Latest news with #FreedomofInformationRequests
Metro
01-07-2025
- Metro
Attacker pulls out huge knife and lunges at young woman in London park
To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video A party at a London park ended with dozens of screams after an attacker began swinging a large knife at a woman. Snapchat video captured the moment the hooded perpetrator whipped out the blade in Gladstone Park, north London, on Monday. The weapon was inches from slashing the terrified victim, as she backed away while others fled. A man filming the attack can be heard screaming, 'She backed out a shank, are you mad?' meaning she brought out a knife. Police officers descended on the scene just after 10pm after the video went viral on social media, but they could not locate the alleged knife-wielder or weapon, the force told Metro. There were no reported injuries and arrests have been made. Metro revealed that almost half of all murders in the UK over the last two years have been due to stabbings or violent incidents with a blade. Figures show that out of the 898 recorded murders in the UK over the last three years, 443 of these murders were committed using a knife, stabbing, or a sharp instrument. Data gathered from Freedom of Information Requests (FOI) from 38 police forces across the UK between 2022-2024 highlighted the worrying rise. Labour says it will bring 3,000 police officers back on the streets alongside a five-step plan to 'tackle the issue 'take back our streets'. This includes the banning of ninja swords this summer. The sword – which has become a weapon of choice for street killers in the UK – will be banned from August 1. More Trending The move follows tireless campaigning from the family of Ronan Kanda, who was killed on a Wolverhampton street in a case of mistaken identity in 2022. A spokesperson for the Met Police told Metro of the Gladstone Park incident: 'On Monday at 10.30pm, police attended Gladstone Park, Brent, having been made aware of a video on social media of a woman with a knife. 'Officers saw no one who matched the description of the woman in the video. 'No one was injured, no weapons were found and no arrests were made. Enquiries continue.' Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@ For more stories like this, check our news page. MORE: Google Maps lets you blur your house – here's why you should do it MORE: Man 'dismembered' couple and froze remains before dumping them off bridge MORE: Hottest tube line forecasted where passengers face 32°C carriage hell
Daily Record
05-06-2025
- Health
- Daily Record
Over 2,000 people from Lanarkshire languishing on NHS waiting list to see psychologist
Freedom of Information Requests revealed that some 22,880 across Scotland are currently on a psychologist waiting list. Over 2,000 people from Lanarkshire are languishing on an NHS waiting list to see a psychologist. Freedom of Information Requests revealed that some 22,880 across Scotland are currently on a psychologist waiting list. Dr Pavan Srireddy, vice-chair of the Royal College of Psychiatrists in Scotland, said: 'While concerning, these figures come as no surprise. The unprecedented demand for services and critical gaps in the mental health workforce is already leading to unacceptably long waits for mental health care and treatment. 'Working on the frontline we see a postcode lottery of specialist mental health services across the country, but our patients deserve so much better than this. 'Alarmingly, waiting times may be even higher because the Scottish Government don't consider the rise in people seeking help for neurodevelopmental conditions such as Autism or ADHD.' NHS Lothian had the longest list, with 4,287 patients waiting to be seen. This was followed by Greater Glasgow and Clyde on 3,733 and Tayside on 2,821. Grampian had 2,736 patients waiting, Forth Valley had 2,729 and Lanarkshire had 2,097. Scottish Labour Mental Health spokesperson Paul Sweeney said 'These shocking figures lay bare the true scale of Scotland's mental health crisis and the SNP's woeful failure to deliver the support needed. 'Behind these figures are people who have been failed in their darkest hour by an NHS that is no longer truly free and available at the point of need. 'NHS staff are working tirelessly to keep overstretched mental health services going, but they are being let down by an SNP government more interested in fiddling the figures than fixing the waiting lists. 'Scots needs NHS mental health services that they can count on and we need a change in government to deliver that.' A Scottish Government spokesperson said: 'The latest Public Health Scotland data shows that more than 74,000 people started treatment in psychological therapies last year. 'One in two patients are starting treatment within three weeks of referral and there was a significant increase of 7.5 per cent of patients starting treatment in the last quarter. 'This has been made possible by the hard work of our psychology services workforce which has increased by 61.8 per cent in the last decade. 'We want to ensure that all people in Scotland can access the right help, at the right time to support their mental and physical health. 'We continue to work with NHS Boards that are not on track to meet the standard that 90% of patients begin treatment within 18 weeks of referral.' *Don't miss the latest headlines from around Lanarkshire. Sign up to our newsletters here.
Daily Record
05-06-2025
- General
- Daily Record
Over 4,000 people from the Lothians languishing on NHS waiting list to see psychologist
Freedom of Information Requests revealed that some 22,880 across Scotland are currently on a psychologist waiting list. Over 4,000 people from across the Lothians are languishing on an NHS waiting list to see a psychologist. Freedom of Information Requests revealed that some 22,880 across Scotland are currently on a psychologist waiting list. Dr Pavan Srireddy, vice-chair of the Royal College of Psychiatrists in Scotland, said: 'While concerning, these figures come as no surprise. The unprecedented demand for services and critical gaps in the mental health workforce is already leading to unacceptably long waits for mental health care and treatment. 'Working on the frontline we see a postcode lottery of specialist mental health services across the country, but our patients deserve so much better than this. 'Alarmingly, waiting times may be even higher because the Scottish Government don't consider the rise in people seeking help for neurodevelopmental conditions such as Autism or ADHD.' NHS Lothian had the longest list, with 4,287 patients waiting to be seen. This was followed by Greater Glasgow and Clyde on 3,733 and Tayside on 2,821. Grampian had 2,736 patients waiting, Forth Valley had 2,729 and Lanarkshire had 2,097. Scottish Labour Mental Health spokesperson Paul Sweeney said 'These shocking figures lay bare the true scale of Scotland's mental health crisis and the SNP's woeful failure to deliver the support needed. 'Behind these figures are people who have been failed in their darkest hour by an NHS that is no longer truly free and available at the point of need. 'NHS staff are working tirelessly to keep overstretched mental health services going, but they are being let down by an SNP government more interested in fiddling the figures than fixing the waiting lists. 'Scots needs NHS mental health services that they can count on and we need a change in government to deliver that.' A Scottish Government spokesperson said: 'The latest Public Health Scotland data shows that more than 74,000 people started treatment in psychological therapies last year. 'One in two patients are starting treatment within three weeks of referral and there was a significant increase of 7.5 per cent of patients starting treatment in the last quarter. 'This has been made possible by the hard work of our psychology services workforce which has increased by 61.8 per cent in the last decade. 'We want to ensure that all people in Scotland can access the right help, at the right time to support their mental and physical health. 'We continue to work with NHS Boards that are not on track to meet the standard that 90% of patients begin treatment within 18 weeks of referral.'
Daily Record
05-06-2025
- Health
- Daily Record
Nearly 23,000 Scots stuck on NHS waiting list to see psychologist
EXCLUSIVE: Freedom of Information Requests revealed that some 22,880 are currently on a psychologist waiting list - with NHS Lothian having the longest list. Nearly 23,000 Scots are languishing on an NHS waiting list to see a psychologist. Freedom of Information Requests revealed that some 22,880 are currently on a psychologist waiting list. Dr Pavan Srireddy, vice-chair of the Royal College of Psychiatrists in Scotland, said: 'While concerning, these figures come as no surprise. The unprecedented demand for services and critical gaps in the mental health workforce is already leading to unacceptably long waits for mental health care and treatment. 'Working on the frontline we see a postcode lottery of specialist mental health services across the country, but our patients deserve so much better than this. 'Alarmingly, waiting times may be even higher because the Scottish Government don't consider the rise in people seeking help for neurodevelopmental conditions such as Autism or ADHD." NHS Lothian had the longest list, with 4,287 patients waiting to be seen. This was followed by Greater Glasgow and Clyde on 3,733 and Tayside on 2,821. Grampian had 2,736 patients waiting, Forth Valley had 2,729 and Lanarkshire had 2,097. The only other health board with more than 1,000 people waiting was NHS Fife, on 1,746. Dr Srireddy continued: 'The situation is only set to get worse if there is no action. Targets are missed but what we need is ringfenced funding and resources ploughed in at local level. 'We also urgently need a strategy to not just recruit more psychiatrists, but to retain our experienced doctors who sadly face excessive workloads, stress and burnout due to staff shortages leading them to leave permanent roles. 'Above all, we need ring-fenced mental health funding to reach the government's own 10% budget commitment and ensure adequate resources are put in place urgently, for recruitment and retention.' Campaigner Peter Todd - who waited five years for mental health treatment - said: "Many of our leaders have no idea much patient's lives are affected by waiting years for psychological treatment because they have no sense of what goes on in the real world. "No doubt we will here covid being used as an excuse. But that doesn't wash because I was forced to wait 5 years back in 2018 due to being a victim of the MP Cyril Smith scandal which I gave evidence at the Historical Abuse Inquiry about. "I look forward to John Swinney campaigning in Caithness in the run up to the Holyrood election, so he can hear my experience and how my Iife was ripped apart because of his parties inept running of mental health services which forced me to wait five years." Scottish Labour Mental Health spokesperson Paul Sweeney said 'These shocking figures lay bare the true scale of Scotland's mental health crisis and the SNP's woeful failure to deliver the support needed. 'Behind these figures are people who have been failed in their darkest hour by an NHS that is no longer truly free and available at the point of need. ' NHS staff are working tirelessly to keep overstretched mental health services going, but they are being let down by an SNP government more interested in fiddling the figures than fixing the waiting lists. 'Scots needs NHS mental health services that they can count on and we need a change in government to deliver that.' A Scottish Government spokesperson said: 'The latest Public Health Scotland data shows that more than 74,000 people started treatment in psychological therapies last year. 'One in two patients are starting treatment within three weeks of referral and there was a significant increase of 7.5% of patients starting treatment in the last quarter. 'This has been made possible by the hard work of our psychology services workforce which has increased by 61.8% in the last decade. 'We want to ensure that all people in Scotland can access the right help, at the right time to support their mental and physical health. We continue to work with NHS Boards that are not on track to meet the standard that 90% of patients begin treatment within 18 weeks of referral.'
Yahoo
26-05-2025
- Automotive
- Yahoo
Questions swirl as Tesla nears Austin launch day for high stakes driverless robotaxi launch
As soon as one week from today, the first driverless Tesla robotaxis could begin zipping passengers through the streets of Austin—a critical moment for the electric carmaker and its mercurial boss, Elon Musk, who has vowed that Tesla's transformation into an autonomous car company will begin in June with the launch of a commercial robotaxi service in Austin. Tesla has been rushing to get everything in order for its ambitious launch: beginning to test the robotaxis with safety drivers in Austin, and in the San Francisco Bay Area, just a few weeks ago—and, more recently—hosting initial meetings and overviews with Texas agencies and Austin city departments to brief them on some of the details. But key groups—including Austin's transportation department, Austin's emergency first responders, and federal regulators—are still missing important information about the self-driving machines set to imminently hit the roads of the Texas capital. Tesla hasn't hosted trainings with Austin emergency responders. It hasn't specified what level of autonomy Tesla cars will be using at launch (the industry's 5-point scale entails everything from cars that require constant human supervision to vehicles with no steering wheels). And, as of last week, Tesla still hadn't shared first responder plans or guides that the Austin Fire Department and Austin transportation department ask self-driving car companies for and rely on when responding to safety episodes, the departments told Fortune. 'We have not yet received First Responder guides from Tesla,' a spokesman for the Austin transportation department told Fortune in an email Wednesday. The fire department 'has not received a guide either,' a department spokeswoman said. Tesla did not respond to a request for comment. Tesla has assured city employees that those guidebooks are coming, however. And its robotaxi engineering teams have been in regular communication with the City since last year, according to emails obtained by Fortune via Freedom of Information Requests. On Monday, Tesla conducted live testing with several members of Austin's autonomous vehicle working group, driving one of its robotaxi cars alongside emergency vehicles on a closed neighborhood street. At the event, Tesla laid out some of their preliminary plans for the launch, according to Andre Jordan, division chief of special operations and homeland security for the Austin Fire Department, who was present. Hands-on training sessions and detailed guidebooks for first responders are coming, Jordan says he's been assured by Tesla. 'That is something that they've been working on and they want to deliver, as well as the first responder training,' Jordan tells Fortune. 'I believe them,' he added, saying that the company has been transparent with them and willing to collaborate. 'I don't know if they've met all their timelines, but they have done what they said they would do.' Robotaxi services like Waymo, Zoox, and the now-defunct Cruise always conduct trainings and briefings with city employees in the weeks or months before they launch in new markets, and they provide guides—dozens of pages long—to emergency responders that explain how to interact with their vehicles and how to work together in case of safety episodes or instances in which their vehicles get stuck. Zoox said it hosts trainings with local first responders before it even begins testing in a new market—and that the company is in contact with city officials and first responders before it begins mapping. Similarly, Alphabet-owned Waymo, which is already operating in Austin, says it tries to reach out to city employees not just before launch, but before their cars arrive in a new city to map roads or to start testing, and that it provides emergency guides, protocols, and videos as part of its initial outreach. One factor giving Jordan some comfort with Tesla's fast-approaching launch is that Tesla's robotaxi is essentially the same Model Y car that's already out on the roads and familiar to first responders. Robotaxis made by other companies, by contrast, are unique designs with large sensors sitting on the roof, and which have required more getting used to, Jordan said. Unlike its rivals, Tesla's self-driving technology doesn't require detailed maps of local roads, relying solely on the car's video cameras and its AI technology—an approach that means Tesla may not necessarily need to spend as much time in a city ahead of launch (though it's worth noting that the safety and performance of Tesla's map-free approach for self-driving robotaxis is still unproven compared to services like Waymo). Jordan noted that Tesla has made four modifications to its launch plans—adding specific guardrails or risk mitigations to the service—that have made the Fire Department feel more comfortable, though he repeatedly declined to specify what they were, saying that they were 'preliminary' and that it was Tesla's 'business information.' 'We had initially thought that that launch date was especially optimistic, but I don't know if that's the case anymore,' Jordan says. 'So I don't know. I'm kind of guessing along with everybody else, but the details that they have shared were reassuring.' Austin is one of several U.S. cities, including Phoenix and San Francisco, where self-driving cars are being tested or have been made available as commercial robotaxi services. Waymo's autonomous Jaguar I-PACE cars have been ferrying paying customers around San Francisco since August 2023, and are now doing rides or testing in Austin, Atlanta, Washington, D.C., Las Vegas, Miami, and other cities. Companies like Zoox, owned by Amazon, and Nuro have all been running pilot programs in various cities around the country. Many companies have set limits as they roll out service or tests—setting up boundaries where vehicles can drive (restricting highway travel, for example), having employees ride in the passenger or back seat, or limiting which customers can use the service, such as family and friends only. In choosing Austin for its robotaxi debut, Tesla has selected a location with looser regulatory requirements than California cities like San Francisco. While Tesla has assured city employees that it plans to share more information in advance of launch, the Transportation and Public Works spokesman pointed out that the city cannot require Tesla to provide it in advance of launch, as it doesn't have enforcement authority under Texas law. Tesla's Austin launch is the first phase of a bold robotaxi plan that involves specially designed 'cybercabs' with no manual controls. Those vehicles aren't expected to go into production until at least next year, however, and Tesla has said the robotaxis coming to Austin will be slightly modified versions of the Model Y cars the company sells to customers. While Tesla currently offers a 'full self-driving' option in the vehicles it sells in the U.S., the technology is 'Level 2,' which is closer to driver assistance than actual autonomous driving, as a driver is required to be fully alert and be prepared to take over the vehicle at all times. Musk has offered few details about its robotaxi and the level of advancement of its software versus that of Tesla FSD that is already available. During Tesla's most recent earnings call, he pointed out that there will initially be between 10 to 20 Model Y robotaxis in circulation in Austin on 'day one' and that Tesla plans to use a remote support team to help out if the cars get stuck. He has also said that the cars will have built-in audio sensing capabilities, allowing it to hear sirens and other sounds. But with just weeks to go until the launch, it's not clear what the technical classification of the cars will be. Under industry-wide autonomy classifications, only cars with 'Level 4' and 'Level 5' technology are capable of operating without a human behind the wheel. (Waymo's customized Jaguars, for example, are Level 4) When asked by Fortune whether the system Tesla is already testing is Level 2, Level 3, or Level 4 autonomy, the transportation department spokesman said the city wasn't sure. While Tesla had communicated with the department that it had begun testing, 'we do not know the details of the testing,' he said. Earlier this month, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration issued a letter to Tesla, demanding information about what level system Tesla is deploying and around whether Tesla's 'robotaxi system has achieved acceptably safe behavioral competency.' NHTSA also reminded Tesla about the agency's ongoing investigation into collisions involving Tesla's FSD software. Tesla has until mid-June to respond. Curiously, some of the recent information Tesla has shared with regulators in California—where the company is also conducting initial testing of a robotaxi service with safety drivers—suggests its technology may still require a human safety driver. In an email to the California Public Utilities Commission on April 16, Tesla shared a notice it had sent out to employees that described the full self-driving (FSD) system it is using in California robotaxi tests as a 'Level 2' system. 'The FSD system in use is an SAE Level 2 system that enforces driver attention, with system limits and can be disengaged via the traditional steering/braking/button methods,' reads the Tesla email, which was sent out to Bay Area employees just last month. Whether that description is an indication of Tesla's actual technology or simply a way for the company to tick off a regulatory checkbox is not clear. Because Tesla doesn't have the permits needed by California regulators to test a Level 3 system in the state, it's possible that Tesla is under-selling the capabilities of its FSD system in order to stay compliant. (Under industry-wide autonomy classifications, companies are expected to self-certify their technology based on the production design and intent of the technology—not how it is being tested, according to SAE International.) 'They're going to be as conservative as possible in the way they speak about this,' says Richard Bishop, an autonomous consultant who publishes an annual report on robotaxis.' Tesla's notice to the California regulator therefore might not be 'a good indication of what reality is in terms of capability.' By promising to launch the robotaxi service in June, Musk has created a self-imposed deadline that has become a focal point for the company's investors. The launch is especially important for Tesla, whose stock is down roughly 16% this year, as sales of its vehicles have fallen in the U.S., China, and Europe following Musk's controversial role in the Trump White House. And tariffs are threatening to impact about a quarter of Tesla's U.S. fleet. 'We believe the vast majority of valuation upside looking ahead for Tesla is centered around the success of its autonomous vision taking hold with a key June launch in Austin the beginning of this next era of growth for Musk and Tesla,' Dan Ives, a Wedbush analyst who has covered Tesla for more than a decade, wrote Friday in a note to investors. That said, Tesla has a history of missing deadlines Musk lays out for the company. In 2019, Musk said that Tesla would have 1 million robotaxis out on the roads by 2020. In 2022, he said production of robotaxis with no steering wheels would have started in 2024. This story was originally featured on
