Each week, Ben Hopkinson looks back at a serious, crazy, and happy news story from the past week.
Serious News
The Met Police will need to cut 2,300 officers and 400 staff next year in order to meet a funding shortfall of £450million, according to its commissioner.
Speaking to the London Policing Board, Sir Mark Rowley admitted that it will have a “seriously detrimental impact” of the UK's largest service – currently employing 33,473 officers and a further 11,178 staff.
Selling off buildings and using reserves “is no longer possible” either, at a more demanding time than ever for the police force.
He also says that the financial pressures “are a cumulative impact of a decade or more” in comparison than this year's budget.
The projections are based on planning assumption that will change until the final figure is announced by City Hall next year.
Crazy News
A New Zealand man won Scrabble’s Spanish world title – when he cannot even speak the language.
Nigel Richards holds five English language tournament wins, alongside the Spanish counterpart as he speaks no words of Spanish and only started memorising the word list last year.
His friend, Liz Faguerlund – a New Zealand Scrabble official – says: “He can look at a block of words together and once they go into his brain as a picture he can just recall that very easily”.
This isn't the first time this has happened for him, as he also won the French Scrabble tournament back in 2015, after studying the word list for a mere nine weeks – as he has been recognised in his three-decade Scrabble career as the greatest player of all time.
His mother, Adrienne Fischer, admits that he did not excel in language at school, never attended university and takes a mathematical approach to the game rather than a linguistic one.
You will never be able to catch him in an interview with journalists, as he doesn't understand what all the “hoo-ha” is about
Happy News
A new wind-powered ferry is set to run between England and France to match the need for low-carbon travel albeit it very slow.
SailLink are behind the service and say it is “on schedule” to launch next year in 2025, following their early pilot back in 2022.
Andrew Simons, who founded the company, says: “I’m not trying to be a competitor with the ferries – I can’t take a lorry. I want to focus on foot passengers and cyclists, the cultural connection between the hearts of the ports, the sailing experience, the real closeness to the ocean, and [for passengers] to be able to go back home and say [they’ve] learned something”.
Each journey can take up to 12 passengers, with tickets costing £85 for a journey that ranges between three and four-and-a-half hours.
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