33pc can’t add up
ONE in three adults struggle with basic maths tasks such as working out change on a shopping trip, according to a new study.
It suggests that adults in England and Northern Ireland perform worse on everyday numeracy tasks than those in many other countries. Researchers from University College London and Cambridge University analysed data from an international OECD survey, which asked 16- to 65-year-olds in 31 nations to answer numeracy-related questions. RUSSIA has threatened retaliatory action after Theresa May announced that 23 suspected spies at its London embassy were being kicked out of the UK in the largest mass expulsion of diplomats since the Cold War.
Announcing the action in the House of Commons, Mrs May said the nerve agent attack on ex-spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury amounted to “an unlawful use of force by the Russian state against the United Kingdom”.
She announced the suspension of highlevel contacts with Russia, including a boycott of this summer’s World Cup by Government ministers and members of the royal family.
And she said Russian state assets will be frozen “wherever we have the evidence that they may be used to threaten the life or property of UK nationals or residents”.
Moscow’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs denounced the moves as an “unprecedentedly crude provocation” and warned: “Our response will not be long in coming.”
In a statement, the ministry said: “We consider it categorically unacceptable and unworthy that the British Government, in its unseemly political aims, further seriously aggravated relations, announcing a whole set of hostile measures, including the expulsion of 23 Russian diplomats from the country.”
But Mrs May said Russia had failed to provide a “credible” explanation for how the Novichok nerve agent which it had developed came to be used in the attack on the Skripals, who remain in hospital after being found slumped on a bench on March 4.
She told MPs: “There is no alternative conclusion other than that the Russian state was culpable for the attempted murder of Mr Skripal and his daughter – and for threatening the lives of other British citi- zens in Salisbury, including Detective Sergeant Nick Bailey.
“This represents an unlawful use of force by the Russian state against the United Kingdom.”
Mrs May addressed MPs yesterday after being briefed by senior military and intelligence chiefs at a meeting of the National Security Council at which it was agreed to take “immediate actions to dismantle Russia’s spy network in the UK”.
The Russian diplomats identified as undeclared intelligence officers have been given a week to leave, in the largest mass expulsion since 31 were ordered out in 1985 following the defection of double agent Oleg Gordievsky.
The expulsions will “fundamentally degrade Russian intelligence capability in the UK for years to come”, said Mrs May, adding: “If they seek to rebuild it, we will prevent them from doing so.”
Mrs May told MPs the Government will also develop new powers “to harden our defences against all forms of hostile state activity”, including by tightening checks on cross-border movements of those who may endanger UK security.