United Kingdom

cross-posted from: https://piefed.world/c/onion/p/1237548/uk-extreme-heat-conference-canceled-by-extreme-heat

We regret that our event on Extreme Heat: Improving governance and strengthening action around the world has been cancelled due to the red extreme heat warning issued by the UK Met Office.

Our apologies to everyone who was planning to attend the event.

Sources:

• Bluesky;
• Event Home Page.

Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy has announced she and her department are leaving Elon Musk's X platform.

Explaining her decision in what seemingly will be her last post on X, Nandy said the platform "isn't healthy for our democracy or our communities and I don't want to support it".

"A platform originally designed for free speech and expression now favours abuse and misinformation over meaningful debate," she wrote.

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The culture department becomes the second government department to stop using X after the attorney general's office, while several MPs also left the platform earlier this year over reports its AI tool was being used to create sexualised images.

Nandy said she would continue to use Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn.

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Attorney General Lord Hermer defended his decision to ban his office from posting on X last month, telling MPs it "constantly descends to racism and misogyny" and that his department "can do better".

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Chief prosecutor looks smug and proud that 2,450 people have been arrested as terrorists, many of which are pensioners. This is the epitome of the banality of evil.

• New ECFR [European Council on Foreign Relations] polling shows British voters see Brexit as a disaster. They are strikingly open to reintegration with the EU. Three quarters want a closer relationship.
• They see that as key to improvements on the economy, security and migration. Old red lines are falling away, with a majority open to freedom of movement and even a European nuclear deterrent.
• Brits much prefer EU states and even the EU itself over the US, sentiments that are reciprocated within the union.
• Leaving the 2016 politics of “leavers” and “remainers” far behind, they are now split into “Optimists” (for confident reintegration), “Realists” (for negotiated closer relations) and “Loners” (for continued distance).
• Politicians must build a broad consensus on UK-EU relations reflecting the Britain of 2026 rather than that of 2016.

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The Brexit divide may have represented an earthquake in British politics a decade ago, and even a useful category in the 2017 and 2019 general elections, but with each passing year it is becoming less relevant as new experiences and debates reconfigure an electorate that is itself evolving over time. Talk of “leavers” and “remainers” is on the way to resembling that of Roundheads and Cavaliers in the English Civil War, or of supporters and opponents of the 19th-century Corn Laws; the relic of a long-past historical clash rather than a guide to future political behaviour.

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British voters of all political hues have left the old leaver-remainer rift behind. They may well be divided on many other things, as the country’s party-political fragmentation suggests, but on the future of UK-EU relations there is a lot of common ground. Therein lies a chance to leave the old polarisation of the 2016 era behind. The referendum ten years ago sometimes seemed to turn colleagues, families, even places against themselves and each other (the BBC’s flagship documentary on the anniversary is called “Brexit: A Very British Civil War”). Today’s picture is actually more promising: more pro-European, yes, but also a more nuanced patchwork of opinion with a lot of common ground concerning the threats facing the country.

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Activists warn that museum may have breached code of ethics following false claims about its removal of 'Palestine' from exhibits

David Anderson, a former UK independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, has warned that unless the bill is amended it could accidentally pull journalists working in danger-zone countries into prosecutions for terrorism.

The new anti-terror powers are designed to allow the UK government to label state-backed groups as terrorist organisations, enabling them to ban groups such as Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).

The legal change, which is expected to complete its final parliamentary stages this week, would also create new criminal offences for people who “support, assist and obtain material benefits” from groups formally listed as state-supported threats.

However, there are concerns that the national security (state threats) bill would in practice go beyond its main aim of targeting proxies, and could end up penalising foreign correspondents as well.

The Halifax brand is being scrapped after 173 years, with all customer accounts to be rebranded to Lloyds.

Lloyds Banking Group, which has owned Halifax since 2009, confirmed the move after reports in May said it was considering phasing out Halifax as a standalone brand.

Lloyds said it remained committed to the town of Halifax and the wider Yorkshire and Humber region, where 3,000 staff are based at its Trinity Road office.

Lloyds Banking Group's chief executive of consumer relationships Jas Singh said very little would change for customers.

"As Halifax changes to Lloyds, our Halifax customers will keep everything they know and love today - the same fantastic app design, the same friendly faces in our branches - even the same sort code and account number," he said.

No job cuts are being announced as part of the shake-up, and Halifax branches will either be rebranded to Lloyds or shifted to a nearby branch throughout 2027.

It is understood the decision was rooted in efforts to simplify the group's portfolio, with the distinction between Halifax and Lloyds seen as becoming less prominent in recent years.

Reform UK’s deputy leader said last week that a parliamentary debate into Israeli influence on British politics was “antisemitic in its very motivation and at its core”.

“As such, we should utterly reject it,” argued Richard Tice to a room full of MPs.

What he did not tell them, however, was that he had been on a trip to “the Gaza front line” last September funded by the newly-created Reform Friends of Israel, where he concluded that the Gaza famine was a “blatant lie”.

They also visited Israel’s police headquarters, which is overseen by far-right national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who is sanctioned by the UK for “repeated incitement of violence against Palestinian civilians”.

This trip was funded by the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, according to newly released Israeli government data seen by Declassified and found by Berlin-based journalist Yossi Bartel.

The records show that the ministry paid Conexión Israel – a company based in Jerusalem that organises high-level country visits – more than £50,000 to facilitate the delegation.

The delegates returned singing Israel’s praises and denouncing British protesters marching against the war in Gaza as antisemitic and “naively propping up a terrorist ideology”.

A leading figure in the Oxfordshire's Raise the Colours movement is due to stand trial accused of making indecent images of children.

Ben Cullen is due to appear before a jury at Reading Crown Court on July 1 having been charged with three counts of the offence.

Court documents say the 45-year-old is accused of making 22 indecent category A photographs, including one moving image, in Wallingford on March 25, 2021.

He is also accused of making indecent pseudo-photographs, namely 36 Category B images of children at the same place and on the same date as well as making 20 Category C images of children.

Cullen, who lives in Wallingford, has been a leading figure behind the Raise the Colours movement, which gained more than 4,000 members of its Facebook social media page but appears to have since been deleted.

The group has been putting up flags across Oxfordshire, from Wallingford to Wantage and from Oxford to Witney.

Motorists will have seen the flags flying from lampposts since last summer. And most of them were put up by the small group of people.

Key figures have said they are motivated by patriotism, but it has received criticism from others.

Earlier this month, Oxfordshire County Council won an injunction against the group and four members including Cullen to stop putting up flags.

Oxfordshire County Council said it brought legal action to stop people raising flags near highways, saying it involved safety risks, as well as trespass and obstruction.

After a short hearing at the High Court where the group represented themselves, the group members agreed not to put up more flags, not to encourage others to do so, and not to obstruct any council worker or contractor taking them down.

Cullen, of Wallingford, is due to appear at Reading Crown Court on July 1.