Victorian police officers will not participate in this year’s Midsumma pride march after organisers announced officers would only be allowed to march if they did notwear their uniforms. Around 100 police, including the chief commissioner, Shane Patton, marched in the event last year, but police were confronted by a group of 50 protesters, leading to…
A “once in a lifetime” winter storm sweeping through the southern United States on Tuesday dumped snow at levels millions of residents had never seen before. The storm blanketed New Orleans and Houston with record snow that closed highways, grounded nearly all flights and canceled school for more than a million students more accustomed to…
US immigration authorities will be able to arrest migrants at schools, churches and hospitals after the Trump administration overturned policies banning immigration enforcement from so-called “sensitive areas”. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection had been restricted from doing so for more than a decade. The US Department of Homeland Security, which oversees…
People could be banned from driving if they repeatedly fail to repay money they owe under a new government crackdown on welfare fraud. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) will also be able to recover money directly from the bank accounts of people fraudulently claiming benefits. The DWP’s fraud, error and debt bill, which…
The Trump administration has announced the reinstatement of the “remain in Mexico” program, resuming an initiative that forced non-Mexican asylum seekers to wait south of the border while their cases were processed. The US Department of Homeland Security said in a statement on Tuesday that it would restart the program immediately, years after it was…
There was “open warfare” between UK government departments during the pandemic, the former vaccines tsar has said, adding the failure to prioritise the needs of clinically vulnerable, immunocompromised individuals was ethically and morally wrong. Dame Kate Bingham led the vaccine taskforce (VTF) – based in the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) –…
Qatari, US and Egyptian negotiators are running a communications hub in Cairo to protect the ceasefire in Gaza, as Donald Trump said he was not confident the break in fighting would hold. Violations have already been reported. Medics in Gaza said on Monday that eight people had been hit by Israeli fire. The start of…
Two 14-year-old boys have been charged with the kidnap and rape of a girl of the same age in a public park in the New Forest in Hampshire. The incident is alleged to have taken place at a recreation ground in the town of Fordingbridge on the evening of 17 January. A Hampshire constabulary spokesperson…
A former member of Village People has distanced himself from the band that performed at Donald Trump’s inauguration events, stating that the current group has “nothing to do with the group that I was a part of”. Village People, whose song YMCA is widely considered a gay anthem and a favorite of the returning US…
The west should seize the opportunity to target the Tehran-backed Houthi leadership in Yemen while the Iranian government is weakened, the vice-president of the UN-backed government in Aden has said. Aidarus al-Zoubaidi said that Iran’s reverses in Lebanon, Syria and Gaza had left the country “massively weakened”. “They have one remaining domain and that is…
