General news

• ‘Significant rise’ in suspected UK scarlet fever cases brings total to nearly 30,000

  20-12-2022 23:56 via theguardian.com
  UKHSA adds 10,000 potential cases in last week while revised total since 12 September more than doublesThe number of suspected scarlet fever cases since September has risen to nearly 30,000 after the UK Health Security Agency added almost 10,000 potential new infections in the last week.More than 27,000 people could have had infections since 12 September, according to the UKHSA, who revealed on Tuesday that there were more cases than first thought because of the “significant rise” in
  
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• I Hate Suzie Too review – Amy Winehouse and Caroline Flack haunt this astounding show

  20-12-2022 23:05 via theguardian.com
  It may be the televisual equivalent of a panic attack – but TV doesn’t get any weirder, sadder or more fearlessly magnificentMy God. If you thought the start of I Hate Suzie was claustrophobic, just wait until you see the start of I Hate Suzie Too (Sky Atlantic). It features a one-take shot that’s basically a panic attack in televisual form. Suzie, made up like a clown and sporting a silver bow so giant it’s closer to a straitjacket, is trailed along backstage corridors o
  
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• Two dead after 6.4 magnitude California quake leaves 70,000 without power

  20-12-2022 23:04 via theguardian.com
  Eleven people were reportedly injured and assessment of total number is ongoing, said officialsA magnitude 6.4 earthquake shook parts of northern California early Tuesday,jolting people awake, damaging buildings and roads and leaving tens of thousands without power. Two fatalities have been linked to the quake “as a result of medical emergencies occurring during and/or just following” the incident, the Humboldt county sheriff’s office reported Tuesday afternoon.Centered just so
  
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• Nurses' strike: 'If we have to, we'll continue to strike'

  20-12-2022 22:58 via bbc.co.uk
  The PM insists he won’t back down against striking workers, as nurses demand a 19% pay rise.
  
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• Eight teenage girls charged with murder in Toronto stabbing death

  20-12-2022 22:31 via theguardian.com
  The suspects – ages 13 to 16 – were said to have met via social media before gathering downtown and allegedly ‘swarming’ victimEight teenage girls who appear to have met on social media have been charged with second-degree murder over the death of a 59-year-old man who was stabbed in downtown Toronto.Police allege that the girls assaulted and stabbed the man at a plaza near the main rail station in Canada’s largest city early on Sunday morning. Three of the girls ar
  
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• ‘Significant rise’ in suspected UK scarlet fever cases brings total to nearly 30,000 - The Guardian

  20-12-2022 21:50 via news.google.com
  ‘Significant rise’ in suspected UK scarlet fever cases brings total to nearly 30,000  The GuardianUK and EU are witnessing alarming health concerns | World News | English news | WION  WIONScarlet fever: Cases more than twice as high as thought, as UK total nears 30,000  The IndependentSouthend strep A and scarlet fever cases as infections rise | Echo  Southend EchoView Full coverage on Google News
  
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• Mark Noble: ‘If a top club wants Declan Rice they’re just going to pay for him, full stop’

  20-12-2022 21:30 via theguardian.com
  West Ham’s sporting director on competing with giants, youthful selfishness and why he expects more countries to buy clubsAs Mark Noble considers the enormous task he will face in his new role as West Ham’s sporting director, he shares his belief that, “in the next 10 to 15 years probably half of the Premier League’s teams will be owned by countries”. Noble played more than 500 games for West Ham, from 2004 to May this year, and the consistency and loyalty of that c
  
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• Steve Bell on Tory priorities: NHS v coronation – cartoon

  20-12-2022 21:00 via theguardian.com
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• Sunak is a puzzling PM – the more you see of him, the less there appears to be | John Crace

  20-12-2022 20:19 via theguardian.com
  His answers to the chairs of Commons select committees are robotic, as if from a meaningless management dashboardChristmas must be a bundle of fun round the Sunaks’. 7am: 5km run. 8.30am: breakfast of granola with manuka honey. 9am: check against delivery to make sure all presents are under the tree. 10.30am: invite family to open presents. All members are to keep a profit and loss spreadsheet to make sure the presents they have received are more valuable than the ones they have given.12pm
  
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• Terry Hall united black and white just as Stormzy does now. Music needs their ‘better vision’ | Pauline Black

  20-12-2022 20:00 via theguardian.com
  Terry seemed so cool when my band toured with the Specials. We are still fighting the same fight for equality he championed back thenTerry Hall was always the epitome of cool. That’s really how I always saw him. On tour together in 1979, I was struck by his boundless elegance, a quiet charisma that voiced universal struggles with such depth and care. Now, even in passing, he remains impossibly cool. Terry was subversive to the end. There was no drama diary of his last weeks, no fuss &ndash
  
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• Heart surgeon 'probably saved the life' of a baby boy thanks to 'world-first' stem cell operation - Daily Mail

  20-12-2022 20:00 via news.google.com
  Heart surgeon 'probably saved the life' of a baby boy thanks to 'world-first' stem cell operation  Daily Mail'World-first' surgery saved baby boy with failing heart  The TimesBaby with heart defect becomes world first to be saved with pioneering stem cell surgery  ExpressHuman stem cell 'plasters' could patch holes in kids' hearts & stop repeat ops  The SunWorld-first operation using placenta stem cells saves baby with heart defect  The Teleg
  
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• ‘Embrace history’: UN environment chief calls for immediate action on Cop15 deal

  20-12-2022 19:39 via theguardian.com
  Inger Andersen said we must not ‘pause for a second’ as we ‘change the relationship between people and nature’The UN’s environment chief has urged citizens, businesses and governments to “not pause for a second” in implementing the new once-in-a-decade deal to halt the destruction of nature, calling for changes in consumption patterns and attitudes.“[With the new agreement] we are acknowledging that protecting the natural world represents a sum of
  
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• The Guardian view on the January 6 committee: Trump’s terrible, no-good year | Editorial

  20-12-2022 19:30 via theguardian.com
  The referral of the former president to the justice department on four criminal charges is largely symbolic, but increases his woesIn its closing months, 2022 is looking like an annus horribilis for Donald Trump – or to put it in the former president’s terms, a terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad year. The January 6 committee’s recommendation on Monday that criminal charges be brought against him over his attempt to subvert the 2020 election results and the deadly storming of
  
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• Russia plans to boost military links with Iran, says UK defence secretary

  20-12-2022 19:28 via theguardian.com
  Ben Wallace says Putin regime will supply military technology in return for drones used to attack UkraineRussia-Ukraine war – latest updatesRussia plans to deepen its military cooperation with Iran in return for Shahed drones that have been used to bomb Ukraine’s cities and energy network since September, according to Britain’s defence secretary, Ben Wallace.The west must hold Russia’s “enablers to account”, he said, in a Christmas update in which he was also
  
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• The Guardian view on Britain’s missing workers: they may never come back | Editorial

  20-12-2022 19:25 via theguardian.com
  Half a million workers have vanished. Policymakers don’t seem to understand whyAs the UK sidles gingerly past the pandemic, a big mystery looms. Where have all the employees gone? Unemployment is around its lowest level since 1974 and well over a million positions are vacant. There are plenty of jobs to help offset those eye-watering fuel and grocery bills yet, since Covid hit these shores, 565,000 Britons have dropped out of the workforce. They have become what statisticians define as &ld
  
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• Ambulance strike: Health bosses warn of patient safety risk

  20-12-2022 19:13 via bbc.co.uk
  People are being asked to use services "wisely" and only call 999 in a life-threatening emergency.
  
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• The Pole who first cracked the Enigma code | Letter

  20-12-2022 19:03 via theguardian.com
  Robert Gawłowski on Marian Rejewski’s efforts to break the code and how the knowledge was shared with British and French alliesYour article says GCHQ has often highlighted the success British cryptanalysts had in cracking the German Enigma machines during the second world war (Get cracking: work as a team to solve our festive puzzle, says GCHQ, 14 December). But let’s not forget where Enigma codebreaking had its beginnings – Poland.This year marks 90 years since Marian Rej
  
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• Keir Starmer doesn’t need a personality cult to win the next election | Letters

  20-12-2022 19:03 via theguardian.com
  Labour’s solid poll lead under Keir Starmer is preferable to the crowd-pleasing leadership style of Jeremy Corbyn, say Richard Skues, Val Stevens, Colin Price and Paddy Eckersley. But Michael Bowers disagreesThe thrust of Andrew Fisher’s lament about Keir Starmer’s performance seems to be that even though Labour has a 20-point opinion poll lead, he is boring and unable to generate the crowd enthusiasm that Jeremy Corbyn did, either prior to losing the 2017 election or the more
  
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• Taliban ban Afghan women from university education

  20-12-2022 18:49 via theguardian.com
  Higher education ministry issues indefinite order three months after thousands sat entrance examsAfghanistan’s Taliban rulers have ordered an indefinite ban on university education for the country’s women, the ministry of higher education said in a letter issued to all government and private universities.“You all are informed to implement the mentioned order of suspending education of females until further notice,” said the letter signed by the minister for higher educati
  
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• British man in Cyprus faces murder trial after refusal of plea bargain

  20-12-2022 18:38 via theguardian.com
  David Hunter not able to admit lesser charge of manslaughter over death of his terminally ill wife, Janice An elderly Briton accused of murdering his terminally ill wife in Cyprus has been denied the chance to plead guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter, almost a year to the day after Janice Hunter died.The state prosecutor Andreas Hadjikyrou said he could not accept a deal that would have allowed David Hunter, aged 76, to make the guilty plea, which had raised hopes of the retiree being r
  
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• MSPs debating changes to gender reforms

  20-12-2022 18:26 via bbc.co.uk
  Holyrood is expected to sit late into the evening to consider about 150 amendments to the bill.
  
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• Rishi Sunak refusing to budge on pay as strike action escalates

  20-12-2022 18:15 via bbc.co.uk
  The prime minister is under pressure to reopen nurses' pay talks, as ambulance workers prepare for walk outs.
  
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• Putin admits to ‘complicated’ situation in Russian-occupied Ukraine

  20-12-2022 18:14 via theguardian.com
  Remarks highlight Moscow’s growing acknowledgement that invasion is not going to planRussia-Ukraine war – latest news updatesVladimir Putin has made a rare admission of his country’s military challenges in the 10-month-old war in Ukraine as Volodymyr Zelenskiy visited a key city in eastern Ukraine that Moscow has failed to capture despite months of relentless shelling.In a video message to Russia’s security services, Putin said the situation in the four Russian-occupied U
  
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• Vietnamese men who died in Oldham fire ‘likely to have been modern slavery victims’

  20-12-2022 18:01 via theguardian.com
  Greater Manchester police believe part of mill used as illegal cannabis factoryFour Vietnamese men who died in a mill fire were likely to have been the victims of modern slavery, police have said.The men’s bodies were discovered 10 weeks after a huge fire destroyed the derelict Bismark House Mill in Oldham, Greater Manchester, on 7 May. Continue reading...
  
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• Shoreham airshow victims were unlawfully killed, coroner rules

  20-12-2022 17:47 via theguardian.com
  As inquest concludes seven years after incident, coroner says pilot should have abandoned a manoeuvre he was undertakingEleven men who died after a Hawker Hunter aircraft crashed on to a motorway during an aerial display at the 2015 Shoreham airshow in West Sussex were unlawfully killed, a coroner has ruled.At the conclusion of an inquest seven years after the incident, in which 13 other people were injured, senior coroner Penelope Schofield said that 11 lives had been “cruelly lost”
  
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• Shoreham air crash victims unlawfully killed, coroner concludes

  20-12-2022 17:42 via bbc.co.uk
  Eleven men died when a jet crashed on to the A27 in West Sussex during the 2015 Shoreham Airshow.
  
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• Woman in Wales admits manslaughter by letting daughter become obese

  20-12-2022 17:29 via theguardian.com
  Father denies causing death of Kaylea Titford, 16, and will be tried in Mold crown courtA woman has admitted the manslaughter of her 16-year-old daughter by allowing her to become obese.Kaylea Titford, who allegedly died from health problems linked to her obesity, was found dead in bed at the family home in Newtown, mid Wales. Continue reading...
  
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• How the Guardian covered 2022 - video highlights

  20-12-2022 17:24 via theguardian.com
  As the news agenda moved to dizzying speed in 2022, the Guardian stayed true to its values to deliver journalism with clarity, truth, wit, ideas, and an occasional dose of hope. We proved that a fast moving world needs quality reporting now more than ever. Here’s how we did it...The Guardian's year in review  Continue reading...
  
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• Warzone 2 Loadout Drops finally return: Buy Station cost & more - CharlieINTEL.com

  20-12-2022 17:07 via news.google.com
  Warzone 2 Loadout Drops finally return: Buy Station cost & more  CharlieINTEL.comWarzone 2.0: Loadout Drops Finally Return  EarlyGameCall of Duty Warzone 2 – The Gulag of ‘New Era’ Is Just Bad in More Ways Than One, Compared to the Original Battle Royale  EssentiallySportsWarzone 2 Loadout Primary Weapon cost has been halved, and players are glad  GamesradarWarzone 2 brings back easy loadout drops  PC GamerView Full coverage
  
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• Police investigate Conservative MP Bob Stewart's Bahrain comment

  20-12-2022 17:03 via bbc.co.uk
  Scotland Yard says it received an online report from a man alleging he had been verbally racially abused.
  
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• There’s news, then there’s the Guardian

  20-12-2022 17:00 via theguardian.com
  As events moved at a dizzying speed in 2022, the Guardian stayed true to its values, delivering journalism that brought clarity, truth, wit, ideas and an occasional dose of hope. We proved that a fast-moving world needs quality reporting now more than ever. Here’s how we did it ...
  Illustrations by Justin Metz Continue reading...
  
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• Hint of crack in standard model vanishes in LHC data - Nature.com

  20-12-2022 17:00 via news.google.com
  Hint of crack in standard model vanishes in LHC data  Nature.comCERN presents new measurements of rare decays that provide a high-precision test of lepton flavor universality  Phys.orgStandard Model survives its biggest challenge yet  Big ThinkLHCb brings leptons into line  CERNView Full coverage on Google News
  
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• Germany returns 21 Benin bronzes to Nigeria – amid frustration at Britain

  20-12-2022 16:51 via theguardian.com
  Artefacts looted in 19th century by UK soldiers and sold on, with many more still held by the British MuseumTwenty-one precious artefacts that were looted by British soldiers from the former west African kingdom of Benin 125 years ago have been handed over by Germany to Nigeria amid laughter, tears, and some audible frustration with the ongoing silence of the country that first stole them.The objects from the haul of treasures known as the Benin bronzes, including a brass head of an oba (king),
  
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• Dagenham deaths: Woman charged with murdering two young boys

  20-12-2022 16:30 via bbc.co.uk
  The boys, aged two and five, were found dead at a home in east London on Friday afternoon.
  
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• Rail travellers in Scotland in disruption warning due to strikes

  20-12-2022 16:29 via bbc.co.uk
  A walk out by RMT members of Network Rail will hit ScotRail services over the festive period.
  
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• The common Covid symptom that more than two-thirds of infected people are showing - Manchester Evening News

  20-12-2022 16:12 via news.google.com
  The common Covid symptom that more than two-thirds of infected people are showing  Manchester Evening NewsCommon Covid symptom most infected people have developed that may be confused for a cold  The MirrorSternation among the 'top' four Covid symptoms now reported by patients  ExpressThe most common Covid symptom could be mistaken for cold as cases rise  Daily RecordNew Covid symptom enters list of most common warning signs  The MirrorView Full
  
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• Being Coleen: Chanel Cresswell stars in TV drama of ‘Wagatha Christie’ trial

  20-12-2022 16:09 via theguardian.com
  Actor plays ‘intimidating’ role of Coleen Rooney in Channel 4 adaptation of libel action brought by Rebekah VardyIt was one of the most closely followed high court trials in recent years, spawning gossip, memes and social commentary across newspapers, Twitter and the legal industry.But one person who did not keep up with the now-infamous “Wagatha Christie” trial – the whodunnit of the digital-age – was Chanel Cresswell, the actor who will be stepping into the
  
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• Lurgan: Murder arrest over suspicious death of Natalie McNally

  20-12-2022 16:03 via bbc.co.uk
  A man in his 30s is arrested after Natalie McNally, 32, is found dead in a house in Silverwood Green.
  
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• Caerphilly: Woman, 83, dies after being injured in dog attack

  20-12-2022 16:03 via bbc.co.uk
  The woman died from her injuries after being attacked by dog on 3 December.
  
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• Striking NHS nurses and Ukrainian dolphins: Tuesday’s best photos

  20-12-2022 16:01 via theguardian.com
  The Guardian’s picture editors select photo highlights from around the world Continue reading...
  
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• Avoid contact sports during ambulance strikes, says minister

  20-12-2022 15:58 via bbc.co.uk
  Will Quince also urges people not to make unnecessary car journeys during action by ambulance workers.
  
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• Cop15 in Montreal: did the summit deliver for the natural world?

  20-12-2022 15:51 via theguardian.com
  The talking is over, and a text has been agreed on the next decade of targets to save the natural world. Here are the highs and lows of the Convention of Biological Diversity’s (CBD) agreementThe term “nature positive”, which scientists had said would be the biodiversity equivalent of “net zero”, did not make the final document. Many will see this as a missed opportunity – a unifying idea similar to keeping global heating to within 1.5C. However, the 2030 goal
  
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• NHS strikes: Military train to drive ambulances at London barracks

  20-12-2022 15:38 via bbc.co.uk
  The personnel are among 600 members of the armed forces providing assistance during strikes.
  
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• China’s screeching U-turn on Covid will not be an instant fix

  20-12-2022 15:07 via theguardian.com
  If Beijing is expecting an immediate boost from abandoning its tough controls it is mistakenFrom zero tolerance to “let it rip”. China has not just changed its mind on how to cope with Covid, it has executed the mother of all U-turns in response to slower growth and mounting civil unrest at the draconian lockdowns.If Beijing is expecting an immediate economic boost from abandoning its tough controls it is mistaken. There will be a growth dividend from the policy shift but the state o
  
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• ‘I have to control the flashbacks’: Anoosheh Ashoori on life after being freed from an Iranian jail

  20-12-2022 15:00 via theguardian.com
  The British Iranian was released from prison after five years in March. The 68-year-old is cherishing time with family and has run the London marathon – but his ordeal still haunts him‘I have discovered you can leave Evin prison but Evin prison does not quite leave you,” says Anoosheh Ashoori, the 68-year-old Iranian-British dual national released in March along with his better-known counterpart, Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe.A gentle, open, yet determined man, he insists he has no
  
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• How to create the best Christmas cheeseboard | Kitchen aide

  20-12-2022 15:00 via theguardian.com
  The types of cheese to include and which accompaniments work best are all telling decisions – but, our experts tell us, the key is timingGot a culinary dilemma? Email [email protected] do I put together the best Christmas cheeseboard?
  Sarah, Ludlow
  The number one rule, Sarah, is not to buy your cheese too early. “It’s like a bottle of wine – when you open a whole cheese, a lot of those flavours, smells and textures dissipate with time,” says Andrew Swinscoe,
  
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• Seven reasons to be cheerful about the Amazon in 2023 – and three to be terrified

  20-12-2022 14:36 via theguardian.com
  The electoral defeat of Jair Bolsonaro by Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is good news for world’s largest rainforest, but the situation remains perilousFor anyone who cares about the Amazon rainforest, there will be an extra reason to celebrate the new year countdown in Brazil on 31 December because the first stroke of midnight will mark the last moment in power of Jair Bolsonaro.The defeat of the ultra-right former army captain, who unleashed a wave of forest burning and river poisoning
  
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• Watch: On the picket line with nurses across the UK

  20-12-2022 14:31 via bbc.co.uk
  Nurses in Northern Ireland, Wales and England stage industrial action, calling for fair pay.
  
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• Health experts tell people to do one thing if mixing with family this Christmas - Wales Online

  20-12-2022 14:10 via news.google.com
  Health experts tell people to do one thing if mixing with family this Christmas  Wales OnlineFlu in Scotland at ‘extraordinary’ level as cases reach highest number since 2017, health officials say  STV NewsFlu and Covid causing increase in hospitalisations in Worcestershire | Worcester News  Worcester NewsFlu cases at highest level in Scotland for five years  The NationalView Full coverage on Google News
  
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• When are the train strikes and why are they taking place?

  20-12-2022 13:31 via bbc.co.uk
  Disruption on the railways is expected, with industrial action in December and January.
  
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