Lisa Nandy announces plan to restore charities to ‘centre of national life’
Care home chain Care UK sold to US property investment company
One of Britain’s largest care home chains, Care UK, has been sold to an American property investment company, the Guardian can reveal, in a deal that comes as private providers lobby the government for a greater role in the NHS.Care UK, which operates more than 150 residential homes for older people, has been the subject of sale speculation since 2018.The private equity firm Bridgepoint Advisers, which paid £420m for the company in 2010, had previously tried and failed to sell the chain, which employs about 10,500 staff and was founded in 1982. It said in its 2019 accounts that it had spent £2.5m on financial advice for an “abortive” sale process
UK firms in ‘significant financial distress’ hits record levels; Gold rises over $2,700/ounce – as it happened
A record number of UK firms are fighting for their financial survival as the uncertain economic outlook hits business confidence.Restructuring specialist Begbies Traynor has reported that there were 632,756 UK businesses in ‘significant’ financial distress in the third quarter of this year – a 32% rise compared with a year earlier.Significant’ financial distress increased in almost every one of the sectors covered by the latest Red Flag Alert survey.It rose particularly rapidly among utilities companies (+19.3%), food & drug retailers (+10
Quit if you don’t like our office-working policy, Amazon executive suggests
A senior Amazon executive has suggested that staff who do not like the company’s new five-days-a-week office-working policy should quit.The head of the tech company’s cloud computing business told an internal meeting that if employees did not support the change they could look for a job elsewhere, according to a transcript reviewed by Reuters.Matt Garman, the chief executive of the Amazon Web Services (AWS) unit, said nine out of 10 workers he had spoken to supported the policy, which is effective for all office-based staff from 2 January, barring those with exceptional circumstances.He indicated that anyone unhappy with the retreat from home-working should leave. “If there are people who just don’t work well in that environment and don’t want to, that’s OK, there are other companies around,” said Garman, in the comments reported by Reuters
AI-generated child sexual abuse imagery reaching ‘tipping point’, says watchdog
Child sexual abuse imagery generated by artificial intelligence tools is becoming more prevalent on the open web and reaching a “tipping point”, according to a safety watchdog.The Internet Watch Foundation said the amount of AI-made illegal content it had seen online over the past six months had already exceeded the total for the previous year.The organisation, which runs a UK hotline but also has a global remit, said almost all the content was found on publicly available areas of the internet and not on the dark web, which must be accessed by specialised browsers.The IWF’s interim chief executive, Derek Ray-Hill, said the level of sophistication in the images indicated that the AI tools used had been trained on images and videos of real victims. “Recent months show that this problem is not going away and is in fact getting worse,” he said
New York Liberty 80-82 Minnesota Lynx: WNBA finals Game 4 – as it happened
First, the glass-half-empty way of looking at it …Breanna Stewart and Sabrina Ionescu struggled. A lot. They finished the game shooting 10-for-36. From 3-point range: 0-for-9. Stewart still had a double-double with 11 and 11, including six offensive rebounds
New Zealand beat West Indies by eight runs: Women’s T20 World Cup semi-final – as it happened
New Zealand are into their first Women’s T20 World Cup final since 2010 after withstanding an all-round onslaught from Deandra Dottin to claim a tense eight-run win over the West Indies.Dottin shone to dump out England in what was effectively a quarter-final this week and claimed four for 22 as New Zealand put up 128 for nine after deciding to bat first on another clammy evening in Sharjah.After New Zealand spinner Eden Carson claimed the wickets of Qiana Joseph, Shemaine Campbelle and Stafanie Taylor, and captain Hayley Matthews holed out off Lea Tahuhu, the Windies were on 55 for four in the 11th over.Dottin, though, muscled three sixes in an over off Tahuhu to bring the equation down to 34 off 24 balls, only to then top-edge a sweep off Amelia Kerr to depart for 33 off just 22 deliveries.West Indies needed 11 off the last five balls but Suzie Bates, bowling her first over of the tournament, held her nerve, castling Zaida James to ultimately seal victory for the White Ferns
Bella Freud’s Marks & Spencer collection sells out in a day
This couple has re-created the sights and smells of a Senegalese market in Brooklyn: ‘Experiences keep people coming back’
Retail sales growth slows in Great Britain despite tech spending lift
Companies House to stop fraudsters joining up under fake names like ‘Darth Vader’
New ‘buy now, pay later’ rules to protect UK shoppers from 2026
ECB cuts interest rates to support flagging eurozone economy