NEW DEFINITION OF STEAMPUNK
Grandad smashes land speed record on 'nutty' STEAM POWERED motorbike he made in his shed


Tom Burgess
Tue, 27 June 2023 

Graham Sykes during his world record breaking attempt. (Image: PROHIBITION PR)

A GRANDFATHER-OF-NINE has smashed the world land speed record for a steam powered motorcycle - on a machine he invented himself.

Graham Sykes, a self-described 'nutty inventor', reached a groundbreaking 163mph in just under four seconds on his three-wheeled steam bike at Elvington Airfield near York.

Mr Sykes designed his steam powered bike in his garden shed at the back of his house in Bedale, North Yorkshire.


It was the culmination of a 10 year effort with Diane Sykes, his wife, to create the fastest steam-powered bike in the world.

The 59-year-old, who turns 60 later this week, named his creation 'The Force of Nature' to emphasise his commitment to eco-friendly methods of travel.

He believes that there is no need to sacrifice speed when trying to invent vehicles in an environmentally friendly way.

The Northern Echo: The self described 'nutty inventor' from Bedale in action

The bike uses hydrogenated vegetable oil to superheat water to create pressurised blasts of steam which launch it forwards.

Mr Sykes lies prone on the vehicle to achieve the most aerodynamic shape possible as twin nozzles propel steam out of the rear.

At the UK&ITA World Records Speed week at Elvington Airfield the 'Force of Nature' performed incredibly well - but Graham thinks it still has more to give.

Before this eco-invention the fastest steam-powered motorcycle speed was held by Bill Barnes, an American inventor, who reached 80mph in 2014.

Mr Sykes said: "It's just a big bomb really, and it all started in my shed.

"I've taken the principles of chemistry, and married them with precision engineering to create something I'm passionate about - fast bikes.

"I wanted to do this in a way that is sustainable for the planet and demonstrates that you don't have to compromise on speed, you just have to get creative."

The Northern Echo: The steam powered motorbike flying down the track at Elvington Airfield, near York.

Looking forward, he hopes to break 200mph over an eigth of a mile after a stationary start.

He believes that the full potential of the vehicle is "yet to be unleashed".

Get more from The Northern Echo with a Premium Plus digital subscription from as little as only £1.50 a week. Click here for details.

Graham has previously broken the British record for fastest three-wheeled vehicle in 2015 with a self-built V8 motorbike.

In that attempt he reached a peak speed of 180.3mph.

The 'Force of Nature' will be showcased by Graham and his team in Germany as part of the Nitro Olympics night show.

Greek far-right makes vote comeback


Petros KONSTANTINIDIS
Mon, 26 June 2023 

Neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn's former spokesman Ilias Kasidiaris is in jail but the Spartans advertised his support for them in their campaign posters (STRINGER)

The far right has made a dramatic return to Greek politics, swept back on a wave of anger over the name deal on North Macedonia and the enduring power of a locked up neo-Nazi leader.

For the first time since the restoration of democracy nearly 50 years ago, Greek voters on Sunday sent not just one nationalist party but three into parliament.

Between them the parties garnered 12.8 percent of the vote, taking 34 out of 300 seats in parliament.

Chief amongst them are the Spartans -- whose logo is an ancient warrior's helmet -- a party so little known that local journalists did not even know where their offices were.

Sunday's general election was their first, and they only appeared in opinion polls barely two weeks before the vote.

But everyone in Greece knows the man who backs them -- Ilias Kasidiaris, the former spokesman of neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn, which was banned from contesting elections after being labelled a criminal organisation by the courts.

Kasidiaris is serving a 13-year prison sentence with other leading members of Golden Dawn over crimes including the murder of an anti-fascist rapper.

Hellenes, the party he founded after leaving Golden Dawn, had also been blocked from standing in the polls.

Despite his criminal record, Kasidiaris' endorsement was apparently sufficient for the Spartans to pick up over 240,000 votes and win 12 seats.

Their leader Vasilis Stigas -- a relative unknown who had previously tried his luck with other nationalist parties -- thanked Kasidiaris after Sunday's vote, calling him "the fuel that gave us the push to get this result."

Beyond the Spartans, the more established pro-Russia party Greek Solution, led by former telesales marketer Kyriakos Velopoulos, also obtained over 230,000 votes, enough for 12 lawmakers.

Velopoulos, whose party first appeared in the 2019 European parliamentary election, used to peddle beeswax as a treatment for hair loss on his television show, as well as letters allegedly written by Jesus Christ.

And another newcomer, the anti-abortion Victory party, led by a theologian fond of reciting psalms during his speeches, took 10 seats.

Its manifesto included a plan to require immigrants to undergo monthly health, working status and penal record checks. Anyone who failed to comply would be expelled from Greece.

"Although I was afraid of the far right's rise, I did not expect us to be facing the most far-right parliament in recent Greek history and one of the worst in Europe," wrote Aristides Chatzis, a law professor at the University of Athens, in Kathimerini daily.

- 'Treason' -

Support appears to be strongest in northern Greece, a traditional stronghold of the right.

Far-right parties took more than 20 percent of the vote in six electoral districts in the northern Macedonia region.

Anger has been simmering there since the signing of the Prespa Agreement by a leftist government in 2018, resolving a quarter-century-long name dispute with neighbouring North Macedonia, with the former Yugoslav republic agreeing to add "north" to its name.

While the agreement with Skopje was hailed in the West, many hardliners in Greek Macedonia viewed it as high treason.

"It is evident that there are significant interconnections among these parties, primarily stemming from their shared stance on the Macedonian dispute and their steadfast refusal to accept the outcome in 2018," Georgios Samaras, Assistant Professor in Public Policy at King's College London, told AFP.

"Furthermore, these parties have consistently launched relentless attacks on the lockdown policies implemented during the pandemic, alongside propagating anti-vaccine sentiments."

Writing in the centrist newspaper Ta Nea, journalist Michalis Mitsos said the "nationalist positions on Greek-Turkish relations, anti-Europeanism and xenophobia mixed with the anti-vax movement and pro-Putin sentiment" had produced a vortex of support for the parties that would otherwise be marginalised.

With three parliamentary parties, "far-right voters in Greece now have access to a range of highly customised, almost tailor-made political options," Samaras said.

pk/jph/hmn/fg

'No one will leave' the EU market because of new AI rules, says Thierry Breton

Méabh Mc Mahon
Tue, 27 June 2023 

 Thierry Breton

"No one, of course, because it's the biggest digital market in the world. So no one can afford it," he went on.

"It's (a market) that is bigger than the one in the US (so) no one could afford not to be. And we welcome everybody."

Breton's comments come in the midst of negotiations for the AI Act, an ambitious law that aims to rein in the excesses of artificial intelligence and ensure the rapidly evolving technology respects the European Union's fundamental values.

The draft legislation is considered a world-first attempt to regulate AI through a human-centric, risk-based approach; and its potential success – or failure – could influence rules in other countries around the world.

"We don't only regulate AI. We have decided to organise our digital space," Breton said in his interview with Euronews.

But the AI Act, which has been subject to thousands of amendments and intense lobbying, has been met with certain scepticism from the industry it tries to govern.

Last month, Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, the company behind the revolutionary ChatGPT, caused a stir when he suggested the firm might consider leaving the European market if it could not comply with the proposed rules.

Altman later walked back from the remarks, which attracted considerable media attention, and said he had "no plans" to exit.

Breton had a chance to discuss this issue withAltman in a recent trip to San Francisco during which he also met with several directors of big tech companies, including META's Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter's Linda Yaccarino.

"He (Altman) told me that it was misinterpreted. So he changed his tweet, and he said: 'I love the regulation, we will follow it.' By the way, including on watermarking," Breton said, referring to the digital technique that allows AI-generated content to be identified as such.

"The rules are rules," Breton went on, speaking of himself as "the enforcer."

"Politicians are here to make the rules to secure when we believe it's important the way our fellow citizens are living in this space or that space, and companies are here to follow the rules. And they will."

EU’s flagship nature laws in jeopardy after voting stalemate

Lisa O'Carroll Brussels correspondent
Tue, 27 June 2023 

Photograph: Thierry Monasse/Getty Images

The future of the EU’s flagship environment laws are again hanging by a thread with a cliffhanger vote, flared tempers and accusations of lies, fake news and manipulation of voting in the European parliament.

Emotions were running high after voting on the European parliament committee steering through the Nature Restoration Law (NRL) ended in a dead heat on Tuesday, with 44 votes in favour and 44 against. It can now progress to a vote of the full parliament in a plenary session in July.

The centre-right European People’s party (EPP) is calling for a delay until a “solid impact assessment” on the consequences for food production and biodiversity in farming.

Related: EU’s biodiversity law under threat from centre-right MEPs

In tense scenes at a press conference shortly after the vote, the chair of the environment committee, Pascal Canfin, accused the EPP of “clear manipulation”, claiming it had “substituted” one-third of its 22 members on the committee to ensure the NRL hit the buffers.

MEP Cesar Luena, rapporteur of the committee, said: “A lot of lies have been told about this proposal. There have been lies and myths spread about”.

He accused the right of using arguments over the environment and migrants for their political convenience, and said young people were watching on in disbelief as the EU pulled together to fight Russia in Ukraine but was “not able to drive through a law on nature and diversity” in the face of a mounting climate emergency.

The law’s fate was sealed after the EPP, the centre-right political grouping across the EU, decided to withdraw from negotiations earlier this year, claiming it would reduce food production and hinder hydroelectric and hydrogen green energy development.

Peter Liese, the German MEP and environment spokesperson for the EPP, launched a scathing attack on Canfin after the vote.

“The chair has always to defend the vote whether he likes it or not. But Pascal Canfin is the worst and most partisan chair of the Envi (environment committee) I have ever experienced and I am here since 1994,” he said.

He dismissed claims that the EPP was going against one of the flagship Green Deal policies of the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, saying the European parliament had already adopted 27 pieces of legislation on the environment, with 13 “more to come”.

The EPP has been pitching itself as the voice of farmers’ across Europe, arguing the NRL has failed to listen to their concerns over the specifics of the new rules.

It has been careful not to criticise Von der Leyen, who has said little on the dispute despite the NRL being a pillar of her Green Deal plans for Europe.

Canfin is confident the law will pass if they can negotiate a truce before the July plenary but the EPP would rather it be dropped altogether.

It has renewed its call on the European Commission vice-president, Frans Timmermans, to withdraw the legislation and find a compromise way forward.

Voting on 2,500 compromises had begun two weeks ago in Strasbourg, France but had timed out, forcing extra voting on Tuesday.

MEPs of environment committee vote down the Nature Restoration Law, throwing its survival into doubt

Jorge Liboreiro
Updated Tue, 27 June 2023 

The legislation, which seeks to reverse biodiversity loss by rehabilitating Europe's degraded land and sea areas, has become the object of relentless criticism by conservative parties.

After going through a long series of amendments, the text as a whole received 44 votes and 44 against, meaning it failed to garner the necessary simple majority to move forward by one single ballot.

The tally prompted a mix of applause and jeers inside the room, a vivid reflection of the stark ideological divide prompted by the law.

It marks the first time the parliament's environment committee (ENVI) rejects an element of the European Green Deal. Previously, two affiliate committees, agriculture (AGRI) and fisheries (PECH), had struck down the text.

As a result, the legislation will be sent to plenary in its original form, as proposed by the European Commission, with a recommendation to be scrapped in its entirety.

The decisive vote is expected to be held in the week of 10 July.

Non-attached lawmakers and independent-minded conservatives could tip the balance and save the draft text, although this is far from guaranteed.

If the hemicycle does follow the advice of the 88-member committee, the legislative process will come to an end: MEPs will not be able to enter negotiations with member states, which have already agreed on a common position, and the law will be effectively dead.

"The process, as far as we understand, is not finished in the European Parliament," said a spokesperson for the European Commission. "Of course, we respect the process that is currently ongoing."

The spokesperson then confirmed that if the Nature Restoration Law were to fall apart, the executive would not table a second proposal.

A bitter exchange of accusations

Tuesday's knife-edge vote took place amidst a political atmosphere of unprecedented hostility against the draft piece of legislation.

Over the past months, the centre-right European People's Party (EPP), the largest formation in the parliament, has mounted an incessant negative campaign against the Nature Restoration Law, which the group sees as a direct threat to the traditional livelihoods of European farmers, fishers and forest managers.

The EPP describes the law as a case of "good design, bad intentions" and says its legally-binding targets to rehabilitate land areas will disrupt supply chains, decrease food production and raise prices for everyday consumers.

The claims put forward by the conservatives have been forcefully contested by progressive parties, environmental NGOs, climate scientists and the renewable energy industry, which argue nature restoration and economic activity are two compatible goals that can thrive side by side.

The back-and-forth played out in public view on Tuesday during the press conferences that the two opposing sides held right after the key vote.

César Luena, the socialist MEP who serves as the law's rapporteur, and Pascal Canfin, the liberal MEP who chairs the ENVI committee, denounced the EPP for distorting the legislation and teaming up with far-right parties to bring it down.

"About this law, a lot of lies and hoaxes have been said," Luena told reporters. "One has to have a bit of class. In the political fight, you have to argue with data, with knowledge, with ideas, but not lies."

Canfin bluntly accused EPP Chair Manfred Weber of replacing "one-third" of the conservative members in the ENVI committee with "nature-sceptic" lawmakers in order to secure the rejection of the draft law.

"It was a very clear manipulation of the ENVI vote," Canfin said. "It cannot happen in the plenary because Manfred Weber cannot replace members in the plenary."

"As a chair of a committee, it's very appalling to see (that) a political group is able to manipulate to that extent," he added.

Christine Schneider and Peter Liese, two German lawmakers from the EPP, immediately fired back, calling Canfin's comments shocking and unacceptable.

"Pascal Canfin is the worst and most partisan chair of the ENVI committee I've ever experienced since 1994," Liese told reporters. "This has never happened before."

Liese admitted his party had "many substitutions" during the vote because "we wanted to be on the safe side" and said his Czech colleague Stanislav Polčák had been the "only one" who had expressed a desire of voting in favour of the law. (Polčák did not take part in Tuesday's vote.)

"Our problems with the law are still the same," Schneider said, calling the text "impractical," "backward-looking" and the "wrong way to go."

Schneider asked the European Commission to withdraw the law before the plenary vote and accused Vice-President Frans Timmermans, who is in charge of the European Green Deal, of threatening MEPs ahead of the closely-watched vote.

Timmermans's office denies the characterisation and insists he is committed to discussing the legislation with co-legislators and finding solutions.

Notably, the EPP's scathing campaign has so far spared Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, who is affiliated with the conservatives.

"It's very obvious that Timmermans drafted this law and Timmermans is the one who did the threats. Ursula von der Leyen didn't do so. So there's a big difference," Liese said when asked about this omission.

A Commission spokesperson said President von der Leyen "fully" supported the Nature Restoration Law and was keeping a "close eye" on the legislative talks.

Meanwhile, beyond the parliamentary fray, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), BirdLife and Greenpeace decried Tuesday's outcome and blamed the EPP for playing "dirty tactic" and spreading "misinformation."

"It's a disgrace that politicians and lobbyists have spread the lie that nature and farming are somehow in conflict – the whole parliament must ignore that nonsense and vote to restore Europe's precious nature," Greenpeace said.

In a sign of the high stakes created by the bitter political sage, an increasingly large number of private companies have spoken on the record in defence of the law.

Earlier this month, CEOs and top executives from 50 companies, including IKEA, Nestlé, H&M, Iberdrola and Unilever, signed a joint letter urging lawmakers to adopt rules on nature restoration and create legal certainty for businesses.

"Our dependence on a healthy environment is fundamental to the resilience of our economies and, ultimately, our long-term success," the CEOs wrote.

What is the Nature Restoration Law?

The Nature Restoration Law was first presented by the European Commission in June 2022 as part of the European Green Deal and the 2030 biodiversity strategy.

The legislation, referred to as the "first continent-wide, comprehensive law of its kind," aims to rehabilitate habitats and species that have been degraded by human interference and climate change.

According to the Commission, 81% of European habitats are in poor status, with peatlands, grasslands and dunes hit the worst.

The law sets out legally-binding targets in seven specific topics, such as farmlands, pollinators, free-flowing rivers and marine ecosystems, that put together should cover at least 20% of the EU's land and sea areas by 2030.

In the now-rejected amended text, MEPs had boosted the goal to 30% in order to align the bloc with the landmark deal that was achieved in December at the end of COP15 in Montreal.

Under the legislation, governments would be asked to draft long-term plans on nature restoration, laying out the projects and initiatives they wish to pursue in order to meet the overarching targets.

Possible actions include planting trees, beekeeping, rewetting drained peatlands and expanding green spaces in urban areas.

Upon its presentation, the Nature Restoration Law was well received by environmental organisations, which hailed the legally-binding targets and the far-reaching scope, but triggered a significant backlash from farmers, fishers and foresters, who later called it an "ill-thought out, unrealistic and unimplementable" proposal bound to have "devastating consequences."

The EPP built upon this reaction to launch its opposition campaign, which critics say is heavily influenced by the upcoming European elections and the emergence of the sudden rise of BBB, the agrarian populist party that has disrupted Dutch politics.

This piece has been updated with new details about the vote.

PwC walks back report used to claim Australia’s nature repair market could be worth $137bn


Paul Karp Chief political correspondent

The Guardian AUS
Tue, 27 June 2023 

Photograph: Mike Bowers/The Guardian

PwC has walked back a report used to claim the nature repair market could be worth $137bn, accepting it measures “indirect spending towards biodiversity” but the amount spent on “threatened species conservation, with clear outcomes, is likely much less”.

The consultancy firm made that submission to a Senate inquiry examining the Albanese government’s nature repair market bill in response to a critique of the report from progressive thinktank the Australia Institute.

Related: Teal MPs criticise Greens’ ‘short-sighted’ opposition to Labor’s planned nature repair market

PwC has also come under fire from Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young, who says the firm has questions to answer about whether the report was written to “get their foot in the door to win more work” associated with the market.

The environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, announced the nature repair market in August 2022 and introduced the bill in March. It proposes to create a market to incentivise investment in nature restoration by creating tradable certificates for projects that protect and restore biodiversity.

The Coalition at first agreed in principle, because it replicated a policy of the Morrison government, but withdrew support in June, putting the bill at risk of defeat in the Senate.

In March Plibersek cited the PwC report, titled “A nature-positive Australia” and published in December 2022, which she said had found a biodiversity market that “could unlock $137bn to repair and protect Australia’s environment by 2050”.

The report measured the “direct value [of] financial flows to biodiversity” with estimates of components including: private biodiversity, conservation and natural capital investments ($78bn); forest carbon and biodiversity offsets ($33bn); conservation NGOs and environmental charities ($11bn); government expenditure and subsidies ($8.5bn).

The Australia Institute submitted to the Senate environmental legislation committee that the report was “misleading on a number of fronts and is entirely unrelated to the nature repair market”.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

“Critically, the $137bn figure presented in the PwC report seems to be in 2050 dollars,” it said.

“That is, PwC has inflated the figures to what they would be in 2050. It is not an accurate representation of what the financial flows it presents are in 2023 or will be in the near future.”

The Australia Institute also argued that “a significant share” of the financial flows estimated by PwC were “not related to ‘markets’ at all, such as direct government intervention and environmental spending by NGOs and charitable donations”.

“Adjusting the estimates to 2023 dollars lowers the total financial flows to just $70bn, and ‘market-based’ flows down to $18bn,” it concluded.

The Australia Institute also took aim at evidence in Senate estimates on 23 May, in which the environment department deputy secretary, Lyn O’Connell, said it “did not commission or pay for that report”.

“It came out of a conversation I had with a principal at PricewaterhouseCoopers in terms of, ‘here’s something that would be useful for us to know’,” she said.

Hanson-Young told Guardian Australia that “there are questions as to whether this is part of a PwC strategy to get their foot in the door to win more work – it’s a corporate strategy we know has been used elsewhere by PwC”.

A PwC spokesperson said: “PwC regularly authors thought leadership on important topics, and in this case saw an important opportunity to progress a conversation around the role of biodiversity markets and the role for the private sector in funding nature repair.”

In its reply submission, PwC’s acting chief executive, Kristin Stubbins, said its report was “developed in light of government interest in market-based mechanisms, as well as businesses and financial institutions becoming increasingly aware of nature-related risks and opportunities”.

PwC accepted the methodology involved estimating “financial flows from a range of vehicles” and the report “details the limitations” of estimates given the lack of data.

“We also acknowledge in the report that financial flows capture indirect spending towards biodiversity through environmental and conservation initiatives, but the proportion spent on targeted threatened species conservation, with clear outcomes, is likely much less.”

“The report did not attempt to outline the impacts specific to the nature repair market, as it was developed both independently of the Australian government and at a time when the [bill] was yet to be made public.”

Plibersek said: “I’ve been clear that I expect the nature repair market will generate billions of dollars of investment in nature repair to better protect our environment for our kids and grandkids.”

“Any extra investment in nature should be welcomed by people who care about the environment,” she said, citing support for the bill from the World Wildlife Fund, National Farmers’ Federation, Australian Land Conservation Alliance, Landcare and the Northern Land Council.

The bill is opposed by many environment groups due to concerns that the scheme as proposed could be used to offset habitat destruction caused by other developments.

The bill passed the House of Representatives on Wednesday evening, with Labor and most independent MPs in favour, while the Coalition, Greens and Zoe Daniel opposed it at the second reading stage.

Hanson-Young said “the last election was about climate action and integrity but the government’s Green Wall Street scheme has neither”.

“We need stronger environment laws to protect nature and the climate, not koala credits for greenwashing.”

Iranian art school students beaten and arrested for defying headscarf rules

Alijani Ershad
Tue, 27 June 2023

© Observers

A group of Iranian students, incensed at rules imposed on June 12 requiring female students to wear a maqna’a – a conservative Islamic headscarf in black that covers the head, neck and shoulders – began a sit-in in protest. They also wrote an open letter to the university administration, which said: “We have nothing to say to you except ‘no'.” A number of students were beaten and arrested for taking part in the protest, while also being threatened with suspension and even death. Thousands of people have posted “no” on their social media accounts in solidarity and students at dozens of other universities have published open letters in support of the Tehran art students.

It all started on Monday, June 12, when students at Tehran University of Art received a text message: “Female students must wear a maqna’a starting June 17 if they want to attend university classes.”

The new rule was imposed just days before final exams and the end of the semester. One student we spoke to said students who still refused to wear a headscarf felt “taken hostage” by the strict imposition at exam time. Students began a sit-in and protested against the rule.

The message was a shock to a number of students at the university, a prestigious art school known to be a relatively liberal institution in the Islamic Republic. Since the widespread “Woman, Life, Freedom” protests began in September 2022, many Iranian women have refused to wear any type of Islamic headscarf.

UK

RED TORY

Starmer fails to commit to recommended public sector pay rises



Sky News
Updated Tue, 27 June 2023 


Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has indicated he too will not be following recommendations on public sector pay rises, saying his party are set to "inherit a real mess" if they win the next general election.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has faced a backlash from opposition parties and unions after hinting he will not adopt proposals from pay review bodies for the coming year in a bid to tackle inflation.

Asked at a New Statesman event what his course of action would be, Mr Starmer did not answer the question, and instead pointed to the UK's "really badly damaged economy".

Pay review bodies (PRBs) take evidence from across sectors like the NHS and education each year, as well as submissions from government, before saying what wage rises should be introduced across the public sector for the following 12 months.

The PRBs' recommendations are expected to be published next month, alongside formal pay offers, with reports claiming the proposed figure could be around 6% for the health service and 6.5% for teachers.

Amid anger from unions about the numbers failing to match inflation last year, Health Secretary Steve Barclay insisted it was right for ministers to "continue to defer to that process to ensure decisions balance the needs of staff and the wider economy".

Asked for Labour's position on PRB recommendations, Sir Keir said he understood there was "a real squeeze" on workers, saying their wages hadn't gone up "in material terms" for 13 years.

He put the blame at the door of the Conservatives for their "failure to grow the economy and the additional damage that Liz Truss did".

But Mr Starmer did not say he would accept PRB recommendations if he becomes prime minister, instead saying: "I am not going to hide from this.

"If we are privileged enough to come into power at the next election, and I hope we are so that we can serve our country, we are going to inherit a real mess, a really badly damaged economy.

"Public services that aren't on their knees but on their face - the NHS in particular - and a sense that we have got to go at pace to try to repair, rebuild and run towards the future which is available for us as a country.

"And Rachel [Reeves - the shadow chancellor] has been clear that will require us to have strong fiscal rules which we are not going to break.

"But you know, we urgently need to get on with the task now of picking the country up, rebuilding and moving forwards."

After numerous reports over the weekend and a raft of ministers refusing to commit to accepting the recommendations for the coming year, Mr Sunak hinted he might block them.

He told broadcasters on Monday: "I think everyone can see the economic context we are in, with inflation higher than we'd like it, and it is important in that context that the government makes the right and responsible decisions in things like public sector pay.

"I think people need to recognise the economic context we are in, and I am going to make the decisions that are the right ones for the country.

"That's not always easy, people may not like that, but those are the right things for everybody, that we get a grip on inflation, and that means the government not excessively borrowing too much money and being responsible with public sector pay settlements."

Nurses' strikes in England to end - as union boss vows 'fight for fair pay is far from over'

Sky News
Updated Tue, 27 June 2023

 

Nurses' strikes are to end in England after the profession's largest union failed to secure enough votes to carry out further action.

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) had planned to stage more walk-outs after its members rejected a pay offer from the government last month.

However, unions have to hold ballots every six months to refresh their strike mandate, with a minimum 50% turnout.

And while more than 100,000 voted in favour of strikes at the time, only 122,000 of the RCN's 300,000 members submitted a ballot paper - a turnout of just over 43%.

RCN boss Pat Cullen said "the fight for the fair pay and safe staffing that our profession, our patients, and our NHS deserves, is far from over", despite the result.

She revealed she would be meeting Prime Minister Rishi Sunak this afternoon to discuss the government's NHS workforce plan - set to be announced later this week - and would "hear him out".

But, she added: "I know staff morale is low and the staffing crisis is set to worsen without immediate action. I will be telling him this today.

"We have started something special - the voice of nursing has never been stronger and we're going to keep using it."

A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Care said they welcomed the end of the "hugely disruptive industrial action so staff can continue caring for patients and cutting waiting lists".

They added: "We hope other unions who remain in dispute with the government recognise it is time to stop industrial action and move forward together."

Members of the nursing union began strike action last year for the first time in its 106-year history over both pay and concerns about patient safety.

It has staged a number of walkouts since, impacting NHS trusts across the country, but gaining strong support from the public.

In May, a number of other NHS unions accepted a pay rise of 5%, along with a one-off payment, but both RCN and Unite members voted against the deal.

At the time, Ms Cullen called it "unfinished business" and urged the government to bring another offer to the table.

But Health Secretary Steve Barclay insisted it was "a fair and reasonable offer".

Senior doctors in England vote for industrial action - union

Muvija M
Tue, 27 June 2023 

Junior doctors hold a strike amid a dispute with the government over pay, in London

LONDON (Reuters) -Senior doctors in England have voted for industrial action over a pay dispute, their union said on Tuesday, leaving the state-run health service facing deep disruption next month when junior doctors are also planning to walk out.

Britain's already-stretched public services have been hit by strikes in the last year as double-digit inflation rates have pushed workers to seek pay rises while the government frets that wage increases could be fuelling price rises even further.

Over 24,000 consultants in England voted in the doctors' ballot, marking a turnout of 71%, with 86% voting for industrial action, the British Medical Association (BMA) said. It said consultants would take such action on July 20 and 21.

The industrial action will take the form of 'Christmas Day cover', meaning most routine and elective services will be cancelled but full emergency cover will remain in place, the BMA said.

They argue consultants' take-home pay fell 35% between 2008/9 and 2021/22, with the squeeze further compounded by a year of high inflation.

"This vote shows how furious they are at being repeatedly devalued by Government," Dr Vishal Sharma, BMA consultants committee chair, said in the statement.

"It is not too late to avert strike action and the Government simply needs come back to us with a credible offer."

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said they were disappointed at the outcome of the ballot and highlighted that consultants had received a 4.5% pay rise for the last financial year, increasing their average earnings to around 128,000 pounds ($163,264.00).

The result comes hours after the country's main nursing trade union failed to secure a new mandate for strike action.

($1 = 0.7840 pounds)

(Reporting by Farouq Suleiman and Kylie MacLellan; editing by William James)

British bats ‘can help identify coronaviruses

with potential to infect humans’

Nina Massey, PA Science Correspondent
Tue, 27 June 2023 


Monitoring British bats can help identify coronaviruses with the potential to cause disease and infect humans, research suggests.

A research team led by Imperial College London and University College London scientists analysed faecal samples from UK bats for coronaviruses – a large family of viruses that usually cause mild to moderate upper-respiratory tract illnesses in humans.

The findings report the circulation of four species of coronaviruses, including two previously unknown ones, among the 16 UK bat species sampled.

The researchers say that while some of these viruses are related to those that cause Covid-19 and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (Mers), none can currently infect humans.

Regular surveillance of viruses in wildlife and more widely is a public health issue, researchers say.

Bats are protected species in the UK, so working with conservation organisations is crucial to this effort, they add.

Lead researcher Professor Vincent Savolainen, from the Georgina Mace Centre for the Living Planet at Imperial College London, said: “Working with a network of conservationists and bat rehabilitators has been most fruitful in documenting the diversity of coronaviruses that is present in British bats, and which had been so far overlooked.

“This collaborative work forms the basis for future zoonotic surveillance and conservation efforts given the importance that bats play in our ecosystems.”

Co-author Professor Francois Balloux, director of the UCL Genetics Institute, added: “In many parts of the world, we have decent surveillance of the pathogens circulating in humans and domestic animals but not so much in wildlife.

“Increased surveillance should improve public health preparedness and food security, and also be beneficial for biodiversity conservation.”

Diseases that emerge in animals and transfer to humans are known as zoonotic.

In order to spread to people, the infection requires the virus to be able to infect human cells, and to cause an outbreak, it must then be able to spread between humans.

Many zoonotic diseases may pass to people in direct contact with the host animal and do not progress further.

The researchers studied the possibility of these viruses spilling over and infecting humans by creating pseudoviruses which carry whichever protein the virus uses to bind to host cells, but cannot replicate.

While none were currently able to infect human cells, one of the sarbecoviruses found in a sample from the lesser horseshoe bat was able to bind to ACE2, the receptor the SARS-CoV-2 virus uses to enter human cells.

However, this could only enter human cells in a lab when there was an overabundance of ACE2, suggesting it would need to adapt further if it were to infect humans.

Lisa Worledge, head of conservation services at the Bat Conservation Trust, said: “New techniques such as the one used in this paper are increasing our understanding and highlight the importance of protecting nature.

“This work provides a great example of researchers and conservationists working together for the wider good.

“Beyond reducing the chances of zoonosis, we know that protecting wildlife brings many other benefits.

“From providing ecosystem services such as controlling insects that damage crops through to the simple joy of watching bats on a summer’s night, bats are a vital part of our natural heritage.”

The findings are published in Nature Communications.

Monitoring British bats can help identify

coronaviruses with pathogen potential

Peer-Reviewed Publication

IMPERIAL COLLEGE LONDON

Researchers who found novel coronaviruses in UK bats say genetic surveys of the viruses should be regularly conducted, even if none of those viruses can infect humans yet.

Working with a network of bat conservationists, a research team led by Imperial College London and University College London researchers screened faecal samples from UK bats for coronaviruses.

Their results, published today in Nature Communications, report circulation of four species of coronaviruses, including two novel ones, among the 16 UK bat species sampled. While some of these coronaviruses are related to those that cause COVID-19 and MERS, none are currently capable of infecting humans.

Regular surveillance of viruses in wildlife and more widely is a public health issue. Bats are protected species in the UK, so working with conservation organisations is crucial to this effort, say the researchers.

Lead researcher Professor Vincent Savolainen, from the Georgina Mace Centre for the Living Planet at Imperial College London, said: “Working with a network of conservationists and bat rehabilitators has been most fruitful in documenting the diversity of coronaviruses that is present in British bats, and which had been so far overlooked. This collaborative work forms the basis for future zoonotic surveillance and conservation efforts given the importance that bats play in our ecosystems.”

Co-author Professor Francois Balloux, Director of the UCL Genetics Institute, said: “In many parts of the world, we have decent surveillance of the pathogens circulating in humans and domestic animals but not so much in wildlife. Increased surveillance should improve public health preparedness and food security, and also be beneficial for biodiversity conservation.”

Pathogenic potential

Diseases that emerge in animals and transfer to humans are known as ‘zoonotic’. Human infection requires the virus to be able to infect human cells, and to cause an outbreak, it must then be able to spread between humans.

Many zoonotic diseases may pass to small groups of people in direct contact with the host animal and do not progress further. To know which viruses have the potential to spread wider, genetic investigations are crucial.

Bats are a large group of mammals, and their diversity means they can harbour a range of potentially pathogenic viruses. While bat virus surveys have been conducted in Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Europe, in the UK bat viruses have been overlooked for detailed genetic studies, beyond European bat lyssaviruses that cause rabies.

The team identified two species of alphacoronaviruses, one Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS)-related coronavirus, and one sarbecovirus. The SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes COVID-19, is also a sarbecovirus.

The researchers then studied the possibility of these viruses ‘spilling over’ and infecting humans. To do so, they created ‘pseudoviruses’, which carry whichever protein the virus uses to bind to host cells, but cannot replicate.

None were currently able to infect human cells, but one of the sarbecoviruses found in a sample from the lesser horseshoe bat was able to bind to ACE2, the receptor the SARS-CoV-2 virus uses to enter human cells. This sarbecovirus could only enter human cells in a lab when there was an overabundance of ACE2, suggesting it would need further adaptations if it were to infect humans.

Good for bats, good for us

Viruses are more likely to spill over from wild animals when they are brought in closer contact with humans. Habitat losses and land-use changes across the world are linked with an increase probability of zoonotic crossover.

Maintaining bat conservation efforts and minimising habitat destruction could therefore help prevent zoonotic spillover, alongside a monitoring program that regularly screens for potential pathogens.

Lisa Worledge, Head of Conservation Services at the Bat Conservation Trust, said: “New techniques such as the one used in this paper are increasing our understanding and highlight the importance of protecting nature. This work provides a great example of researchers and conservationists working together for the wider good.

“Beyond reducing the chances of zoonosis, we know that protecting wildlife brings many other benefits. From providing ecosystem services such as controlling insects that damage crops through to the simple joy of watching bats on a summer’s night, bats are a vital part of our natural heritage.”

---

JOURNAL

Nature Communications

DOI

10.1038/s41467-023-38717-w 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

Genomic screening of 16 UK native bat species through conservationist networks uncovers coronaviruses with zoonotic potential

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

27-Jun-2023