Pramod Thomas is a senior correspondent with Asian Media Group since 2020, bringing 19 years of journalism experience across business, politics, sports, communities, and international relations. His career spans both traditional and digital media platforms, with eight years specifically focused on digital journalism. This blend of experience positions him well to navigate the evolving media landscape and deliver content across various formats. He has worked with national and international media organisations, giving him a broad perspective on global news trends and reporting standards.
BRITISH prime minister Boris Johnson has pledged that the government will not simply ‘roll over and surrender' to union demands in the face of threats to bring the railways to a standstill, according to a report.
He added that the government will help the industry weather the storm if a deal can’t be struck, the MailOnline reported.
The Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association (TSSA) union, whose members manage control rooms, signalling and power for train operators and Network Rail, has launched its first strike ballot, while the Associated Society of Locomotive Engineers and Firemen (Aslef) union has called the first regional walkouts by drivers. Their strikes will coincide with those by the rail, maritime and transport workers union (RMT).
Aslef drivers on Hull Trains will strike on June 26 and those on Greater Anglia on June 23. Drivers on the Croydon Tramlink, in south London, will also walk out on June 28, 29 and July 13 and 14.
These dates coincide with the RMT’s strikes, which will see 40,000 workers for Network Rail and 13 train firms covering most of the country walk out on June 21, 23 and 25.
It means almost no trains are likely to run on these routes, the report added.
The members of the TSSA union at train operator Avanti West Coast could also walk out on one of the most important rail corridors in the UK from mid-July.
Croydon Tram drivers will stage two 48-hour strikes on 28-29 June and 13-14 July, and Hull Trains drivers will strike on 26 June.
The railway is expecting to run about 20 per cent of normal services between 7 am and 7 pm, preserving some trains on mainlines and urban services. A tube workers’ strike will also halt the London Underground on 21 June.
"You don’t want to go back to the 1970s where you had inflationary pay rises which led to more inflation. You have to keep pay rises sensible to keep inflation down," Johnson was quoted as saying in a Cabinet meeting.
Ministers and MPs also critised the unions. Transport secretary Grant Shapps tweeted: "The theatre, live music and hospitality industries are some of those which are going to suffer from the planned rail strikes. I again encourage unions to stop these strikes and engage in talks with the rail industry.’
Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng, posting a link to an article in which Labour’s Lisa Nandy apparently backed the action, tweeted: 'RMT’s strike action is completely self-defeating.’ He said ‘Labour-backed rail chaos’ would lead to fewer people using trains, drops in revenue, lower pay and job losses."
Commons leader Mark Spencer said the RMT should ‘reflect long and hard’ before making travellers’ lives a misery.
According to MailOnline, the potential damage that the RMT strikes alone will inflict on the industry is £150 million.
Negotiators said RMT workers could get an even bigger increase if the union agreed to discuss modernising work practices, the report added. The RMT’s resistance to modernising work practices has been branded ‘absurd’.
According to reports, managers and train drivers could join the strikes across the railway, potentially setting up a complete national shutdown by the time of the Commonwealth Games in July.
Talks were held on Thursday (9) between Network Rail and the RMT but with no breakthrough in the dispute over pay and workplace reform.
The shadow levelling up secretary, Lisa Nandy, gave qualified backing to rail workers but said Labour wanted to avoid strikes.
Nandy said: “We want to avoid the strikes and we’re on the public’s side on this. We’re also on the rail workers’ side. They’re dealing with the same pressures that everyone else is – the cost of food, the cost of soaring inflation rates, taxes going up, and they’re really struggling to make ends meet."
A VANDALISED plinth of Mahatma Gandhi’s statue in London was restored in time for the birth anniversary of the Indian freedom icon on Thursday (2).
India’s High Commissioner Vikram Doraiswami and the mayor of Camden Council were joined at Tavistock Square by community leaders s tributes were paid on Gandhi’s birthday, which is marked as the International Day of Non-Violence.
“It’s particularly timely that we have this event today, not just because it is International Day of Non-Violence, which is Gandhi Jayanti, but also because of what was done to the statue and its base a few days ago,” Doraiswami said.
“That was particularly saddening because this statue has been here for over 50 years in this square and it’s been part of the architecture and fabric of the India-UK friendship," he added.
“It’s the community around Tavistock Square who reported this act of vandalism and it’s all of us, the High Commission and the Camden Council team, who managed to have it cleaned to a brilliant gleaming white again; which is in a sense a lovely message.
“It carries the message of swachhta or cleanliness, it carries the message of renewal, but it also carries the message that you cannot do violence to an idea whose time has come.”
Camden mayor, councillor Eddie Hanson, said he and his team had been very upset when they heard about the “very, very sad incident".
“This statue means everything to us here in Camden when it comes to peace. That's why he's here with us, because we believe in his message, we believe in his teaching, we believe in what Gandhiji stood for,” said Hanson.
The annual gathering concluded with the students of the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan in London performing Gandhiji’s favourite bhajans, ‘Raghupati Raghav’ and ‘Vaishnava Jan’, and a peace prayer by Buddhist monks.
The group also laid floral tributes at the Gandhi statue at Parliament Square to mark his 156th birth anniversary.
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PRIME MINISTER Keir Starmer on Thursday (2) called for a "robust" response by the head of London's under-fire Metropolitan Police after a BBC undercover report showed officers using excessive force and making racist and misogynistic comments.
"I've not yet seen the footage, but I've had it described to me, and it's shocking, and I'm glad the commissioner is responding. He needs to be very robust in his response," Starmer told reporters ahead of a meeting with European leaders in Copenhagen.
BBC reporter Rory Bibb spent seven months until January 2025 working in a civilian role as a detention officer in the custody suite of Charing Cross police station in central London.
The resulting BBC Panorama documentary, aired on Wednesday (1), exposed officers making misogynistic, racist and Islamophobic remarks, as well as using excessive force.
Metropolitan Police chief Mark Rowley condemned the behaviour as "completely reprehensible".
Anyone viewing the footage would be "upset and angry... seeing the racism, the misogyny, and the sort of relishing in using excess force on people who've been arrested", he said, adding that he was working urgently to have the officers dismissed.
He said that following contact with the BBC ahead of the programme 10 officers and staff had been suspended.
"They are suspended, they are not anywhere near the public any more, but I want them off the payroll and gone as quickly as possible," he told BBC radio.
The custody team at the Charing Cross station featured in the report has been disbanded, according to Rowley.
During the reporter's time undercover, "officers called for immigrants to be shot, revelled in the use of force and were dismissive of rape claims," the BBC said in a statement.
Several male police officers were secretly filmed making shocking statements, including that a detainee who had overstayed his visa should have "a bullet through his head", and that migrants from Algeria and Somalia were "scum".
The reputation of UK policing has been in tatters since the 2021 kidnap, rape and murder of marketing executive Sarah Everard by a serving Met officer who was later jailed for life.
In another shocking case, an officer from the same unit last year received 36 life sentences for a "monstrous" string of 71 sexual offences, including the rapes of 12 women.
In the year to March 2024, nearly 600 officers in England and Wales were sacked.
The Met alone in January 2023 revealed that 1,071 officers in the 40,000-strong force of staff and officers had been under investigation for domestic abuse and violence against women and girls.
England and Wales has a police workforce of more than 147,000 across the 43 forces.
(AFP)
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Members of the public and congregants seen as Police and other emergency responders attend the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue, where multiple were injured after stabbing and car attack on Yom Kippur, on October 2, 2025 in the Crumpsall suburb of Manchester, England. (Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)
TWO people have died in the incident at a synagogue in Manchester in northern England and a third person suspected to be the offender who was shot by police is also believed to have died, a police statement said.
Police said they could not confirm if the suspect was dead "due to safety issues surround suspicious items on his person." A bomb disposal unit has been called and is now at the scene.
Greater Manchester Police said officers had been called on Thursday (2) to the incident at Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue in the north Manchester district of Crumpsall after a witness said they had seen a car driven at members of the public and that one man had been stabbed.
Armed officers responded and a man, believed to be the offender, was shot, GMP said.
King Charles said he was "deeply shocked and saddened" by the attack. Charles said he and Queen Camilla were "deeply shocked and saddened to learn of the horrific attack in Manchester, especially on such a significant day for the Jewish community" as members celebrated the Yom Kippur holiday.
A video shared on social media and verified by Reuters showed police shooting a man inside the synagogue’s perimeter, while another man lay on the floor in a pool of blood, appearing to wear a traditional Jewish head covering.
"I'm appalled by the attack at a synagogue in Crumpsall," prime minister Keir Starmer said on X as he left a European political meeting in Copenhagen early.
"The fact that this has taken place on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, makes it all the more horrific," Starmer said.
A Reuters photographer reported a heavy police presence in the area. Ambulance crews were seen in protective body armour and helmets, and at least one person was seen being taken into an ambulance.
Police said there were further reports that a security guard had been attacked with a knife.
The Israeli embassy in London condemned the attack, calling the act which left two people dead "abhorrent and deeply distressing" in a social media post.
Greater Manchester Police said they were called to the scene shortly after 9.30am, when a witness said the assailant drove a car at people and then stabbed someone. Police then shot the suspected attacker. (Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)
"Paramedics arrived at the scene ... and are tending to members of the public, currently four members of the public with injuries caused by both the vehicle and stab wounds," GMP said in a statement on X.
There were no further details.
Yom Kippur is the holiest day in the Jewish calendar when even many non-regular synagogue-goers take time to pray and all road traffic stops in Israel.
Manchester mayor Andy Burnham said it was a serious incident but told BBC radio "that the immediate danger appears to be over".
The Community Security Trust, a charity that provides security to Jewish organisations and institutions across Britain, said it was working with police and the local community. "This appears to be an appalling attack on the holiest day of the Jewish year," the CST said on X.
Britain suffered its second worst year for antisemitism in 2024 with more than 3,500 incidents being recorded, reflecting sustained levels of hatred towards Jews, the CST said earlier this year.
Reported levels of antisemitism rocketed to record levels in the wake of the October 7, 2023 attack by Hamas on Israel and Israel's subsequent war in Gaza that has devastated the Palestinian enclave.
Britain has suffered a number of Islamist militant attacks since the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, including a deadly 2017 suicide bombing at the end of an Ariana Grande pop concert in Manchester.
The police have in recent years also warned about the threat from organised far-right terrorism.
Earlier this year, British right-wing extremists were convicted of planning to carry out a terrorist attack at mosques or synagogues as part of a "race war".
MINISTER for equalities, Seema Malhotra, this week hosted a race equalities meeting at Downing Street and pledged to work for a fairer society, ahead of Black History Month, observed in October.
Ethnic minority leaders and representatives from the Department for Business and Trade (DBT), the British Business Bank, the West Midlands Combined Authority, the National Police Chiefs' Council and Avon and Somerset Police attended a meeting of the Race Equality Engagement Group (REEG) on Monday (29).
Its chair is Baroness Doreen Lawrence.
Malhotra said, “No one should be held back or denied opportunities because of their race.
“I am committed to working closely with the group to remove barriers, strengthen accountability and help create a fairer society for communities up and down the country.”
Improving access to investment for ethnic minority led businesses and the Police Race Action Plan were on the agenda for the meeting.
“The Race Equality Engagement Group is working to ensure ethnic minorities' voices are heard having their say on the issues that matter most to them. I look forward to working with members to bring about real and lasting progress on race equality,” said Lawrence.
“Collaboration between ethnic minority communities and the government is crucial in this current climate.”
The REEG, set up in March, aims to strengthen the government's links with ethnic minority communities.
An Equality (Race and Disability) Bill is set to be introduced to address mandatory ethnicity and disability pay gap reporting for large employers, which the government believes would be a significant step towards greater workplace equality.
Black History Month is marked in October and celebrates the contribution of black and ethnic minority leaders, activists and pioneers.
A JUDGE has described how vulnerable young girls were let down by local authorities in northern England as he jailed seven members of a child sexual exploitation gang for between 12 to 35 years on Wednesday (1).
The men, all of south Asian descent, exploited at least two vulnerable white teenage girls in Rochdale, near Manchester, using them as "sex slaves".
They were repeatedly raped over a five-year period starting in 2001, a court heard.
Jurors heard they were forced to have sex "with multiple men on the same day, in filthy flats and on rancid mattresses".
"They were passed around for sex - abused, humiliated, degraded and then discarded," judge Jonathan Seely said on passing sentence.
The longest sentence of 35 years went to market stallholder Mohammed Zahid, 65.
The father-of-three gave free underwear from his lingerie stall to both teenagers, alongside money, alcohol and food, expecting in return regular sex with him and his friends.
The Manchester resident was found guilty of 20 offences including rape, indecency with a child, and attempting to procure unlawful sexual intercourse from a girl.
Fellow Rochdale market traders Mushtaq Ahmed, 67, and Kasir Bashir, 50, both of Oldham, received jail terms of 27 years and 29 years, respectively.
Both were convicted of offences including rape and indecency with a child.
Bashir, who absconded before the trial began and is believed to have fled abroad, was sentenced in absentia.
Taxi drivers Mohammed Shahzad, 44, Naheem Akram, 49, and Nisar Hussain, 41, all of Rochdale, were convicted of multiple counts of rape and received sentences ranging from 19 to 26 years.
A final offender, 39-year-old Roheez Khan, of Rochdale, was jailed for 12 years for a single count of rape.
The men sentenced on Wednesday were prosecuted as part of Operation Lytton, a police investigation launched in 2015 into historical child sexual exploitation in Rochdale.
Police probes into historic child sexual exploitation in Rochdale have so far led to the conviction of 32 offenders, including the seven sentenced on Wednesday, according to the police.
The perpetrators have collectively been jailed for more than 450 years.
Handing down the jail terms, Seely said the two victims "were highly vulnerable, both had deeply troubled backgrounds and were known to the authorities".
Seven men jailed for more than 170 years for Rochdale child sexual exploitation
"They were highly susceptible to the advances of these men and others, and both were sexually abused by numerous other men," he noted.
"Both were seriously let down by those whose job it was to protect them."
A jury hearing their four-month trial in Manchester found all seven guilty in June of rape and dozens of other offences, after both victims gave evidence in court.
Social services and police have apologised for their past failings surrounding the victims.
Liz Fell, specialist prosecutor in the case, thanked both victims for their "strength and dignity throughout what has been a lengthy and challenging legal process".
"Their determination to see justice done has been fundamental to securing these convictions," she said, noting the defendants had failed to show the "slightest remorse".
Sharon Hubber, director of children’s services at Rochdale Borough Council, said: “Rochdale Borough Council is in a very different place to where it once was more than a decade ago, and our work to improve our safeguarding practice and our response to child sexual exploitation has been recognised in every Ofsted inspection since 2014.
“We will not be complacent however, and we remain committed to doing all that we can with our partners to protect and support victims and survivors.
“We also continue to provide a safe and supportive environment to anyone affected by non-recent abuse or exploitation to ensure people get the right support that they need.”