General news

• Tesla posts record $710m net loss as it struggles to produce Model 3 cars

  02-05-2018 23:55 via theguardian.com
  Concerns over company’s future after it burned through $745.3m in cash during important quarter, though revenue grew 26%Tesla posted a record $709.6m net loss in the first quarter and burned through $745.3m in cash while struggling to crank out large numbers of its Model 3 mass-market electric car.The loss and cash burn announced Wednesday raised questions about the company’s future and whether it would be able to pay all of its bills by early next year without more borrowing or ano
  
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• Liverpool beat Roma to reach Champions League final against Real Madrid

  02-05-2018 23:36
  Liverpool have beaten Roma 7-6 on aggregate to reach the Champions League final.Jurgen Klopp's men will play Real Madrid after a breathless semi-final second leg which they lost 4 - 2 on the night.Liverpool's 5-2 victory over Roma at Anfield on Tuesday 24 April was enough to secure them a place in their first final since 2007.
  
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• Justin Langer is named as Australia’s new head coach

  02-05-2018 23:28 via theguardian.com
  • Former opening batsman takes over from Darren Lehmann
  • ‘Significant challenges ahead for our group,’ says LangerAustralia’s attempt at repairing their battered public image began when they turned to their former Test opener Justin Langer to be their new head coach.The 47-year-old was confirmed as the man to take over from Darren Lehmann who resigned following the ball-tampering scandal in South Africa. Cricket Australia said that Langer will coach the side in all t
  
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• Facebook data breach firm Cambridge Analytica shutting down

  02-05-2018 23:23
  Cambridge Analytica, the political consultancy at the centre of the Facebook data row, has announced it is to close and declare bankruptcy.Eighteen enforcement officers spent the night searching Cambridge Analytica's offices after the High Court granted a warrant in March.The information commissioner obtained a legal order to access their records and data after it emerged the company had harvested information from 50 million Facebook users.
  
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• Hawking's final paper reveals thoughts on mystery of the cosmos

  02-05-2018 23:14
  Stephen Hawking's final thoughts on the mysteries of the cosmos have been published just weeks after his death - and it suggests a simpler theory than many experts believe.A very basic background for those who are not prize-winning physicists: a widely held view is that after the Big Bang the universe expanded rapidly by a process known as inflation.Some think this may still be continuing, producing a 'multiverse' with many universes out there in addition to our own.
  
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• Love in the Countryside review – Sara Cox gives farmers a hand finding rural romance

  02-05-2018 23:00 via theguardian.com
  Despite some awkward Blind Date-style interviews and some old-fashioned views, there’s plenty of charm in this rural dating showSara Cox is busy. She has barely finished going Back in Time For Tea, now she is helping lonely farmers find love. As well as her Radio 2 stuff. I don’t mind, there’s no such thing as too much Sara Cox.So eight farmers uploaded video profiles, and prospective partners were invited to write them letters. Letters! What is this, the past? Do they not have
  
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• £250m spent but no starter homes yet built under flagship fund

  02-05-2018 23:00 via theguardian.com
  Labour accuses government of betraying young people amid affordability crisisThe government has spent £250m to boost starter home construction without a single property being built so far, it has emerged.Dominic Raab, the housing minister, made the admission in response to a question from John Healey, the shadow housing secretary, who described the situation as “a betrayal of young Brits looking for help to buy a first home”. Continue reading...
  
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• Liverpool beat Roma 7-6 to reach Champions League final

  02-05-2018 22:58
  Liverpool have beaten Roma 7-6 on aggregate to reach the Champions League final.Jurgen Klopp's men will play Real Madrid after a breathless semi-final second leg which they lost 4 - 2 on the night.Liverpool's 5-2 victory over Italy's Roma at Anfield on Tuesday 24 April was enough to secure them a place in their first final since 2007.
  
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• Liverpool weather Roma storm to squeeze into Champions League final

  02-05-2018 22:48 via theguardian.com
  Is it too presumptuous, when Liverpool are playing with this kind of attacking conviction, to believe they have the riches to prevent Real Madrid, the most successful team in the history of the European Cup, from registering a 13th success in the competition they cherish the most? The final will be on 26 May in Kiev and Liverpool, on this evidence, will be going to Ukraine to score goals and examine the theory that Madrid can be susceptible at the back.Evidently they will need to tighten up thei
  
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• House Republicans nominate Donald Trump for Nobel peace prize

  02-05-2018 22:23 via theguardian.com
  Eighteen lawmakers write to Nobel committee to say president should receive 2019 prize ‘in recognition of his work to end the Korean war’Eighteen House Republicans have nominated Donald Trump for the 2019 Nobel peace prize. In a letter spearheaded by the Indiana Republican Luke Messer and sent to the Norwegian Nobel committee, the lawmakers claim that Trump should “receive the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of his work to end the Korean War, denuclearize the Korean penin
  
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• Olympic 1500m champion Asbel Kiprop ‘tested positive’ for EPO

  02-05-2018 22:21 via theguardian.com
  • Kenyan world champion is said to be aware of allegations
  • 28-year-old believes there is an error with his sampleAsbel Kiprop, a three-times world and Olympic 1500m gold medallist, is understood to have tested positive for the banned blood-boosting drug EPO.It is understood that Kiprop believes there is an error with his sample and he is fighting his case. Continue reading...
  
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• Sajid Javid joins hard-Brexiters to derail PM on customs plan

  02-05-2018 22:18 via theguardian.com
  Inner cabinet fails to agree stance as home secretary opposes May’s proposalSajid Javid has joined hard-Brexiters to voice strong doubts about the prime minister’s favoured customs plan as her Brexit inner cabinet broke up without agreement on the government’s negotiating stance.Just days after replacing Amber Rudd as home secretary in the wake of the Windrush crisis, Javid staked out his independence from Theresa May by suggesting her favoured model of a “customs partner
  
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• Steve Bell on Rees-Mogg's Brexit missive to the PM – cartoon

  02-05-2018 21:59 via theguardian.com
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• U.S. considering restrictions on China's telecoms companies - sources

  02-05-2018 21:58
  The Trump administration is considering issuing an executive order that would restrict some Chinese companies' ability to sell telecommunications equipment in the United States, two industry officials said, an action likely aimed at Huawei Technologies Co Ltd [HWT.UL] and ZTE Corp.President Donald Trump's administration has already targeted Huawei and ZTE, two of the world's major telecommunications equipment manufacturers, with a number of recent actions to restrict their businesses in the Unit
  
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• Five dead after military plane crashes on highway near Georgia airport

  02-05-2018 21:50 via theguardian.com
  Air national guard C-130 cargo plane was on a training missionThe cause of the crash wasn’t immediately knownA cargo plane on a training mission has crashed on to a busy highway near a Georgia airport, killing at least five national guard members from Puerto Rico, authorities said.Black smoke rose into the sky from a section of the plane that appeared to have crashed into a median on the road. Firefighters later put out the blaze. Continue reading...
  
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• Arsène Wenger channels spirit of 2006 as Arsenal bid to outgun Atlético

  02-05-2018 21:49 via theguardian.com
  • Wenger recalls 1-0 win at Real as his greatest European night• ‘I want to finish this love story well’ says FrenchmanArsène Wenger went back to Madrid – in his own mind – when he was asked last week to reveal his most memorable European result with Arsenal. It came in February 2006, the manager said, in the Champions League last‑16 first leg, when his team outplayed a Real Madrid line-up that featured Zinedine Zidane, Roberto Carlos and the Brazil
  
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• Facebook data breach firm Cambridge Analytica 'ceasing all operations'

  02-05-2018 21:43
  Cambridge Analytica has announced it is "ceasing all operations" following the Facebook data breach.Eighteen enforcement officers spent the night searching Cambridge Analytica's offices after the High Court granted a warrant in March.The information commissioner obtained a legal order to access their records and data, after it emerged the company had harvested information from 50 million Facebook users.
  
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• Chris Froome asks fans 'not to make up their minds' amid doping case

  02-05-2018 21:26
  Team Sky rider Chris Froome has urged people not to "make up their minds just yet" as he continues his bid to clear his name after an adverse analytical finding for the asthma drug salbutamol.The five-time Grand Tour winner was speaking in Jerusalem ahead of Friday's opening Giro d'Italia stage, where he is attempting to re-write the history books and become the first cyclist in 35 years to hold the Tour de France, Vuelta a Espana and Giro titles at the same time."I would say to people 'don't ma
  
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• Cambridge Analytica closing after Facebook data harvesting scandal

  02-05-2018 21:21 via theguardian.com
  Political consultancy, under fire over use of millions of Facebook users’ data, has begun insolvency proceedingsSCL Group and its Cambridge Analytica consultancy, which were at the centre of this year’s Facebook privacy row, are closing and starting insolvency proceedings.The company has been plagued by scandal since the Observer reported that the personal data of about 50 million Americans and at least a million Britons had been harvested from Facebook and improperly shared with Cam
  
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• In Brexit stronghold of Havering, immigration is less of an issue now

  02-05-2018 21:14 via theguardian.com
  Local election Labour candidates say crime and housing have moved up the list of concernsLast summer a row erupted over Havering council’s plan to split from the rest of London. The motion, tabled by a Ukip councillor and dubbed “Hexit”, was an attempt to solve the east London borough’s so-called “identity crisis”.“It was laughed out of the chamber,” says Fay Hough, the 30-year-old Labour candidate for the Rainham & Wennington ward in the upcom
  
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• MPs prepared to force Channel Islands and Isle of Man to reveal firms' owners

  02-05-2018 21:10 via theguardian.com
  Backbenchers behind tax haven vote want crown dependencies to also adopt measures MPs are prepared to look at ways of forcing the crown dependencies of the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man to introduce public registers of company ownership if they are not willing to, in the wake of this week’s decision by parliament to insist that the overseas territories do so.Andrew Mitchell, a Conservative, and Labour’s Margaret Hodge want ministers to tell the crown dependencies to fall in lin
  
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• Facebook fires engineer accused of stalking, possibly by abusing data access

  02-05-2018 21:03 via theguardian.com
  Employee allegedly called himself ‘professional stalker’ on Tinder as site seeks to launch dating app and faces privacy scandalFacebook has fired a security engineer after he was accused of stalking women online possibly by abusing his “privileged access” to data, raising renewed concerns about users’ privacy at the social network. The controversy, which came to light after the employee allegedly called himself a “professional stalker” in a message to a
  
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• Creditors review – Strindberg's scintillating tale of passion and possession

  02-05-2018 21:00 via theguardian.com
  Royal Lyceum, Edinburgh
  Stewart Laing directs August Strindberg’s drama about a man wheedling his way into his ex-wife’s marriageIf the men’s rights movement is looking for a spokesman, it could do worse than Gustav in August Strindberg’s three-hander, adapted in 2008 by David Greig and given a scintillating revival by Stewart Laing. He is the spurned lover who wheedles his way into his ex-wife’s new marriage while pushing a doctrine of male superiority and female d
  
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• Pope Francis on Chile sexual abuse scandal: 'I was part of the problem'

  02-05-2018 20:55 via theguardian.com
  Whistleblowers have private Vatican meeting with pontiffSurvivors want deeds to match words to tackle abuse ‘epidemic’The three whistleblowers in Chile’s sex abuse scandal have urged Pope Francis to transform his apology for having discredited them into concrete action to end what they called the “epidemic” of sex abuse and cover-up in the Catholic church.Related: Pope's promise to tackle abuse tested by appointment of Chilean bishopContinue reading...
  
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• TSB's Paul Pester hits series of wrong notes in front of MPs | Nils Pratley

  02-05-2018 20:52 via theguardian.com
  Bank’s chief executive failed on three fronts at Treasury select committee hearing after IT chaosPaul Pester, the chief executive of TSB, had three main tasks to perform at the Treasury select committee hearing on Wednesday. First, apologise with maximum contrition for the IT shambles and the hassle caused to customers. Second, declare that he definitely won’t be getting any form of bonus this year. Third, say when the problem will be fixed. He failed on all three fronts.The formal a
  
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• Labour motion to see Windrush documents defeated in Commons

  02-05-2018 20:52
  Theresa May told MPs a ‘package of measures to bring transparency on the issue’ would be announced.The government defeated a Labour motion in the Commons seeking access to documents laying out the policies behind the Windrush crisis, promising instead to allow independent oversight of an internal review into what went wrong.Labour had put down the same type of “humble address” procedure it used last year to force ministers to hand over their Brexit impact assessments, to
  
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• Government defeated as Lords back powers to prevent hard Irish border

  02-05-2018 20:52
  The House of Lords on Wednesday voted to give parliament the power to stop any Brexit deal that might restore a hard border across the island of Ireland, in the latest defeat for Prime Minister Theresa May's government.The House of Lords voted 309 to 242 in favour of the amendment to the government's key Brexit blueprint that will sever political, financial and legal ties with the EU.Northern Ireland will be Britain's only land frontier with the European Union after Brexit.
  
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• Lizzie Deignan: 'Female cyclists are still a long way behind the men’

  02-05-2018 20:41 via theguardian.com
  The Tour de Yorkshire has introduced prize parity, but as the Guardian finds out on a ride near her home town of Otley, the Olympic silver medallist still sees cycling as a sexist sportCycling is still a sexist sport, the world champion Lizzie Deignan has said, as she questioned why the Tour de Yorkshire this week offers women a two‑day course while the men race over four days.The 29-year-old, who won silver at the London Olympics under her maiden name, Armitstead, won the second edition o
  
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• UAE warns investors not to deal with Financial.org

  02-05-2018 20:26
  The United Arab Emirates' securities regulator on Wednesday warned investors not to deal with Financial.org, an unregulated British company that has attracted investors from countries across Asia and the Gulf."The (UAE) authority warns investors against dealing with that website (Financial.org) and any services it is offering regarding financial products and investment portfolios," the Emirates Securities & Commodities Authority said in a statement.It added that Financial.org did not have pe
  
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• Mike Ashley reignites row over Sports Direct's working practices

  02-05-2018 20:26 via theguardian.com
  Founder files complaint over union gift against Shirebrook inquiry leader Iain Wright Mike Ashley, the billionaire founder of Sports Direct, has resurrected the controversy over working conditions at his company’s Shirebrook warehouse by filing a complaint against the former MP who led the parliamentary inquiry into the retailer.
  The company has complained to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards about the conduct of Iain Wright, the former Labour MP for Hartlepool, who chaired the
  
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• Chris Froome steers straight course as he prepares for Giro d’Italia

  02-05-2018 20:26 via theguardian.com
  • Froome targets emulating Hinault by holding three grand tours
  • Brailsford wants focus on race and not Froome’s failed drug testChris Froome knows as well as anybody that the Giro d’Italia could be the last time he rides competitively for a while. The result of his anti-doping case is expected some time between the finish of this race on 21 May and the start of the Tour de France in July.But while the Team Sky principal, Dave Brailsford, wore a battle-weary look on anothe
  
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• Cambridge Analytica To Shut Down After Facebook Scandal

  02-05-2018 20:23
  Scandal-hit political analysis firm Cambridge Analytica is closing down.
  
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• The computer glitch that led to 450,000 cancelled breast screenings

  02-05-2018 20:18
  The AgeX trial was set up to test whether cancers could be usefully picked up, without undue harm, in those aged 47 to 49 and those aged 71 to 73.Up to 450,000 women in England were not called for their last mammogram before they turned 70 because of a computer failure that goes back to 2009, health secretary Jeremy Hunt has told the House of Commons.The women were enrolled in AgeX, a major NHS trial designed to find out whether extra screening would protect older women from breast cancer.
  
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• White House's top Russia lawyer Ty Cobb departs in latest Trump shake-up

  02-05-2018 20:13 via theguardian.com
  Cobb had been main lawyer dealing with Mueller’s inquiry but Trump was reportedly unhappy with his conciliatory approachThe lawyer leading Donald Trump’s response to the special counsel investigation into alleged collusion with Russia is stepping down in the latest shake-up of the White House legal team.Ty Cobb will retire at the end of the month and reportedly be replaced by Emmet Flood, a veteran lawyer who represented Bill Clinton during his impeachment. Continue reading...
  
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• Plants 'talk to' each other through their roots

  02-05-2018 20:00 via theguardian.com
  Scientists studying corn seedlings believe that they send signals under the soil, advising each other of the proximity of other plantsPlants use their roots to “listen in” on their neighbours, according to research that adds to evidence that plants have their own unique forms of communication.The study found that plants in a crowded environment secrete chemicals into the soil that prompt their neighbours to grow more aggressively, presumably to avoid being left in the shade. Continue
  
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• Welsh assembly excludes Ukip member for racial term

  02-05-2018 19:58
  Michelle Brown has been suspended without pay for a week.Michelle Brown, a Ukip politician, has been excluded from the Welsh assembly without pay for a week over a racial slur she made against a Labour MP, which came to light last year.The assembly member for north Wales called Chuka Umunna, the MP for Streatham, a “fucking coconut” during a conversation in May 2016 with an adviser.
  
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• TSB chief Paul Pester to forfeit £2m bonus in wake of IT meltdown

  02-05-2018 19:43 via theguardian.com
  Bank bosses tell MPs they do not know how many of 1.9m online customers were affectedThe chief executive of TSB will forfeit a £2m bonus payment in the light of an IT failure that left thousands of customers locked out of their accounts, as MPs accused the bank boss of being “extraordinarily complacent”.During a bruising evidence session before the Treasury select committee, TSB chief executive Paul Pester and the bank’s chairman, Richard Meddings, said they had received
  
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• Is it a prop? Is it a prank? Mystery car hanging from bridge perplexes Toronto

  02-05-2018 19:39 via theguardian.com
  Canadian police initially said the hollowed-out Honda Civic found dangling linked to a movie shoot. Now they don’t knowWas it the aftermath of a horrific accident? An art project? A prank?Police and passersby were left perplexed and concerned after a burned-out car was found dangling precariously from a Toronto bridge as traffic rumbled overhead. Continue reading...
  
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• We won’t have a hard Brexit. There aren’t enough MPs to back it | Martin Kettle

  02-05-2018 19:30 via theguardian.com
  The issue need not bring down Theresa May’s government, but Jacob Rees-Mogg’s sabre-rattling is a bluff she will have to callWith the wonderful benefit of hindsight, the great moments of political choice can take on a deceptive inevitability. Yet in real time, these moments that make or break governments – such as Sir Robert Peel’s repeal of the corn laws, which split the Tories for a generation – are more typically the hard-fought climax of processes that 
  
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• Billy Vunipola’s hamstring adds to England’s injury worries

  02-05-2018 19:28 via theguardian.com
  • Saracens No 8 pulls up after ‘feeling tightness’ in training
  • Eddie Jones to name South Africa tour squad next weekBilly Vunipola’s hopes of an injury‑free end to the season have suffered another setback after the Saracens No 8 pulled up with a hamstring problem at training on Wednesday, having only just returned to action after a broken arm ruled him out of the Six Nations.England, who are due to name their tour squad for South Africa next week, now fac
  
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• Barry Hawkins and Kyren Wilson make World Championship semi-finals

  02-05-2018 19:28 via theguardian.com
  Hawkins wins 13–5 to reach fifth semi-final in past six yearsWilson sees off Mark Allen 13-6 and will face Trump or HigginsBarry Hawkins and Kyren Wilson booked their places in the last four of the World Championship with ruthless demolitions of their quarter-final opponents.
  Hawkins thrashed third seed Ding Junhui 13-5 to set up a semi-final showdown with either Mark Williams or Ali Carter, while Wilson will face Judd Trump or John Higgins after beating Mark Allen 13-6.Related: Barry Hear
  
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• TSB boss in switching row at MPs' hearing over IT meltdown

  02-05-2018 19:26
  The under-fire boss of TSB has been accused of failing to grasp the seriousness of the bank's continuing IT woes, 10 days after a bungled server migration.Paul Pester was answering questions from the Treasury Select Committee of MPs when he admitted to its chair, Nicky Morgan, that he did not have figures for the number of customers who had requested to leave the bank.
  
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• The Guardian view on Tory divisions: deeper than Brexit | Editorial

  02-05-2018 19:22 via theguardian.com
  Cabinet rows over a customs union are the proxy for a more profound ideological battle that Theresa May is desperately trying to deferA remarkable and alarming feature of the Brexit process so far is the way deadlines that ought to force the government to make difficult choices come and go with critical decisions stubbornly untaken.A cabinet committee meeting on Wednesday was billed as a crunch point on the question of a customs union. But, as different Tory factions lobbied Theresa Ma
  
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• Cot death expert raises concerns over Scotland's cardboard baby boxes

  02-05-2018 19:18
  The Scottish government insisted its box was the first non-commercial cardboard baby box in the world to be given safety accreditation.One of the world’s leading experts on cot deaths has raised significant safety concerns about cardboard baby boxes given out free to thousands of new mothers in Scotland.Tens of thousands of baby boxes, which include a mattress, blankets, a digital thermometer, clothes, books and bathing products, have been given to expectant mothers for free under a nation
  
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• House of Fraser confirms store closures in rescue plan

  02-05-2018 19:14
  House of Fraser has confirmed it is to launch a restructuring plan that will mean a round of store closures as part of a deal which will see the Chinese owner of Hamleys take a major stake.The struggling department store chain said it would launch a company voluntary arrangement (CVA) in June - after Sky News first revealed last month that it would explore such an option.There was no confirmation of how many of House of Fraser's 59 sites would close under the rescue plan, though its chairman sai
  
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• Community order for man who sent racial abuse to Diane Abbott

  02-05-2018 19:11 via theguardian.com
  ‘I accept you are not a racist’, judge tells 69-year-old after threats to set fire to MP’s house A man who sent a racially abusive letter to Diane Abbott has been given a community order. Roy Brown, 69, sent the letter to the shadow home secretary’s Westminster office in August 2017. The note, which was opened by one of her parliamentary assistants, included a string of racist abuse.Continue reading...
  
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• Lost in translation: Macron thanks Australian PM's 'delicious' wife

  02-05-2018 19:04 via theguardian.com
  French president’s choice of English words in Sydney sets tongues waggingWas it a verbal faux pas, or a jeu de mots gone wrong? We will probably never know, but Emmanuel Macron’s choice of English words certainly set Australian tongues wagging. “I want to thank you for your welcome,” the French president said to the country’s prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, at the end of a joint press conference in Sydney on Wednesday. “Thank you and your delicious wife for
  
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• Breast cancer screening IT error: what you need to know

  02-05-2018 19:04
  If you have noticed any changes to your breasts or had any breast cancer symptoms, then you should go to see your GP.The health secretary, Jeremy Hunt, has launched an inquiry after an IT error meant 450,000 women in England aged 70 to 79 missed crucial breast cancer screenings.Of the women who missed screenings, 309,000 are still alive and will be sent a letter informing them about the error before the end of May. Hunt said the first 65,000 notifications would be sent out this week.
  
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• ‘I miss the old Kanye’: what has happened to rap’s most complex star?

  02-05-2018 19:03 via theguardian.com
  His suggestion that black people have been complicit in their own slavery has prompted widespread outrage. What lies behind Kanye West’s recent provocations?Photograph: Smallz & Raskind/Contour by Getty ImageIn a video viewed more than 6m times on Twitter, 21-year-old Chika Oranika summed up the current feelings of many black Americans about Kanye West. She delivered her own lyrics over the beat of the rap star’s Jesus Walks. “How you say you Yeezus but do nothing to restor
  
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• Fossil sheds light on evolutionary journey from dinosaur to bird

  02-05-2018 19:00 via theguardian.com
  Scientists have reconstructed the skull of an Ichthyornis dispar, a very early bird species that still had the sharp teeth of a dinosaurIt was one of the fossils Darwin hailed as evidence of evolution. Now scientists have unveiled four skulls of an ancient toothed seabird in a study experts say reveals the face of early birds.Thought to have lived between 66 and 100m years ago the gull-like bird, known as Ichthyornis dispar, was first written about in the 19th century by American palaeontologist
  
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