General news

• Teen Found Dead On Roof Of Eurotunnel Train

  23-07-2015 23:57
  
  A teenager has been found dead on the roof of a Eurotunnel train, police have said. The body - thought to be that of a migrant trying to reach the UK from Calais - was found by police at 4.13am on Thursday on the loading bay of the vehicle shuttle service. The death comes as authorities on both sides of the Channel struggle with a growing migrant crisis centred on Calais.
  
  Read more

• Heathrow Airport braced for its busiest ever day for departures

  23-07-2015 23:31
  
  Britain’s brittle transport infrastructure faces its greatest test this weekend. The UK’s biggest airport is braced for its busiest-ever day for departures, while drivers heading for the West Country are being warned of delays exceeding two hours on 25 July.
  
  Read more

• Tens of thousands of pregnant women and new mothers forced out of jobs every year because of employer discrimination

  23-07-2015 23:28
  Tens of thousands of women are forced out of their jobs in Britain every year because of discrimination by employers against pregnant women and new mothers, the biggest research study of its kind has found.
  
  Read more

• Pope Francis' approval ratings plummet in America ahead of his first visit to the country

  23-07-2015 23:27
  
  Pope Francis' approval ratings have plummeted in the USA ahead of his first trip to America, mostly driven by a drop in his support amongst political conservatives.
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• No signs of homicide in Sandra Bland case, Texas officials say

  23-07-2015 23:27
  
  Texas officials have released autopsy findings in the death of Sandra Bland, a 28-year-old black woman who died while in police custody.
  
  Read more

• Obama urges Britain to stay in EU in BBC interview

  23-07-2015 23:20
  
  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama told the BBC in an interview excerpt that aired on Thursday that Britain must remain in the European Union to maintain its global influence. Britain's EU membership "gives us much greater confidence about the strength of the transatlantic union," Obama said. He also said his biggest frustration was the failure to pass "common-sense gun safety laws" in the United States. (Reporting by Peter Cooney; Editing by Sandra Maler
  
  Read more

• Going off-menu in a restaurant can cause problems for both kitchen and proprietor

  23-07-2015 22:30
  
  Halfway through their mains, the father on Table 9 calls me over.
  
  Read more

• Commonwealth Games: Glasgow legacy is cashed in as residents move into athletes' village

  23-07-2015 22:28
  
  Ann Allan has lived in the east end of Glasgow for almost all of her life, but her new house is a bit different to the others – not least because a year ago, an elite athlete was probably sleeping in her living room. In March, the 74-year-old became one of the first residents of the Athletes’ Village, which it is hoped will become one of the most lasting legacies of the 2014 Commonwealth Games.
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Michael Gove spotted leaving hospital with a guide on how to bring discipline to prisons

  23-07-2015 22:11
  
  Not for Michael Gove the latest potboiler to while away the tedium of a visit to an accident and emergency department after he hurt his foot.
  
  Read more

• Liam Lyburd: Bitter teenager amassed weapons and planned mass murder at former college, court hears

  23-07-2015 22:11
  
  An “embittered” teenager planned mass murder at his former college after amassing a collection of weapons and explosives, a court has heard.
  
  Read more

• From the Sex Pistols to Queen: A person's musical preference provides insight into how they think, says study

  23-07-2015 21:47
  
  Are you empathetic or analytical? The answer could lie in your CD collection. Researchers from the University of Cambridge have established that a person’s preference for particular musical artists – from Norah Jones to Metallica – can provide an insight into how they think.
  
  Read more

• Donald Trump at US-Mexico border: Video shows protesters greeting the Republican as he touches down in Texas

  23-07-2015 21:47
  
  Donald Trump has touched down at the US -Mexico border.
  
  Read more

• America's Cup 2017: Sir Ben Ainslie - Olympian charts course for Great Britain to challenge for trophy

  23-07-2015 21:47
  
  It crashes, it bangs, it sets up a banshee scream of wind noise, and it has an ooh-aah factor which stops old ladies walking their dogs on the Portsmouth shore to watch a weird and wonderful man-made contraption skimming at high speed across the water. They are not watching graceful sailing, they are captivated by the image of paceful sailing. Peaceful it ain’t.
  
  Read more

• Officials to open highly classified Whitehall papers which could shed light on child abuse

  23-07-2015 21:34
  
  Government officials are examining a secret stash of highly classified documents which could shed new light on some of the most controversial episodes of British political life over the last 50 years.
  
  Read more

• British intelligence service spying on MPs in defiance of laws prohibiting it

  23-07-2015 21:34
  
  British intelligence agencies have been spying on MPs and peers in contravention of a decades-old convention prohibiting surveillance of politicians’ communications, a tribunal has heard.
  
  Read more

• Andy Burnham and Yvette Cooper fight to be 'next best thing' to Jeremy Corbyn supporters

  23-07-2015 21:34
  
  Yvette Cooper launched a campaign against the  Government’s welfare cuts yesterday  as she tried to prevent Andy Burnham emerging as the “stop Jeremy Corbyn candidate” in Labour’s fractious leadership contest.
  
  Read more

• Tour de France 2015: Women's road races are struggling for status - and survival

  23-07-2015 21:30
  
  This year's Tour de France ends on Sunday, and all eyes will be on the scores of elite male cyclists pedalling their way up the Champs Elysée. It's the most prestigious race in the cycling calendar, yet you don't have to look very far to find an obvious disparity: where are all the women?
  
  Read more

• Officials to open Whitehall papers which could shed light on child abuse

  23-07-2015 21:22
  
  Government officials are examining a secret stash of highly classified documents which could shed new light on some of the most controversial episodes of British political life over the last 50 years.
  
  Read more

• Vicar Goes On The Run After Stealing £24k

  23-07-2015 21:21
  A vicar is on the run after being convicted of stealing £24,000 from bereaved families and engaged couples. Simon Reynolds, 50, went out for lunch during his trial at Sheffield Crown Court and did not come back, a court official said. A jury went on to find the Church of England vicar guilty of all charges, the official said.
  
  Read more

• Earth 2.0: What we know about Kepler 452b, the most Earth-like planet ever discovered

  23-07-2015 21:16
  
  Nasa scientists have announced the discovery of Kepler 452b, also know as 'Earth 2.0', an earth-like planet in our galaxy.
  
  Read more

• Labour is misreading election results: Five years is a long time in politics

  23-07-2015 20:40
  
  The Labour Party has lapsed into a crisis that was wholly avoidable and arises from a wilfully self-serving or inadvertent misreading of the party’s unexpected defeat at the election.
  
  Read more

• Iran – the land where some 700 souls were executed last year

  23-07-2015 20:40
  
  The gallows stain Iran far more than the centrifuge. You can negotiate over a nuclear facility. You can’t reboot death. I’ve argued about this with an Iranian ambassador who is – or was – a friend of mine. How can Iran hang a woman when the world pleads for her life? Was it not for God to make decisions over life or death? There had to be temporal judgments, I was told. There had to be law. The laws of Islam, of course.
  
  Read more

• Iran executions: 'Unprecedented spike' in the number of Iranians put to death sees Tehran face renewed calls to address human rights abuses

  23-07-2015 20:40
  The Islamic Republic of Iran, like its nuclear ally America, is fighting and failing in its own “war on drugs”. And its hangmen have never been busier.
  
  Read more

• Guantanamo Bay closure: Why plans to close the notorious prison may be wishful thinking

  23-07-2015 20:40
  
  It sounds like an old vinyl record stuck in its groove, another regular reminder of what has long since been a national disgrace. After six years of trying in vain to close the infamous prison for suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay, the White House, it is said, is close to finalising another plan to do just that. To which one is tempted to reply: “Dream on”.
  
  Read more

• Financial Times offloaded to Japan’s Nikkei for £844m

  23-07-2015 20:40
  
  Nikkei, the Japanese media conglomerate, has pulled off a media coup by snapping up the 127-year-old Financial Times from the Pearson publishing group in a deal worth £844m.
  
  Read more

• Isis in Afghanistan: Country's Taliban problem hasn't gone away – and it has new extremists to contend with

  23-07-2015 20:29
  
  Gulbuddin Hekmatyar was the poster boy of the West when he was fighting the Russians in Afghanistan. There were lavish gifts from the CIA, MI6 and the Saudis; tonnes of arms and tens of millions of dollars. Ronald Reagan praised him as a great hero; he was invited to tea with Margaret Thatcher in Downing Street.
  
  Read more

• Israeli national anthem: Arabs who won't sing 'Hatikva' should not be judges, claims right-wing MP

  23-07-2015 20:13
  
  Having just been selected to the committee that chooses Israel’s judges, a right-wing MP has taken the opportunity to court controversy by claiming that anyone unwilling to sing the Israeli national anthem “Hatikva” should not be allowed to be a judge.
  
  Read more

• 'Diet pill' user's last text: I think I’m going to die

  23-07-2015 20:13
  
  A student sent a text message saying she knew she was going to die after taking toxic “slimming pills”, an inquest has heard.
  
  Read more

• Abused Boys 'Playthings For Powerful People'

  23-07-2015 20:04
  
  A survivor of the Kincora Children's home has told Sky News he believes paperwork in Westminster will show Government complicity in child abuse in Northern Ireland. Clint Massey, 57, was a teenager when he was moved into the now notorious home in east Belfast. Allegations have existed for years that senior figures within the security services, British military and other VIPs had free reign to sexually abuse children at the home in the 1970s and 1980s.
  
  Read more

• Afghanistan's Taliban problem hasn't gone away – and now Isis has arrived too

  23-07-2015 20:01
  
  Gulbuddin Hekmatyar was the poster boy of the West when he was fighting the Russians in Afghanistan. There were lavish gifts from the CIA, MI6 and the Saudis; tonnes of arms and tens of millions of dollars. Ronald Reagan praised him as a great hero; he was invited to tea with Margaret Thatcher in Downing Street.
  
  Read more

• Global warming blamed for extinction of mammoth and giant sloth

  23-07-2015 20:00
  
  Rapid spells of global warming similar to the one occurring now were chiefly to blame for killing off large prehistoric beasts such as the woolly mammoth and giant sloth, scientists believe.
  
  Read more

• Four-legged snake fossil 'may unravel slithering mystery'

  23-07-2015 20:00
  The first known fossil of a four-legged snake has been discovered by scientists who believe it may help unravel the mystery of how serpents lost their legs.
  
  Read more

• Kepler-452b: Earth's 'older cousin' discovered by Nasa

  23-07-2015 19:55
  
  An "older cousin" of Earth has been discovered orbiting a distant sun-like star more than 1,000 light years away.
  
  Read more

• Gerard Depardieu calls in on Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko as his world tour of political pariahs continues

  23-07-2015 19:50
  
  The actor Gérard Depardieu has extended his world tour of political pariahs by popping up in an official Belarusian video receiving scything lessons from President Alexander Lukashenko, sometimes described as “Europe’s last dictator”.
  
  Read more

• Tories the greenest government ever, insists PM

  23-07-2015 19:49
  
  Prime Minister David Cameron insists the Conservatives have been the greenest government ever.
  
  Read more

• Glasgow bin lorry crash driver 'had blacked out at wheel before'

  23-07-2015 19:49
  
  The driver of a runaway bin lorry that killed six people had suffered a blackout at the wheel years before, an inquiry has heard.
  
  Read more

• 8 best solar-powered lights

  23-07-2015 19:48
  
  Whatever the weather’s doing, this is the time of year when we spend a lot of time outside making the most of our gardens, decks and balconies. Energy-saving solar lighting can make all the difference to a space (and stop you from tripping over your flower beds or borders).
  
  Read more

• Killer Used Fake Voicemails To Cover Tracks

  23-07-2015 19:40
  
  Dominic Isom tried to cover his tracks after inflicting 23 injuries on mother-of-four Samantha Henderson and dumping her body in Hamworthy Lake, Dorset. Ms Henderson, from Corfe Castle, was reported missing by Isom on 22 January. But a jury at Winchester Crown Court heard Ms Henderson was already dead when the call was made.
  
  Read more

• Sandra Bland: Twitter erupts over theory that hanged woman already was dead in her mugshot

  23-07-2015 19:38
  
  Much remains unknown in the death of Sandra Bland, the woman found hanged in her Texas jail cell after being arrested in what started as a routine traffic stop.
  
  Read more

• Illegal drug use figures do not suggest UK law is 'working'

  23-07-2015 19:38
  
  According to policing minister Mike Penning, the Government’s strategy in the war on drugs is working because long-term levels of the abuse of illicit substances are falling. Whether you agree depends on how you interpret the word “working”.
  
  Read more

• UK border official denied right to know why he was fired on national security grounds

  23-07-2015 19:26
  
  A former UK border official has lost his seven-year fight to find out why he was sacked by the Home Office on national security grounds.
  
  Read more

• President Obama in Kenya: His name sells in the homeland of his father – and his extended family members are cashing in

  23-07-2015 19:26
  Three years ago, the going rate for an interview with US President Barack Obama’s half-brother, Malik, was $1,500. For the more enterprising of the President’s extended family in Kenya, the Obama presidency has represented a window of opportunity.
  
  Read more

• Man allegedly breaks into home, hides under bed for three days

  23-07-2015 19:26
  
  A man allegedly broke into a home in Spotswood, New Jersey and hid under a bed for three days.
  
  Read more

• Kepler 452B: Nasa announces discovery of new planet seen as 'close cousin' to Earth

  23-07-2015 19:26
  
  Nasa scientists have announced the discovery of a “close cousin” to the Earth with an atmosphere that could contain water and therefore potentially sustain extra-terrestrial life.
  
  Read more

• Justin Bieber arrest warrant for alleged attack on photographer revoked by Argentinian court

  23-07-2015 19:26
  
  Justin Bieber can breathe a (small) sigh of relief this week after a court in Argentina revoked a warrant for his arrest for allegedly attacking a photographer.
  
  Read more

• EU referendum: Former Ukip backers launch £20m campaign to persuade voters to leave European Union

  23-07-2015 19:26
  
  A group of former Ukip backers is to launch a £20m campaign to persuade the public to vote to leave the European Union in the in/out referendum to be held  by 2017.
  
  Read more

• Bill Cosby biography pulled as comedian accused of sexual assaults faces civil suit

  23-07-2015 19:26
  
  When Mark Whitaker’s biography of Bill Cosby was published in September 2014, it earned favourable reviews for its sympathetic portrait of a comedy legend, who, in spite of some personal flaws, had contributed immeasurably to race relations in the US.
  
  Read more

• Andy McSmith's Diary: Dinner goes down better with a £35,000 Nick Clegg speech

  23-07-2015 19:26
  
  Nick Clegg’s salary was halved when he lost his position as Deputy Prime Minister, falling from £134,565 to £67,060, but he may yet save himself the embarrassment of having to shop at Lidl instead of Waitrose. He has been signed up as a corporate speaker by Leading Authorities, a Washington-based agency.
  
  Read more

• Student Living Index 2015: Belfast named most affordable city in the UK for students in NatWest survey

  23-07-2015 19:23
  
  Students in Belfast definitely have something to celebrate after the city was named the most affordable for students to live and work in in the UK – with London, not-so-surprisingly, coming tenth.
  
  Read more

• Underage smoking and drinking falling - but ecstasy use among 16-24 year-olds soars

  23-07-2015 19:13
  
  Underage smoking and drinking among young teenagers in England is at its lowest level in over thirty years – while ecstasy use among 16-24 year olds is on the rise.
  
  Read more

Follow @GeneralnewsUK on Twitter!