Author: LoveWorld UK

Maybe this Nations League thing isn’t a bad idea after all. It may not be universally recognised as a real tournament, at least not yet, but it turns out that it’s a lot of fun. The final four brought three wild nights in Milan and champions who twice had to come from behind to lift a still unfamiliar trophy, not least because when it came to the moment that decided its destination, there in the madness was Kylian Mbappé, blood running cold. There too was Hugo Lloris, the man raising it to the sky. A game of control and quality but few…

A minister has sought to play down splits between government departments over support for firms struggling with fast-rising energy prices, denying that the business secretary had lied and blaming a spat between the Treasury and business department on “unnamed sources”. In extraordinary events on Sunday, after the business secretary, Kwasi Kwarteng, said he was consulting the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, about what help could be offered, Treasury sources openly rejected this and accused Kwarteng of “making things up”. Asked if this meant Kwarteng had lied, the Home Office minister Damian Hinds said: “Of course not.” Hinds, who also defended Boris Johnson’s decision to go on…

Sixteen unvaccinated athletes won another round in their legal battle to play sports, despite Western Michigan University’s mandate that all of its inter-collegiate athletes get the COVID-19 vaccination shot. In a unanimous published decision issued Oct. 7, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in Cincinnati, Ohio, held that the university violated the athletes’ First Amendment rights. All 16 athletes had filed for religious exemptions, which, according to the court, the university “ignored or denied.” The court stated: “The university put plaintiffs to the choice: Get vaccinated, or stop fully participating in intercollegiate sports. By conditioning the privilege of playing sports on plaintiffs’ willingness to abandon their…

The prospect of an energy island in the North Sea surrounded by windfarms with the ability to power British homes has taken a step closer after National Grid, the UK energy company, revealed that it is in talks about helping to build the project – and claimed it could be done before 2030. “We are in tripartite discussions over an energy island that the UK would likely connect to,” Nicola Medalova, the company’s managing director of interconnectors, told New Scientist. She declined to name the two other parties in the talks. The scheme would involve significantly larger offshore windfarms than existing ones,…

The Florida Department of Education on Thursday sanctioned eight Florida school districts for defying the state’s ban on school mask mandates. School districts in Brevard, Broward, Duval, Hillsborough, Leon, Miami-Dade, Orange and Palm Beach counties now face financial penalties. Commissioner Richard Corcoran reported to the board that none of the eight counties had provided any information proving that they were in compliance with state law before Thursday’s meeting. “They can’t pick and choose which parts of the law they want to follow,” Corcoran said as he was handing out the penalties to the school districts.  He also gave the districts 48 hours…

At least this time Belgium can say that they provoked a genuinely brilliant response from France. The last meeting between these countries begat rancour, with Belgium grumbling about the negativity of Didier Deschamps’s team after losing 1-0 in the 2018 World Cup semi-final. This time France were forced to attack after Yannick Carrasco and Romelu Lukaku fired Belgium into a 2-0 lead. And oh, how they attacked. Theo Hernandez’s ferocious winning goal crowned a momentous fightback to set up a duel with Spain in Sunday’s Nations League final. It was a thrilling, topsy-turvy contest in which France looked sketchy in the first half but played with…

Parents have served a ‘cease and desist’ legal notice on a school threatening to sue and potentially pursue GBH charges – if children are given Covid jabs without parental consent. The 17 parents of children in years seven, eight and nine at Tretherras School, in Newquay, Cornwall, have signed the letter. This autumn all children aged 12 to 15 years are being offered the first dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine, and government guidance says parents are ‘asked for consent’. But if it is refused and the child is deemed ‘competent’ then ‘the parent cannot overrule the decision’ and the child can…

Nicola Sturgeon’s plan to hold an independence referendum without consent from Westminster could be ‘torpedoed’ by a Supreme Court ruling in London yesterday. Scotland’s first minister was dealt the humiliating blow when the United Kingdom’s highest court ruled that her government had overstepped its powers. Experts described the judgment as ‘unprecedented’, amid a scathing attack by the judges – including the court’s Scottish president Lord Reed – on the ‘deliberate’ attempt to bypass UK Parliamentary sovereignty. Five senior judges, including Reed, unanimously found that two Bills passed in March by MSPs were incompatible with the 1998 Scotland Act, which is the basis…

House prices registered the strongest monthly rise for 14 years in September, pushing the average cost of a home to a record high and reversing a three-month decline in annual growth. Halifax, one of the country’s biggest mortgage lenders, said last month the average cost of a home rose by 1.7%, or £4,425, to £267,587. The previous peak was £263,162 recorded in August. “The average house price is now as expensive as it ever has been,” said Russell Galley, the managing director of Halifax. The annual rate of house price inflation rose to 7.4% from 7.2% in August, reversing a…

Nicola Sturgeon’s plan to hold an independence referendum without consent from Westminster could be ‘torpedoed’ by a Supreme Court ruling in London yesterday. Scotland’s first minister was dealt the humiliating blow when the United Kingdom’s highest court ruled that her government had overstepped its powers. Experts described the judgment as ‘unprecedented’, amid a scathing attack by the judges – including the court’s Scottish president Lord Reed – on the ‘deliberate’ attempt to bypass UK Parliamentary sovereignty. Five senior judges, including Reed, unanimously found that two Bills passed in March by MSPs were incompatible with the 1998 Scotland Act, which is the basis…