British Isles

Northern Ireland: discussions to restore devolution

09 Jan 2020
Northern Ireland has been without a devolved government for three years. Proposed legislation for an Irish language act and reforming the assembly's controversial veto system are among the key sticking points in ongoing…

FA urged to reconsider deal with betting firm

09 Jan 2020
Culture secretary Nicky Morgan has said that she hopes the Football Association will ‘reconsider’ after it allowed a betting company to broadcast FA Cup matches, more than two years after it had said…

Intercessor Focus: praying for 2020

03 Jan 2020
Pray for Brexit leavers and remainers to end enmity and rebuild a genuinely United Kingdom. Boris Johnson has an 80-seat majority; may his government members speak with strong voices in Brussels and achieve…

Civil service changes

03 Jan 2020
Government officials could face exams in a bid to end an environment where civil servants change jobs regularly and ‘almost no one is ever fired’, in an organisation of which some say ‘failure…

British pastor and children drown

03 Jan 2020
Olubunmi Diya is mourning after her daughter Comfort (9), son Praise-Emmanuel (16), and husband Pastor Gabriel (52) drowned in a hotel swimming pool on Christmas Eve. Olubunmi said she believed something was wrong…

BBC ‘a secular church’

03 Jan 2020
Conservative peer Charles Moore, as a guest editor on Radio 4's Today programme, said the BBC has a liberal bias: ‘What I am objecting to is preaching.’ He said the BBC is a…

Youngsters with knives at school

03 Jan 2020
Between April 2017 and December 2019, Kent police investigated 109 children for possessing, or threatening with, an offensive weapon or blade at school. Two children, aged seven and nine, were not prosecuted for…

Personal debt crisis

03 Jan 2020
Britain's personal debt mountain is growing. Households borrowed an extra £20bn on credit cards and have £45bn more personal debt than they did a decade ago – an increase of 25%. In 2019,…

Church discourages bias against women

03 Jan 2020
CofE staff are being given ‘unconscious bias training’ in a bid to see an equal gender split across its leadership by 2030. The Bishop of London, Sarah Mullally, said, 'I certainly think that…

Cyprus: rape case

03 Jan 2020
UK foreign secretary Dominic Raab expressed ‘serious concern’ about a possible miscarriage of justice by a Cypriot court convicting a British teenager of lying about being gang-raped on holiday. The 19-year-old originally told…