UK: Ten Things You Need to Know Today: Thursday 1 Mar 2018
The Prime Minister will meet the European Council president, Donald Tusk, today before she makes a major speech on Brexit. The meeting comes after Theresa May talked tough yesterday, saying no UK leader could ever consider having different customs arrangements for Northern Ireland and the rest of the home nations.
Hundreds of drivers were stranded on the M80 between Glasgow and Stirling last night due to heavy snow, with some saying they spent 13 hours in their cars. In Lincolnshire, ploughs failed to clear the A52. Now Storm Emma is approaching the UK from the south-west, bringing blizzard conditions as it hits the ‘Beast from the East’.
Donald Trump has infuriated Republicans and the gun lobby by abruptly shifting position on gun control in the wake of the Florida school shooting. The US President called for tighter background checks before gun sales, taking guns from the mentally ill and restricting access to the young. The Breitbart website called him a “gun grabber”.
A New Zealand teenager tried to shoot and kill the Queen in 1981, newly-declassified documents reveal. Christopher John Lewis was imprisoned for 14 years and killed himself in 1997. It is thought his rifle may not have been sufficiently high-powered for his plan to work, but he fired several shots which the press were told were fireworks.
A six-year-old boy who suffers as many as six epileptic seizures in one day, every seven to 10 days, may be given illegal cannabis oil to help his condition after the policing minister met his parents to discuss the treatment. Alfie Dingley tried medical cannabis in the Netherlands last year and it reduced his attacks to one every 27 days.
A senior lawyer has told The Guardian that the former mayor of London Boris Johnson could be investigated for misconduct if it is shown that his “reckless indifference” led to a waste of public money when the idea of building a ‘garden bridge’ across the Thames was floated. Johnson will answer questions from MPs on the scheme this week.
British firm Dyson, best known for vacuum cleaners, is pushing to construct an electric car by 2020, and is seeking 300 engineers to make the project happen. The privately-owned firm has not yet decided where the cars will be manufactured once they are designed – but the options are said to be Britain, Singapore, Malaysia and China.
A 30-year quest by an Italian musician to track down the songs, symphonies and opera composed by prisoners in Nazi concentration camps, some written on toilet paper, will culminate in a concert next month. Francesco Lotoro has accumulated 8,000 pieces of music – and some of it will be performed for the first time at the event.
The Rolling Stones are still fighting, as well as rocking, after 50 years: guitarist Keith Richards has just apologised rather formally to singer Mick Jagger for calling him a “randy old bastard” in an interview and adding: “It’s time for the snip – you can’t be a father at that age. Those poor kids!” Richards said he “deeply regrets” his words.
New Zealand is planning to release a deadly virus in an effort to curb its out-of-control wild rabbit population. The virus, RHDV1 K5 (K5), is expected to be released at 100 sites in Otago, a region in the south of the country’s South island.
The virus will be unleashed in Otago in late March or April, as part of nation-wide effort aims to decrease the rabbit population by 40%, says The New Zealand Herald. Its effectiveness will then be studied prior to a planned nationwide roll-out.
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