NORTHERN IRELAND BORDER CHECKS STOPPED

The Daily Mail reports that all checks on animal and food products arriving at ports in Northern Ireland have been suspended over safety fears for staff. Import inspections at Belfast and Larne were stopped ‘with immediate effect’ last night as Stormont’s Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (Daera) assessed risk to workers at the sites. The decision came after a local council agreed to remove 12 of its staff at Larne port due to ‘an upsurge in sinister and menacing behaviour in recent weeks’. A Daera spokesman said: ‘On the basis of information received today and pending further discussions with the PSNI (Police Service of Northern Ireland), Daera has decided in the interests of the wellbeing of staff to temporarily suspend physical inspections of products of animal origin at Larne and Belfast..Last month graffiti appeared near to the ports, with one message saying No Irish sea border and another Ulster sold out.

 

BRITAIN TO HELP THE WORLD

The Daily Express reports that  Health Secretary Mat Hancock speaking at the Downing Street press conference on Monday evening, hailed the success of the UK’s vaccine rollout so far and said  that  more than 9.2 million Brits have now received the first dose of a Covid jab.Over the weekend alone, more than a million doses were administered, with almost nine in 10 of all those aged over 80 now vaccinated and over half of those in their 70s immunised. Mr Hancock went on to say  that  the UK was racing ahead of other countries in rolling out its immunisation programme and would donate surplus jabs to other nations to help inoculate the global population.

 

PEACE PRIZE NOMINATION FOR DONALD TRUMP

According to The SUN former president Donald Trump has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize again for “not starting any wars” while he was in office. Jaak Madison, a member of Estonian right-wing populist party EKRE, has nominated former president  Donald Trump for having contributed to ensuring stability in the Middle East.  “Donald Trump is the first president of the United States in the last thirty years, in whose office the country has not started any war,” the MEP stated in a Facebook post, which cited his nomination application. “In addition, several peace agreements have been made under his leadership in the Middle East, which has helped ensure stability in the region and peace.” Israel and the United Arab Emirates agreed to a historic deal normalizing relations in 2020.

 

SCHOOLBOY LED TERROR GROUP

The Daily Mail reports that a schoolboy has become the UK’s youngest terrorist  at the age of 13 after admitting offences including masterminding a British far-right extremist cell from his grandmother’s cottage. The child – who told investigators he was just trying to ‘look cool’ – ran the UK branch of the Feuerkrieg Division until July 2019. Counter-terror police learned of a British-based FKD ‘unit’ operating on the internet and launched a huge investigation to find out who was in the cell. At the Old Bailey hearing and via video-link – alongside his supportive grandmother – he admitted 10 counts of possessing terrorist documents and two counts of distributing terrorist material.

 

ROOKIE JUDGES

From The Times: Inexperienced judges who have never heard a case have been hired to clear an avalanche of employment claims from sacked and aggrieved workers. Trade union and town hall lawyers are among 59 new faces judging cases at tribunals, where battles can cost millions of pounds in compensation and legal bills. In the biggest simultaneous recruitment of judges for nearly 400 years, appointees are being hired at annual salaries of £113,000.  An investigation by The Times shows that the tribunal system is in chaos with a record backlog of 40,000 cases. The average waiting time from a case being received to its conclusion now drags on for 39 weeks.

 

RUSTY AIRLINE PILOTS IN THE USA

From The Telegraph: According to  this Telegraph article airline pilots are making mistakes because they have become rusty due to the lack of flying time during the coronavirus pandemic. Dozens of pilots have told NASA’s Aviation Safety Reporting System that they have made errors since getting back into the cockpit. On one occasion a pilot forgot to disengage the parking brake when pulling away from the gate. Another pilot struggled to land a plane in heavy wind, only succeeding in doing so at the third attempt.Other incidents included a first officer forgetting to turn on the de-icing system, which ensures that the altitude and speed sensors operate properly.

 

DEBT REPAID DURING LOCKDOWN

The Guardian reports: British households repaid the most money borrowed on credit cards and loans in 2020 since records began almost three decades ago, as consumers cut back spending during the coronavirus pandemic. Figures from the Bank of England show £16.6bn of net repayments on credit cards, personal loans, student borrowing and car finance last year – the most repaid since 1993 and the first annual net reduction since 2011, when the UK was still recovering from the financial crisis. Consumers had racked up £13.2bn of extra debt in 2019.

 

FUEL  DUTY RISE MAY BE ON THE WAY

The Telegraph reports that a hike in fuel duty could be announced in the Budget after Conservative MPs signalled to Rishi Sunak they could live with an end to the decade-long freeze. Acknowledging the need to get the public finances under control, backbenchers from across the party have told The Daily Telegraph they believe an increase in the levy now looks inevitable. One Tory MP said that Mr Sunak has actively drawn attention to fuel duty in pre-Budget conversations with backbenchers which is  currently 57.95 pence per litre for petrol and diesel and has not been raised in 10 years.

 

THE PRIME MINISTER ACCUSED OF DERELICTION OF DUTY

The Independent reports that Boris Johnson has been accused of  dereliction of duty. He was accused of not doing enough to address Irish Sea trade disruption amid the continued fallout from the European Union’s  botched move to invoke a mechanism to suspend elements of the new trading arrangements. Arlene Foster, Northern Ireland’s first minister, said it was “patronising and offensive” to describe the problems encountered by Northern Ireland businesses and consumers in the wake of Brexit as “teething problems” and she called on the prime minister to act and move immediately to deploy Article 16. It comes after the EU tried to unilaterally suspend part of the Northern Ireland Protocol to prevent the region being used as a backdoor to move vaccines from the bloc into the UK.

 

CRACKING DOWN ON SOUTH AFRICAN VARIANT OF CORONAVIRUS

The Times reports that door-to-door testing of tens of thousands of people has started in an effort to contain the South African variant of coronavirus after studies confirmed it was being passed on in this country. At least 11 cases of the variant have been detected in people with no link to travel to South Africa, and public health officials believe that there are probably now hundreds of cases of community transmission.

 

BBC TORN APART  OVER FAWLTY TOWERS ROW

The Daily Express reports that the BBC was torn apart in a blunt rant by shock comic Frankie Boyle as he blasted the decision to remove Fawlty Towers from streaming services.The comedy, which starred John Cleese wasn’t the only TV show that was reevaluated during the discussions.The debate about Fawlty Towers, which became one of the most high-profile examples during the debate, was fiercely fought on both sides. UKTV, which was set-up by BBC Studios, temporarily removed the show’s 1975 episode The Germans from its streaming platform while it analysed the content.

 

AND FINALLY

From the Independent:The annual garden bird watching  survey run by the RSPB saw a surge in interest from locked-down Britons this weekend. The charity said online participants in the Big Garden Birdwatch on 29 to 31 January, in which people spend an hour watching birds in their garden or balcony and record which species they see, were up 85 per cent on last year’s figures.

The event proved so popular some keen participants reported having trouble logging their results on the website on Sunday. As of 9am on Monday morning, there had also been more than 705,000 blue tits recorded in gardens and more than 652,000 starlings.

 

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