Throughout the year, more than 50,000 guests are invited to Buckingham Palace for various Royal events, and about half a million people pay for guided tours. Compared to the Tower of London, which boasts over 2 million visitors each year, Buckingham Palace could easily accommodate more visitors. However, paying tours only run for 56 days over August and September, as well as a few “selected dates” between D ...

For the first time since they took a place on the bench in the late 13th century, barristers across England and Wales took a half-day off work to come together and stage strikes in protest to government cuts to legal aid. Demonstrations outside courthouses up and down the country were joined by hundred of barristers in full court attire to protest against planned cuts to the legal aid system, which the lawy ...

Shadow Education Secretary Tristram Hunt says that raising the standards of teaching, and not just creating a new school structure, is the way to raise the standards of our children’s learning. At the moment, unqualified teachers are able to teach in academies and free schools, but Mr Hunt proposes that, under a new Labour government, this scheme will be gotten rid of to pave the way for boosting learning i ...

At the end of last year, China confirmed their position as the world’s top goods trader for the first time ever, overtaking the US who has held the title for decades. Beijing released figures on 10 January showing that China’s goods trade has risen to approximately 25 trillion yuan, about £2.5 trillion, a record high amount. The General Administration of Customs (GAC) announced that exports rose by almost 8 ...

Abortions have been the subject of many a discussion, with arguments against the termination of any pregnancy, and others for the right to have a choice. In most of the UK abortions have been legal on a number of grounds since the Abortion Act 1967, but Northern Ireland have kept strict laws, making abortions completely illegal apart from some vastly extenuating circumstances. David Ford, Northern Ireland’s ...

There are an estimated 540 football players registered in the Premier League, and around 1.5% of the British population is homosexual, according to ONS (Office of National Statistics). Doing the maths, this means there are around 8 current Premier League footballers who are gay, and not a single one has come out and admitted it. And why is that? There is still so much stigma about homosexuality, with many m ...

The UK has had the highest levels of teenage pregnancy in Europe, but the number of pregnant teens has been making a steady decline year after year. In the past 12 months, England’s teen birth rate as a whole has fallen by an astonishing 8.4% - to it’s lowest level in 40 years! NHS Maternity Statistics, England: 2012/2013 is a report by the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC) containing the fi ...

On December 15 fighting broke out across South Sudan, the world’s newest country that has only been independent of Sudan since 2011. It is worried that the clashes will lead to an all out civil war, but though the fighting isn’t over yet, peace talks are underway in Ethiopia, and Chia is urging for an immediate ceasefire. The fighting began as a clash between those loyal to President Salva Kiir, and those t ...

In a movie-worthy plotline, three women have been rescued from a house in London after being held captive for more than 30 years by a married couple, and forced to be their domestic slaves. After more than three decades, the women were rescued from their enslavement from what appeared to be an ordinary home in an ordinary neighbourhood. The Metropolitan police’s human trafficking unit worked with a charity ...

Back in September, Daily Diamond covered the benefits of electronic cigarettes compared to tobacco products and nicotine patches. E-cigarettes are becoming increasingly popular, and as if to prove this point, Heathrow Airport in London and e-cigarette brand Gamucci are to open the world’s first ever “vaping zone”, where e-smokers will be able to ‘light up’ indoors. No airports in the UK allow smoking inside ...