Author: Loveworld UK

Health workers are being urged to accept a pay deal for NHS staff worth up to 6.5% over three years after unions reached agreement with the Government. If accepted the deal will provide the first significant pay rise for around one million NHS staff in eight years. Doctors and dentists are not covered by the deal.Pay was frozen by the coalition Government for two years following the 2010 election and has risen at just 1% a year for the last five years. Image: Nurses, midwives, ambulance drivers and porters would all benefit from the increase The GMB – a general…

Moscow has condemned Britain’s decision to skip a Russian foreign ministry briefing on the Salisbury poisoning, with the US also snubbing the meeting. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said it was “another vivid example of the absurd situation when questions are asked and an unwillingness to hear even any answers is demonstrated”.Russia has intensified the war of words over the poisoning of double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, which has plunged ties between the two nations to their worst level since the Cold War.Moscow said the UK was either behind the poisoning or was unable to stop what it…

Unemployment rose by 24,000 to 1.45 million in the three months to January – but wage growth improved, official figures show. It is the second month in a row the Office for National Statistics (ONS) has reported an increase in the jobless total – a rare setback in a broad trend of falling unemployment going back to 2011.But hopes for an end to the cost-of-living squeeze for those who are in work were boosted as the figures showed wage growth – excluding bonuses – improving to 2.6%.That was the highest rate since November 2016, and up from 2.5% reported last…

The man suspected of carrying out a series of bombings in Texas has died after blowing himself up in his car as police closed in on him. Austin Police chief Brian Manley said the 24-year-old white male, who has not been named, had been tracked down to a hotel in Round Rock, near the US state’s capital.Officers were waiting for tactical teams to arrive to arrest the suspect when his vehicle began to drive away, Mr Manley said.Authorities followed the car, which ran into a ditch at the side of the road, and when a SWAT team approached the suspect…

Carpetright is exploring a rescue plan which would allow it to speed up the closure of underperforming stores. The beleaguered retailer, which employs 2,700 people in the UK, did not reveal the number of locations facing the axe though it has been suggested that around 100 are likely to be affected.Carpetright announced the strategy as it confirmed that it had secured £12.5m in funding from a major investor – confirming a report hours earlier on Sky News.It was the latest bleak update from the high street on a day which also saw a profit warning from menswear business Moss Bros…

Sky News has been given exclusive access to an interactive 3D model of the Grenfell Tower which aims to provide an unrivalled understanding of the fire that killed 71 people. The team of architects, designers and academic researchers are called Forensic Architecture, based at Goldsmiths, University of London, and they focus on investigating human rights violations throughout the world. Grenfell is their first project in the UK.The agency has scoured TV footage of the night, mobile phone data and witness testimony to recreate what people would have seen and heard and has used this to build a minute-by-minute account of…

Texas has been hit by its fifth explosion this month as police hunt a suspected serial bomber. A FedEx worker was injured after a package containing nails and shrapnel blew up at a distribution centre in the San Antonio town of Schertz.The package had reportedly been bound for Austin – the state capital where a series of blasts in March has so far killed two people.On Sunday, two men, aged 22 and 23, were seriously injured in an explosion involving a tripwire device. Video: Deadly Texas parcel bomb attacks ‘linked’ The FedEx employee is believed to have suffered non-life threatening…

Inflation fell to a seven-month low last month raising hopes there has been a “turning point” in Britain’s Brexit-linked cost-of-living squeeze. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) measure of inflation fell to 2.7% in February, from 3% the month before, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).That raises the prospect that wage growth, which has been lagging behind price increases and leaving consumers feeling worse off, could catch up soon.Phil Gooding, ONS head of CPI, said: “Many of the early 2017 price increases due to the previous depreciation of the pound have started to work through the system.”Lower petrol prices…

Plans to crack down on irresponsible bosses of failed companies – and give increased protection to affected workers and suppliers – have been announced by the Government. It follows controversy over the recent collapse of construction and outsourcing giant Carillion and before that the demise of retailer BHS.The Government said that most firms were run responsibly but that recent cases had raised concerns that company directors could “unfairly shield themselves from the effects of insolvency and – in the worst cases – profit from business failures while workers and small suppliers lose out”.Proposals include clawing back money for workers and…

Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy is being held by police in connection to alleged campaign funding from late Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi. Mr Sarkozy is being questioned as part of an investigation into “irregularities” in election campaign financing, a French court source told Reuters.He is said to have accepted €50m from Muammar Gaddafi’s regime, claims which have been repeated by the late Libyan dictator’s son and French businessman Ziad Takieddine. Image: Nicolas Sarkozy (L) greets Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2007 in Paris The amount would be more than double the legal spending limit in French elections at that time,…