16 h. ago Britain's most extreme cleaner has made millions taking jobs 'no

Growing up on a Welsh farm, Ben Giles, 49, realised clean-up jobs other people said no to he could cope with, sparking a lucrative career in biohazard cleaning.

Politics

39 h. ago Trump sends dark bloodbath warning as millions of jobs hang in balance and hatchet man slashes billions in blue states

Director of the Office of Management and Budget Russell Vought - the architect of Project 2025 - has taken center stage since the shutdown began on Wednesday.

Events

42 h. ago ‘We called ourselves the lifeboat crew’: how fired USAID workers launched a rescue project ‘to save as many babies as we can’

After the Trump administration closed the organisation down, a group of former staff secured new funding for almost 80 programmes, benefiting an estimated 40 million peopleThey call themselves the “lifeboat crew”. After losing their jobs abruptly when the Trump administration slashed US overseas aid earlier this year, a group of dedicated workers decided to launch their own rescue package.Refusing to “wallow in misery”, Rob Rosenbaum, a former USAID economist, and a group of like-minded former agency staff began efforts to save some of the vital programmes that faced closure after the cuts. Continue reading...

Events

2 d. ago Destination unlimited: our campaign smashes through the £1 million mark

Ant and Dec back the Standard’s drive with King’s Trust to help the young find jobs

Economics

1 week ago Legal groups resist Trump authoritarian moves with pro bono work

Groups of lawyers battling to get clients’ jobs back, avoid prosecutions or recoup money that has been illegally blockedAs the Trump administration has fired federal employees and top officials for political reasons, blocked millions of dollars Congress appropriated and flouted legal norms, several legal outfits are providing crucial pro bono and other help to many individuals hurt by Donald Trump’s authoritarian actions, say lawyers involved and ex-prosecutors.Lowell & Associates, Democracy Defenders Fund and the Washington Litigation Group, are among the leading legal groups with clients battling to get their jobs back, avoid prosecutions, or recoup millions of dollars that have been illegally blocked, say attorneys with the trio and experts. Continue reading...

Politics

1 week ago The human stain remover: what Britain’s greatest extreme cleaner learned from 25 years on the job | Tom Lamont

From murder scenes to whale blubber, Ben Giles has seen it – and cleaned it – all. In their stickiest hours, people rely on him to restore orderWhen the entrance to a theatre in London’s West End was discovered to be smeared with blood and faeces one day in March, a distress call went out to the headquarters of Ben Giles, a 49-year-old veteran of the extreme clean, who is based in Cardigan in Wales. Decades earlier, as a young know-nothing, hired by police to clean vehicles, Giles laboured for hours to remove fingerprint dust from the interior of a stolen car – work that now, with the experience of innumerable litter-dashed, liquid-sodden, gunge-roped scenes, would take him about 30 minutes. Job by job, he figured out when to scrape or sand, soak or fog, preserve or dispose. Boilersuited and plastic booted, Giles learned how to eliminate most evidence of spillages, collisions, protests, haemorrhages, severings, explosions, fires and floods, becoming a self-taught stain savant, a wal...

Politics

1 week ago DWP to start contacting all those on sickness benefits with 'new plan'

Millions of people on illness benefits will be regularly contacted by jobcentre staff for the first time, under a government plan to reduce the cost of benefits

Politics

2 w. ago Springfield Properties to tap into Scotland’s green jobs boom as pre

“We are very excited about the prospects in the north of Scotland, in particular, and we continue to look to the future with great confidence” – Innes Smith, CEO

Society

2 w. ago ‘One jab will do the job’: Pakistan begins rollout of HPV vaccine to millions of girls

Despite vaccination hesitancy, the end may be in sight for cervical cancer, which kills 64% of women with the diseaseThe questions come fast and furious: “Why only girls?”, “will it affect her periods?”, “can it cause infertility?”, “is it halal?” Inside the airy sports hall of Khatoon-e-Pakistan government girls’ school, the pupils in their crisp blue and white uniforms whisper among themselves, as their parents listen attentively to the health officials taking the session.While there are some fathers in the chairs laid out for the occasion, the majority are mothers. The groundwork is under way ahead of Pakistan’s first nationwide rollout of the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination campaign. Continue reading...

Politics

3 w. ago Weight loss drugmaker to slash 9,000 jobs in £926 million cost cut

Novo Nordisk was at one point last year Europe's most valuable listed company

Economics