General news

• NHS England to review cutting compulsory training for doctors

  22-04-2024 06:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Exclusive: Study will be aimed at improving medics’ working lives by reducing frequency and repetition of coursesThe amount of time doctors have to spend doing compulsory training will be cut as part of an NHS drive to improve medics’ working lives, the Guardian can reveal.Concern that doctors have too heavy a burden of mandatory training has prompted NHS England to commission a review, which it is expected to announce imminently. Continue reading...
  
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• Elijah Adebayo strikes but frustrated Luton fail to put Everton away

  03-05-2024 23:10 via theguardian.com
  
  Every point counts, but this one is unlikely to be enough for Luton Town. When the story of the 2023-24 Premier League season comes to be told, it is likely that they will look back with regret when they remember the night when they failed to find a way past a negative, limited Everton side.Of course, nobody inside Kenilworth Road could quibble with the level of Luton’s spirit and desire. There was also a lovely equalising goal from Elijah Adebayo, whose strike cancelled out Dominic Calver
  
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• Ukraine unveils AI-generated foreign ministry spokesperson

  03-05-2024 23:08 via theguardian.com
  
  Victoria Shi is modelled on Rosalie Nombre, a singer and former contestant on Ukraine’s version of the reality show The BachelorUkraine on Wednesday presented an AI-generated spokesperson called Victoria who will make official statements on behalf of its foreign ministry.The ministry said it would “for the first time in history” use a digital spokesperson to read its statements, which will still be written by humans. Continue reading...
  
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• Weight of history: Saints look to seize day in Leinster Champions Cup clash

  03-05-2024 23:00 via theguardian.com
  
  One step from a Champions Cup final, Northampton must first navigate a trip to Croke Park that is as historic as it is dauntingBy his own admission, Northampton’s director of rugby, Phil Dowson, is a history buff. This week he invited the club’s Irish strength and conditioning coach, Eamonn Hyland, to give his players an “incredibly powerful” lesson in the cultural and historic significance of becoming the first English side to play at Croke Park. Players were moved to go
  
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• California man charged with threatening to kill Fani Willis

  03-05-2024 22:48 via theguardian.com
  
  The man, Marc Shultz, posted multiple comments last October under two separate YouTube livestream videosA California man has been charged with sending death threats to Fani Willis, the Fulton county district attorney who is overseeing the Georgia prosecution against Donald Trump over his alleged efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election in the state.The man, Marc Shultz, is alleged to have posted multiple menacing comments last October under two separate YouTube livestream videos. He
  
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• Adrian Newey exit could spark Red Bull exodus, predicts McLaren chief

  03-05-2024 22:43 via theguardian.com
  
  Zak Brown claims ‘an increase in CVs coming our way’ Red Bull insist they do not anticipate major departuresThe McLaren team principal, Zak Brown, has said Adrian Newey’s departure from Red Bull has ­instigated a spate of applications from Red Bull personnel to join McLaren and that the British designer may be only the first domino in an exodus he has precipitated.Newey, the most successful car designer of the modern era, announced on ­Wednesday he was ­leaving Red
  
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• Canadian police charge three over alleged assassination of Sikh activist

  03-05-2024 22:12 via theguardian.com
  
  Prime minister said there were ‘credible allegations’ that India was behind killing of Hardeep Singh NijjarCanadian police have charged three members of an alleged hit team for their role in the assassination of the Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar, the first arrests in a high-profile killing which officials believe was masterminded by India.The arrest, first reported by CBC News, comes nearly a year after the prominent activist was killed in the parking lot of his gurdwara in the
  
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• Hope Hicks tells hush-money jury of Trump’s control over 2016 campaign

  03-05-2024 21:57 via theguardian.com
  
  Ex-president’s former communications director says Access Hollywood tape ‘was a crisis’ for his campaignHope Hicks, Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign press secretary, broke into tears on Friday while testifying in the ex-president’s New York criminal hush-money trial, hours after she described his complete control over the campaign.Hicks, who cut a skittish figure in Judge Juan Merchan’s courtroom, is a key prosecution witness. She described Trump campaign staffers
  
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• Big Tory losses but no Labour landslide. What might happen at Westminster? – a visual analysis

  03-05-2024 21:53 via theguardian.com
  
  Tory council representation has imploded, but Labour’s gains have not been seismic. These charts show what this may signal for a general electionConservative representation has collapsed to its lowest level since 1998 in the areas that voted in Thursday’s local elections, according to a Guardian analysis.The Tories now control 19% of seats in the 98 council areas that had announced results by 20:40 on 3 May – their lowest level since Labour’s Tony Blair swept to power in
  
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• ‘Promising signs’: Greens dominate in Bristol election

  03-05-2024 21:44 via theguardian.com
  
  As party narrowly misses out on overall majority, co-leader says it has won spread of urban and rural seatsThe Greens are celebrating a spectacular win in Bristol, where it became by far the largest party, as it headed for a record number of councillors in local elections across England.Party officials said they believed they were on track to finish with more than 800 members on more than 170 councils. Continue reading...
  
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• Conservatives crushed by ‘worst local election result’ in years

  03-05-2024 21:40 via theguardian.com
  
  Spread of Tory losses leads former minister to say there’s ‘no such thing as a safe seat any more’The Conservatives are facing one of their worst local election results in 40 years, with striking Labour gains across England and Wales in key battlegrounds they need to secure victory at the general election.The spread of the Conservative losses led one former minister to claim there was “no such thing really as a safe Tory seat any more”, but the prime minister appear
  
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• Berlin wants to give away Joseph Goebbels’ countryside villa

  03-05-2024 21:25 via theguardian.com
  
  Berlin’s finance minister says property owned by Hitler’s propaganda minister will be demolished if taker not foundBerlin’s government is offering to give away a villa once owned by Adolf Hitler’s propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, hoping to end a decades-long debate on whether to repurpose or bulldoze a sprawling disused site in the countryside north of the German capital.“I offer to anyone who would like to take over the site, to take it over as a gift from the
  
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• Brazil: 37 killed and dozens missing in worst floods in 80 years

  03-05-2024 20:28 via theguardian.com
  
  More than 23,000 people forced to leave homes after heavy rains in southern Rio Grande do Sul prompt record-breaking floodsHeavy rains in the southern Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul have killed 37 people, with another 74 still missing, as record-breaking floods devastated cities and forced thousands to leave their homes.It was the fourth such environmental disaster in a year, following floods in July, September and November that killed 75 people in total. Continue reading...
  
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• Gas stoves increase nitrogen dioxide exposure above WHO standards – study

  03-05-2024 20:13 via theguardian.com
  
  Science Advances report also finds people of color and low-income residents in US disproportionately affectedUsing a gas stove increases nitrogen dioxide exposure to levels that exceed public health recommendations, a new study shows. The report, published Friday in Science Advances, found that people of color and low-income residents in the US were disproportionately affected.Indoor gas and propane appliances raise average concentrations of the harmful pollutant, also known as NO2, to 75% of th
  
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• Video of sun’s surface shows solar rain, eruptions and coronal moss

  03-05-2024 20:12 via theguardian.com
  
  Ethereal scenes of flowing super-heated material may help explain why atmosphere is hotter than surfaceThe sun’s otherworldly landscape, including coronal moss, solar rain and 6,000-mile-tall spires of gas, is revealed in footage from the Solar Orbiter spacecraft.The observations, beamed back by the European Space Agency probe, reveal feathery, hair-like structures made of plasma and also capture eruptions and showers of relatively cooler material falling to the surface. Continue reading..
  
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• Labour celebrates victories but loses ground in urban and heavily Muslim areas

  03-05-2024 19:53 via theguardian.com
  
  Party did better in places it had lost since 2016 but one commentator called it ‘progress at a price’ Labour was celebrating a string of election successes on Friday in a set of results that party officials said showed it heading for victory in the upcoming general election.Beneath the euphoria of wins in places such as Blackpool, Hartlepool and Thurrock, however, lay a nervousness about the party’s performance in urban areas, with campaigners warning it had lost ground in both
  
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• Hainault sword attack victim thanks NHS and family for saving his life

  03-05-2024 19:47 via theguardian.com
  
  Henry De Los Rios Polania said on social media from his hospital bed that he had a ‘long journey ahead’ to recoverA man injured in the sword attack in east London has thanked the emergency services and his family for saving his life as he recovers in hospital.Henry De Los Rios Polania, 35, an IT engineer from Hainault, was stabbed in his home on Tuesday morning. He was described by his sister, Jessica De Los Rios, 31, as a hero for protecting his family from the assailant. Continue r
  
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• ‘It really isn’t good enough’: crime novel of the year award criticised for entirely white longlist

  03-05-2024 19:38 via theguardian.com
  
  Authors including Dreda Say Mitchell, Harriet Tyce and Sarah Pinborough have expressed disapproval of the Theakston Old Peculier award – the UK’s most prestigious crime-writing prizeThe Theakston Old Peculier crime novel of the year has faced criticism after its 2024 longlist did not feature a single book by an author of colour.The UK and Ireland’s most prestigious prize for crime fiction is awarded to the best crime novel published each year in paperback. The winner is voted f
  
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• NYPD issues arrest figures amid ‘outside agitator’ claim at Columbia Gaza protest

  03-05-2024 19:36 via theguardian.com
  
  New York police say about 29% of those detained ‘not affiliated’ with university as more are arrested at NYU and New SchoolNew York’s police department has declared that approximately 29% of the people it arrested at pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University were “not affiliated” with the institution, as the city’s mayor continues to face scrutiny over his claims that the hardline police response was due to the actions of “outside agitators”.
  
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• Our hitchhiking memories show the depths of human kindness | Letters

  03-05-2024 19:33 via theguardian.com
  
  Readers were inspired by Hilary Bradt’s experiences and recall their ownAs I recuperated from surgery, my spirits were much lifted by the memories evoked by Hilary Bradt’s article (Confessions of an 82-year-old hitchhiker, 27 April).As a hitchhiker in the 1960s and early 70s, I, like Bradt, experienced wholly positive interactions with those willing to offer a lift: interesting conversations over the course of a few miles, company over a shared meal in otherwise soulle
  
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• Ministers are callous and clueless on Pip payments | Letters

  03-05-2024 19:33 via theguardian.com
  
  Readers on the government’s plans to move away from financial support for those with mental health conditions given through personal independence paymentPerhaps we shouldn’t be surprised that the government has continued to attack “mental health culture” (Mentally ill people being used as ‘political football’, campaigners say, 29 April). The publication of its disability green paper, in which the government says it wants to move away from financial support for
  
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• Geopolitical tensions and Covid crisis: Noel Quinn’s five years at HSBC’s helm

  03-05-2024 19:14 via theguardian.com
  
  CEO is making a surprise exit after successfully slimming down the global bank and winning over its tough chairHSBC’s chief executive, Noel Quinn, is seen by many as ending his five-year tenure on a high note. The 62-year-old stunned the banking world this week by saying he planned to retire after an “intense” five years in the role to get a better work-life balance.Quinn has slimmed down a sprawling global bank, paid out $19bn (£15bn) to shareholders last year and succes
  
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• Detained asylum seekers given Home Office booklet saying Rwanda is ‘generally safe’

  03-05-2024 19:12 via theguardian.com
  
  Glossy promotional leaflet handed out to asylum seekers detained under Rishi Sunak’s deportation policyAsylum seekers who have been detained under Rishi Sunak’s deportation policy are being handed a colourful promotional document entitled: “I’m being relocated to Rwanda. What does it mean to me?”The news came as the government faced a second legal challenge over the prime minister’s £500m policy and it emerged that dozens of asylum seekers were being for
  
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• The Guardian view on Patriarch Kirill’s religious war in Ukraine: betraying the faith | Editorial

  03-05-2024 19:03 via theguardian.com
  
  With talk of ‘holy’ conflict, the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church is bringing the institution he heads into disreputeFollowing the Julian rather than the Gregorian calendar, the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) celebrates Easter this weekend – the most important religious festival of its liturgical year. One priest who will not be leading a service is Dmitry Safronov, a prominent Moscow cleric. In March, Mr Safronov presided over a memorial service at the grave of Alexei Nav
  
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• The Guardian view on local elections: voters aren’t listening to Tories, but are hearing Labour | Editorial

  03-05-2024 19:03 via theguardian.com
  
  These were intensely domestic polls. But it was foreign affairs that caused Sir Keir Starmer trouble The results from local elections across England suggest that the Tories are on course to lose power to Labour when voters elect a new parliament. Sir John Curtice, the eminent pollster, set the tone by telling the BBC that he was “looking at one of the worst, if not the worst, Conservative performances in local government elections for the last 40 years”. The
  
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• How pervasive is antisemitism on US campuses? A look at the language of the protests

  03-05-2024 19:00 via theguardian.com
  
  The movement to press for an end to Israel’s war on Gaza has now found itself overshadowed by its loudest voicesThe protesters who seized Columbia University’s Hamilton Hall on Tuesday swiftly unfurled a banner down the front of the storied building with just one word: intifada.Other students among the pro-Palestinian demonstrators in the heart of the New York campus were sceptical about invoking the Arabic call for an uprising because it has been so widely used by pro-Israeli groups
  
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• ‘A disgrace’: Ratcliffe reads riot act after visiting Manchester United facilities

  03-05-2024 18:54 via theguardian.com
  
  Chief of football operations rails at ‘high degree of untidiness’IT department and age-group dressing rooms ‘reflect poorly’Sir Jim Ratcliffe has ordered ­Manchester United’s staff to raise standards after describing the level of ­untidiness in offices as a “disgrace” and some dressing rooms as “not much better”.Ratcliffe, the minority owner who now controls United’s football policy, made his comments after a two-day tour of Old
  
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• Ex-Post Office lawyer denies ‘covering up’ knowledge of IT problems

  03-05-2024 18:38 via theguardian.com
  
  Inquiry hears Jarnail Singh ‘sat on’ email highlighting bugs in Horizon systemA former Post Office lawyer has denied “covering up” knowledge of problems with the Horizon IT system after a public inquiry heard that he “sat on” an email highlighting IT bugs, which was not disclosed to the criminal trial of a pregnant post office operator.Jarnail Singh, the former head of criminal law at the Post Office, was being questioned at the long-running public inquiry int
  
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• UK cottage cheese sales boom as social media craze drives demand

  03-05-2024 18:27 via theguardian.com
  
  Influencers’ inventive recipes for high-protein dairy product have boosted trade by 40% for one producer If you peered into a UK fridge in the late 1970s, it is more than likely you would have found a pot of cottage cheese tucked between the prawn cocktail and sherry trifle.A popular “diet food” at the time, demand waned in subsequent decades as the high-protein, low-fat wonder food fell out of fashion. But 50 years on from its heyday, cottage cheese is making a comeback in the
  
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• Manchester City told to ‘fight to the end’ despite WSL title rivals Chelsea faltering

  03-05-2024 18:21 via theguardian.com
  
  Four points from final two games would clinch title for CityManager Gareth Taylor warns against complacencyGareth Taylor has played down the impact of Chelsea’s shock 4-3 loss to Liverpool on Wednesday, which gave his Manchester City side a firm advantage in the Women’s Super League title race. “It’s changed nothing,” he insisted on Friday. “There’s been a lot of talk around it but the objective is the same: win the next game.”City, who have won on
  
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