
UK Response to Aid Abused Migrant Carers Failing Most, Data Show
A major government initiative to match exploited migrant care workers in the UK with new employers has helped less than 4% find new roles, according to a Freedom of Information request, casting further doubt on the government's efforts to cut migration in the social care sector.
More than 28,000 migrant care workers whose visas were tied to their employer had to be referred to government job-finding 'hubs' between May 2024 and April 2025, according data released by the Home Office in response to an FOI from charity the Work Rights Centre. That was after they lost the job they were supposed to fill when UK Visas and Immigration officers discovered more than 470 employers were exploiting staff, and revoked their licenses to sponsor overseas workers.
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‘We don't want to be a niche brand': Seaweed is taking plastic out of stadiums and sandwich boxes
If you're lucky enough to be seeing Beyoncé at Tottenham Hotspur stadium in London this month, chances are your concert snacks will come in a container made out of seaweed. Notpla, the company which makes seaweed-based packaging to replace single-use plastics, has gone from strength to strength since winning the Earthshot Prize in 2022, bagging a prize of €1 million in the global environmental award created by the UK's Prince William. The venture started with its two French and Spanish founders, Pierre Paslier and Rodrigo Garcia Gonzalez, experimenting in their student kitchen while at Imperial College London. Now, Notpla has replaced more than 21 million items of single-use plastic across Europe, and is aiming to displace 1 billion units by 2030. In order to make a real dent in the insidious issue of plastic pollution, the 'disappearing packaging' solution is being rolled out in new venues and fashioned into new shapes and sizes. We caught up with chief revenue officer Lise Honsinger, Notpla's first employee in 2017, to find out more. Related Nappies, smartphone glass, and cigarette butts are piling up in Europe. How can we recycle them? Notpla's prototype was an edible water capsule called Ooho. It garnered viral interest in 2017, which Honsinger partly attributes to a 'zeitgeist' of plastic pollution awareness. The start-up partnered with Lucozade to replace 36,000 plastic bottles at the London Marathon in 2019. Then COVID hit, events stopped, and the company pivoted to focus on seaweed coatings for food packaging which make takeaway boxes compostable like fruit peel. In partnership with Just Eat, Notpla's packaging was used at the UEFA Women's Final at Wembley Stadium, London in 2022. From seven types of folded carton board boxes that year, it has grown into a catalogue of over 50 different designs. 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Council approves flats at former Go Outdoors site
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Call for German coalition talks to resolve legal limbo over asylum
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