Author: Blake Anderson

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.The national health service in England has spent billions rolling out electronic patient records and yet large numbers of frontline staff are unable to use them effectively, according to think-tank research. A small number of NHS organisations are struggling to use EPRs at all and “many more aren’t yet using these systems to their full potential”, the Health Foundation said in a report on Wednesday. Health secretary Wes Streeting has made transitioning the NHS from “analogue to digital” one of the three “big shifts”…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Dan Norris, a Labour MP and mayor of the West of England, has been arrested on suspicion of sexual offences and rape.The Labour party said it had suspended the MP for North East Somerset and Hanham on Saturday after it learned of his arrest. Avon and Somerset Police said that a man in his 60s was arrested on Friday and had since been released on conditional bail.The force said in a statement: “In December 2024, we received a referral from another police…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Sanctioned Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska has asked London’s High Court to compel the intelligence arm of Sir Lynton Crosby’s CT Group to reveal information about the source of an allegedly forged document.The application, filed on Tuesday, names as respondents: CT Solutions & Private Advisory, the unit’s founder Eugene Curley, and Leah James, the company’s former global head of intelligence.The case highlights how London’s courts have remained at least partially open to Russia’s wealthiest businessmen despite sanctions being imposed after Moscow’s full-scale invasion…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.A government scheme to boost the provision of dental care across England has “comprehensively failed” and actually resulted in fewer new patients seeing an NHS dentist, according to an influential cross-party group of MPs. A damning report by the House of Commons public accounts committee (PAC) on Friday warned that the last Conservative government’s “dental recovery plan” has exacerbated the crisis facing the sector. In February last year, ministers vowed to create an additional 2.5mn appointments and allocated £200mn towards their plan…

Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for freeYour guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the worldSir Keir Starmer claimed on Wednesday that his patient diplomacy with Donald Trump had been vindicated, after the US president slapped a 10 per cent “reciprocal” tariff on UK exports, half the EU’s 20 per cent rate.Downing Street said the prime minister’s approach had saved thousands of jobs, but Starmer will now continue to negotiate a UK-US trade deal which he hopes will ultimately cut the US tariff on British exports.Number 10 was relieved that Trump had spared Britain the…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Britain’s two leading environmental protection and conservation agencies will be set new objectives to ensure they are not “blocking” development or nature restoration projects, the government will announce on Wednesday.The Environment Agency (EA) and Natural England will be given clear remits by environment secretary Steve Reed to work for the public and not “get in the way of progress”.“We will be working with those regulators and others to make sure they are prioritising economic growth,” Reed said in an interview.The EA is…

UK consumers are about to be hit by a series of price increases from this month, in what parts of the British media are dubbing “awful April”. Increases to water, energy and telecoms bills will push up inflation, even as chancellor Rachel Reeves’ £25bn boost to employers’ national insurance kicks in, leading employers both to raise prices and to curb wages.Kemi Badenoch, Conservative party leader, will cite the price increases as she attacks the Labour government, warning that the “true cost of Rachel Reeves will really hit home with a vicious cocktail of bill increases and price rises”. Mel Stride, shadow…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.An artificial intelligence tool to mark schoolchildren’s homework is being developed using a trove of UK government data, ahead of plans to sell public records including health information within a decade. A new government scheme has pooled public documents such as curriculum guidance, lesson plans and anonymised pupil assessments, which are now being used to train AI models, including one that can mark children’s work and provide detailed feedback. The “content store” — created by UK company Faculty AI with £4mn of…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.The UK government should replace the windfall tax on oil and gas “as soon as practicable”, a business-led task force has said, warning the window of opportunity to secure the future of the North Sea is “closing fast”. The North Sea Transition Taskforce, backed by the British Chambers of Commerce, said ministers have chosen to “wait too long” with their decision to replace the “flawed” energy profits levy in 2030. The current effective tax rate of 78 per cent on oil and…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Ministers plan to cancel thousands of UK government credit cards in response to concerns about waste after spending on these accounts quadrupled in the past five years to £675mn.The government will freeze around 20,000 so-called procurement cards, which have been handed out to officials in Whitehall departments and agencies since their introduction in 1997 to purchase necessary, lower value goods and services.Officials will have to reapply for the taxpayer-funded cards and make the case for retaining them, with around half expected to…