Image of Alphabeti Spagetti by Steven Feather, Flickr, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has today launched its first strategic market status (SMS) investigation under the new digital markets competition regime which came into force on 1 January 2025. The investigation will assess Google’s position in search and search advertising services and how this impacts consumers and businesses including advertisers, news publishers, and rival search engines.
Google’s search services are a gateway through which millions of people and businesses access and navigate the internet. In the UK, Google accounts for more than 90% of all general search queries, and more than 200,000 UK advertisers use Google’s search advertising.
Special counsel Jack Smith said he believed there was sufficient evidence to convict Trump over his attempts to overturn the 2020 election result. Photograph: The Washington Post/Getty Images
Report by Jack Smith says evidence ‘was sufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction’ had Trump not won re-election in 2024
Donald Trump would have been convicted of crimes over his failed attempt to cling to power in 2020 but for his victory in last year’s US presidential election, according to the special counsel who investigated him.
Jack Smith’s report detailing his team’s findings about Trump’s efforts to subvert democracy was released by the justice department early on Tuesday.
After the insurrection at the US Capitol on 6 January 2021, Smith was appointed as special counsel to investigate Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election. His investigation culminated in a detailed report submitted to the attorney general, Merrick Garland.
In it, Smith asserts that he believes the evidence would have been sufficient to convict Trump in a trial if his success in the 2024 election had not made it impossible for the prosecution to continue.
Just Stop Oil protesters with a police officer outside Westminster Abbey in central London after they spray painted “1.5 is dead” on the grave of Charles Darwin, in the north aisle of the nave of the Abbey, January 13, 2025
JUST STOP OIL activists painted the grave of British naturalist Charles Darwin today to demand an end to reliance on fossil fuels by 2030.
Two activists entered Westminster Abbey and sprayed “1.5 Is Dead” on the grave after it was confirmed that 2024 was the first year on record with a global average temperature exceeding 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.
During the action, the supporters said: “We have passed the 1.5° threshold that was supposed to keep us safe
“Darwin would be turning in his grave to know we are in the midst of the sixth mass extinction.
“The government’s plans will take us to over 3 degrees of warming.
“This will destroy everything we love. World leaders must stop burning oil, gas and coal by 2030.”
Police officers and demonstrators clash during the ‘Luxemburg-Liebknecht-Ehrung 2025’ demonstration in memory of Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht, in Berlin, January 12, 2025
GERMAN police attacked the annual march to the graves of Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht today, targeting marchers expressing solidarity with Palestine.
The second Sunday in January sees a traditional procession from Berlin’s Frankfurt Gate to the Friedrichsfelde cemetery, where a monument marks the graves of communist revolutionaries killed in the struggle, with thousands joining to place red carnations on their graves.
But a Palestine solidarity bloc came under immediate attack as the march moved off, with police charging marchers who chanted “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” and seizing individuals from the crowd to carry off.
Organisers halted the march and called for everyone to close gaps to prevent any bloc being separated and beaten up by police. But officers continued to snatch people from the crowd, saying placards or items of clothing were promoting “unconstitutional” messages, which ranged from expressions of solidarity with Palestine to one member of the German communist youth league being detained for wearing a red triangle, the badge assigned to political prisoners by the Nazis as the yellow star was for Jews.
The emergency department at Midland Metropolitan University Hospital, Smethwick, January 8, 2025
Royal College of Emergency Medicine says advertisement is ‘normalising’ patients being treated in the corridors
A LONDON hospital has advertising for “corridor care” nurses because so many A&E patients are being cared for while waiting for beds or treatment.
The 12-hour shifts were advertised by Whittington hospital in north London.
The Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM) said the advertisement indicated the “normalising” of patients being treated in the corridors of hospital A&E departments.
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Retired paediatrician Dr John Puntis, co-chair of campaign group Keep Our NHS Public, said: “There can be no bleaker illustration of the current state of the NHS than ‘care’ delivered in corridors.
“Winter pressures on an already overstretched service were entirely predictable.
“Six months in power and Labour has done nothing pro-active to alleviate this situation.”
He accused the government of instead “throwing money at the private sector.”
