Business

The Welsh Rugby Union will cut up to 20 roles as it implements a restructure aimed at saving £5m a year.

It said the "transformative programme" would involve savings and efficiencies in the business and would allow the governing body to operate" in a manner befitting of a £100m-a-year business".

The organisation which employs 344 people added it has entered a formal consultation period with staff.

It comes after the WRU announced on Wednesday it had agreed to buy Cardiff Rugby, one of the four regional Welsh sides, after it collapsed into administration earlier this week.

A woman who set up her own youth club aged 17 has said she was inspired by her own youth workers.

Yasmin Betteridge leads Wallingford TRAIN in Oxfordshire, an offshoot of Didcot charity TRAIN Youth which she attended as a teenager last year.

She said her youth workers were some of her "biggest role models" and helped her "build up a lot of confidence".

Yasmin won a "highly commended" title at the Oxfordshire Apprentice Awards last month.

Yasmin grew up in Didcot and started going to TRAIN Youth aged 11, but said she later found herself drawn into trouble in the town as a teenager.

"In secondary school I got into a different friendship group, and would say I was involved in anti-social behaviour," she said.

"In towns like Didcot and Wallingford there isn't really much to do or anywhere to go.

"We played to stereotypes of what [adults] and pretty much anybody thought of us."

Aged 15, Yasmin was asked by TRAIN Youth to help with interviews for a new staff member.

She said: "I turned around to one of our trustees and said 'that'll be me you're interviewing one day'."

After doing her work experience with the charity she said she "begged" her manager to set up an apprenticeship, which she then successfully applied for.

She then worked for the charity while studying for a youth work diploma and is now a youth worker alongside her university studies. .

'She calms me down'

Michelle, a volunteer with the Wallingford group, said Yasmin was an "amazing" youth worker who the young people at the club identified with.

"I've known Yasmin for a long, long time. She's got a super relationship with all the young people that come through. She's a brilliant individual," she said.

Dorian, who attends the group, said Yasmin was a particularly good listener.

"When I'm angry I talk to her and she just calms me down. I have a feeling she's gone through the same thing."

Charlotte, who travels to the group from her home in Benson, agreed: "She's a very easy person to chat to and she's… very understanding."

Yasmin said she wanted Train Youth in Wallingford to be somewhere that was both inclusive and safe.

"I think the young people of Wallingford know if they need something that they can call my work phone [or] come to us if they need anything.

"That's pretty much what my idea has been," she added.

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A teenage boy has been badly hurt in an attack by a group of men while he was riding an e-scooter, police said.

Officers said the 17-year-old was assaulted on Dilmore Lane, Fernhill Heath, Worcestershire, on Saturday and fell off, suffering serious injuries to his abdomen.

He was taken to hospital but has since been discharged.

Det Insp Natalie Arrowsmith, from West Mercia Police, said officers were following several lines of enquiry to identify the men.

She added that they were keen to hear from anyone who was in the Dilmore Lane area at about 21:00 BST on Saturday or who might have dashcam footage of the incident.

A team of nurses who helped nearly 200 people in North Lincolnshire access health services has secured funding to keep going for another 12 months.

The community inclusion team at NHS Humber Health Partnership was set up in 2023 to help those who do not have regular access to services due to their personal circumstances, such as vulnerable people and members of the travelling community, according to bosses.

Their role includes hosting community drop-in sessions and visiting people living on the streets or in temporary accommodation.

To date, the team – dubbed "the angels" – has seen 196 patients, who were previously not engaging with health services, the organisation has said.

'Rewarding job'

Matron Laura Inglis said: "Sometimes it can take weeks or months before people will approach us, but we now have regular patients we see and have developed strong relationships with.

"It's a rewarding job, getting people the help they desperately need," she said.

NHS Humber Health Partnership said feedback from those using the service had been very positive.

The team is hoping to carry out more outreach work with rough sleepers over the next 12 months, the organisation added.

Lincolnshire on BBC Sounds latest episode of Look North here.

He also expressed solidarity with "the people of Palestine who are experiencing the injustice of war and bombardment".

"Spain's commitment to international law and human rights must be constant and must be coherent," he said. "Europe's should be too."

Sánchez and his government, which officially acknowledged a Palestinian state last year, have been harsh critics of Israel, and last week in Congress the prime minister referred to the country as "a genocidal state".

Israel has strenuously denied accusations of genocide, and its foreign ministry summoned the Spanish ambassador for a formal reprimand over Sánchez's "serious remarks".

At Eurovision, Spain's televote saw the country award Israel maximum points for its song New Day Will Rise by Yuval Raphael. Spain's broadcast network RTVE has since requested an audit of the votes.

Ahead of the Eurovision final on Saturday, RTVE aired a message in support of Palestinians – despite being warned to avoid references to Gaza by the EBU.

Spain's entry, Esa Diva by Melody, finished in 24th place on Saturday night in Basel.

A blaze ignited in a parked car before spreading to a campervan next to it on a residential street.

Cornwall Fire Service said it received calls at about 15:40 BST on Sunday to reports of a fire in Porthleven.

Photos shared on social media showed a plume of black smoke rising as the flames spread from the car to the small campervan.

A fire service spokesperson said crews from Helston and Penzance used two hose reels to extinguish the blaze.

A cafe owner has been sentenced for fraudulently claiming £150,000 in Covid bounce back loans from the government.

Mehmet Akyuz, 36, from Conway Street, Brighton, East Sussex, made three applications for two businesses which were not operating at the time.

He was given a 20-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, at Hove Crown Court on Monday, after admitting three counts of fraud by false representation.

He was also ordered to complete 300 hours community service, has been banned from being a company director for five years and faces a proceeds of crime hearing in September.

Each of the three loans was for the maximum amount of £50,000, and were for Akyuz's companies Green and Hove Limited, a food and grocery shop with a cafe, and Leather Wear Limited, an importer of bags and belts.

Both firms had been incorporated in 2019 with him as sole director.

He claimed the cafe had a turnover of £270,000, and the import firm between £215,000 and £225,000.

However, the cafe had filed dormant accounts between 2020 and 2021, and the import firm between 2020 and 2022.

David Snasdell, chief investigator at the Insolvency Service, said: "Mehmet Akyuz's actions in fraudulently applying for three bounce back loans he was not entitled to were completely unacceptable.

"This was taxpayers' money designed to support small businesses through the pandemic and should not have been exploited in such a cynical manner.

"The Insolvency Service remains committed to investigating these cases and bringing fraudsters such as Akyuz to justice."

A proceeds of crime hearing is due to take place at Hove Crown Court on 18 September.

A one-year-old toddler who was seriously injured in a crash has died.

Four people – including two boys aged five and one – were injured after their grey Skoda Karoq collided with a white Peugeot 208 on the eastbound A303 in Amesbury on 28 March.

The family of the toddler has now confirmed that he died in hospital from his injuries.

The Peugeot was being driven by a woman in her 20s who suffered serious but not life-threatening injuries, as did the five-year-old boy.

After colliding with the Skoda, the Peugeot then spun onto the westbound carriageway and crashed head-on with a silver Volvo V70 near the Bulford junction.

The driver of the Volvo, a man in his 70s, suffered minor injuries.

Wiltshire Police has asked anybody with relevant information about the crash, which happened at about 17:30 GMT, to get in touch.

Paige Williams is desperate to pass her driving test.

Her three-year-old son sometimes has "meltdowns" on public transport, where he might scream, cry or throw himself on the floor, she says. She just wants to be able to visit family and go on day trips more easily.

But the 28-year-old single mum, from Barnsley, is having to drastically cut back on how much she spends on food, gas and electricity to be able to afford her £35-an-hour lessons, which she's been having since September.

"It's literally scrimping and scraping to be able to manage to get one lesson a week," she says.

As the cost of driving lessons continues to rise alongside an already high cost of living, experiences like Paige's may be becoming increasingly common.

The BBC has spoken to more than a dozen learners and parents of learners who say they're frustrated by how much they have to pay – and also to instructors who argue that the prices are justified.

Driving instructors can charge what they like, and the DVSA does not release official statistics on average lesson costs.

But a DVSA survey completed by more than 5,000 approved driving instructors (ADIs) in September shows how prices have shot up in recent years.

In the survey, the most common price bracket for an hour lesson was £36 to £40 per hour.

Just 31.5% of driving instructors said they charged £35 or less per hour – that number had halved since the DVSA's June 2023 survey.

While 20.8% said they charged more than £40 an hour – nearly triple as many as in June 2023.

For many people, driving is essential for taking their kids to school, going to work or carrying out caring responsibilities.

Public transport might be unaffordable, inaccessible or simply not available for some people.

Two-thirds of people in Great Britain who commute to work drive in, and 45% of five-to-10 year olds are taken to school by car, Department for Transport figures from 2023 show.

Faustina Kamara, a 23-year-old in Birmingham, needs a licence for her dream job – being a runner in the media industry.

But the £60 cost of her two-hour driving lessons means she's only having them once a fortnight, which isn't as frequently as she'd like, and means it will delay when she can take her test.

She says she'd love to have lessons weekly but it would mean she'd have to cut back on spending money seeing her friends.

Other people also say that the high cost of driving lessons means it's taking them longer to learn to drive.

Rather than having the two lessons a week she would have liked, Sandra Onuora, a 30-year-old civil servant in Newcastle, had three per month until she passed her test in March.

"That was all I could afford," she says. And even then, "I had to take a lot of money from my savings" for her £39-an-hour lessons, she adds.

Because she had to space out her lessons more, she had to wait longer until she felt ready to take her test.

She'd spend hours every week travelling between her home, her son's childminder's and her office, taking six buses every weekday.

"It was a rough year," says Sandra. She would return home "so exhausted".

And just as driving lessons become more expensive, some learners are also finding they're having to take more of them.

That's because of a huge practical test backlog, which means learners are having to take lessons for longer to keep up their skills.

Keith Rose hasn't been able to book a driving test near where he lives in Bridgwater, Somerset, for his 17-year-old son, Brandon.

The best option he could find is an hour's drive away in Newport, Wales, and isn't until September.

Keith says that his son is ready to take his test, but will need to keep taking lessons at a cost of £76 for a two-hour session to maintain his skills.

"We're being forced into spending money that we don't need to," Keith says.

Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander has acknowledged that waiting times for tests are too long and pledged to reduce the average waiting time for a driving test to no more than seven weeks by summer 2026.

Instructors say that they have little choice but to charge these kind of rates if they want to make a profit.

"Prices for driving lessons are where they should be, having been probably under-priced for many years," says Stewart Lochrie, the owner of a driving school in Glasgow and chair of the Approved Driving Instructors National Joint Council (ADINJ).

"I think the price was overdue a reset."

Stewart notes that the UK's more than 41,000 approved driving instructors are having to pay more for the expenses associated with their jobs like buying or leasing a car, fuel, insurance and maintenance.

"We have costs to cover as well and if the things that we need to run our business go up, then our prices will have to go up as well," he says.

The rising price of lessons "isn't really translating to a pay increase in our pockets," adds Terry Edwards, a driving instructor in Ashford, Kent.

His expenses include around £280 a month on fuel, £135 on insurance and £440 on car payments.

Other costs include servicing, repairing and cleaning his car.

Terry charges £39 an hour, but offers a discount for buying in bulk. While customers "don't generally push back" against his prices, some "try and be a bit cheeky" and ask for discounts, he says.

For Amy Burnett, a pharmacy advisor in Glasgow, the prices are so high that she's avoiding learning for the time being. The only instructors she'd found with availability charge between £50 and £60 an hour, she says.

"I'm living pay cheque to pay cheque as it is," the 22-year-old says.

But she sees being able to drive as an investment in her future – she'd have more freedom and she's had to limit her previous job searches to roles accessible by public transport, she says.

Amy hopes to pass her test by the time she's 24 – if she can find a more affordable instructor with availability in her area, she says.

Paige, the mum in Barnsley, is sure her frugality will be worth it in the end. Being able to drive would make it much easier for her to return to work, she says.

And it would make journeys with her son much less stressful, she says. Most of all, she wants to take her two children to the seaside.

"It'd be so good for my son Ronald, with his sensory needs," Paige says. "Getting to go on the little arcade rides and seeing his little face would be lovely."

Original Coronation Street star Philip Lowrie has died aged 88.

Lowrie, who appeared in the first episode of the ITV soap in 1960 as the original bad boy Dennis Tanner, died on Friday, his publicist Mario Renzullo said.

"My client and very dear friend, Philip Lowrie, the beloved actor renowned for his role as Dennis Tanner on Coronation Street, passed away yesterday," he said.

"His death marks the end of an era for the world's longest-running soap, where he became a cornerstone of its storytelling."

Lowrie was born in Ashton-under-Lyne, Greater Manchester.

When the soap started more than six decades ago, Lowrie's character was seen as a national heartthrob thanks to his roguish role.

Dennis was introduced as the son of Elsie Tanner, and moved in with his mother after being released from prison.

Lowrie had originally auditioned for the role of Ken Barlow prior to the show's launch, and appeared in the first episode at the age of 24.

William Roache was soon cast as Ken for the beginning of the soap and became a regular sparring partner for Dennis.

He left the Street in 1968, when he married Jenny Sutton and moved to Bristol, and did not return until 2011.

Corrie reappearance

According to Mr Renzullo, Lowrie was presented in September 2011 with a certificate by the Guinness World Records for being the person with the longest gap between television appearances as the same character in the same show.

Dennis soon got back in touch with newsagent Rita Sullivan (Barbara Knox), who was his sweetheart when she first appeared in the show in 1966, and they tied the knot when he came back.

He left the soap again in 2014 and was later killed off without making another appearance on screen.

Varied career

Lowrie's mother saved for his fees to go to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (Rada) in London after he left school.

After graduating three years later, he soon received his first parts in the West End, appearing with Dame Margaret Rutherford and Peggy Mount in the play Farewell, Farewell, Eugene.

He also appeared on Victoria Wood's comedy shows, such as Victoria Wood's All Day Breakfast, Victoria Wood, Pat and Margaret, Live In Your Own Room, and We'd Quite Like To Apologise.

His later stage lead roles in the 2000s and 2010s included being in Dame Agatha Christie's The Mousetrap, The Case Of The Frightened Lady and The Lady Vanishes.