Ten Things You Need to Know Today: 6 January 2023

1. Explosive Prince Harry claims

A series of eye-catching claims and accusations from Prince Harry’s autobiography, Spare, have been leaked. Harry recalled how he and his brother Prince William begged their father not to marry Camilla, fearing she would become a “wicked stepmother”, admitted to cocaine use and claimed that he killed 25 Taliban fighters while serving in Afghanistan. He also said he lost his virginity in field behind a pub with a woman who treated him “like a stallion” and then slapped him on the bottom.

Spare: the leaks, the quotes, the damage

2. Nurses ‘ready to compromise’

The general secretary of Britain’s nursing union has said she is willing to “meet the government halfway” over pay. Pat Cullen, of the Royal College for Nursing, said nurses “understand the economic climate that we’re working in” and would consider a settlement of 10% if ministers hold talks. The union had previously insisted on a 19% pay rise. “Look, let’s discuss it, is what I would say. Let’s get in and set out our stalls,” Cullen told Times Radio.

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NHS in crisis: how can we fix the health service?

3. Flu leading to high deaths

Britain is “in the grip of its worst flu season for a decade” leading to hundreds of deaths, according to new data. Hospital admissions in the week before Christmas were 50% higher than they were at the peak of the last bad flu season, in 2017-18, when 22,000 people are believed to have died. In the week that ended on December 23, hospital admissions were up by 40%. Of the excess 2,493 deaths, only 429 were linked with Covid, with the collapse in NHS emergency care and rising flu cases blamed for others.

The future of the flu

4. Inflation ‘slowly reversing’

The inflation crisis is coming to an end, the chief executive of Next has predicted. “We can see inflation in garments coming down,” said Simon Wolfson. “What we can see at the moment, because we’re negotiating for stock to be delivered in five to six months’ time... is the things that cause our prices to go up in the first place, all are slowly reversing,” he added. The Telegraph said the news would be a “boon for millions of consumers suffering from price rises”.

Inflation forecast: will it rise or fall in 2023?

5. McCarthy fails again

The Republican leader of the House of Representatives, Kevin McCarthy, has failed in his latest bid to be elected Speaker after a group of right-wing rebels derailed an 11th attempt to elect him on the third day of voting. The “paralysis of US government” has “not seen since the pre-Civil War era”, said the BBC. CNN added that McCarthy, the “first major GOP leader to embrace ex-President Donald Trump after the January 6, 2021, insurrection” is “being consumed by the MAGA politics he helped push”.

Republican leader Kevin McCarthy fails to gain support of own party

6. Anger over anti-strike plan

The government’s proposed new anti-strike legislation to enforce “minimum service levels” in key public sectors including the NHS and schools has drawn “fury”, said The Guardian. The law would allow health, education, fire, ambulance, rail and nuclear bosses to sue unions and sack employees if minimum levels are not met. “Whatever the latest scheme the government comes up with to attack us, unions will continue to defend workers,” said the Unite union. Keir Starmer said he would repeal the anti-trade union legislation if Labour formed the next government.

OCT 2022: The right to strike: are minimum service levels needed?

7. Kyiv rejects truce call

Ukraine has rejected Vladimir Putin’s call for a Christmas truce. The Russian president Vladimir Putin has ordered his defence minister to impose a 36-hour ceasefire on the Ukrainian frontline, to coincide with the Russian Orthodox Christmas. However, Ukraine’s presidential adviser, Mykhailo Podolyak, said there could be no “temporary truce” and called it a “propaganda gesture” and a “trivial ploy”. In his nightly video address, Volodymyr Zelensky said that Russia wanted to use the truce as a cover to stop Ukrainian advances in the eastern Donbas region.

Can Ukraine win war in the skies with Russia?

8. Record wind power in 2022

The National Grid said that Britain produced a record amount of wind-powered electricity in 2022. On a single day in November, more than 70% of electricity was produced by wind, or around 20GW - “enough power to heat about 1700 homes for a year”, noted the BBC. However, said Jess Ralston, head of energy at the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit, an effective ban on onshore wind has hampered progress. “Our old-fashioned energy grid urgently needs investment to maximise the opportunity that wind and solar offer to continue to reduce bills,” she said.

Pros and cons of onshore wind farms

9. Tate ‘tattooed his sex workers’

Young women working at Andrew Tate’s online sex business were tattooed with the words “owned by Tate”, according to reports. It was also claimed yesterday that the controversial online influencer moved to Romania while being investigated in the UK for an alleged rape and throttling. Tate, now 36, who shot to fame in 2016 as a contestant on Channel 5’s Big Brother reality show, denies any wrongdoing.

Andrew Tate: the ‘king of toxic masculinity’ accused of human trafficking and rape

10. Pret declares war on Greggs

Pret a Manger has launched a price-cutting initiative in the face of the cost of living crisis, said The Times. The chain’s Made Simple range includes eight sandwiches for as low as £2.99, a move “bound to spark a price war” with its rival Greggs as both companies “stare down the barrel of double-digit inflation”, said The Times. The paper noted that Pret will still be more expensive than Greggs, which sells a tuna crunch baguette for just £2.75. Pret’s £5 meal deal is also more expensive than Tesco’s £3.90 sandwich, drink and snack meal offer.