Man accused of inciting terror attack

A man from Newcastle has been accused of encouraging someone to carry out a terrorist attack in Germany.

Fatah Mohammed Abdullah, from the Arthur’s Hill area of the city, is accused of encouraging another person to plough a car into crowds, attack people with a meat cleaver and set off bombs.

The 33-year-old Iranian is due to appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court via videolink tomorrow, after being charged by Counter-Terrorism Policing North East. The charge against him alleges that between April 9 and December 11 2018, he incited another person to commit an act of terrorism, namely to drive a car into a crowd in Germany, attack people with a meat cleaver and use explosives with the aim of killing and/or causing serious injury.

BUDGET cuts that could see more than 80 firefighter jobs lost in Tyne and Wear have been put partly on hold, in the hope of securing new funding from the Government.

Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Service (TWFRS) bosses revealed last week that they planned to cut 82 jobs over the next three years in a bid to save £3.3m.

Those measures were expected to be approved by the region’s fire authority yesterday, but a late intervention from Labour councillors has meant that a decision on a large section of the cuts will be delayed.

Ahead of the meeting at the service’s Sunderland headquarters, dozens of firefighters, trade unionists, Labour activists, and members of the public joined a demonstration against the proposed cuts, which were described as “unnecessary and dangerous”.

Sixteen jobs will be lost in the first round of the spending reductions, which will be implemented in the coming financial year and save the service £682,000. Those proposals also involve relocating fire engines from Gosforth and Washington into central Newcastle and Sunderland.

But the remainder of the savings scheduled to be made between 2020 and 2022 - have not yet been signed off, with councillors hoping they could be averted if a better funding deal can be secured from the government.

Gateshead Labour councillor Gary Haley said that the move “puts the ball back in the government’s court”.

He added: “By 2020, we hope that the Government will have responded and told us what they intend to do about our predicament.”

If all of the staffing cuts do go ahead, 78 firefighters posts and another four control room jobs will be lost - all of which are expected to be through planned retirements rather than compulsory redundancies.

Coun Bruce Pickard, deputy mayor of North Tyneside, said that ministers could “easily” find the money that the fire service needs to plug a £3.7m hole in its budget.

His colleague Coun John Harrison added that councillors had a “responsibility to the people” to lobby government for a better deal.

Chris Lowther, the service’s chief fire officer, said that delaying a decision on some of the budget cuts would have no negative impact on the plans.

After the meeting, Russ King, Tyne and Wear Fire Brigades Union sec- retary said: “I welcome the authority’s direction, however we have got to remind people that we are still seeing cuts and losses of 16 jobs.”

He pledged to work with the fire service to help lobby the government for extra cash and “push our hardest to get that extra funding”.

The union has argued that the service should not be cutting jobs at a time when it also plans to build a new £5m station in Hebburn.

The decision to delay some of the cuts was backed by Labour and Conservative councillors, but not the authority’s Liberal Democrat representatives.

Newcastle Lib Dem councillors Tom Woodwark said that it was too optimistic to expect any extra cash from ministers. He said: “The evidence we have from Government does not back that optimism.”

Coun Woodwark added that Labour were “hoping for jam tomorrow when there is no evidence that the jam is even in existence”.