Monday, June 8

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Tory chairman defends Theresa May’s botched reshuffle
9Jan By Sumon AdminNo Comments
Featured, United Kingdom

Tory chairman defends Theresa May’s botched reshuffle

    Brandon Lewis, who is charged with overhauling the Conservative party’s organisation, insisted May was in control and had succeeded in bringing in new talent. He named Matt Hancock, the new culture secretary, Damian Hinds, the new education secretary, Caroline Nokes, an immigration minister and Claire Perry, a business minister, as signs that fresh faces would be seen around the cabinet table. However, the prime minister’s attempt to stamp her authority on her party was overshadowed by the botched changes at cabinet level, in which Jeremy Hunt refused to give up his job as health secretary and Greening refused to take the role of work and pensions secretary. Lewis told the BBC’s Today programme: In a reshuffle, personalities, people, roles do change. It is a shame ...
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David Davis complaint about planning for no deal Brexit
9Jan By Sumon AdminNo Comments
Europe, Featured

David Davis complaint about planning for no deal Brexit

    The European Union has expressed surprise at David Davis’s complaints about its planning for a no deal Brexit given the scenario was first put forward by Theresa May. In a letter to the Prime Minister, the Brexit Secretary said he would urge the EU to drop measures and guidance that could require UK companies to relocate to Europe or risk contracts being terminated in the event of no deal. Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon described Mr Davis’s moaning as extraordinary given the Government has set aside £3.7 billion to prepare to leave the EU without an agreement, and has repeatedly stated that no deal is better than a bad deal. And European Commission chief spokesman Margaritis Schinas told a daily Brussels briefing: “We are somehow surprised that the United ...
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Britain First deputy leader to face trial over anti-terror rally comments
9Jan By Sumon AdminNo Comments
Featured, United Kingdom

Britain First deputy leader to face trial over anti-terror rally comments

    The deputy leader of far-right group Britain First faces a spring trial in Belfast over remarks made at an anti-terrorism rally last summer. Jayda Fransen appeared at Belfast Magistrates Court on Tuesday on two hate charges related to a speech she made at a Northern Ireland Against Terrorism rally in the city in August. The 31-year-old will go on trial on April 6, district judge Fiona Bagnall said. Britain First Deputy Leader Jayda Fransen leaving Belfast Magistrates Court where she faced charges related to comments made about Islam. She faces four unrelated charges after alleged threatening behaviour concerning remarks made on December 13 beside a peace wall dividing Catholics from Protestants in Belfast. The comments, about Islam, were posted on social media. ...
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White House struggles to silence talk of Trump’s mental fitness
9Jan By Sumon AdminNo Comments
America, Featured

White House struggles to silence talk of Trump’s mental fitness

    The White House is struggling to contain the national discussion about President Trump's mental acuity and fitness for the job, which has overshadowed the administration's agenda for the past week. Trump publicly waded into the debate spawned by a new book, Fire and Fury Michael Wolff's inside account of the presidency over the weekend by claiming on Twitter that he is "like, really smart" and a very stable genius. In doing so, the president both underscored his administration's response strategy by being forceful and combative while also undermining it by gleefully entering a debate his aides have tried to avoid. Trump privately resents the now-regular chatter on cable television news shows about his mental health and views the issue as an invented fact and a joke...
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May’s reshuffle could have been radical
9Jan By Sumon AdminNo Comments
Featured, United Kingdom

May’s reshuffle could have been radical

    For Westminster villagers, Cabinet reshuffles are like Christmas and Transfer Deadline Day rolled into one, with the minutiae of every promotion, demotion and gaffe feasted upon. It is true, the wider public won’t care whether or not David Lidington’s move to the Cabinet Office makes him de facto First Secretary of State, or about how many minutes Chris Grayling was named party chairman before the mistake was rectified. But what the public will notice are the broad brush impressions that are left by what should be a set-piece moment for any Prime Minister. Which begs the question, what is the big visionary message that Theresa May is hoping to get across to voters particularly those who deserted her party on election day last June from what was billed as her widest...
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This businesswoman made $2 billion in just 4 days
8Jan By Sumon AdminNo Comments
Asia, Featured

This businesswoman made $2 billion in just 4 days

  A share surge at Country Garden Holdings Co., China’s largest developer by sales, has sent Vice Chairman Yang Huiyan’s wealth up by $2.1 billion -- and that’s just in the first four trading days of the year. Yang, controlling shareholder of Country Garden, saw her fortune soar to $25.6 billion as of Jan. 5 to rank as the fifth-richest person in the nation, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. That’s before Country Garden’s shares rose another 6.9 percent on Monday in Hong Kong trading, taking its year-to-date-gain to more than 16 percent. The 36-year-old Yang is China’s richest woman and the nation’s youngest billionaire, according to the Bloomberg index. In 2005, her father transferred his controlling stake to her “due to his intention to train Yang Huiyan as the...
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Britain going to face huge VAT burden after Brexit
8Jan By Sumon AdminNo Comments
Featured, United Kingdom

Britain going to face huge VAT burden after Brexit

    The VAT changes spelled out in the taxation (cross-border trade) bill one of a string of Brexit laws passing through parliament are causing uproar among UK business groups, which say that they will create acute cashflow problems and huge additional bureaucracy. Labour and Tory MPs and peers said that the only way to avoid the VAT Brexit penalty would be to stay in the customs union or negotiate to remain in the EU-VAT area. Last night the Tory chair of the all-party Treasury select committee, Nicky Morgan, said the committee would launch an urgent investigation. She also said she would be writing to the head of HM Revenue and Customs to see what contingency plans were being made to avoid hitting UK firms. David Levene for the Guardian The Treasury select committee,...
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KPMG is no longer on the Grenfell Tower inquiry
8Jan By Sumon AdminNo Comments
Featured, United Kingdom

KPMG is no longer on the Grenfell Tower inquiry

    Accounting giant KPMG is no longer advising on the Grenfell Tower inquiry after campaigners said the government's decision to appoint the firm was a conflict of interest. The company said on Sunday night that it was stepping away from the investigation as we recognise that strength of opinion about our role risks undermining confidence in the inquiry. The move comes after an open letter signed by pop star Lily Allen as well as academics, writers, politicians and campaign groups urged prime minister Theresa May to drop the company from the probe. They argued that KPMG should not be involved in the process given it is an auditor to Celotex, which made the insulation in the building, Rydon Group, the contractor that refurbished it, and the Royal Borough of Kensington ...
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Due to lapsed security settings the Tory website goes down on cabinet reshuffle day
8Jan By Sumon AdminNo Comments
Featured, United Kingdom

Due to lapsed security settings the Tory website goes down on cabinet reshuffle day

    The Conservative website broke in the middle of Theresa May's critical reshuffle. The official site found at Conservatives.com wouldn't show to visitors who attempted to visit on one of the Government's most high-profile days. It was one of a run of technical problems for the party, which also tweeted the news that Chris Grayling would move to be Conservative party chairman before deleting it very soon after. As chairman, it would be one of Mr Grayling's responsibilities to ensure the website worked. Visitors over the morning of the reshuffle saw a message that said the connection to the site wasn't private, and were warned not to continue. Others saw a less explained error, which only showed that the site's server had broken. The problem appears to be a consequ...
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Bannon backs off explosive comments about Trump’s son
8Jan By Sumon AdminNo Comments
America, Featured

Bannon backs off explosive comments about Trump’s son

    President Donald Trump’s former strategist Steve Bannon on Sunday backed away from derogatory comments ascribed to him about Trump’s son in a new book that sparked White House outrage and could threaten Bannon’s influence as a would-be conservative power broker. Bannon, ousted from the White House in August, was quoted in ‘Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House,’ by journalist Michael Wolff, as saying a June 2016 meeting with a group of Russians attended by Donald Trump Jr. and his father’s top campaign officials was ‘treasonous’ and ‘unpatriotic.’ The president responded by saying Bannon had lost his mind, and the White House suggested the hard-right news site Breitbart News part ways with Bannon as its executive chairman. Bannon said in a statement released ...
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