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Chair criticises use of ‘VIP lane’ to prioritise PPE contracts for companies with Tory connections in damning reportBoris Johnson’s government wasted £10bn of public money with the flawed purchasing of personal protective equipment during the coronavirus pandemic, an official inquiry has concluded.The Covid-19 inquiry chair, Heather Hallett, also criticised the then Conservative government’s controversial “VIP lane”, which gave high priority for PPE contracts to companies with politica

Public health advocates warn of conflicts of interests and say panel likely to provide justification for key rollbacksThe Trump administration has stacked a top chemical safety board with industry-aligned scientists who have a range of financial conflicts of interest and stand to profit from deregulation, public health advocates say.The Environmental Protection Agency’s science advisory committee on chemicals (SACC) is slated to review research for dozens of toxic chemicals during the

Exclusive: Campaigners voice concerns over rising costs of £11bn Essex to Kent road tunnelThe UK’s public spending watchdog has said it plans to investigate the Lower Thames Crossing, as campaigners voice concerns over the rising costs of one of the UK’s largest infrastructure projects.The head of the National Audit Office (NAO) said he anticipated the agency would “examine and report” on the planned £11bn road tunnel between Kent and Essex, and that work to monitor the project had alr

New Trump administration rules would undermine longstanding research practices. It’s death by a thousand cutsA politician who aims to gradually privatize and ultimately destroy an institution funded by tax dollars – say, a public school system or public transportation network – may choose to do so by strategically disinvesting resources from that institution until it becomes barely functional, leading users to look elsewhere to meet their needs. Eventually, the user-base of the public

Plans specify tolls must not be compulsory, as US officials urge Iran to make public statement that strait is open and that shipping can safely passEurope is studying proposals that may allow the charging of navigational fees in the strait of Hormuz so long as the tolls are not compulsory and have the support of the UN agency that regulates maritime transport.Britain’s deputy prime minister, David Lammy, said the imposition of compulsory tolls would be disastrous. But some of his cabin

Exclusive: Move comes as allies of Andy Burnham work on proposals to take water companies into public controlMinisters are drawing up plans to set legally binding debt targets for England’s water companies as they look for ways to avoid another corporate failure such as Thames Water.Sources say Emma Reynolds, the environment secretary, is working on proposals that would force companies to keep their debt below certain levels for the first time or face legal punishment. Continue reading

Instagram users should check privacy settings after rollout of new Meta AI image generator, advocates warnMeta has sparked blowback from privacy advocates for allowing its new AI image maker to generate photos of users with public profiles by default.Users of Meta’s Muse Image AI tool, released Tuesday, can tag public Instagram profiles and generate pictures that pull from faces of people featured in these social media posts. Instagram users are not notified when their posts are integr

Whenever major reform is proposed the media, big business and Westminster quickly conclude it’s too expensive and disruptive. This doesn’t bode well for Andy BurnhamIn an old, often anxious and conservative country, the perception of risk is a potent political weapon. If a policy or a project for reforming the UK seems too risky, or can be made to seem so by its opponents, then it can usually be quickly killed off. It can be added to the pile of possible futures that never occurred.In

Ethics and integrity commission chief says overhaul is crucial to help restore trust in standardsAll lobbying of government ministers, aides and senior officials should be publicly declared – from WhatsApp chats to party conference meetings – in a fundamental shake-up of transparency laws, the government’s ethics watchdog has said.A review led by Doug Chalmers, the head of the ethics and integrity commission, has called for a new register to highlight who is lobbying, which policies th

MPs demand publication of full report that outlines catastrophic consequences amid concerns for food securityMembers of parliament have demanded full publication of an explosive report by the UK’s spy leaders that found the collapse of ecosystems overseas would have catastrophic consequences for the UK’s national security, warning that the UK has “no future” if the findings are not urgently acted on.Despite growing concerns for the UK’s food security, likely to be worsened by the third

Exclusive: The details behind the financial transactions that bankers have flagged up to the National Crime AgencyThe rise in public support for Reform UK – and Nigel Farage’s own prediction that he expects to be the UK’s next prime minister – has put the party and its leader in unfamiliar territory.Their policies and candidates are coming under greater scrutiny, and now, so is their funding. Continue reading...

Experts say cuts have hindered the response to DRC’s Ebola outbreak and resulted in ‘significant numbers’ of deathsElon Musk has an Ebola problem. SpaceX stock dropped precipitously after its initial public offering, and Tesla faces a wave of lawsuits. But instead of focusing on his companies, Musk has posted frequently on X about the US Agency for International Development (USAID), which he helped dismantle – or, in his words, feed into the woodchipper – last year.“Elon’s USAID crash-