6:50 am, October 5, 2021
Raab and Patel use Tory conference to set out measures to tackle crime
Senior Tories will focus on law and order issues in the wake of protests on motorways and the brutal murder of Sarah Everard.
Justice Secretary Dominic Raab will use his conference speech in Manchester to announce a major expansion in the number of offenders wearing tags, while Home Secretary Priti Patel will give further details of new powers to tackle Insulate Britain protesters.
Ms Patel will also use her Conservative Party conference address to announce a £15m expansion in testing suspects for drugs on arrest, which could lead them to being given treatment for their addictions.
‘Faulty configuration change’ to blame for outage, Facebook says
Facebook has blamed a ‘faulty configuration change’ for the widespread outage which impacted the social media platform, along with Instagram and WhatsApp, for several hours late on Monday.
The platforms had confirmed on Twitter they were aware of issues and working to resolve them after thousands of people reported outages shortly before 5pm on Monday.
Users were eventually able to access Facebook and Instagram from late on Monday evening, while WhatsApp said its services were ‘back and running at 100 per cent’ as of 3.30am on Tuesday.
Pfizer jab ‘effective at preventing hospital admission for at least six months’
The Pfizer Covid vaccine is highly effective at preventing hospital admission even with the Delta variant, new research shows – though its effectiveness against infection almost halves after six months.
Two doses of the jab are 90 per cent effective against Covid-19 hospital admission for all variants for at least six months, according to the study.
But effectiveness against infection fell over the study period, dropping from 88% within one month after receiving two vaccine doses, to 47 per cent after six months.
Australia to remain closed to international tourists until 2022
International tourists will not be welcomed back to Australia until next year, with the return of skilled migrants and students given higher priority, the prime minister said.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Australia was expected to reach the benchmark of 80 per cent of the population aged 16 and older having a second dose.
Last week, he outlined plans to allow vaccinated citizens and permanent residents to fly overseas from November for the first time since an extraordinarily tough travel ban took effect in March last year.
Britain has 1,782 more million pound streets than a year ago, says Zoopla
There are nearly 1,800 more streets across Britain where the average home is valued at £1m-plus compared with a year ago, analysis has found.
Some 11,673 streets in September 2021 had an average property price of £1m or more, which was 1,782 more than the 9,891 million pound streets in September 2020, Zoopla said.
The South East of England accounts for about half of the increase, with 942 more million pound streets having been created there over the past year, compared with 262 in London.
Monday’s Car Dealer headlines you might have missed
- Tributes pour in as JCT600 founder Jack Tordoff passes away aged 86
- Dodgy dealer sold unroadworthy vehicles with ‘worthless’ warranties and fake service histories
- Citroen takes over 1,000 Ami reservations in less than two weeks
- Nissan dealership provides all-electric van to foodbank in bid to avoid fuel crisis
- International Motors completes takeover of Mitsubishi aftersales business
- Mazda begins taking orders on new CX-5 with prices starting at £27,845
Sunak: I will only cut taxes once nation’s finances are repaired
Rishi Sunak has told Tory activists that he would only consider cutting taxes once the public finances are on a ‘sustainable footing’ following the coronavirus crisis.
The Chancellor, who has faced criticism from Tory allies and political opponents over the scale of the tax burden, said it would be ‘immoral’ to borrow more as he defended his approach.
But he also used his Conservative conference speech to paint an optimistic picture about the country’s future, promising to put the UK at the forefront of the artificial intelligence revolution with new scholarships and research placements.
Star Trek’s Captain Kirk to rocket into space
Star Trek’s Captain Kirk is rocketing into space this month – boldly going where no other sci-fi actors have gone.
Jeff Bezos’ space travel company, Blue Origin, announced that William Shatner will blast off from West Texas on October 12.
‘Yes, it’s true; I’m going to be a ‘rocket man!’ the 90-year-old tweeted. He added: ‘It’s never too late to experience new things.’
Honda confirms 2022 launch for new Civic Type R
Honda has announced that its latest Civic Type R will arrive next year.
It’s the first time that the company has confirmed the existence of a new model, though has been very limited with any details surrounding the upcoming Type R.
In a small post, Honda revealed just two pictures of the new model wearing heavy camouflage, along with the caption ‘Development of the best performing Honda Civic Type R continues’.
FTSE 100 struggles in poor day for European markets
The FTSE 100 closed in the red yesterday as markets across Europe endured a poor start to the week.
The British stock index fell by 16.06 on Monday (0.23 per cent) to close the day at 7,011.01.
Elsewhere the German Dax dropped by 0.79 per cent to 15,036.55 and the French Cac experience a 0.61 per cent fall to 6,477.66.
Heavy rainfall expected
Today, much of northern England and Wales will see spells of heavy rain. Elsewhere, it should remain mostly dry with some brighter intervals, but a chance of rain in eastern parts of Scotland, reports the BBC.
Tonight, it will remain largely dry under mostly clear skies. However, spells of rain will linger for a time in north-east and eastern parts of England before clearing into the North Sea.
Tomorrow will bring a dry and bright start for most areas, but it will remain mostly cloudy in N Ireland as a band of patchy rain arrive into the afternoon, and then western Scotland later.
