Author: LoveWorld UK

The 1998 Northern Irish peace deal is under threat and a Pandora’s box of protest and political crisis will be opened unless the European Union agrees to significant changes to the Brexit deal, a senior loyalist warned on Friday. The 1998 peace deal, known as the Belfast or Good Friday Agreement, ended three decades of violence between mostly Catholic nationalists fighting for a united Ireland and mostly Protestant unionists, or loyalists, who want Northern Ireland to stay part of the United Kingdom. But David Campbell, chairman of the Loyalist Communities Council which represents the views of loyalist paramilitaries, said he…

NatWest will buy back 1.1 billion pounds ($1.5 billion) of its shares from the British government, edging the state-backed lender further towards private hands as the government pushes to fully sell off banks bailed out in the financial crisis. The sale crystallises a further loss of around 1.8 billion pounds for the government on its 45-billion-pound rescue of NatWest. The Office for Budget Responsibility forecast in March the government would make an overall loss of about 39 billion pounds on the bailout once finance costs were factored in. NatWest, formerly Royal Bank of Scotland, will be 59.8% government-owned after the…

British homebuilders Taylor Wimpey and Countryside Properties must remove contract terms that lock leaseholders into rents that double every 10 or 15 years, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority ruled on Friday. “These ground rent terms can make it impossible for people to sell or get a mortgage on their homes, meaning they find themselves trapped. This is unacceptable,” CMA Chief Executive Andrea Coscelli said. The two homebuilders can respond to the watchdog’s concerns and avoid court action by signing formal commitments known as “undertakings” to remove the ground rent terms from their leasehold contracts. Shares in Taylor Wimpey and…

Nicola Sturgeon misled the Scottish parliament over the Alex Salmond crisis, a Holyrood inquiry has concluded after a narrow majority vote, it is understood. A special Holyrood committee ruled, by five votes to four, that Scotland’s first minister gave an “inaccurate” account of her meetings with Salmond in 2018 during evidence on oath to MSPs earlier this month. That remarkable conclusion amounts to an accusation Sturgeon misled parliament – but the committee has stopped short of ruling she did so “knowingly”. Knowingly misleading parliament would be a clear breach of the ministerial code and a resignation matter. While MSPs did…

Manchester United squeezed into the Europa League quarter-finals the hard way: coming to Milan and earning the victory required. In doing so, Ole Gunnar Solskjær’s men won their biggest game of the campaign. Zlatan Ibrahimovic, once of United, was brought on for the latter stages. As the minutes ebbed away he rose above Luke Shaw to head strongly but Dean Henderson tipped over. By the close United had survived – the excellent Shaw’s late intervention as Alexis Saelemaekers lurked was indicative of a nervy finish – with Paul Pogba the tie-winning hero, scoring the vital goal shortly after entering for…

Facebook’s drive to register 4.5 million voters swayed the November election to President Joe Biden, a Facebook executive opined in hidden camera footage. The executive, Benny Thomas, expressed grim views of the giant tech company, but counted the voter drive among its positives while secretly being recorded earlier this year by reporters with Project Veritas, an undercover journalism nonprofit. “This is the good side of Facebook. … We made a big difference,” he said in a video released by Veritas on March 16, explaining that Facebook exceeded its goal of registering 4 million people and could only accomplish the task because of its “sheer…

More British people returned to offices after schools in England reopened, but there were falls in consumer spending and ships calling at British ports, weekly official figures on the impact of COVID-19 on the economy showed on Thursday. Bank of England CHAPS payment data showed debit and credit transactions at 80% of their February 2020 level in the week to March 11, down from 83% of their pre-pandemic level the week before. The Office for National Statistics, which published the data, said the fall reflected a drop in spending on ‘staples’ – such as food and utility bills – which…

With 33 minutes gone at Stamford Bridge something startling happened. There are moments in the life of a successful team that come to be seen as transformative. It might be pushing it to see outright ignition, a lightning bolt, the man of many parts creaking up from his trolley, neck bolts whirring, in a breakaway goal from an attacking trio with a combined record of five goals in their past 66 Chelsea games before this second leg. But then, it really was a brilliant goal. And something did seem to stir here, enough to drive Chelsea on to an increasingly fluent 2-0…

Blanket orders not to resuscitate some care home residents at the start of the Covid pandemic have been identified in a report by England’s care regulator. A report published by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) found disturbing variations in people’s experiences of do not attempt cardiopulmonary resuscitation (DNACPR) decisions during the pandemic. Best practice is for proper discussions to be held with the person involved and/or their relatives. While examples of good practice were identified, some people were not properly involved in decisions or were unaware that such an important decision about their care had been made. Poor record-keeping, and…

Nicola Sturgeon today blasted the ‘latest instalment of Alex Salmond’s conspiracy theory’ as she said she ‘strongly refutes the suggestions and insinuations’ made by David Davis in the House of Commons last night using parliamentary privilege. A number of journalists attempted to grill the SNP leader on Mr Davis’s comments as she held her daily coronavirus briefing. But she said she would only answer one question on the matter because she would not allow the briefing to be ‘sidetracked’. Following the first question on the issue, the Scottish First Minister said ‘this is the only comment I am going to…