to go back from a major tournament straight into club football.
"The next few weeks are important for us to monitor, probably more so the players that perhaps haven't been with us as regularly.
"But then, as we go towards March, it's really key who is in form and who can help us to win what is a crucial game going to Naples, and then with Ukraine as well."
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Jonathan Edwards: Wife assault caution MP may run as independent - BBC News
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2023-01-18
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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An MP who was cautioned for assaulting his wife could run against his former party, Plaid Cymru.
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Wales politics
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Jonathan Edwards says he has support in his constituency to run again.
An MP who was cautioned by police for assaulting his wife said he could run against his former party at the next election.
Carmarthen East and Dinefwr MP Jonathan Edwards quit Plaid Cymru last year amid a row about his status in the party.
Mr Edwards said he has a "groundswell of support" locally to stand again.
Plaid Cymru said it was "entirely focused on continuing to deliver policies that make a real difference to people's lives".
In May 2020 Mr Edwards was arrested when police were called to his home in Carmarthenshire.
He received a police caution for common assault on his wife, Emma Edwards. The pair have since divorced.
At the time he said he was deeply sorry and that it was the biggest regret of his life.
Two years later he was allowed to re-join Plaid Cymru by a disciplinary panel - triggering an argument about whether he should represent the party in the House of Commons.
Ms Edwards said she was "appalled and disappointed" that the party reinstated him.
A majority of the party's ruling national executive committee recommended that he should not resume his work as a Plaid Westminster MP - meaning he would have to sit as an independent.
After Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price called for him to leave, he quit the party altogether.
"Part of the process of deciding what to do is the support I am receiving locally, and there is a lot of support from individuals locally," he told BBC Wales.
Mr Edwards said he had received enough money to stand and fight an election "from small donations from numerous individuals".
He said that if he did stand he would do so on his "record as an elected member in Carmarthenshire for over a decade-and-a-half".
Asked if he was a fit and proper person to be an MP, he said: "That is a matter for the people to decide and determine.
"There were no procedures against me by the House of Commons at all and there was no prosecution by the police."
He said he completed a specialist course requested by the Plaid Cymru disciplinary panel "faithfully".
Jonathan Edwards said he was shocked by a statement made by Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price
Mr Edwards said he was shocked by a statement by Mr Price that said his actions "did not represent our values and his position as an MP sends the wrong message out to domestic abuse survivors".
He added: "The disciplinary committee decided I met all their expectations and were happy for me to re-join. Unfortunately the leadership of Plaid Cymru enabled that process to become politicised."
He accused the leadership of Plaid Cymru of taking an "absolute position" that an individual should "should be cancelled and destroyed and that there is no way back for that individual any more".
"There is another group of people who believe that if an individual is honest about the mistakes they have done and recognise that they acted improperly and they have taken their punishment, then that individual deserves a second chance."
Plaid Cymru said: "The disciplinary process in question has long concluded.
"Plaid Cymru is now entirely focused on continuing to deliver policies that make a real difference to people's lives through its co-operation agreement with Welsh government, holding the Tories in Westminster to account for their chronic neglect of Wales, and supporting public sector workers in their disputes with the Labour government."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-64320533
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Chris Mason: Section 35 - The wire in devolution never before tripped - BBC News
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2023-01-18
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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Section 35 of the Scotland Act has been triggered - a wire in devolution never before tripped.
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UK Politics
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Wandering up the green-carpeted spiral staircase of Bute House, the official residence of the first minister of Scotland, pictures of those who've been able to call this place home hang from the walls.
There are five pictures: those of Donald Dewar, Henry McLeish, Jack McConnell, Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon.
Devolution, the sharing of power around the UK, is a quarter of a century old.
For all the fault lines between the Scottish Parliament and the government at Westminster, the tensions in the wiring of devolution, I'm here to talk about a wire never before tripped.
The secretary of state for Scotland has triggered Section 35 of the Scotland Act 1998 - vetoing the Scottish government's plans to make it easier for people to change gender. (You can read more about that here)
Arguments about gender and arguments about the constitution are as complex as they are keenly fought over.
But the essence of this one is this: the issue of gender is devolved, it is a power that rests in Edinburgh.
The issue of equalities is reserved, to use the jargon, it is a power that rests in London.
The Scottish government insists its planned new law doesn't clash with the Great-Britain-wide Equality Act, while the government at Westminster insists it does - and has now set out why it thinks that.
That is the crux of the legal and political argument to come, exploring avenues never before travelled since Donald Dewar became first minister in 1999.
We can expect a judicial review, an appointment at the Court of Session in Edinburgh and, quite probably, a final calling point of the UK Supreme Court to sort this out.
In my interview with Nicola Sturgeon, she claimed the UK government's decision amounted to "a direct attack on the institution of the Scottish parliament" and could be the start of a "slippery slope" of interventions from what she described as "an increasingly hostile UK government wanting to undermine devolution".
But, while unprecedented, the UK government is using a lever within the existing law, a law backed by the SNP, albeit a long time ago in the late 90s.
And it is, undoubtedly, provocative.
The language from ministers in Westminster is noticeably more emollient in public than the words of the first minister, although some senior Conservatives privately suggest the Scottish government may have seen this row coming a mile off, knowing they would either secure the change in the law they would like (and was, it should be pointed out, strongly endorsed by the Scottish parliament) or provoke a constitutional argument allowing them to point at what they would see as the inadequacies of devolution.
Opponents of the reforms have protested outside the Scottish Parliament
Nicola Sturgeon claims bluntly the UK government is acting in "bad faith".
Within government at Westminster, there was agonising private debate about what to do in the days prior to the announcement.
While there are divisions in all the big parties on the issue of transgender rights, there is a genuine difference of instinct between the Tories in Westminster, who are cautious, conservative, when it comes to significant changes to the existing law, and the SNP, which is more liberal.
And while plenty of Tories really didn't like the Scottish bill, or the potential implications they fear around Britain, many flinched before triggering Article 35.
They knew they were creating a precedent, they knew they would be sparking a political row.
One figure suggested that, until now, the Conservative government had what was described to me as a "Sturgeon containment strategy" - limit the provocations that fan the flames of an argument about the constitution for as long as she remains first minister - perhaps, some suggest, another few years - and hope her successor isn't half as politically successful as she has been.
So much for that, when you then choose to open up a brand new front of constitutional anger.
Equally, I suggested to the first minister, when she claimed ministers in London were weaponising the lives of trans people, was she not weaponising her language in how she chose to respond, to further an argument for independence?
Was it not possible both sides had a passionate disagreement, in good faith?
But those allegations of bad faith are made in both directions.
In truth, there is a profound difference of instinct on trans rights visible here, and a significant legal disagreement too.
And both are wrapped up in diametrically opposed visions for the future of Scotland; the SNP dream of independence and the UK government's unionist view.
And so that imminent legal tussle will be magnified by the rhetoric of political argument on both sides, as a new frost develops between the residents of Bute House and 10 Downing Street.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-64309606
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Afghanistan: UN's top women meet Taliban over female aid worker ban - BBC News
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2023-01-18
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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The UN sends in its most senior team since the Taliban retook power to try to avert a looming famine.
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Asia
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Getting enough food to eat and keeping the cold at bay is a daily challenge
In a country where women are barred from university and secondary schools, and banned from many workplaces, the world's biggest aid operation is now at risk of failing those who desperately need it.
And it's happening in the cruellest depths of winter when famine and frostbite are knocking at the door.
In the middle of a deepening crisis, the most senior UN delegation to visit Afghanistan since the Taliban swept to power in 2021 has flown into Kabul.
The UN secretary general dispatched his deputy Amina Mohammad, the UN's most senior woman, with a team which also includes the head of UN Women, Sima Bahous.
They've been tasked with speaking to senior Taliban leaders at the highest-possible level about reversing restrictions, including a new ban on female aid workers, now seen to endanger urgent life-saving humanitarian operations.
The UN delegation have met the Taliban's acting foreign minister
"People are freezing and time is running out," emphasises Ramiz Alakbarov, the UN's humanitarian co-ordinator in Afghanistan in a statement which emphasises the all too obvious.
"We need to build shelters now but, in this conservative society, if we don't have female aid workers to speak to women in the families, we can't do this work."
It's not just that the UN has sent a senior delegation, they've also sent one headed by women with decades of experience.
"If there are women in the room, there is a greater chance that the uncomfortable conversations about women will take place," said one aid official who often sits in the room during efforts to reconcile the Taliban government's demands with international norms on human rights.
There's often been criticism that, all too often, foreign delegations send men-only teams which reinforce conservative Taliban views of their world.
The world's top table, the UN Security Council, recently condemned with unusual unanimity the "increasing erosion for the respect of human rights and fundamental freedoms".
The first Taliban official to meet the visiting delegation in Kabul was acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi.
On social media, his spokesman said the meeting began with the minister expressing hope that the "delegation would portray Afghanistan's true picture to the world".
He also reiterated the Taliban argument that the absence of international recognition of their rule, along with sanctions, was hindering their ability to govern effectively.
Across Afghanistan, temperatures are plunging to as low as -17C and even lower in mountainous areas.
Electricity is erratic or absent, and millions of families are struggling to make it through the night. Hardscrabble lives in one of the world's poorest countries have always been harsh - but not as harsh as this.
"We cannot provide humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan without the participation of half the society," is the urgent mantra of aid agencies struggling to respond to the new Taliban government edict restricting Afghan female aid workers.
Some aid agencies have temporarily suspended their operations. The ruling is the latest in a raft of rules in recent months which also banned women from attending university, socialising in public parks, or even going to women-only gyms.
Taliban leaders say conditions compliant with their interpretation of Islamic Sharia law and Afghanistan's conservative traditions must first be readied.
Despite earlier promises, the Taliban have steadily pushed women out of public life since they swept back to power
There's been some movement on this latest ban.
Within the Taliban system, some officials understand the gravity of these new rules.
The Health Ministry has now clarified that women can work in the health sector where women doctors and nurses are absolutely essential. That's triggered the resumption of some vital health programmes.
"While the majority of our programmes remain on hold, we are restarting some activities - such as health, nutrition and some education services - where we have received clear, reliable assurances from relevant authorities that our female staff will be safe and can work without obstruction," announced Save the Children in a statement this week.
Samira Sayed Rahman, of the International Rescue Committee in Kabul, underlined the need for Afghan women to work everywhere, from door-to-door surveys in the field to desks in the office.
"We are taking a pragmatic approach, working with Taliban officials' sector by sector," she told the BBC.
With the economy on its knees, growing numbers of Afghans rely on food aid
These aren't just concerns of the outside world. In one province after another, tribal leaders and religious scholars have been imploring Taliban leaders to open girls' secondary schools and provide more opportunities for work.
On our visit to the remote central highlands of Ghor last summer, we heard from farmers and their families how timely interventions by the UN World Food Programme last winter pulled some districts from the brink of famine.
"We feel the world is now forgetting us," one farmer lamented, as he brandished dried shafts of wheat, a painful symbol of years of punishing drought which have deepened the hardship.
This high-level UN delegation started their mission by first visiting Afghanistan's neighbours, as well as to the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) to underscore what the UN has called "the importance of the international community speaking with one voice with a unified approach".
This UN visit, at this time, is an important signal to many Afghans and their allies who feel much of the world seems to have forgotten a country where they once invested so much commitment and cash.
"Where are the Nato countries that rushed through the door in 2021?" demanded Jan Egeland, the secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council.
In a message posted last week on Twitter during his own visit to Afghanistan, he discarded any niceties about the US-led pull out which played a part in the Taliban takeover. "You left 40 million Afghans with us."
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Elon Musk trial: Prospective jurors call him narcissistic, smart - BBC News
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2023-01-18
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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He could be ordered to pay billions of dollars in damages if he loses the fraud lawsuit over a tweet.
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US & Canada
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If a jury rules in favour of Tesla's shareholders, Mr Musk may be ordered to pay billions of dollars in damages
Prospective jurors in a civil lawsuit against Elon Musk have a range of opinions of him, from "smart, successful" to "off his rocker".
Mr Musk, who is being sued by Tesla shareholders arguing he manipulated the firm's share price, has said he cannot get a fair trial in San Francisco.
He wanted the trial to take place in Texas - where he has moved Tesla's headquarters - but that was rejected.
A jury has been selected, after jurors completed a pre-trial questionnaire.
The case centres on 2018 tweets, saying that he would take Tesla private. US regulators removed Mr Musk as Tesla chairman because of the posts.
On 7 August 2018, he tweeted that he had "funding secured" to take the carmaker private in what would be a $72bn (£58.7bn) buyout.
In a second tweet, Musk added that "investor support is confirmed," and that the deal was only awaiting a vote by shareholders. No such deal went ahead.
"The claim is that the investors felt that they were defrauded by Musk's tweet, that he was considering taking Tesla private and critically, that he had funding secured for it," Robert Bartlett, law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, told Reuters.
"That turned out not to be the case. So when the stock price rose after the news, they allegedly bought, and then it collapsed when the truth came out. They claimed that that was fraud."
The Tesla chief executive, however, argued that he believed he had secured funding from Saudi Arabia's Investment Fund, and did not commit securities fraud.
"I think he's a little off his rocker, on a personal level," one possible juror wrote on a questionnaire asking whether they could be impartial.
"I truly believe you can't judge a person until you walk in their shoes," said another possible juror, who added that Mr Musk seemed "narcissistic".
Another person said Mr Musk had a "mercenary" personality because he's "willing to take risks… that's my image of him".
Another called him a "fast-rising business man", while yet another said he was a "smart, successful pioneer".
"I think he is not a very likable person," said one person, according to Yahoo.
When asked by the judge whether that meant she would not be impartial towards him, the woman responded: "A lot of people are not necessarily likable people…. sometimes I don't like my husband."
Ultimately a jury of nine people was chosen, and opening arguments are set to begin on Wednesday.
Mr Musk argued that mass sackings at Twitter, a company he bought last year, affected many employees in the Californian city, and a fair trial couldn't take place there.
However, on Friday the judge said the trial would go ahead in California.
If a San Francisco jury rules in the shareholders' favour, Mr Musk could be ordered to pay billions of dollars in damages.
He has already paid $20m to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for the tweet, while Tesla had to pay another $20m.
His tweet has become legendary in Silicon Valley, as it showed the sheer power that Twitter can have.
Legal experts said they believe it will be a difficult case for Mr Musk to win, and that the fine he paid to the SEC will be used against him in the case. However, jury trials in cases of fraud are notoriously difficult to predict.
The case may see Mr Musk give evidence under oath. The witness list includes Oracle's CEO Larry Ellison and media tycoon James Murdoch. It is expected to last around three weeks.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-64293744
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UK government is not blocking Scotland gender reform bill lightly - minister - BBC News
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2023-01-18
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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Scottish Secretary Alister Jack tells MPs trans people deserve respect - but Scotland's bill could undermine UK equalities law.
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Scotland
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Downing Street insists that using Section 35 of the Scotland Act to veto this Holyrood bill is not a political choice but a legal necessity.
That argument is complicated by the fact that when the mechanism was proposed in 1998, the Conservatives’ Constitutional Affairs Spokesman Michael Ancram was highly critical of it.
The MP for Devizes invoked the notion of colonialism by referring to it as a “governor-general clause” which appeared “to place draconian powers in the hands of the Secretary of State”.
Nicola Sturgeon is now trying to frame the decision to use Section 35 (confusingly known at the time as Clause 33) as an attack on devolution itself.
But her position is complicated by the fact that SNP MPs voted for the Scotland Act after abstaining on Ancram’s amendment
It sought to raise the bar for invoking Section 35 albeit in a way that would probably not have made a difference in this case as it simply required the minister to seek legal advice before making a decision, which the Scottish Secretary Alister Jack appears to have done.
Labour, which designed the devolutionary framework, is in more of a pickle about the gender law itself. UK leader Sir Keir Starmer expressed concerns about it on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg even though Scottish Labour MSPs had voted for it.
So we are now heading for the courts. In the meantime, you might want to ask Ancram for his lottery numbers because, in the House of Commons debate on 12 May 1998, he made this prediction:
“…the purpose of the Opposition throughout the passage of the Bill has been to try to identify the areas in it that could lead to dramatic confrontation between the Parliament and Government in Edinburgh and the Parliament and Government in London.
"I can see within this draconian power—were it used in a way that ran counter to the wishes of the Scottish Parliament—the epitome of such a confrontation.”
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-scotland-64294059
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news_live_uk-scotland-64294059
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Brazil protests: Security forces detain 1,500 after Congress stormed - BBC News
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2023-01-08
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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Brazilian authorities have begun to dismantle protest camps after key government buildings were stormed.
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Latin America & Caribbean
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While Jair Bolsonaro may not have been the mastermind behind the invasion, he cannot be separated from it.
Throughout his term, he has repeatedly questioned the efficacy of Brazil's institutions - accusing the Supreme Federal Court of being politically against him, and the voting system of being prone to fraud, despite no evidence to support those claims.
His supporters took on his narrative wholeheartedly.
Since he lost the elections in October he flew off to Florida to avoid having to hand over the presidential sash to Lula - and he's allowed his most ardent supporters to remain angry over a democratic election that he legitimately lost.
Tension has definitely been building. Camps were set up across the country in front of army headquarters, with protesters loyal to Bolsonaro calling for military intervention. And then in December, supporters set fire to Federal Police headquarters in Brasilia. Another supporter was arrested for allegedly trying to set off a bomb before Lula's inauguration on 1 January.
It's no secret that many security forces are more on the side of Bolsonaro than Lula.
For Bolsonaro's supporters, Lula - who was jailed in 2017 for corruption, and spent 18 months in prison before the convictions were annulled - is a corrupt politician who belongs in prison, not the presidential palace.
They falsely accuse him of being a communist, wanting to impose a regime like Venezuela or Cuba. They won't be convinced by anything else - and they won't give up their fight for "democracy" as they call it.
But there's a massive flaw in their argument in wanting freedom and democracy.
They are calling for a very undemocratic military intervention to "save" Brazil - an intervention that despite their best efforts, doesn't look forthcoming.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-latin-america-64206148
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news_live_world-latin-america-64206148
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Brazil's far-right faithfuls are not giving up - BBC News
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2023-01-08
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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With only days to go until Lula is sworn in as president, some of his opponents refuse to accept defeat.
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Latin America & Caribbean
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Protesters opposed to Lula's election have been camped out outside the barracks
Following the arrest in Brasilia of a supporter of outgoing President Jair Bolsonaro for allegedly trying to set off a bomb to create chaos ahead of the inauguration of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva as Brazil's new president, the BBC's South America correspondent Katy Watson examines the risks that hardcore Lula opponents pose for his presidency.
Outside the military barracks in the centre of São Paulo, there is a small group of about 50 people protesting.
Draped in Brazil's flag, they are chanting: "Armed forces, save Brazil." Some are waving banners with the words: "Our flag will never be red - out with communism".
Around them, dozens of tarpaulin tents have been set up, most of them green, blue and yellow, the colours of the national flag, which are now associated with the country's far-right.
One young man who introduces himself as Rodrigo is camping out in one of them, along with four other people.
Rodrigo says he is willing to stay outside the barracks long-term if need be
He pitched up just after October's presidential election in which the far-right candidate he was backing - incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro - narrowly lost to left-winger Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
"It's a greater cause," he says, explaining that he is here to stay and not considering returning home.
When asked whether Jair Bolsonaro is the driving force behind his decision to stay on and protest, he admits he is.
"He's influential on social networks - the things he posts about family, God, liberty, which are our principles, make us stay here."
But fellow protester Luca Oliveira disagrees - he says their movement is bigger than the soon-to-be former leader.
"Our voting system? It's a fraud," says Luca. He claims Brazil's electronic voting system is prone to irregularities and that the "biased" Supreme Court is doing nothing about it.
It is a familiar argument. Jair Bolsonaro made it throughout the election campaign, providing no proof to back it up. But repeat the allegations over and over again, and that is enough to keep this group of people on the streets.
"We are calling for something different," Luca says, without defining exactly what that is.
The truth is, people here want the military to get involved.
"I come here mainly because we have reason to believe that the elections were not done in a clean manner," explains 22-year-old Sofia, a law student who did not want to give her surname.
Sofia is a law student who thinks the army should intervene
"Lula da Silva is an ex-convict. Having him become president is basically saying it's OK for you to be a criminal here in Brazil," she says referring to the time the president-elect served in jail before his conviction was annulled.
Sofia argues that under Brazil's constitution, it falls to the army to intervene to take care of national security in cases when there is something wrong with the elections or the electronic voting machines.
She says that the armed forces should take "whatever measures necessary" to ensure "the election is correct".
But there is no sign that Brazil's military wants to intervene.
A report by the armed forces on the security of Brazil's electronic voting system found no evidence of fraud during the elections, although it did point out some vulnerabilities that it said could be exploited.
That sliver of doubt is enough to keep these protesters hoping for a radical U-turn from the authorities.
It is a scene replicated across Brazil since Lula won the presidential elections at the end of October.
One demonstrator is carrying a sign which reads "#Brazilianspring" in a reference to the mass protests in 2013, when more than a million people took part in anti-government protests in about 100 cities across the country.
The demonstrators believe the election was "stolen" by Lula
Political scientist Jonas Medeiros says these protests are nothing like on the scale of the unrest the country experienced back then.
But he does caution that what is happening now is worth paying attention to. "There is a tendency in the progressive camp as well as the media to minimise their [the protests'] importance," says Mr Medeiros.
"That they are just a minority of interventionist pariahs, so don't give them any attention. But these people are building networks, possible civil organisations and this is the seed for the future of the opposition that Lula will have to deal with for the next four years."
Michele Prado is also a political scientist. She knows first-hand how these protesters operate, because until recently she was one of them.
She voted for Jair Bolsonaro in 2018 and talks about having become "radicalised" before she realised that many of arguments she had read on right-wing WhatsApp groups "weren't democratic".
She says she fell for the narrative which "appeared to defend democracy and liberty".
But even though Ms Prado may have had a change of heart, she insists Mr Bolsonaro's influence remains strong.
"Just look at his behaviour until now. He's still not given a declaration [after Lula's victory]," she says referring to the fact that the outgoing president has not admitted defeat.
Jair Bolsonaro has not been seen in public much since he lost in the election
"He left the door open for extremist mobilisation to continue. He legitimises this radicalisation and the extreme right because he himself spent his entire mandate attacking democratic institutions, disrespecting minorities, the separation of power," she explains.
Law student Sofia is one of those still holding out for the armed forces to somehow prevent the handover of power from happening.
She says she believes "the armed forces will actually do something" to stop Lula from taking office.
It is an unlikely outcome that those protesting alongside her outside the army barracks may still be holding out for, but one that few Brazilians truly believe will occur.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-64094197
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news_world-latin-america-64094197
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Prince Harry accuses Prince William of physical attack in book - BBC News
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2023-01-05
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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In his book Spare, the Duke of Sussex claims his brother pushed him to the floor, the Guardian says.
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UK
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Prince Harry has claimed his brother Prince William physically attacked him, according to the Guardian, which says it has seen a copy of the Duke of Sussex's memoir, Spare.
The newspaper reported that the book sets out an argument between the pair over Harry's wife Meghan.
"He grabbed me by the collar, ripping my necklace, and he knocked me to the floor," the Guardian quotes Harry.
Kensington Palace and Buckingham Palace have both said they will not comment.
The palaces - which represent William, now Prince of Wales, and the King respectively - seem to have adopted the strategy that any controversial claims will fizzle out faster without a response.
Meanwhile, in a new clip previewing an interview with ITV, Harry refuses to commit to attending the King's coronation in May.
He says there is a lot "that can happen between now and then" and the "ball is in [the Royal Family's] court".
Harry's memoir will not be published until next Tuesday, but the Guardian said had it obtained a copy amid what it called "stringent pre-launch security".
BBC News has not yet seen a copy of Spare.
The book was, however, on sale in Spain five days ahead of its anticipated publish date - entitled En La Sombra, which translates as "In the shadow".
Book shops in the UK say they are under a strict embargo to ensure the autobiography is not released early.
According to the Guardian, the book claims the row was sparked by comments William made to Harry at his London home in 2019.
Harry, the paper says, writes that his brother was critical of his marriage to Meghan Markle - and that William described her as "difficult", "rude" and "abrasive".
He reportedly writes that his brother was "parrot[ing] the press narrative" as the confrontation escalated.
Harry is said to describe what happened next, including an alleged physical altercation.
"He set down [a glass of] water, called me another name, then came at me. It all happened so fast. So very fast.
"He grabbed me by the collar, ripping my necklace, and he knocked me to the floor.
"I landed on the dog's bowl, which cracked under my back, the pieces cutting into me. I lay there for a moment, dazed, then got to my feet and told him to get out."
Harry writes that William left but returned "looking regretful, and apologised", the Guardian says.
When William left again, Harry is said to write that his brother "turned and called back: 'You don't need to tell Meg about this.'
"'You mean that you attacked me?'
"'I didn't attack you, Harold,'" William is said to have responded.
Harry's name is not short for Harold - his actual full name is Henry Charles Albert David.
Photographs suggest Harry regularly wore a dark necklace at events such as the Invictus Games, and on foreign tours with Meghan, as recently as September 2019.
Harry, wearing a distinctive necklace, alongside Meghan in South Africa, months before they stepped back from royal duties
The revelations create the bleak impression of a family fight, right at the centre of the monarchy, that shows no sign of being reconciled.
This is still the territory of an acrimonious divorce rather than the reconciliation.
Separately, the memoir claims William "howled with laughter" when he saw his brother dressed in a Nazi costume before a fancy dress party in 2005, the New York Post reports.
Harry was 20 when a picture of him in the outfit was published in the UK press.
The New York Post reports Harry asked William, and his future wife Catherine, whether he should wear the costume, or dress as a pilot - and claims the pair laughed and said the Nazi uniform.
Martin Pengelly, a journalist for the Guardian's US website who wrote its report on Harry's book, said he had not approached William's communication team.
The reporter said that his article was "a report on Harry's book, which he's written - it's Harry's account".
Mr Pengelly told BBC Radio 5 Live: "We carefully, obviously in reporting it, didn't call it a fight because Harry says he didn't fight back."
Harry's book has been seen on sale in a bookstore in Barcelona, Spain, before its official release date
While publishers at Penguin Random House are yet to confirm whether the leaked excerpts from the book are genuine, Harry has recently spoken of his troubled relationship with his brother.
And the duke calls William his "beloved brother and arch-nemesis" in his memoir, an interview with Good Morning America reveals.
In that interview, Harry says there has "always been this competition" between the pair, and it played into the "heir/spare" dynamic which formed the basis of the book's title.
The concept of the "heir and the spare" dates back centuries in royal circles and refers to the continuation of the royal bloodline: the first son and heir the one who inherits the throne, the second son therefore a spare should anything happen to the first-born.
In Harry and Meghan's Netflix documentary, the prince recounts a meeting he attended with his brother, father - the now King - and the late Queen, his grandmother.
Describing the conference in early 2020, he says: "It was terrifying to have my brother scream and shout at me and my father say things that just simply weren't true, and my grandmother quietly sit there and sort of take it all in."
The Guardian says Harry details a meeting with Charles, then Prince of Wales, and William after the funeral of his grandfather, Prince Phillip, in April 2021.
If this leak is accurate, perhaps the most poignant image is of King Charles caught in the middle, asking his warring sons not to make his life a "misery".
Spare, ghostwritten by memoirist JR Moehringer and part of a multi-million dollar book deal, was previously believed to be subject to the utmost secrecy with few details known about its content.
"For Harry, this is his story at last," Penguin Random House said in a publicity statement back in October.
Archewell, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex's company, has not commented on news of the book.
In a trailer for a sit-down interview, which will be broadcast on 8 January ahead of the book's release, Harry said: "I would like to get my father back, I would like to have my brother back".
However, Harry told ITV's Tom Bradby "they've shown absolutely no willingness to reconcile," although it was not clear who he was referring to.
Buckingham Palace has declined to comment on this.
• None Prince Harry details physical attack by brother William in new book - Books - The Guardian The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.
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Prince Harry will not say if he will attend coronation - BBC News
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2023-01-05
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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The Duke of Sussex says the “ball is in their court” in this family dispute, in an ITV trailer.
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UK
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Watch: Prince Harry says the door's always open, the ball is in their court
Prince Harry has not confirmed whether he would accept an invitation to his father's coronation in May, according to a trailer for an ITV interview.
"There's a lot that can happen between now and then. But the door is always open. The ball is in their court," he told interviewer Tom Bradby.
The coronation of King Charles will be held at Westminster Abbey on 6 May.
The interview is expected to discuss conflicts between the Duke of Sussex and members of the Royal Family.
"There's a lot to be discussed and I really hope that they're willing to sit down and talk about it," said Prince Harry, in an interview linked to his upcoming memoir, Spare.
Reports in the Guardian of leaks from this "unflinching" memoir include claims of angry and physical altercations with his brother William, the Prince of Wales.
In Prince Harry's reported version of events, Prince William had called Harry's wife Meghan "difficult", "rude" and "abrasive".
A row had followed, after which Prince Harry says his brother "grabbed me by the collar, ripping my necklace, and he knocked me to the floor".
Adding to the sense of family tensions, in a US trailer for the Good Morning America show, an interviewer asks Prince Harry about calling Prince William both his "beloved brother and arch nemesis" in the memoir.
Buckingham Palace, Kensington Palace and Archewell, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex's company, have all declined to comment on the prince's book, due to be published next week.
In the ITV trailer, Prince Harry is asked about the merits of bringing such family arguments into the public sphere.
"I don't know how staying silent is ever going to make things better," Prince Harry tells Tom Bradby.
Prince Harry also rejects suggestions that by revealing such personal disputes he was "invading the privacy" of others in his family.
"That would be the accusation from people that don't understand or don't want to believe that my family have been briefing the press," says Prince Harry, in an interview to be broadcast at 9pm on Sunday.
Despite being unwilling to commit to going to his father's coronation, Prince Harry said that he still believed in the monarchy.
Asked whether he had a part to play in its future, he replied: "I don't know."
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex would have been expected to have been invited to the coronation, even though Prince Harry is no longer a "working royal".
Not attending the coronation events to be held in May would be likely to be seen as a snub and a measure of the scale of the family rift.
Prince Harry came to the UK for Queen Elizabeth's Platinum Jubilee celebrations last year, but was not allowed to take part in the appearances on the Buckingham Palace balcony.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-64174909
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news_uk-64174909
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Keir Starmer embraces Brexit slogan with 'take back control' pledge - BBC News
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2023-01-05
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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The Labour leader promises to transfer powers from Westminster and turn the slogan into a "solution".
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UK Politics
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. WATCH: 'Take Back Control' bill will turn slogan into solution, says Sir Keir Starmer
Sir Keir Starmer has promised a new "take back control" bill to transfer powers from Westminster to communities.
In his first speech of 2023, the Labour leader - a former Remain supporter - said he wanted to turn the Brexit campaign slogan "into a solution".
He pledged to devolve new powers over employment support, transport, energy, housing, culture and childcare.
Sir Keir said the legislation would be "a centrepiece" of Labour's plans if it wins the next general election.
With the country facing severe pressure on the NHS, a wave of strike action and a cost-of-living crisis, Sir Keir said he was "under no illusions about the scale of the challenges we face".
In his speech in east London, he promised a "decade of national renewal" under Labour and "hope" for the future.
But the Labour leader warned his party "won't be able to spend our way" out of the "mess" he said would be left by the Conservatives.
Setting out his priorities for a future Labour government, Sir Keir said he wanted to give communities "the chance to control their economic destiny".
"The decisions which create wealth in our communities should be taken by local people with skin in the game, and a huge power shift out of Westminster can transform our economy, our politics and our democracy," he said.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Sir Keir Starmer tells Chris Mason he expects to inherit a "very badly damaged economy" from the Conservatives if he wins the next election
During the Brexit campaign of 2016, Sir Keir said he "couldn't disagree with the basic case so many Leave voters made to me".
"It's not unreasonable for us to recognise the desire for communities to stand on their own feet. It's what 'take back control' meant," he said.
"So we will embrace the 'take back control' message but we'll turn it from a slogan to a solution. From a catchphrase into change."
Keir Starmer - a man who voted Remain and campaigned for a second referendum - is cloaking himself in the language of Brexit.
His promise of what he calls a '"take back control bill", a planned new law pushing powers away from Westminster, is nothing if not unsubtle.
Taking the highly effective slogan of the victorious Brexit campaign and claiming it as his own.
Labour needs to win back dozens and dozens of seats that voted Leave and Sir Keir might as well be screaming "I get it" from every rooftop he can clamber on.
It does mean critics will ask what he really believes: it might be savvy politics to court Brexit voters, but who is the real Keir Starmer?
Sir Keir was Labour's shadow Brexit secretary under Jeremy Corbyn between 2016 and 2020, when he unsuccessfully campaigned for a second EU referendum.
Asked by reporters whether he now regretted supporting a fresh vote, Sir Keir said: "Even in those turbulent years, 2016 to 2019, I was always making the argument that there was always something very important sitting behind that leave vote.
"That phrase 'take back control' was really powerful, it was like a Heineken phrasing, got into people.
"And the more they ask themselves, do I have enough control, the more they answer that question, no."
Labour said the bill would give English towns and cities the tools to develop long-term plans for economic growth, creating high-skilled jobs in their areas.
The party said there would be "a presumption towards moving power out of Westminster", with local leaders able to bid for any powers which had already been devolved elsewhere.
"Take back control" was used by the Vote Leave campaign, including Boris Johnson
Elsewhere in his speech, Sir Keir accused the Conservatives of "sticking plaster politics", saying they had failed to address long-term issues.
Although he acknowledged investment was needed after the "damage" done by the Conservatives to public services, he warned Labour would not be "getting its big government chequebook out".
By suggesting a move away from big increases in public spending, Sir Keir appeared to distance himself from his predecessor as Labour leader, Mr Corbyn.
Pressed by the BBC's Chris Mason over whether a Labour government would spend any more than the Conservatives, Sir Keir said he would make "different choices" but any commitments would be fully costed.
He said the party would inherit "a broken economy" and with the tax burden already high there was not scope for big tax increases.
Sir Keir also said he wanted a Labour government to work with business to deliver its aims.
Asked by reporters whether there was more scope for private sector involvement in public services, Sir Keir said trying to deliver everything through the state did not work and he was instead proposing a "partnership model" with private business.
Sir Keir's speech made no mention of abolishing the House of Lords - a proposal which was unveiled by Labour in a report last month.
But the Labour leader denied he had "gone cool" on the idea, saying it was a "key part" of the party's report on constitutional change.
The speech provoked criticism from some on the left of the Labour Party.
Former shadow home secretary Diane Abbott, who is a close ally of Mr Corbyn, said a "take back control" bill was an "empty promise" without new money to go with it.
Labour councillor Martin Abrams, a committee member of the Momentum campaign group, said Sir Keir's speech was "totally out of step with the scale of the crisis facing us" and the reference to private sector partnerships "makes people's hearts sink".
The speech came a day after Rishi Sunak set out his own priorities for government at a venue just a short distance away.
In his new year speech, the prime minister promised to halve inflation, grow the economy, ensure national debt falls, cut NHS waiting lists and pass new laws to stop small boat crossings.
Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said Mr Sunak's five pledges were in contrast to Sir Keir's speech, which he claimed made "no firm commitments".
On Labour's "take back control" plan, Mr Cleverly said the Conservatives had already given local communities more power through regional mayors.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-64173370
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news_uk-politics-64173370
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Sir Keir Starmer makes 'take back control' pledge to voters - BBC News
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2023-01-05
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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The Labour leader vows to devolve more powers to communities, using a Take Back Control Bill to do that.
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UK Politics
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Next, Starmer is asked by a journalist from the Sun whether - given he appears to be using his New Year message to champion Brexit voters - he regrets in the past having advocated for a second Brexit referendum.
"Should vote leave voters now believe you?", he is asked.
Starmer says that even in the turbulent years from 2016 to 2019 he was "making the argument that there was always something very important sitting behind the Leave vote".
He says the Leave campaign's slogan - take back control - was "really powerful", it "got into people".
"The more they asked themselves 'do I have enough control?' the more they answered themselves 'no'," he says.
"If you can't make ends meet in your family, you don't have control, if you don't have a secure job, you don't have control, if you feel you can't go out after dark because of anti-social behaviour, you don't have control - I've always accepted that argument," he says.
He says that we're now "many years on" from the referendum and it's time to embrace the argument.
"We intend to turn that slogan into a solution," he says, and again mentions Labour's proposed Take Back Control bill to spread power out of Westminster, which he says will "deliver it in action".
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-politics-64168236
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news_live_uk-politics-64168236
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Ukraine hit by Russian missiles day after West's offer of tanks - BBC News
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2023-01-27
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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Eleven people have been killed and 11 others injured after strikes hit buildings in several regions.
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Europe
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The aftermath of a Russian strike was seen on Thursday in the town of Hlevakha, outside Kyiv
Russia launched a wave of missiles at Ukraine on Thursday, a day after Germany and the US pledged tanks to aid Kyiv's fight against the invasion.
Eleven people died and 11 others were injured after 35 buildings were struck across several regions, the state's emergency service said.
It added the worst damage to residential buildings was in the Kyiv region.
Officials also reported strikes on two energy facilities in the Odesa region.
The barrage came as Russia said it perceived the new offer of military support, which followed a UK pledge to send Challenger 2 battle tanks, as "direct" Western involvement in the conflict.
In what was a sustained and wide-ranging attack, the head of the Ukrainian army said Moscow launched 55 air and sea-based missiles on Thursday.
Valery Zaluzhny added that 47 of them were shot down, including 20 around Kyiv.
Earlier, Ukraine's air force said it had downed a cluster of Iranian-made attack drones launched by Russian forces from the Sea of Azov in the south of the country.
A 55-year-old man was killed and two others wounded when non-residential buildings in the south of the capital were struck, officials reported.
The offensive was a continuation of Russia's months-long tactic of targeting Ukraine's infrastructure. The freezing winter has seen power stations destroyed and millions plunged into darkness.
After Thursday's strikes, emergency power cuts were enforced in Kyiv and several other regions to relieve pressure on the electricity grid, said DTEK, Ukraine's largest private power producer.
A day earlier, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz promised to provide Ukraine with 14 Leopard 2 tanks, following weeks of international pressure. They are widely seen as some of the most effective battle tanks available.
The heavy weaponry is expected to arrive in late March or early April.
President Joe Biden later announced the US would send 31 M1 Abrams battle tanks, marking a reversal of longstanding Pentagon arguments that they are a poor fit for the Ukrainian battlefield.
Canada has also promised to supply Ukraine with four "combat-ready" Leopard tanks in the coming weeks, together with experts to train Ukrainian soldiers in how to operate them.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Thursday that 12 countries had now joined what he called the "tank coalition".
But for tanks to be "game-changer", 300 to 400 of them would be needed, an adviser to Ukraine's defence minister told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.
"The sooner we defeat Russia on the battlefield using Western weapons, the sooner we will be able to stop this missile terror and restore peace," Yuriy Sak said.
Speaking on the same programme, Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said sending tanks to Ukraine would make a big difference to the country's ability to win the war.
He also warned that Russia was planning a fresh offensive, just as reports began emerging from Ukraine of missile strikes following drone attacks overnight.
On Thursday, the US designated Russia's Wagner group, which is believed to have thousands of mercenaries in Ukraine, a transnational criminal organisation.
It also imposed fresh sanctions on the group and their associates to "further impede [Russian President Vladimir] Putin's ability to arm and equip his war machine", Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said in the statement.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-64411259
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news_world-europe-64411259
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Gareth Southgate: England manager on decision to stay, World Cup & human rights - BBC Sport
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2023-01-27
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Gareth Southgate talks to BBC sports editor Dan Roan about his decision to remain England manager, the team's performance in Qatar and why he has no regrets.
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Gareth Southgate considered stepping down as England boss because of criticism he faced before the World Cup, saying: "The last thing you want as a manager is that your presence is divisive and inhibits performance."
England were knocked out of the tournament by France in the quarter-finals, 18 months after losing the Euro 2020 final to Italy on penalties at Wembley.
The team were booed off in June following a 4-0 defeat against Hungary at Molineux in the Nations League - part of a generally poor series of results leading into the winter World Cup.
Explaining for the first time how he reached the decision to stay in his job, he told BBC Sport: "I never want to be in a position where my presence is affecting the team in a negative way.
"I didn't believe that was the case, but I just wanted a period after the World Cup to reflect and make sure that was still how it felt."
The 52-year-old said he asked himself: "Is it the right thing to keep taking this project on? I wanted to make sure I'm still fresh and hungry for that challenge."
Describing his role as "the greatest privilege of my life", he said the decision to stay was ultimately "not difficult" because of "the quality of performances and the progress that we're making".
"The team are still improving. We're all gaining belief in what we're doing," he said.
In a wide-ranging interview conducted at the team's training base St George's Park, Southgate:
• None strongly suggested he considered announcing last year that Qatar would be his final tournament to "free that narrative up so the support is behind the team, and not debating whether the manager should be there or not"
• None said getting knocked out in the quarter-final was "really difficult to take" but the support from players and fans "definitely lifts you"
• None revealed he was "comfortable" with his tactics during the and had no regrets
• None insisted England are "really competitive against everybody now" and is "very confident" about their chances at next year's European Championship in Germany
In the immediate aftermath of his team's defeat to France six weeks ago, Southgate said he felt "conflicted" about his future, having "found large parts of the last 18 months difficult".
England went into the World Cup on the back of relegation from their Nations League group and during the Hungary defeat some England fans chanted "you don't know what you're doing" at the manager.
After failing to match both the semi-final he led England to in the 2018 World Cup and the final of Euro 2020, Southgate said he would "review and reflect".
But a week later the FA announced he would see out the remaining two years of his contract.
Now, in his first public comments since that decision, Southgate has opened up on the effect the criticism he received following the Hungary defeat had on him.
"I was worried after that game the team would be affected by the narrative about whether the manager stay or go, and when we went into the games in September we were a little bit anxious.
"At Wembley against Germany the crowd weren't against their team but they were waiting to see what happened.
"I've been around teams where that can inhibit performance, and the last thing you want as a manager is that your presence is divisive and inhibits performance.
"I knew I had support with the players and [the FA], there are bigger things at stake with England than just [that].
"My only concern… was when it feels like there might be division between what the fans want and where my position might have been, that can affect the team, and I was conscious of that leading into the World Cup.
"I felt we had great support, but I was conscious… how would things be during and after?"
Southgate says his team recovered before the World Cup, but that he wanted to be sure after the tournament that staying was the right thing for his side.
"You need to give yourself time in these situations to make good decisions," he said.
"I think it's easy to rush things when emotions are high, and very often you have to sleep a little bit more and come to the right conclusions.
"The question for me was… 'is it the right thing to keep taking this project on?' Because it's not just the six years I've been with the seniors - I've been here 10 years with developing everything as well. So I wanted to make sure I'm still fresh and hungry for that challenge."
'Trying to break through history'
In an indication of how close he had come to announcing before the World Cup that he would step down following the tournament, Southgate said: "My thinking is always around, 'How does this affect the team?'
"Is this going to give the team the best chance going into the World Cup?" he added.
"Do we need to free that narrative up so the support is behind the team, and not debating whether the manager should be there or not? But I think we came through that period."
Asked whether he wavered as he weighed up whether to stay, Southgate said: "Not after the World Cup. In the lead-in that was a little bit different.
"I wasn't quite sure how things would play out, and I think it's always right to judge an international manager on their tournaments.
"Our performances were good. With France, across the flow of the game, we should win. But football is a low-scoring game where small margins make a difference.
"And we have to make sure now those small margins are turned in our favour. We're much closer now to really having that belief to win. We've still got a small step to take - I saw progress in the team from our performances in the Euros.
"We're trying to break through history here as well as against opponents that are high-level. I feel we're really competitive against everybody now.
"Outside of France, and you could argue Croatia, we've probably been as consistent as any team in terms of our finishes. And I think people have enjoyed that journey with us."
Asked how it would have felt to see someone else take over, Southgate replied: "I'm never worried about somebody else taking over and benefiting, that's how it should work.
"We're talking about building a future for England for now, for the next tournament, but also beyond that."
'Exit was difficult to take'
Southgate said the support he received from players and fans after the France defeat "definitely lifts you".
"The moment you depart is really difficult to take, and you know the steps you have to take for the next one," he said.
"But I don't think you can make decisions as a manager just on having support from everybody because you're never going to have support of everybody."
While most of Southgate's selections paid off in Qatar, and his team showed more attacking intent than previously, there was some criticism that he waited until the 85th minute against France to introduce in-form Manchester United striker Marcus Rashford.
When asked if he had any regrets about the match, he said: "I don't really. What I've learned in this job, whenever the result doesn't go as you hope then the solution is always the things you didn't do, because of course nobody knows what they might look like.
"So I'm comfortable with that. I think we used the squad well. There can always be an argument for a different player providing something at a different time."
When it was suggested to Southgate that some fans feel a new manager is needed to help deliver silverware for England, he said: "I think if our performances weren't at the level they had been, then I think there would be a little bit more legitimacy in that argument.
"We're all gaining belief in what we're doing.
"We're really competitive against everybody now and the game with France showed we can dominate the ball against those big teams."
In the build-up to the World Cup Southgate was regularly asked to comment on the human rights issues that surrounded Qatar's controversial hosting of the tournament.
"There are moments where life would be more straightforward for me if it was just focusing on football," he said.
"You are very conscious of the impact of your words and you have got to be representing your country on a global stage.
"So there might be a view in our country of certain things, but you've also got to be an ambassador when you travel and when you're dealing with other people.
"So it is complex, but it's also been the greatest privilege of my life to lead my country and I'm very conscious of that honour. It's allowed me to have life experiences I could never have expected."
Southgate was speaking before the FA Cup 4th round and said the matches would play a part in helping him select his squad for the upcoming Euro 2024 qualifiers against champions Italy and Ukraine in March.
"A lot of the teams have been playing young English players and for a lot it's their first experience of competitive football," he said.
"So that's great to see young players breaking through.
"We have several players playing well. And it's interesting to watch this period because it's the first time players have had to go back from a major tournament straight into club football.
"The next few weeks are important for us to monitor, probably more so the players that perhaps haven't been with us as regularly.
"But then, as we go towards March, it's really key who is in form and who can help us to win what is a crucial game going to Naples, and then with Ukraine as well."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/64397469
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rt_football_64397469
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Uranium in cargo sparked alert at Heathrow Airport - BBC News
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2023-01-11
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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Counter-terrorism officers are investigating the shipment, which originated from Pakistan.
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UK
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Police are investigating after metal contaminated with uranium was found at London's Heathrow Airport last month.
Officers of the Metropolitan Police's Counter Terrorism Command responded to the security alert which was triggered on 29 December.
The Sun, which first reported the news, said the uranium came from Pakistan.
One line of inquiry is whether it was the result of "poor handling" in the country, the BBC was told. Police say there was no threat to the public.
It was found in a shipment of scrap metal, a source said.
A Pakistan foreign ministry spokesperson told BBC News that the reports were "not factual", adding that no information to this effect had been shared with Pakistan officially.
A former commander of the UK's defence forces said "a very small sample" was found and offered assurances that "there are people looking out for this 24 hours a day".
Colonel Hamish De Bretton-Gordon said the incident "should not worry the public".
However, he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that, in light of recent nuclear threats, he could see why the public was concerned.
He said uranium could potentially be used for nuclear fuel in power stations and, when highly enriched, it could be used for nuclear weapons.
Alarms were triggered at Heathrow after specialist scanners detected the substance as it was ferried to a freight shed owned by handling firm Swissport, the Sun said.
The shipment's intended destination is not clear. No-one has been arrested.
The Metropolitan Police said: "We can confirm officers from the Met's Counter Terrorism Command were contacted by Border Force colleagues at Heathrow after a very small amount of contaminated material was identified after routine screening within a package incoming to the UK."
Commander Richard Smith from the force's counter terrorism team separately told the BBC: "Although our investigation remains ongoing, from our inquiries so far, it does not appear to be linked to any direct threat.
"As the public would expect, however, we will continue to follow up on all available lines of inquiry to ensure this is definitely the case."
Strict protocols must be followed in order to fly dangerous cargo, including uranium, being loaded onto the base of units in the cargo hold and ensuring a minimum distance is kept between the nuclear material and cabin above.
Uranium is an element which occurs naturally. It can have nuclear-related uses once it has been refined, or enriched. This is achieved by the use of centrifuges - machines which spin at supersonic speeds.
Low-enriched uranium can be used to produce fuel for commercial nuclear power plants.
Highly enriched uranium has a purity of 20% or more and is used in research reactors. Weapons-grade uranium is 90% enriched or more.
Cabinet minister Steve Barclay said he hoped for more information in "due course" and it was right an investigation "looks at all the issues".
"I'm learning about this this morning," he told Sky News.
The Home Office said: "We do not comment on live investigations."
• None The element that causes arguments
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-64231557
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news_uk-64231557
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Prince Harry condemns 'dangerous spin' about his Taliban comments - BBC News
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2023-01-11
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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Responding for the first time to coverage of his book, the prince accuses some in the press of "lies".
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UK
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Watch: Prince Harry speaks on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert
Prince Harry has said claims that he was boasting when he wrote in his new book about killing 25 Taliban fighters in Afghanistan are a "dangerous lie".
The prince has been criticised for discussing killings in Spare, with some military figures saying it was wrong to refer to the dead as "chess pieces".
But on US TV, Harry accused the press of taking his words out of context and said the spin endangered his family.
He also defended his remarks, saying he had wanted to reduce veteran suicide.
Spare, which was published on Tuesday, has become the fastest-selling non-fiction book ever in the UK.
Some 400,000 copies of the memoir have been bought, despite many excerpts being leaked in the press ahead of its official release.
In a wide-ranging interview with Stephen Colbert on The Late Show - the first conducted after details from the book were published - Harry suggested there had been attempts to undermine his book, spoke of his fractured relationship with his brother, and attacked the "bigoted" British press.
Harry said writing the book had been a "cathartic" experience and the "most vulnerable I have ever been in my life", while also leaving him feeling stronger.
But he added: "The last few days have been hurtful and challenging, not being able to do anything about those leaks."
In his condemnation of the media coverage, Harry claimed outlets had intentionally chosen to "strip away the context" of his account.
"Without a doubt, the most dangerous lie that they have told, is that I somehow boasted about the number of people I killed in Afghanistan," he said.
"If I heard anyone boasting about that kind of thing, I would be angry. But it's a lie.
"It's really troubling and very disturbing that they can get away with it... My words are not dangerous - but the spin of my words are very dangerous to my family. That is a choice they've made."
He said he had wanted to be honest about his experience in Afghanistan, and to give veterans the space to share theirs "without any shame".
"My whole goal and my attempt with sharing that detail is to reduce the number of [veteran] suicides," he added.
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Harry also claimed Buckingham Palace attempted to undermine the stories told in his memoir, assisted by the British press.
No names were mentioned but host Colbert asked if there had been attempts by the palace to undermine the book.
"Of course, and mainly by the British press," he replied, without going into more detail.
A Buckingham Palace spokeswoman declined to comment on the claim, and other allegations made by Harry in the book.
When asked about his brother Prince William allegedly pushing him over during an argument, he showed the audience the necklace that was broken in the incident.
"This one - which is now fixed. We've got my kids' heartbeats [engravings of their cardiogram readings] which my wife gave me," he explained.
In lighter moments during the interview, Harry drank tequila with Colbert and joked that it felt like "group therapy". He was asked questions about getting frostbite on his penis on a trip to the North Pole and performed a skit introducing the show with Hollywood actor Tom Hanks.
The prince also admitted he watched Netflix series The Crown - the drama based on the Royal Family - and joked about fact-checking it.
On his late grandmother the Queen, he said he most remembers her sharp wit, sense of humour and her "ability to respond to anybody with a completely straight face - but totally joking".
In Spare, Prince Harry reveals for the first time that he killed 25 enemy fighters during two tours in the Helmand region of Afghanistan.
Prince Harry claimed the media "stripped away the context" of his account of his time in Afghanistan
"So, my number: 25. It wasn't a number that gave me any satisfaction. But neither was it a number that made me feel ashamed," he writes.
"Naturally I'd have preferred not to have that number on my military CV, on my mind, but by the same token I'd have preferred to live in a world in which there was no Taliban, a world without war...
"While in the heat and fog of combat, I didn't think of those 25 as people. You can't kill people if you think of them as people. You can't really harm people if you think of them as people.
"They were chess pieces removed from the board, Bad taken away before they could kill Goods.
"I'd been trained to 'other-ize' them, trained well. On some level I recognised this learned detachment as problematic.
"But I also saw it as an unavoidable part of soldiering. Another reality that can't be changed."
Harry served as an Apache helicopter pilot in 2012-13
He goes to say he would never forget watching people jump from the World Trade Centre on 9/11 and the war was "avenging one of the most heinous crimes in world history".
Subsequent media coverage of the comments, which were leaked to the press ahead of the book's publication, drew criticism from figures in the military.
Ex-army officer Col Richard Kemp, who oversaw forces in Afghanistan, told the BBC he was concerned at references to dead Taliban insurgents as chess pieces, saying such descriptions could give "propaganda to the enemy".
And ex-colonel Tim Collins, who gained worldwide fame for an eve-of battle speech to troops in Iraq, said: "He has badly let the side down. We don't do notches on the rifle butt. We never did."
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-64231560
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news_uk-64231560
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Spiking: No need for specific offence, government says - BBC News
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2023-01-11
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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The government says a new law is unnecessary as there are already several offences which cover spiking.
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UK Politics
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The government has said it will not create a specific offence for spiking, arguing a new law is unnecessary.
Ministers said they were looking into the issue last year.
But on Wednesday, Home Office Minister Sarah Dines said there were already several offences which covered spiking incidents and the government had not found "any gap in the law".
Supporters of the idea argue it could help increase reporting of incidents and improve police data.
MPs on the Home Affairs Committee were among those calling for new legislation to target spiking - when someone puts alcohol or drugs into another person's drink or body without their knowledge of consent.
Ms Dines confirmed the government's position in a letter to the committee's chairwoman, Labour MP Diana Johnson, which was written in December but published on Wednesday.
She said the government had considered the case for legislation but had decided a new offence was not required.
"The existing offences cover all methods of spiking, including by drink, needle, vape, cigarette, food or any other known form," she said.
"Police are yet to encounter a case where they could not apply an existing offence."
She added that a specific spiking offence would not increase the powers available to judges in such cases or the likelihood of charging or prosecuting an offender.
Ms Dines said the government had concluded its focus should be on non-legislative measures to tackle spiking and it would consult on potential changes to statutory guidance to include "explicit reference to spiking being illegal and give examples of such spiking".
The committee had previously argued a specific offence would have several benefits, including increased reporting of incidents, facilitating police work by improving data and "sending a clear message to perpetrators that this is a serious crime".
Last year, then-Home Secretary Priti Patel told the committee the government was looking into "a specific criminal offence to target spiking directly".
During a Westminster Hall debate earlier, she called for existing legislation to be amended so there was a "coherent approach" in addressing spiking.
Dame Diana said she was disappointed by the government's decision as existing legislation was "clearly not working" and not being used.
"Reporting is low, and prosecution rates are very rare indeed," she added.
Labour's shadow Home Office minister Sarah Jones said: "We should call a spade a spade in this case and introduce a specific offence for spiking."
Conservative MP Richard Graham also criticised the government's response, accusing it of "various straw man arguments".
"In almost 13 years as an MP I have not read such an extraordinary letter," he said.
Almost 5,000 cases of needle and drink spiking incidents were reported to police in England and Wales in the 12 months to September 2022, according to the National Police Chiefs Council.
It said forces had increased their focus on spiking, with high visibility patrols across town and city centres, following a rapid rise in spiking reports during the autumn of 2021.
Spiking is illegal under current laws, for example the Sexual Offences Act 2003, which says it is an offence to administer a substance to another person without their consent, with the intention of "stupefying or overpowering" them so as to enable any other person to engage in sexual activity with them.
Section 23 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861 also makes it an offence to maliciously administer poison so as to endanger the life of someone or inflict grievous bodily harm.
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Jeff Beck: British guitar legend dies aged 78 - BBC News
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2023-01-11
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One of rock's most influential guitarists, he was inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice.
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Entertainment & Arts
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Jeff Beck performing at Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland in 2022
Jeff Beck, one of the most influential rock guitarists of all time, has died at the age of 78.
The British musician rose to fame as part of the Yardbirds, where he replaced Eric Clapton, before forming the Jeff Beck Group with Rod Stewart.
His tone, presence and, above all, volume redefined guitar music in the 1960s, and influenced movements like heavy metal, jazz-rock and even punk.
Beck's death was confirmed on his official Twitter page.
"On behalf of his family, it is with deep and profound sadness that we share the news of Jeff Beck's passing," the statement said.
"After suddenly contracting bacterial meningitis, he peacefully passed away yesterday. His family ask for privacy while they process this tremendous loss."
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Watch: Jeff Beck performs on the BBC in 1974
Describing his playing style in 2009, Beck said: "I play the way I do because it allows me to come up with the sickest sounds possible."
"That's the point now, isn't it? I don't care about the rules.
"In fact, if I don't break the rules at least 10 times in every song, then I'm not doing my job properly."
Beck performing with Johnny Depp at the Helsinki Blues Festival in 2022
Born Geoffrey Arnold Beck in Wallington, south London, the musician fell in love with Rock and Roll as a child, and built his first guitar as a teenager.
"The guy next door said, 'I'll build you a solid body guitar for five pounds'," he later told Rock Cellar Magazine. "Five pounds, which to me was 500 back then [so] I went ahead and did it [myself].
"The first one I built was in 1956, because Elvis was out, and everything that you heard about pop music was guitar. And then I got fascinated. I'm sure the same goes for lots of people."
After a short stint at Wimbledon Art College, he left to play with shock-rocker Screaming Lord Sutch and the Tridents.
When Eric Clapton left the Yardbirds in 1965, Jimmy Page suggested hiring Beck - and he went on to play on hits like I'm A Man and Shapes Of Things, where his pioneering use of feedback influenced musicians like Paul McCartney and Jimi Hendrix.
The Yardbirds, backstage at Top Of The Pops, in 1965
"That [technique] came as an accident," he later told BBC Radio 2's Johnnie Walker.
"We played larger venues, around about '64-'65, and the PA was inadequate. So we cranked up the level and then found out that feedback would happen.
"I started using it because it was controllable - you could play tunes with it. I did this once at Staines Town Hall with the Yardbirds and afterwards, this guy says, 'You know that funny noise that wasn't supposed to be there? I'd keep that in if I were you.'
"So I said, 'It was deliberate mate. Go away'."
The guitarist stayed with The Yardbirds for nearly two years, before declaring he was quitting music altogether... then releasing his first solo single Hi Ho Silver Lining.
Recorded in just three hours, the song was his only top 20 hit in the UK, charting in both 1967 and 1972. But the singer was famously ambivalent about it.
He was persuaded to record the song by producer Mickie Most who, Beck said, "wasn't the slightest bit interested in recording my sort of music".
"I couldn't say to him, 'Look, you don't know what's going on,' because he had 20,000 gold disks on the wall saying 'I do know what's going on'," he told Rolling Stone magazine in 1971. "So for a couple of years I wasted my career doing junk tunes."
When he left the studio after cutting the track, the receptionist was already singing it. "That," he said, "was when I knew it was a disaster".
He went to describe the song as a "pink toilet seat around my neck", but eventually made his peace with it, even performing it on Jools Holland's TV show in 2015.
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After that brief brush with fame, he formed the Jeff Beck Group, whose first two albums Truth (1968) and Beck-Ola (1969), took a ferocious approach to the blues that laid the groundwork for heavy metal.
But the band were unhappy - with a US tour regularly descending into arguments and physical fights.
Singer Rod Stewart and bassist Ronnie Wood quit in 1970 to join the Small Faces (later The Faces), and when Beck was injured in a car accident, he had to put his career on hold.
When he recovered, Beck assembled a second line-up of his band but their albums were commercially unsuccessful and Beck went solo in 1975.
That year, he recorded an album, Blow By Blow, with Beatles producer George Martin. Entirely instrumental, Beck's lyrical, mellifluous guitar playing essentially replaced the parts of a lead vocalist, an approach he would take for most of the rest of his career.
Blow By Blow made the US top 10 and was awarded a platinum disc, and Beck quickly followed it up with 1976's Wired (also produced by George Martin) and the 1977 concert album Jeff Beck With The Jan Hammer Group Live.
After the tour documented on the album, the musician retired to his estate outside of London and remained quiet for three years.
"The pitch I play at is so intense that I just can't do it every night," he later explained.
The 1980s saw him collaborate with Nile Rodgers on an album called Flash, which contained his first US hit single - a cover of Curtis Mayfield's People Get Ready with Rod Stewart on lead vocals - and earned him a Grammy Award.
In 1987, he played on Mick Jagger's solo album Primitive Cool, and continued to work with artists like Roger Waters and Jon Bon Jovi in the 1990s, as well as contributing to Hans Zimmer's score for the Tom Cruise movie Days Of Thunder.
Beck performing in a charity concert in New York in December 1983
But his solo output slowed down, until the release of 1999's You Had It Coming, featuring Imogen Heap on vocals, followed in 2003 by an album he simply called Jeff.
Around this time, he started incorporating more electronic and hip-hop elements to his music; culminating in his fourth Grammy victory for the tempestuous, shape-shifting instrumental Plan B.
He toured extensively in the 2010s, including a joint-headline venture with Beach Boy Brian Wilson.
The duo had hoped to record together but those plans fell apart. Instead, Beck ended up befriending actor Johnny Depp, with whom he released a full-length album, 18, in 2022.
Beck was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice, in 1992 as a member of the Yardbirds, then as a solo artist in 2009.
His legacy lies in the balance between the fluidity and aggression of his playing, a technical brilliance equalled only by his love of ear-crunching dissonance.
"It's like he's saying, 'I'm Jeff Beck. I'm right here. And you can't ignore me'," wrote Mike Campbell of the Heartbreakers in an essay for Rolling Stone's Greatest Guitar Players of All Time, where Beck placed seventh.
"Even in the Yardbirds, he had a tone that was melodic but in-your-face - bright, urgent and edgy, but sweet at the same time. You could tell he was a serious player, and he was going for it. He was not holding back."
"He'd just keep getting better and better," Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page once recalled. "And he leaves us, mere mortals".
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Are elections the way to break the indyref2 deadlock? - BBC News
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2023-01-15
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SNP members are being offered two new routes to independence - a vote at the next general election or at the next Holyrood one.
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Scotland politics
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The next UK general election was to be an independence showdown - a substitute for another referendum, if all routes to that were blocked.
That, at least, was how it seemed when Nicola Sturgeon first alighted on the idea, in June last year.
She might still try it. Then again, she might not. It depends what SNP members decide at a special conference in Edinburgh on Sunday 19 March.
The party's ruling body has now unanimously agreed a "draft resolution" that offers a choice between the next UK election (probably in 2024) and the next Holyrood vote in 2026.
If they opt for Westminster, the proposal is for the SNP to make clear they would consider every vote for them as a "yes" to the question: "Should Scotland be an independent country?".
The party would claim a mandate to negotiate independence with the UK government if it won more than 50% of the votes cast.
They say votes for other independence-supporting parties could count too but only if there was an agreement with the SNP in advance.
It's relatively easy to see that kind of deal being struck with the Greens. Less so with Alex Salmond's party - Alba.
If SNP members opt for Holyrood, the idea is much the same although the party has not specified whether they would count constituency votes, regional list votes or both in their independence calculations.
Before getting to that, there would be a further attempt to persuade Westminster to agree to a referendum.
If the SNP were to win the most seats in the next UK general election, they would demand the power to hold a referendum and only if that was refused would they take the fight into the Holyrood campaign.
One consideration is that 16 and 17-year-olds, EU nationals and legally resident foreign nationals get to vote in Holyrood elections but not for Westminster.
It's not so long since the SNP leadership rubbished talk of trying to bring about independence via an election - with Ms Sturgeon at one point suggesting that discussing alternatives to an actual referendum was a "unionist trap".
Nicola Sturgeon has called for a full and open debate
An official referendum remains her preference but there is no obvious prospect of securing one and no agreed route to doing so.
While "yes" supporters say democracy is being denied, "no" backers say the democracy of 2014 should be respected and that if a settled majority for independence emerges, there could be another referendum then.
In 2014, the referendum rejected independence by 55% to 45%. The SNP think Brexit is a significant change of circumstances that justifies another vote.
Winning a majority for indyref2 with the Greens in the 2021 Holyrood election did not persuade Westminster to agree terms. Plan A failed.
The UK Supreme Court rejected the argument that Holyrood has the power to hold a referendum without UK government consent. Plan B failed.
That is why the SNP moved on to Plan C - to target one election or another.
Nicola Sturgeon clearly specified the next UK general election last June but in her SNP conference speech in October she talked about using "an" election without saying which one.
When I pointed this out on social media and raised the potential flexibility in her wording, a senior SNP source told me I was "over interpreting". Maybe not.
While the SNP still describe using the next Westminster vote to test support for independence as the "principal" alternative to the referendum they really want, it is no longer the only one.
And if SNP members don't like the idea of using either the next UK or Scottish general election, they are invited to submit further options of their own.
Nicola Sturgeon has called for a "full and open" debate and has not yet specified which option she prefers.
Given that she has previously described a UK election as the "best" opportunity to put the independence question - my guess is that remains her starting point.
If the party prefers to defer this showdown that could be seen as a rare and significant rejection of her leadership.
The SNP say using either election as an independence vote would be "credible and deliverable" except that it does not have buy-in from their opponents.
There can be any number of issues at play in an election and unionist parties do not accept that it can be a legitimate route to Scottish statehood.
Treating an election as a referendum would be a huge gamble. The SNP has never won a majority of votes in an election before, although they came very close in 2015.
Failure would be a major setback for the independence campaign. It would demand new thinking and - presumably - new leadership.
Success would increase democratic pressure on the UK government but it would not necessarily deliver independence. That would still require Westminster consent.
Without an agreed referendum, the SNP leadership has concluded that election results are their best chance of breaking the deadlock - that there is nowhere else for them to go.
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Brazil protests: Security forces detain 1,500 after Congress stormed - BBC News
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2023-01-09
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Brazilian authorities have begun to dismantle protest camps after key government buildings were stormed.
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Latin America & Caribbean
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While Jair Bolsonaro may not have been the mastermind behind the invasion, he cannot be separated from it.
Throughout his term, he has repeatedly questioned the efficacy of Brazil's institutions - accusing the Supreme Federal Court of being politically against him, and the voting system of being prone to fraud, despite no evidence to support those claims.
His supporters took on his narrative wholeheartedly.
Since he lost the elections in October he flew off to Florida to avoid having to hand over the presidential sash to Lula - and he's allowed his most ardent supporters to remain angry over a democratic election that he legitimately lost.
Tension has definitely been building. Camps were set up across the country in front of army headquarters, with protesters loyal to Bolsonaro calling for military intervention. And then in December, supporters set fire to Federal Police headquarters in Brasilia. Another supporter was arrested for allegedly trying to set off a bomb before Lula's inauguration on 1 January.
It's no secret that many security forces are more on the side of Bolsonaro than Lula.
For Bolsonaro's supporters, Lula - who was jailed in 2017 for corruption, and spent 18 months in prison before the convictions were annulled - is a corrupt politician who belongs in prison, not the presidential palace.
They falsely accuse him of being a communist, wanting to impose a regime like Venezuela or Cuba. They won't be convinced by anything else - and they won't give up their fight for "democracy" as they call it.
But there's a massive flaw in their argument in wanting freedom and democracy.
They are calling for a very undemocratic military intervention to "save" Brazil - an intervention that despite their best efforts, doesn't look forthcoming.
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Prince Harry says Diana would be 'heartbroken' over Royal Family rift - BBC News
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2023-01-09
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Prince Harry tells a US interviewer his mother would have been upset at the fallout between her sons.
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UK
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Prince Harry has ruled out a return to the UK as a working royal
Princess Diana would have been "heartbroken" about the conflict with his brother Prince William, Prince Harry has told a US television interview.
He told Good Morning America their mother would have been saddened at the arguments, which he said were fuelled by briefings to a divisive press.
Prince Harry said there had to be "accountability" before reconciliation.
He also ruled out a return to the UK as a working royal.
Prince Harry told ABC News TV interviewer Michael Strahan a return to such a life within the Royal Family in the UK would be "unsurvivable".
"That's really sad, because that's essentially breaking the relationship between us," said Prince Harry, in an interview about his memoir, Spare.
In the book Prince Harry speaks about the traumatic legacy of his mother's death in a car accident in 1997 - but says Diana would now be sad to see the dispute between her sons, with Prince Harry seeing William as his "arch nemesis" as well as "beloved brother" and describing a physical altercation between them.
"I think she would be looking at it long term to know that there are certain things that we need to go through to be able to heal the relationship," he said in the interview.
He also spoke about his relationship with Camilla, the Queen Consort, saying they hadn't spoken for a long time, but he didn't think of her as an "evil stepmother".
Prince Harry said he had compassion for her as the "third person within my parents' marriage".
It was soon presented as "Meghan versus Kate", says Prince Harry about the sisters-in-law
"She had a reputation and an image to rehabilitate. And whatever conversations happened, whatever deals or trading was made right at the beginning, she was led to believe that would be the best way of doing it," he told the US news show.
These claims, presenting Prince Harry's view of events, have so far not drawn a response from Buckingham Palace or Kensington Palace.
In an ITV interview on Sunday, Prince Harry had accused the Royal Family of failing to defend his wife Meghan - with overnight viewing figures showing it had been seen by an audience of 4.1 million viewers, behind Call the Midwife and Happy Valley which drew over 5 million that evening.
Prince Harry highlighted the controversy over a Jeremy Clarkson newspaper column, saying the "silence is deafening" from the Royal Family about what he called the "horrific" Sun article.
He contrasted this with the quick action taken after a race row at a Buckingham Palace reception.
The Clarkson article about Meghan had described how the columnist was "dreaming of the day when she is made to parade naked through the streets of every town in Britain while the crowds chant 'Shame!' and throw lumps of excrement at her".
Later taken down by the Sun and prompting an apology from the paper and Mr Clarkson, the article was described by Prince Harry as "horrific and hurtful and cruel towards my wife".
"The world is asking for some form of comment from the monarchy. But the silence is deafening. To put it mildly," he said.
"Everything to do with my wife, after six years, they haven't said a single thing.
He also said he believed that stereotyping about Meghan - as an "American actress, divorced, biracial" - had been a barrier to Prince William and Catherine "welcoming her in" to the family.
"Very quickly it became Meghan versus Kate," he said of how the relationship was presented in the media, also saying it was fair to say "almost from the get-go" that the sisters-in-law did not "get on".
Prince Harry accused the Royal Family of "getting into bed with the devil" to improve its image - which he linked to relationships between "certain members of the family and the tabloid press".
The prince contrasted the lack of a royal response to the Clarkson article with the events that followed an encounter at Buckingham Palace between Lady Susan Hussey and Ngozi Fulani, just three weeks earlier.
While attending an event, Ms Fulani - a black British charity founder - was challenged repeatedly by Lady Hussey about where she was "really from".
The controversy that followed produced a rapid apology.
Prince Harry defended Lady Hussey, saying "she had never meant any harm at all". But he contrasted the reconciliatory meeting held between her and Ms Fulani at Buckingham Palace with the response to Prince Harry and Meghan's complaints.
Prince Harry also gave an interview to Anderson Cooper for 60 Minutes on CBS News, which aired a few hours after ITV's show, and saw him speaking about Camilla, the Queen Consort, and her relationship with the media.
Cooper asked the duke about comments he made in his memoir suggesting that Camilla would be "less dangerous" if she was happy.
Prince Harry said Camilla's need to "rehabilitate her image" and her "willingness" to forge relationships with the British press made her dangerous.
"And with a family built on hierarchy, and her on the way to being Queen Consort, there was going to be people or bodies left in the street because of that."
The ITV interview had also returned to Prince Harry and Meghan's previous claim - made in a 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey - that a member of the Royal Family had raised questions about the skin colour of their future child.
Prince Harry again did not name the individual - and suggested this might have been a case of "unconscious bias" rather than racism.
Asked if he would see the questioning as racist, he said: "I wouldn't, not having lived within that family."
He rejected that he had accused members of the Royal Family of racism in the Oprah interview, saying the "British press had said that".
Prince Harry made repeated criticisms of the tabloid press - saying that it was his "life's work" to change the media landscape.
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Jonathan Edwards: Wife assault caution MP may run as independent - BBC News
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2023-01-19
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An MP who was cautioned for assaulting his wife could run against his former party, Plaid Cymru.
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Wales politics
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Jonathan Edwards says he has support in his constituency to run again.
An MP who was cautioned by police for assaulting his wife said he could run against his former party at the next election.
Carmarthen East and Dinefwr MP Jonathan Edwards quit Plaid Cymru last year amid a row about his status in the party.
Mr Edwards said he has a "groundswell of support" locally to stand again.
Plaid Cymru said it was "entirely focused on continuing to deliver policies that make a real difference to people's lives".
In May 2020 Mr Edwards was arrested when police were called to his home in Carmarthenshire.
He received a police caution for common assault on his wife, Emma Edwards. The pair have since divorced.
At the time he said he was deeply sorry and that it was the biggest regret of his life.
Two years later he was allowed to re-join Plaid Cymru by a disciplinary panel - triggering an argument about whether he should represent the party in the House of Commons.
Ms Edwards said she was "appalled and disappointed" that the party reinstated him.
A majority of the party's ruling national executive committee recommended that he should not resume his work as a Plaid Westminster MP - meaning he would have to sit as an independent.
After Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price called for him to leave, he quit the party altogether.
"Part of the process of deciding what to do is the support I am receiving locally, and there is a lot of support from individuals locally," he told BBC Wales.
Mr Edwards said he had received enough money to stand and fight an election "from small donations from numerous individuals".
He said that if he did stand he would do so on his "record as an elected member in Carmarthenshire for over a decade-and-a-half".
Asked if he was a fit and proper person to be an MP, he said: "That is a matter for the people to decide and determine.
"There were no procedures against me by the House of Commons at all and there was no prosecution by the police."
He said he completed a specialist course requested by the Plaid Cymru disciplinary panel "faithfully".
Jonathan Edwards said he was shocked by a statement made by Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price
Mr Edwards said he was shocked by a statement by Mr Price that said his actions "did not represent our values and his position as an MP sends the wrong message out to domestic abuse survivors".
He added: "The disciplinary committee decided I met all their expectations and were happy for me to re-join. Unfortunately the leadership of Plaid Cymru enabled that process to become politicised."
He accused the leadership of Plaid Cymru of taking an "absolute position" that an individual should "should be cancelled and destroyed and that there is no way back for that individual any more".
"There is another group of people who believe that if an individual is honest about the mistakes they have done and recognise that they acted improperly and they have taken their punishment, then that individual deserves a second chance."
Plaid Cymru said: "The disciplinary process in question has long concluded.
"Plaid Cymru is now entirely focused on continuing to deliver policies that make a real difference to people's lives through its co-operation agreement with Welsh government, holding the Tories in Westminster to account for their chronic neglect of Wales, and supporting public sector workers in their disputes with the Labour government."
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France strikes: One million protest against Macron's rise in retirement age - BBC News
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2023-01-19
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Protesters take to the streets across France over plans to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64.
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Europe
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Watch: Protesters held flares and played drums in strikes across France
More than a million people have joined a day of protests and strikes, according to France's interior ministry, against plans to push back the age of retirement from 62 to 64.
Some 80,000 protesters took to the streets of Paris, with demonstrations in 200 more French cities.
President Emmanuel Macron called the reforms "just and responsible" - but they are facing a make-or-break moment.
The strikes severely disrupted public transport and many schools were closed.
Protests took place across France, in Nantes, Lyon, Bordeaux, Marseille and Toulouse, as train drivers, public sector workers and refinery staff walked out.
The head of the big CGT union, Philippe Martinez, put the total number of protesters at beyond two million, higher than the government's 1.12 million figure. They said 400,000 peopled had joined the biggest march, from Place de la République in Paris.
Buoyed by their success, the unions called another day of action for 31 January.
Police were out in force in Paris in case of violence from ultra-left "black bloc" infiltrators but there were few clashes and 38 arrests. Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne praised both the police and the unions for the "good conditions" in which the protests had taken place.
On some rail lines, as few as one in 10 services were operating, while the Paris metro was running a skeleton service.
The main secondary education union said 65% of teachers were on strike, although the education ministry said it was 35%.
Under the proposals outlined by the prime minister earlier this month, from 2027 people will have to work 43 years to qualify for a full pension, as opposed to 42 years now.
Hailed by the government as a vital measure to safeguard France's share-out pension system, the reform is proving deeply unpopular among the public, with 68% saying they are opposed, according to an IFOP poll this week.
All the country's unions - including so-called "reformist" unions that the government had hoped to win to its side - have condemned the measure, as have the left-wing and far-right oppositions in the National Assembly.
Because his Renaissance party does not have a majority in the Assembly, President Macron will be forced to rely on support from the 60 or so MPs of the conservative Republicans party. Although in principle in favour of pension reform, even some of them have warned they could vote against.
With the parliamentary process expected to take several weeks, Mr Macron faces a rolling campaign of opposition.
The worst outcome for the government would be rolling strikes in transport, hospitals and fuel depots - effectively bringing the country to a standstill.
If the scale of opposition forces the president into a retreat. If that happened, it could mark the end of any serious reforms in this, his second term.
On the one hand, inflation, the energy crisis and constant reports of run-down public services have left many people feeling anxious and irascible. President Macron's poor image outside the prosperous cities contributed to the "yellow-vest" insurrection four years ago and could well do so again.
But on the other hand, pollsters have also identified a sense of resignation among many people, who no longer identify with "old-school" social movements such as those the unions specialise in.
The prime minister invoked the principle of "inter-generational solidarity" to justify the decision to make people work longer. Under the French system, very few people have personal pension plans linked to capital investments.
Instead, the pensions of those who are retired are paid from the same common fund into which those in work are contributing every month. Workers know they will benefit from the same treatment when they retire.
Train drivers joined teachers and refinery workers in walking out on Thursday
However, the government says the system is heading for disaster because the ratio between those working and those in retirement is diminishing rapidly.
From four workers per retiree 50 years ago, the ratio has fallen to around 1.7 per retiree today, and will sink further in the years ahead.
Nearly all other European countries have taken steps to raise the official retirement age, with Italy and Germany, for example, on 67 and Spain on 65. In the UK it is currently 66.
President Macron made an earlier, and more ambitious, attempt to reform the system at the end of 2019, but pulled the plug when Covid hit. This second plan was part of his re-election manifesto last year - a key argument deployed by the government in the battle for public opinion.
To palliate the effects of the reform, Élisabeth Borne has promised easier ways to retire early for people in dangerous or physically demanding jobs; steps to encourage older people back into the workforce; and a higher guaranteed minimum pension.
The opposition argues the system is not technically in deficit at the moment, so there is no urgency to act. It says there are cost-saving alternatives to making people work longer, such as cutting pensions for the better-off.
It also says the brunt of the reform will be borne by the poorest. These are people who tend to start work earlier in life, so have normally earned the right to a full pension by the age of 62. Now they will have to work two extra years for no added benefit.
This is the seventh French pension reform since President François Mitterrand cut the retirement age to 60 in 1982.
Every subsequent attempt to reverse that change has led to mass opposition on the street - though in most cases, the reform did in the end go through. For example, in 2010, Nicolas Sarkozy raised the retirement age to 62, despite weeks of protests.
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Afghanistan: UN's top women meet Taliban over female aid worker ban - BBC News
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2023-01-19
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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The UN sends in its most senior team since the Taliban retook power to try to avert a looming famine.
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Asia
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Getting enough food to eat and keeping the cold at bay is a daily challenge
In a country where women are barred from university and secondary schools, and banned from many workplaces, the world's biggest aid operation is now at risk of failing those who desperately need it.
And it's happening in the cruellest depths of winter when famine and frostbite are knocking at the door.
In the middle of a deepening crisis, the most senior UN delegation to visit Afghanistan since the Taliban swept to power in 2021 has flown into Kabul.
The UN secretary general dispatched his deputy Amina Mohammad, the UN's most senior woman, with a team which also includes the head of UN Women, Sima Bahous.
They've been tasked with speaking to senior Taliban leaders at the highest-possible level about reversing restrictions, including a new ban on female aid workers, now seen to endanger urgent life-saving humanitarian operations.
The UN delegation have met the Taliban's acting foreign minister
"People are freezing and time is running out," emphasises Ramiz Alakbarov, the UN's humanitarian co-ordinator in Afghanistan in a statement which emphasises the all too obvious.
"We need to build shelters now but, in this conservative society, if we don't have female aid workers to speak to women in the families, we can't do this work."
It's not just that the UN has sent a senior delegation, they've also sent one headed by women with decades of experience.
"If there are women in the room, there is a greater chance that the uncomfortable conversations about women will take place," said one aid official who often sits in the room during efforts to reconcile the Taliban government's demands with international norms on human rights.
There's often been criticism that, all too often, foreign delegations send men-only teams which reinforce conservative Taliban views of their world.
The world's top table, the UN Security Council, recently condemned with unusual unanimity the "increasing erosion for the respect of human rights and fundamental freedoms".
The first Taliban official to meet the visiting delegation in Kabul was acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi.
On social media, his spokesman said the meeting began with the minister expressing hope that the "delegation would portray Afghanistan's true picture to the world".
He also reiterated the Taliban argument that the absence of international recognition of their rule, along with sanctions, was hindering their ability to govern effectively.
Across Afghanistan, temperatures are plunging to as low as -17C and even lower in mountainous areas.
Electricity is erratic or absent, and millions of families are struggling to make it through the night. Hardscrabble lives in one of the world's poorest countries have always been harsh - but not as harsh as this.
"We cannot provide humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan without the participation of half the society," is the urgent mantra of aid agencies struggling to respond to the new Taliban government edict restricting Afghan female aid workers.
Some aid agencies have temporarily suspended their operations. The ruling is the latest in a raft of rules in recent months which also banned women from attending university, socialising in public parks, or even going to women-only gyms.
Taliban leaders say conditions compliant with their interpretation of Islamic Sharia law and Afghanistan's conservative traditions must first be readied.
Despite earlier promises, the Taliban have steadily pushed women out of public life since they swept back to power
There's been some movement on this latest ban.
Within the Taliban system, some officials understand the gravity of these new rules.
The Health Ministry has now clarified that women can work in the health sector where women doctors and nurses are absolutely essential. That's triggered the resumption of some vital health programmes.
"While the majority of our programmes remain on hold, we are restarting some activities - such as health, nutrition and some education services - where we have received clear, reliable assurances from relevant authorities that our female staff will be safe and can work without obstruction," announced Save the Children in a statement this week.
Samira Sayed Rahman, of the International Rescue Committee in Kabul, underlined the need for Afghan women to work everywhere, from door-to-door surveys in the field to desks in the office.
"We are taking a pragmatic approach, working with Taliban officials' sector by sector," she told the BBC.
With the economy on its knees, growing numbers of Afghans rely on food aid
These aren't just concerns of the outside world. In one province after another, tribal leaders and religious scholars have been imploring Taliban leaders to open girls' secondary schools and provide more opportunities for work.
On our visit to the remote central highlands of Ghor last summer, we heard from farmers and their families how timely interventions by the UN World Food Programme last winter pulled some districts from the brink of famine.
"We feel the world is now forgetting us," one farmer lamented, as he brandished dried shafts of wheat, a painful symbol of years of punishing drought which have deepened the hardship.
This high-level UN delegation started their mission by first visiting Afghanistan's neighbours, as well as to the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) to underscore what the UN has called "the importance of the international community speaking with one voice with a unified approach".
This UN visit, at this time, is an important signal to many Afghans and their allies who feel much of the world seems to have forgotten a country where they once invested so much commitment and cash.
"Where are the Nato countries that rushed through the door in 2021?" demanded Jan Egeland, the secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council.
In a message posted last week on Twitter during his own visit to Afghanistan, he discarded any niceties about the US-led pull out which played a part in the Taliban takeover. "You left 40 million Afghans with us."
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Keir Starmer embraces Brexit slogan with 'take back control' pledge - BBC News
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2023-01-06
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['https://www.facebook.com/bbcnews']
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The Labour leader promises to transfer powers from Westminster and turn the slogan into a "solution".
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UK Politics
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This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. WATCH: 'Take Back Control' bill will turn slogan into solution, says Sir Keir Starmer
Sir Keir Starmer has promised a new "take back control" bill to transfer powers from Westminster to communities.
In his first speech of 2023, the Labour leader - a former Remain supporter - said he wanted to turn the Brexit campaign slogan "into a solution".
He pledged to devolve new powers over employment support, transport, energy, housing, culture and childcare.
Sir Keir said the legislation would be "a centrepiece" of Labour's plans if it wins the next general election.
With the country facing severe pressure on the NHS, a wave of strike action and a cost-of-living crisis, Sir Keir said he was "under no illusions about the scale of the challenges we face".
In his speech in east London, he promised a "decade of national renewal" under Labour and "hope" for the future.
But the Labour leader warned his party "won't be able to spend our way" out of the "mess" he said would be left by the Conservatives.
Setting out his priorities for a future Labour government, Sir Keir said he wanted to give communities "the chance to control their economic destiny".
"The decisions which create wealth in our communities should be taken by local people with skin in the game, and a huge power shift out of Westminster can transform our economy, our politics and our democracy," he said.
This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. Sir Keir Starmer tells Chris Mason he expects to inherit a "very badly damaged economy" from the Conservatives if he wins the next election
During the Brexit campaign of 2016, Sir Keir said he "couldn't disagree with the basic case so many Leave voters made to me".
"It's not unreasonable for us to recognise the desire for communities to stand on their own feet. It's what 'take back control' meant," he said.
"So we will embrace the 'take back control' message but we'll turn it from a slogan to a solution. From a catchphrase into change."
Keir Starmer - a man who voted Remain and campaigned for a second referendum - is cloaking himself in the language of Brexit.
His promise of what he calls a '"take back control bill", a planned new law pushing powers away from Westminster, is nothing if not unsubtle.
Taking the highly effective slogan of the victorious Brexit campaign and claiming it as his own.
Labour needs to win back dozens and dozens of seats that voted Leave and Sir Keir might as well be screaming "I get it" from every rooftop he can clamber on.
It does mean critics will ask what he really believes: it might be savvy politics to court Brexit voters, but who is the real Keir Starmer?
Sir Keir was Labour's shadow Brexit secretary under Jeremy Corbyn between 2016 and 2020, when he unsuccessfully campaigned for a second EU referendum.
Asked by reporters whether he now regretted supporting a fresh vote, Sir Keir said: "Even in those turbulent years, 2016 to 2019, I was always making the argument that there was always something very important sitting behind that leave vote.
"That phrase 'take back control' was really powerful, it was like a Heineken phrasing, got into people.
"And the more they ask themselves, do I have enough control, the more they answer that question, no."
Labour said the bill would give English towns and cities the tools to develop long-term plans for economic growth, creating high-skilled jobs in their areas.
The party said there would be "a presumption towards moving power out of Westminster", with local leaders able to bid for any powers which had already been devolved elsewhere.
"Take back control" was used by the Vote Leave campaign, including Boris Johnson
Elsewhere in his speech, Sir Keir accused the Conservatives of "sticking plaster politics", saying they had failed to address long-term issues.
Although he acknowledged investment was needed after the "damage" done by the Conservatives to public services, he warned Labour would not be "getting its big government chequebook out".
By suggesting a move away from big increases in public spending, Sir Keir appeared to distance himself from his predecessor as Labour leader, Mr Corbyn.
Pressed by the BBC's Chris Mason over whether a Labour government would spend any more than the Conservatives, Sir Keir said he would make "different choices" but any commitments would be fully costed.
He said the party would inherit "a broken economy" and with the tax burden already high there was not scope for big tax increases.
Sir Keir also said he wanted a Labour government to work with business to deliver its aims.
Asked by reporters whether there was more scope for private sector involvement in public services, Sir Keir said trying to deliver everything through the state did not work and he was instead proposing a "partnership model" with private business.
Sir Keir's speech made no mention of abolishing the House of Lords - a proposal which was unveiled by Labour in a report last month.
But the Labour leader denied he had "gone cool" on the idea, saying it was a "key part" of the party's report on constitutional change.
The speech provoked criticism from some on the left of the Labour Party.
Former shadow home secretary Diane Abbott, who is a close ally of Mr Corbyn, said a "take back control" bill was an "empty promise" without new money to go with it.
Labour councillor Martin Abrams, a committee member of the Momentum campaign group, said Sir Keir's speech was "totally out of step with the scale of the crisis facing us" and the reference to private sector partnerships "makes people's hearts sink".
The speech came a day after Rishi Sunak set out his own priorities for government at a venue just a short distance away.
In his new year speech, the prime minister promised to halve inflation, grow the economy, ensure national debt falls, cut NHS waiting lists and pass new laws to stop small boat crossings.
Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said Mr Sunak's five pledges were in contrast to Sir Keir's speech, which he claimed made "no firm commitments".
On Labour's "take back control" plan, Mr Cleverly said the Conservatives had already given local communities more power through regional mayors.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-64173370
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