Day: July 15, 2018

    British Prime Minister Theresa May has warned there may be ‘no Brexit at all’ because of attempts to wreck her controversial blueprint for Britain’s departure from the European Union. She claims that rival Commons revolts by warring pro- and anti-Europe Tory MPs threaten to sabotage hopes of winning a post-Brexit deal for Britain. And in a hard-hitting message to Brussels, the Prime Minister says she will not budge an inch on the proposed Brexit deal she agreed with Cabinet Ministers at her Chequers summit. Writing in today’s Mail on Sunday, Mrs May dramatically raises the stakes in her bid to win support for her proposal to make a success of leaving the EU. Her fighting talk comes after US President Donald Trump enraged Downing Street last week by claiming that Mr...

    Schools that unofficially exclude children to hide them from exam league tables are fuelling gang violence, the children’s commissioner for England says. Anne Longfield said she has begun an investigation into the practice of taking children off-roll without formally excluding them because they are viewed as difficult to manage and may drag down the school’s results. The office of the commissioner, an independent position backed by statute, is conducting an urgent analysis of confidential government data, including exclusions and police records, to establish how many off-roll children are drawn into gangs. Longfield said it was vital for the government to give clearer advice to schools on handling children at risk of joining gangs, after receiving a letter from a M...

    The grieving son of Amesbury Novichok victim Dawn Sturgess has called on Donald Trump to raise his mother’s death with Vladimir Putin. The US president, who is on the last day of his visit to the UK, is due to meet the Russian leader in Helsinki on Monday. Ewan Hope, 19, said he wants his mother’s killer, or killers, to get what they deserve. I don’t share Donald Trump’s politics and I’ll never be a supporter of his, but I would like him to raise mum’s case with the Russian president, he told the Sunday Mirror. We need to get justice for my mum. The Government has blamed Russia for the failed nerve agent attack on former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury in March. Ms Sturgess, 44, and her partner Charlie Rowley fell ill in Amesbury,...

    Like a desiccated woman who is crawling across a scorching desert and thinks she has spotted a source of moisture, for a brief moment Theresa May tasted the sweet tang of relief from her miseries. She had about 72 hours of experiencing what it feels like to be a prime minister who is in control. This time last week, she had launched her Brexit plan and it had not instantly exploded on takeoff. EU leaders gave the blueprint a polite, if highly guarded, reception. No one flounced out of the Chequers meeting, saying they could no longer sit in her cabinet. Even critics expressed some backhanded praise for the way in which Mrs May choreographed the corralling of her ministers. Opponents revived the old charge, an accusation not heard against her since she blew last yea...