2 h. ago ‘Treated like shirkers’: German unions cry foul over Merz’s sick

Opponents say proposal to end sick notes issued over phone would fill up doctors’ waiting rooms unnecessarilyA German proposal to end the right to get short-term sick leave from a doctor over the telephone as a means of cracking down on skiving has met with outcry from labour groups and the medical profession.Germans enjoy some of the most generous employee illness policies in Europe, a fact the conservative chancellor, Friedrich Merz, says is undermining efforts to kickstart the EU’s biggest economy, whose growth has largely stalled since 2022. Continue reading...

Politics

2 h. ago Germany’s plan to axe sick notes given over phone meets outcry from unions and medics

Opponents say proposal, designed to tackle employee skiving, would fill up doctors’ waiting rooms unnecessarilyA German proposal to end the right to get short-term sick leave from a doctor over the telephone as a means of cracking down on skiving has met with an outcry from labour groups and the medical profession.Germans enjoy some of the most generous employee illness policies in Europe, a fact the conservative chancellor, Friedrich Merz, says is undermining efforts to kickstart the EU’s biggest economy, whose growth has largely stalled since 2022. Continue reading...

Politics

5 d. ago Generation Monologue: How the voice note killed the art of conversation

This way of communicating took off during the pandemic and never left. But as broadcasting our thoughts becomes the norm, Helen Coffey wonders whether we’ve forgotten how to just talk to each other

Events

1 week ago Russian who fled Putin dies in mystery window fall as cryptic note found on phone

Exiled journalist Evgeny Safronov, 38, fled Russia amid Vladimir Putin's crackdown on press freedom - and has now been found dead after falling from the window of his flat

Events

4 w. ago ‘I wouldn’t answer Stephen Graham’s calls’: Erin Doherty on dreams, danger and ghosting Adolescence’s creator

She won an Emmy for her electric performance in the Netflix smash hit, but the casting process wasn’t exactly hiccup-free. The actor opens up about a year of success, struggle – and how she nearly became a footballerFor a while, Erin Doherty ignored Stephen Graham’s calls. Not deliberately, she stresses with a laugh. “I’m just really bad at my phone. I’m such a technophobe, and he knew that,” she says. They had made the Disney+ show A Thousand Blows together, in which Doherty plays an East End crime boss in Victorian London, and Graham had talked about an idea he wanted to dramatise, about a teenage boy who is catastrophically radicalised by online misogyny. A couple of months after they’d wrapped A Thousand Blows, Graham and his wife and producing partner, Hannah Walters, kept trying to get in touch. “I was getting voice notes from him and Hannah being like, ‘Erin, pick up your phone!’” Doherty’s girlfriend told her to ring him back and Graham offered her the role in Adolescence. S...

Politics

last month Rugby brain injury case suffers huge blow after judge rejects court appeal

Up to 80% of league and 20% of union claims face strike-outAppeal over medical record disclosure denied on all groundsTwo appeals launched by the legal firm representing former players in rugby league and rugby union have both been denied in a significant blow to the ongoing legal action about brain damage caused by the sport. It means that after five years of legal arguments a large number of the claimants in both codes face the risk of having their cases struck out before they come to trial.The appeal judge, Mr Justice Dexter Dias, ruled that the judge presiding over the management of the case, Senior Master Jeremy Cook, had been right to find that the claimants firm, Rylands Garth, had failed to fulfil its obligations to disclose necessary medical material to the defendants, World Rugby, the Wales Rugby Union, and the Rugby Football Union in one case, and the Rugby Football League in the other. Continue reading...

Events

last month Rugby brain injury case suffers blow after judge rejects court appeal

Up to 80% of league and 20% of union claims face strike-outAppeal over medical record disclosure denied on all groundsTwo appeals launched by the legal firm representing former players in rugby league and rugby union have both been denied in a significant blow to the ongoing legal action about brain damage caused by the sport. It means that after five years of legal arguments a large number of the claimants in both codes face the risk of having their cases struck out before they come to trial.The appeal judge, Mr Justice Dexter Dias, ruled that the judge presiding over the management of the case, Senior Master Jeremy Cook, had been right to find that the claimants firm, Rylands Garth, had failed to fulfil its obligations to disclose necessary medical material to the defendants, World Rugby, the Wales Rugby Union, and the Rugby Football Union in one case, and the Rugby Football League in the other. Continue reading...

Events

last month Rugby brain injury case suffers blow after judge rejects court appeals

Up to 80% of league and 20% of union claims could be struck outAppeals over medical record disclosure denied on all groundsTwo appeals launched by the legal firm representing former players in rugby league and rugby union have been denied in a significant blow to the ongoing legal action about brain damage caused by the sport. It means that after five years of legal arguments a large number of the claimants in both codes face the risk of having their cases struck out before they come to trial.The appeal judge, Lord Justice Dias, ruled that the judge presiding over the management of the case, Senior Master Jeremy Cook, had been right to find that the claimants’ firm, Rylands Garth, had failed to fulfil its obligations to disclose necessary medical material to the defendants, World Rugby, the Wales Rugby Union, and the Rugby Football Union in one case, and the Rugby Football League in the other. Continue reading...

Events