6:43 am, July 24, 2023
First flights due to rescue British holidaymakers fleeing Rhodes wildfires
The first repatriation flights are due to arrive on fire-ravaged Rhodes to rescue British holidaymakers stuck in a ‘living nightmare’.
Airline easyJet will operate two rescue flights totalling 421 seats on Monday and a third on Tuesday, in addition to its nine scheduled flights to the Greek island.
A British Foreign Office spokesman confirmed a Rapid Deployment Team had arrived on Rhodes to support travel operators in bringing Britons home.
Sunak confirms new housing to be focused in cities as Gove announces reforms
The prime minister said the bulk of Britain’s new homes will be built in major cities as he vowed not to ‘concrete over the countryside’.
Ahead of planning reforms due to be announced by housing secretary Michael Gove, Rishi Sunak has confirmed that the Conservative Westminster government is on course to meet its target of building one million homes between 2019-24.
Sunak, who is due to visit the West Midlands, and Gove are expected to provide more details on Monday about plans to prioritise house building in inner city areas.
PM told to ‘rethink’ green targets as ministers vow to shield public from costs
Ministers have vowed to protect consumers from ‘any rising costs’ associated with green policies as Conservative MPs called for a ‘rethink’ over the pace of change to reach net zero.
Right-wing Tories are urging the prime minister to review the deadlines around environmental measures after voter concerns about the expansion of London’s ultra low emission zone (Ulez) helped the party hang on to Boris Johnson’s old Uxbridge and South Ruislip during last week’s by-election.
The result has given the governing party hope that its chances of pulling off a shock general election victory are not over if it can focus on issues where there is a clear divide with Labour.
Banks to be summoned to discuss reforms after Farage-Coutts account closure row
A Treasury minister is reportedly to warn banks he will ‘take all action necessary’ to crack down on accounts being closed in response to customers’ political views.
Andrew Griffith, economic secretary to the Treasury, is set, according to several reports, to send a letter to 19 bank chiefs on Monday inviting them for a meeting regarding changes the government is making to better protect customers.
It comes after former UK Independence Party (Ukip) leader Nigel Farage discovered his bank account was shut down by private bank Coutts, owned by NatWest Group, because it found his public statements did ‘not align’ with its values.
Scottish Labour warns home ownership will become unaffordable as prices soar
Scottish Labour has warned that home ownership is becoming ‘out of reach’ as house prices and interest rates soar.
The party was reacting to figures revealed by the Office for National Statistics, which showed the average house prices in Scotland rose by £23,929 between May 2021 and May 2023. The Bank of England’s interest rate also increased from 0.1 per cent to 4.5 per cent.
The Labour party warned that mortgages have risen to their highest point in 15 years and said, due to the increase, homeowners could pay an average of £500 more per month. The party called on Holyrood and Westminster to offer more support to people through the price increase.
Barbie takes US box office crown and Oppenheimer soars in ‘historic’ weekend
Barbenheimer, the social media-fuelled fusion of Greta Gerwig’s Barbie and Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer brought moviegoers back to US cinemas in record numbers this weekend.
Warner Bros’s Barbie claimed the top spot with 155m dollars (£120m) in ticket sales from North American cinemas from 4,243 locations, surpassing The Super Mario Bros Movie as well as every Marvel movie this year as the biggest opening of the year and breaking the first weekend record for a film directed by a woman.
Universal’s Oppenheimer also soared past expectations, taking in 80.5m dollars (£62.6m) from 3,610 cinemas in the US and Canada, marking Nolan’s biggest non-Batman debut and one of the best starts for an R-rated biographical drama.
Elon Musk shares plans to replace Twitter bird logo with an X
Twitter owner Elon Musk appears to have suggested he will replace the social media platform’s bird logo with an X.
The Tesla and SpaceX founder, who bought the company in October, tweeted on Sunday morning: ‘And soon we shall bid adieu to the twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds’, before quickly adding: ‘If a good enough X logo is posted tonight, we’ll make go live worldwide tomorrow’.
The blue logo, known as Larry the Bird, has been Twitter’s emblem since its creation in 2006, with the current design in use since 2012.
Weather
A band of heavy showers will clear in southern England this morning, reports BBC Weather. Cloud will take the place of the rain, though, while the rest of the country will see patchier cloud, sunny spells and the odd shower. A cool 20 degrees expected today in the south-east; mid-teens elsewhere.
Tonight, showers for north-western Scotland and eastern England. Clear spells with variable cloud elsewhere.
