There were gasps in NHS England’s headquarters near Waterloo station on Thursday morning as Sir Keir Starmer announced live on television that the organisation was being abolished. The 15,000 staff working for the central NHS body were blindsided by the prime minister’s decision. More than half will be sacked, with the rest merged into similar roles at the Department of Health. It marks one of the biggest reorganisations in NHS history, bringing to an end a decade-long experiment to give the health service greater independence from government. Like its demise, the birth of NHS England resulted from a party leader needing a big announcement that would wrongfoot his critics.

Sir Keir Starmer's decision to scrap NHS England gets a warm reception in the Mail. The Financial Times says abolishing NHS England leaves "a slew of unanswered questions" about how the health service will be run once ministers take direct control. The former Conservative defence minister and British Army officer, Tobias Ellwood, has written a comment piece for the paper, external. The Telegraph says the Science and Technology Secretary, Peter Kyle, has been using artificial intelligence to come up with policy ideas, external. The prince tells the paper that he starts moving himself and his children around the house quite quickly - in the hope that it will change his side's luck.

The Times has compiled its annual list of the 100 Best Places to Stay in the UK for another year and several places in the county make the cut. 2025’s list features individual awards for specific categories, and the “Best Romantic Hotel” gong has been added to an Oxfordshire venue. Bull on High Street in Burford opened in 2023 and has been impressing visitors ever since thanks to its two restaurants, cocktail bar and modern rooms. READ MORE: New restaurant Oak opens at Oxfordshire Crazy Bear hotelSigmund Freud. (Image: Britannica)“There’s nothing we like better than when a local buys the town’s much-loved pub to safeguard it from potential descent into anonymity,” said The Times.

FAQs(You can now subscribe to our(You can now subscribe to our Economic Times WhatsApp channelMeghan Markle isn't letting the criticism of her new Netflix series With Love, Meghan stop her. Disregarding criticism and celebrating the success of her second season renewal, the Duchess of Sussex is still concentrating on building her audience, as per reports.“With Love, Meghan,” Meghan Markle's new Netflix series, has received mixed reviews. Some critics have criticized the idea of a second season.Meghan Markle dismisses harsh criticism of the Netflix series, saying she "is here to stay. "I'm not even 30 seconds into the first episode and I already know that With Love, Meghan is the FAKEST stuff ever," argued one individual. "She's brushing it off and focusing on her supporters, according to experts, who believe she's determined to build a loyal fan base.Yes, despite mixed reviews, Netflix has renewed the show, indicating Meghan's Hollywood career is far from over.

New Delhi: A British national was allegedly raped and molested at a hotel in southwest Delhi's Mahipalpur on Tuesday night. When the woman reached a hospital, which then informed police about her allegations, the cops arrested the two men.The woman told the cops that she came into contact with Kailash in Feb on social media, and they became friends. The woman alleged that Kailash then raped her.Police have found phone chats between the accused and the survivor. The British visitor told the cops that finding her intoxicated, Gulfham, on the pretext of helping her to the lift, touched her inappropriately. In 2022, a 40-year-old cab driver was arrested for making obscene gestures while ferrying a woman passenger, a British national, in Dhaula Kuan.

In Stuart Flinders’s study of a Victorian cult on the fringes of the Established Church, the tension between insanity and zeal hangs over every chapter. As The Times asked in 1860, were the worshippers who gathered at “The Abode of Love” being led by “a religious enthusiast, a lunatic or an adventurer”? And the priests at the heart of the cult, James Henry Prince and John Smyth-Pigott, were accused of being “blasphemous buffoons” and suffering from “Messianic delusion”. On the surface, with its servants, stables, and croquet lawns, “The Abode of Love” looked like a genteel hotel. A Very British Cult: Rogue priests and the abode of loveStuart FlindersIcon Books £20(978-1-83773-147-3)Church Times Bookshop £18

NHS bloodbathKEIR Starmer is living the Tories’ dream. His left-wing Labour backbenchers may loathe him scrapping NHS England and slashing up to 10,000 penpushers. 1 Sir Keir Starmer must now take his chainsaw to hundreds more quangos Credit: PAWe couldn’t be happier. The Health Secretary must set out exactly how this streamlining will translate into drastically shorter wait times and better patient outcomes. And while Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood knows how dangerously divisive this is, she refuses to back a Tory Bill to override it.

Write to letters@thetimes.co.ukSir, Unsurprisingly, President Trump’s approach to Ukraine is that of a businessman closing a deal, not a statesman securing peace (“Two to Tango”, leading article, Mar 13). But by pausing military aid, forcing Kyiv to retreat before negotiations even began, and publicly signalling that Ukraine must cede land and abandon Nato aspirations, he has handed Putin the initiative and a path to victory. For instance, as colonial secretary, Churchill forced the Irish Republic to negotiate by applying relentless military pressure, offering an honourable settlement only when the republicans had no choice but to take it. Churchill negotiated from strength. Trump has done the opposite, weakening his ally, relieving his enemy, and pre-emptively surrendering his strongest

“My memory is that there was always an understanding of QR funding and what it does,” he says. However, last year, Research England commissioned Rand Europe to undertake an impact evaluation of strategic institutional research funding, of which QR is the biggest chunk. In his speech, for instance, Brady said Imperial’s QR funding supports research in molecular sciences, vaccines manufacturing research and environmentally sensitive materials. Reid sees the UK’s dual-support system for research as representing a “sweet partnership” of both retrospective “performance-driven funding” and forward-looking “project-driven funding”. “If you took away QR funding, how do you reward past performance?” he asked.

Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer (AP)LONDON: UK’s govt is to abolish the £200 billion NHS England to cut bureaucracy and duplication with the department of health and bring it back under govt control, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced in a speech on Thursday.Starmer said this would shift money back to the front line and bring the NHS “back into democratic control”. “The budget for NHS England staff has soared to £2 billion.”“Such bloated and inefficient bureaucracy cannot be justified. Frontline NHS staff are drowning in micromanagement subjected to by vast layers of bureaucracy,” he said.Streeting said there are 15,300 staff in NHS England and 3,300 in the department of health and social care. That will deliver hundreds of millions of pounds worth of savings.” It will mean “fewer checkers and more doers”, he said.Integration of NHS England and his department has begun and will be complete in two years. If politicians run the NHS, that is not good news.

The Russian leader’s pointed visit came a day after a U.S. delegation met in Saudi Arabia with Ukrainian officials, who agreed to a 30-day cease-fire in the war. American officials planned to take the proposal to Mr. Putin, who has previously said he is not interested in a temporary truce. Dressed in a green camouflage uniform, Mr. Putin sat at a desk with maps spread out in front of him, according to photos released by the Kremlin. In video footage released by Russian state media, Mr. Putin praised the Russian military formations that had taken back much of the territory captured by Ukraine in the Kursk region. He called on the troops to seize the territory for good from Ukrainian forces, who have been occupying portions of the Russian border region since last summer.

FIZZY drinks raise your cancer risk, according to a study. Women who consume more than one sugary drink per day were found to be five times more likely to get mouth cancer than those who drink less than one a month. Oral cancer cases are rising and hit 10,825 in the UK last year, making it the 10th most common type. Smoking, booze and the HPV virus are linked to the vast majority of mouth cancer cases and it is generally more common in men. Sugar linked to cancer riskThe new research found sugary drinks also appear to increase the risk, regardless of whether the patient smoked or drank.

Nor is the history of changing the health service a happy one. A former Conservative minister, Andrew Lansley, oversaw the creation of N.H.S. England as part of an overhaul of the health service that was widely criticized and has been gradually undone. After years of underfunding, the country’s creaking, overstretched health care system badly needs investment: The waiting list for medical procedures currently exceeds seven million. The government says it wants to slim the size of the state and deliver services more efficiently.

The move will undo the structural reforms that the NHS were put through in 2012. The prime minister also stressed that the shake-up will allow the ministers to reduce record waiting lines. In his speech, PM Starmer said he couldn't possibly justify why the Britons needed to spend their money on "two layers of bureaucracy". "That money could and should be spent on nurses, doctors, operations, GP appointments," he added.UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said NHSE has been abolished with the aim to reduce record waiting lists. NHS England will now be absorbed into the DHSC.

How the Russell 2000 Index Has Moved in the Last YearInvestors watching the S&P 500’s plunge this week are processing a mix of signals. There is a different stock index that is flashing a clearer warning sign. Doing the same for the Russell 2000 only slightly changes its roughly 10.5 percent drop this year. The Russell 2000 index is also more domestically focused. Roughly 30 percent of the revenues for the S&P 500 come from outside the United States, double that of the Russell 2000.