Freedom day
Independent
Boris Johnson has delayed the easing of lockdown restrictions in England until 19 July, as the Delta variant of coronavirus surges. It was “sensible to wait just a little longer”, he said.
The prime minister’s announcement came as analysis showed England’s rate of new infections had climbed to its highest level for more than three months. Some 37,729 new infections were recorded in England in the seven days to 9 June, according to Public Health England.
This is the equivalent of 67.0 cases per 100,000 people, the highest level since 2 March, when the rate stood at 69.6.
And on Monday Public Health England reported that the UK had logged 7,742 new infections in just the last 24 hours – the highest one-day tally since February.
Similar stories appear in Evening Standard, BBC News, Mail , Telegraph
Times
Boris Johnson faces a backlash from all wings of the Conservative Party over his plan to delay the end of coronavirus restrictions by at least a month.
The prime minister will appeal to the nation to be patient when he sets out the case for a delay at a Downing Street press conference this evening.
But Conservative MPs across the party privately accuse Johnson of having lost his nerve, especially after Edward Argar, a health minister, conceded this morning that it was “possible” restrictions could be extended again beyond July 19.
Sir Charles Walker, a leading lockdown-sceptic, said that he now had an “overwhelming sense of pessimism” that coronavirus restrictions would continue into next year.
BBC News
Health Secretary Matt Hancock has insisted he does not expect any further delay to the final easing of coronavirus restrictions in England.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson confirmed on Monday that measures would remain in place until 19 July because of the rapid spread of the Delta variant.
Mr Johnson said that would be the “terminus date” for the remaining restrictions on social contact.
But some Conservative MPs are concerned they could stay in force for longer.
Scientists advising the government had warned of a “significant resurgence” in people needing hospital treatment for Covid-19 if stage four of easing the lockdown went ahead as planned on 21 June.
The prime minister said a four-week delay would allow more people to get vaccinated.
However, a few restrictions are being lifted on 21 June, including the limit on wedding guest numbers – although venues will still have to adhere to social distancing rules.
Hospitality, wedding and night-time entertainment businesses are among those to have criticised the delay.
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Northern Ireland
Express
BRUSSELS has been accused of “weaponising peace” in Northern Ireland with its claim that goods crossing the Northern Ireland border would put the integrity of the entire single market at risk.
The latest data available shows only 0.2 percent of goods imported into the bloc cross the boundary between the Republic of Ireland and the Six Counties. The figure flies in the face of dire warnings coming from Eurocrats for months, suggesting the bloc’s single market would be undermined if checks on goods travelling from Great Britain to Northern Ireland are not carried out.
The EU argues that such measures are necessary to ensure no unauthorised product ends up in the Republic, a member state.
But the likelihood of this happening is slim, as official figures show.
According to Facts4EU.org, 99.8 percent of all the goods imported into the EU in 2019 – the most recent year for which data is available – did not cross the boundary from Northern Ireland.
A report by the website titled “Exposed: How EU has weaponised peace in NI over 1/500th of EU’s goods imports” said: “Put simply, ‘the integrity of the EU single market’ is NOT at risk from goods crossing the NI border.
Similar stories appear in the Guardian, ITV News
Telegraph
Northern Ireland’s most popular supermarkets will be unharmed by any EU ban on British bangers, the Telegraph can reveal, as London and Brussels teeter on the brink of a sausage trade war.
The row totally dominated the G7 meeting in Cornwall, was mentioned at Monday’s NATO summit and risks stoking tensions in Northern Ireland ahead of the marching season.
But Tesco, which boasts 50 stores in Northern Ireland, has only stocked sausages from local suppliers for several years.
Marks and Spencer, which has about 20 stores in the country, also gets its entire chilled sausage stock from Northern Ireland, which means the popular shops are invincible in the face of the threatened ban on imported UK sausages.
Other major supermarkets operating in Northern Ireland, which has a proud sausage making tradition, are believed to source most of their bangers domestically.
“People here like their sausages from the butcher’s and even if they go to the supermarket they’ll go for a local brand like Denny or Cookstown,” butcher Julie Price told the Belfast Live website.
A similar story appears in the Guardian.
Guardian
A dispute between Sinn Féin and the Democratic Unionist party (DUP) over an Irish-language act is threatening to derail the Northern Ireland assembly and executive.
Arlene Foster formally resigned as first minister at 1pm on Monday but a standoff between the two biggest parties at Stormont is blocking her designated successor, Paul Givan, 39, from taking the post.
If Sinn Féin and the DUP do not resolve the crisis within seven days – by 1pm on 21 June – the devolved power-sharing institutions will collapse and there will be an early assembly election.
Edwin Poots, the DUP leader, appeared to harden his position on Monday when he declined to say if Irish-language legislation would happen during this mandate. “Time will tell,” he told BBC Radio Ulster.Sinn Féin has demanded the long-promised legislation as part of the price of rebooting the executive after a change of DUP leadership. It has accused Poots of acting in bad faith.
Similar stories appear in BBC News, GB News
Trade
Times
Boris Johnson and the Australian prime minister, Scott Morrison, will today announce Britain’s first bespoke post-Brexit trade deal.
With most of the deal already agreed, one final key dispute was left to be resolved by the two prime ministers at a dinner in London.
The UK had offered Australia tariff- and quota-free access for beef and lamb exports but demanded a 15-year transition period to give British farmers time to adapt to the increased competition.
However, Australia had rejected this and called for the transition period to be no longer than five years.
One source with knowledge of the talks predicted that the disagreement would not be a “deal breaker” preventing Morrison and Johnson from announcing a deal in principle today. Late last night
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Covid
Independent
More than 40,000 people could die this summer as the Delta variant of coronavirus sweeps through the UK, even after Boris Johnson’s decision to delay the lifting of lockdown restrictions by four weeks to 19 July, scientists have warned.
A paper submitted to the government’s Scientific Advisory Group on Emergencies (Sage) said that a summer wave of infections, hospitalisations and deaths is “likely” whether or not restrictions are lifted because of the highly virulent nature of the variant, but the potential peak death rate could be reduced from 700 to 500 a day by delaying Step 4 of Mr Johnson’s roadmap from the planned date of 21 June.
The prime minister today said he was “confident” that the so-called Freedom Day – when most remaining social distancing rules will be lifted and crowds return to sports fixtures and arts events – will not have to be deferred again beyond 19 July and that it will not be necessary to reimpose any of the curbs on shops and hospitality which have been removed over the past few months.
Similar stories appear in the Telegraph, Sun
EU
Express
THE European Commission is being threatened by a group of international financial investors with a fresh lawsuit that could scupper the bloc’s Recovery Fund in Portugal.
The group of eight international institutional investors called “Recover Portugal” are currently owed £1.7billion (€2billion) by the Bank of Portugal over a lawsuit that began in 2015. The investors are calling on the EU Commission to settle the case on behalf of the Portuguese national bank as they fear failing to do so could jeopardise the EU’s Recovery Fund.
They explain that in order for Brussels to start delivering funds to member states, the bloc will have to borrow money from international investors who will be unwilling to lend funds to an institution that is yet to pay its debts to the sector.
In a joint statement, they said: “It is essential that the law is respected in member states and that there is no political influence.
“We want information about what is happening and to be compensated for what we have lost.”
They also demanded, “guarantees of redress and equitable treatment before considering partial funding of the EU recovery fund”.
Breitbart
European Union leaders reportedly blocked attempts from the United States, Britain, and Canada to call out the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for the use of slave labour in Xinjiang.
EU leaders said that the West should focus on “cooperative” areas with China instead of adversarial elements.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi, and European Union leaders Ursula von der Leyen and Charles Michel opposed efforts to publicly shame the regime in Bejing over forced labour in Xinjiang, The Times reported.
The summary of the G7 communiqué failed to mention China, Xinjiang, or Hong Kong at all and the full 25-page report of the summit’s agreements reportedly had a reference to Xinjiang slavery removed despite pushes from the Americans.
The final version of the G7 communiqué read: “We are concerned by the use of all forms of forced labour in global supply chains, including state-sponsored forced labour of vulnerable groups and minorities, including in the agricultural, solar, and garment sectors.”
Falkland Islands
Express
ARGENTINA’s fixation with the sovereignty of the Falkland Islands is pointless and will achieve nothing except to undermine relations with the UK, a Tory MP has warned after Buenos Aires staked a fresh claim on the remote archipelago.
Andrew Rosindell, who is chairman of the British Overseas Territories All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) spoke out after remarks by Daniel Filmus, Argentina’s Secretary of Affairs pertaining to the Malvinas, accused the UK of “usurping” the Falklands and “plundering” its wealth, with Alberto Fernandez, the country’s Peronist President, also weighing in. The islands, located 400 miles off the South American country in the south Atlantic, were the subject of a short but bloody war between Argentina and the UK in 1982 which was triggering by an invasion ordered by then-leader, military junta General Leopoldo Galtieri.
Despite its defeat, Argentina has never relinquished its claim on the Falklands and has even tried to enlist the support of the United Nations and Josep Borrell, the European Union’s foreign policy supremo, in recent years.
Nevertheless, speaking on the 39th anniversary of the end of the Falklands War, Mr Rosindell, MP for Romford in Essex, said both Mr Fernandez, who has declared sovereignty to be a key policy of his administration, and Mr Filmus, would once again be disappointed.
Mr Rosindell told Express.co.uk: “It would seem to me to be a waste of the time and money of Argentinian taxpayers for there to be a Secretary for Las Malvinas, given the decisive nature in which this issue was resolved, firstly in the 1982 war and secondly in the almost unanimous consent that the Falkland Islanders gave to their continuing status as a British Overseas Territory in the 2013 referendum.
Scotland
Express
AN SNP policy to pay every Scot a Universal Basic Income (UBI) could leave some earners with tax bills as high as 85 percent, a think tank has claimed.
The SNP put the policy in their Social Justice and Fairness Commission report and said it would replace all forms of benefit as well as a state pension. The report did not state how much the policy would cost, which includes two tiers, high and low.
The report said: “Our goal is to eradicate poverty by ensuring everyone in Scotland reaches the agreed minimum income.
“UBI is a potential means through which to achieve this aim.”
But the Fraser of Allander Institute who crunched the numbers for a potential scheme for Scotland said the scheme would be an “expensive policy”.
Free speech
Telegraph
Cambridge University has become embroiled in a new free speech row after a senior don accused the vice-chancellor of suppressing his pro-Brexit article.
Sir Noel Malcolm, an honorary Fellow at three Cambridge colleges, said he was “shocked” at his treatment by the university when he attempted to have an opinion piece published on the Brexit section of their website.
He said he felt compelled to speak out on the matter after several of the university’s academics claimed the vice-chancellor was “committed to championing freedom of expression”.
The group of academics mounted a defence of Prof Stephen Toope in the wake of a separate free speech revolt over a list of “micro-aggressions” published by the university last month.
But writing to The Telegraph, Sir Noel described how his own experience “lies on the contrary side”.
Sir Noel, an expert in early modern intellectual history who was knighted for his services to scholarship, told how he submitted an article about the merits of Brexit for universities in early 2019.
Political correctness
Guido
Another week, yet more politically correct idiots intent on creating headlines. This week Guido brings you news from North Tyneside council where a top council official ordered the Tory offices last week to take down their Union Jacks over concerns that, in a publicly funded building, they are “overtly political”. Guido’s not sure why an unelected council official has any right to dictate how the Tory grouping’s room should be decorated…
Guido’s been sent the message in question from Bryn Roberts, the head of “Law and Governance” at North Tyneside Council, noting the issue and saying he “will make arrangements for them to be removed at the end of the day”
A similar story appears in the Mail.
Its time a few Sage widows were bricked
More sickening stuff from Mayhar Tousi. Apparently and I agree with this, even if Boris Johnson fires Priti Patel over the immigration crisis, it’ll make no difference and someone else will be appointed that will be equally ineffective. It seems that there are just too many laws that need to be changed and absolutely no political will to do so.
“Home Office LIED About Illegal Migration”
Mayhar Tousi
https://youtu.be/j7R0t5PWd4s
Flyer Amazing that you (12,000 miles away and haven’t been in the country for years) seem to be able to grasp the fact that the Tories always talk tough on migration and have no intention of delivering on manifesto promises yet millions of useful idiots here still buy into that kind of guff in their millions. I despair at their credulousness. We have saying around here, ‘If you catch a weasel asleep, piss in its ear’ – and that is what the Tories do with those (except their wealthy sponsors/donors) who foolishly take them at their word.
“Never give a sucker a break” is the Tory party motto.