No 10 has no immediate plans to subsidise the cost of plug-in solar panels which go on sale on Thursday, but suggested local authorities and charities would be able to do so.
The panels, which are plugged directly into a mains socket like any other device and then placed on balconies and outdoor spaces, are officially made legal on Thursday and will be stocked by major retailers priced at up to £600.
Asked by The i Paper if subsidies would be available for poorer households, energy minister Martin McCluskey appeared to leave the door open, saying there were no plans “at the moment”.
How Birmingham could become Britain’s first 20mph city
Implementing a 20mph speed limit on Birmingham’s non-A-class roads would be a “life-saving measure”, a West Midlands transport boss has said.
What you need to know
The roads included in the new speed limit scheme would be B, C and unclassified routes within city confines.
Birmingham City Council has been considering the measure since it declared a road safety emergency in 2024, but plans would need to go through consultation. Mat MacDonald, road safety commissioner for the region, says he backs the idea.
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A closer look at the detail
Speaking to BBC Radio , MacDonald said the measure could stop tragedies such as the death of six-year-old Bobby Colleran, who was hit by a van in Liverpool in 2014.
- “We know that if that van had been travelling at 20 rather than 30mph, which was the speed limit of that road… on a balance of probabilities he would still be alive today,” he said.
Would the new measure work?
The introduction of the same limit in Wales in 2024 saw around 100 fewer people being killed or seriously injured on relevant routes in its first year.
Birmingham City Council has recently reaffirmed its stance on the measures by putting them in its Local Plan – a document setting out how it can help influence the city’s future.
The student bank account perks – from takeaways to extra cash
Students soon to start their first year of university could snag themselves some extras and freebies by signing up to a student bank account.
Lloyds and Nationwide
With Lloyds, students can get a £100 sign-up bonus and up to £120 worth of Deliveroo vouchers if they meet certain conditions. Nationwide offers the same, but instead provide Just Eat vouchers.
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Bank of Scotland and Natwest
If you open an account with Bank of Scotland and pay in at least £500 by 30 October, you’ll receive £100 in November. Then, you’ll get a £20 Deliveroo voucher for each month between November and April that you make 20 or more valid debit card transactions.
At NatWest, students get a welcome bonus of £100 and a four-year Tastecard for restaurant discounts. This card offers discounts on eating out, takeaways and entertainment.
What do other banks offer?
- Santander students have access to a four-year railcard and cashback and reward schemes.
- HSBC students get some discounts through their Home & Away scheme and access to a 5 per cent AER regular saver.
- Starling offers a £50 Amazon gift card for students signing up and entry into a prize draw.
- Barclays doesn’t offer extra perks, but offers an interest-free overdraft of up to £1,500.
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What about overdrafts?
Most of the banks listed offer interest-free overdrafts. The most you can get is £3,250 from your third year onwards with NatWest.
Starling, however, does charge interest on its overdraft. When signing up for a student account, be sure to check the terms and conditions.
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Sterling charged with dangerous driving – what we know
Former England footballer Raheem Sterling has been charged with dangerous driving and possession of nitrous oxide for wrongful inhalation after crashing into barriers on the M3 motorway.
Court date set
No other vehicles were involved in the crash. The 31-year-old was also charged with failing to provide a specimen.
- Sterling was arrested in May after he was filmed swerving his £270,000 Lamborghini and was released on bail. He is due to appear in court on 15 September.
Sterling’s career so far
Sterling enjoyed enormous success during his career in England, winning the Premier League four times with Manchester City and scoring 20 goals in 82 appearances for England.
His career took a sharp turn after he moved to Chelsea in 2022, after which he joined Dutch club Feyenoord last season. He is now without a club.
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us news
Meta agrees to pay up to $17bn to settle social media case
Meta has reached a settlement with US states and territories to resolve a court case related to child safety.
The agreement will require the social media giant to pay up to $17bn (£12.5bn).
What has Meta agreed to?
Meta agreed to establish safeguards for teenage users, including daily usage limits and night-time blocks nationwide in the US.
This is the first time Meta has been forced to change how its platforms function.
As part of the settlement, the company denies wrongdoing.
What happened at the trial?
- It was alleged the company had violated numerous federal and state privacy laws for children.
- The states suing Meta claimed it used its platforms “to ensnare youth and teens”, and ignored the damage they did to the “wellbeing of America’s youth”.
- After the settlement was announced, District of Columbia attorney general Brian Schwalb called it a “monumental public health victory”.
What did Meta say?
Today, we are announcing an agreement with a bipartisan group of 52 attorneys general across US states, territories, and the District of Columbia, building on our long-standing efforts to empower parents and support teens
Calls for TikTok to follow
- The company said TikTok and YouTube should also implement the same safety features for their younger users.
- “Our new Time Limit commitments, Night Mode features and usage limits during school hours set the right path forward for our whole industry, but this framework will only work if all our peers join us,” Meta’s chief legal officer, CJ Mahoney, said.
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The subtle eye signals your dog may be sending you
Researchers have found that dogs blink more frequently when they see their owners doing so, which may mean that they are communicating more than just a need to momentarily close their eyes.
What did the study find?
Writing in the journal , Dr Chiara Canori from the University of Parma described how 35 different breeds were shown two videos with three people in them, one of them being their owner. In one video the humans blinked every three seconds and in the other they did not blink.
The researchers found that the dogs blinked more when the humans did, and this increased when shown their owner.
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What do the blinks mean?
Previous research has found that dogs turn on puppy eyes when humans look at them and can distinguish happy human faces from other expressions.
However, there may not be a huge amount of meaning behind dogs’ blinks. Canori said: “As of today… we cannot say that a dog deliberately blinks in order to convey a particular message. It may provide subtle feedback about attention or engagement.”
Blinking can be influenced by social context
Our study does not show that every time a dog blinks it is deliberately ‘saying’ something (…) What our work suggests is that this apparently simple and automatic behaviour can nevertheless be influenced by the social context
Dr Chiara Canori, University of parma
Downpours and thunderstorms will continue to bring the risk of flooding to parts of the UK on Wednesday and Thursday.
A yellow warning for thunderstorms is in place in large areas of the country from 3am until 10pm on Wednesday, then again from 6am until 10pm on Thursday.
Where does the warning cover?
The Met Office warning covers much of the Midlands, parts of northern, eastern and southern England as well as the far east of Wales.
A yellow warning means severe weather is possible and could cause travel disruption.
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Wednesday’s weather warning
Thursday’s weather warning
Rain to fall after prolonged drought
Many areas of the country have recently experienced drought, with the next few days likely to bring the wettest weather in many weeks.
- The punishing heat has made the ground hard, meaning the water cannot soak in and flash flooding is a real concern.
Scientists find ‘window of opportunity’ to start to cut dementia risk
A large new study of postmenopausal women in the UK has found that a common treatment for menopausal symptoms may significantly lower the risk of dementia.
What you need to know
The study, led by experts from the University of East Anglia and University of Exeter, found taking hormone replacement therapy (HRT) was associated with a 10 per cent reduced risk of all dementia and 16 per cent reduction in risk of Alzheimer’s disease specifically.
- The team discovered that starting treatment between the ages of 46-56 “conferred the greatest benefit”.
A closer look at the results of the study
The research analysed more than 183,000 postmenopausal women taking part in the UK Biobank study.
- An average 13-year follow-up found that almost 4,000 of them were diagnosed with dementia.
- After examining information on the dementia diagnoses, they found that those who started HRT between the ages of 46-50 had a 13 per cent reduced risk of dementia.
- Those who started taking HRT when they were aged 51-56 had a 23 per cent reduced risk.
- Women who took HRT after surgical menopause had a 26 per cent lower risk.
What else did the study find?
The study also found that women who naturally had lower exposure to oestrogen over their lifetime appeared to have a 16 per cent lower chance of dementia after taking HRT.
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It led to claims by poverty campaigners that the much-anticipated roll-out of plug-in solar power could “entrench the divide between people who can afford to take energy saving measures and those who must cut back on energy use due to a lack of affordability”.
The announcement that the panels will now be legal to buy came as Ofgem raised the energy price cap by 4 per cent, or £73, to £1,935 a year from October – the highest level in three years.
Responding to the increase, Andy Burnham said: “We’ll continue to look as we go forward at how we get energy prices down in the long term, and that’s what we need to do too.”
Argos among those selling from Thursday
Plug-in solar panels are cheaper than traditional solar panels, which require installation, and reduce a household’s energy bills by generating electricity and reducing the amount drawn from the grid.
While the technology is widely used in countries like Germany, it has been illegal in the UK up until now under safety regulations.
However, after the completion of an independent safety study, the Government has declared that the technology is safe to use with UK wiring and new regulations will come into effect on Thursday allowing the kits to go on sale.
McCluskey said that the Government expected the price of single panel kits to settle at between £400 and £600, and that Argos would be among those selling them from Thursday with “other retailers to follow soon after”.
Single panel kits could save households up to £110 a year on their bills, with each kit producing up to 800 watts – enough to power 20 per cent of an average home’s electricity use – or roughly sufficient to run a fridge, television, Wi-Fi router, laptop, phone charger and an Xbox S at once when the sun is shining.
With the kits still costing hundreds of pounds to buy, The i Paper asked McCluskey whether there were any plans for government grants to reduce the upfront cost for lower-income households.
He said: “At the moment we’re not proposing delivering them through a government scheme from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero.
“But obviously local authorities, charities, others will have their own funds that they could choose if they want to subsidise plug-in solar or to purchase plug-in solar for their residents… there’s nothing standing in their way of doing that.”
Ministers will ‘look more closely’ at subsidies
McCluskey said that ministers would “look more closely at” whether subsidised units would be “something in the future that we might provide through government schemes”. He said if local authorities wanted to do it now they had his “enthusiastic” support and “should get on and do it”.
The Government had previously indicated that it would pilot free plug-in solar panels for some households under its Warm Homes Plan.
Many renters will still have to get permission from their landlords to use the kits, but McCluskey urged landlords not to stand in the way.
“We have written to the National Landlords Association, making quite clear the benefits of plug-in solar, and would hope that that would be looked on favourably by landlords,” he said. “I don’t see a reason why a landlord should needlessly withdraw consent or not provide consent for that when the safety case is robust.”
The Energy Secretary, Miatta Fahnbulleh, said that plug-in solar would be a “simple, affordable way for households to take control of their energy bills and start saving straight away” and that it would allow people to benefit from “clean homegrown energy”.
Fears over energy divide
But poverty campaigners have questioned whether cash-strapped local authorities can afford to give out grants, and suggested the Government could do more to make them more affordable.
Simon Francis, co-ordinator of the End Fuel Poverty Coalition, said: “Households struggling with further increases in energy bills or in energy debt cannot find several hundred pounds up front, however good the payback looks over four years.
“The danger is this could entrench the divide between people who can afford to take energy saving measures and those who must cut back on energy use due to a lack of affordability. In the current climate, expecting charities or local authorities to cover this cost is unrealistic.”
Jonathan Bean from Fuel Poverty Action added: “We should all be getting our fair share of the cheap clean energy from our wind and sun. Government must make solar power, storage and cheap tariffs available to everyone, not just a privileged few.”