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  • MIL-OSI Global: DeepSeek: how China’s embrace of open-source AI caused a geopolitical earthquake

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Peter Bloom, Professor of Management, University of Essex

    Lightspring/Shutterstock

    We are in the early days of a seismic shift in the global AI industry. DeepSeek, a previously little-known Chinese artificial intelligence company, has produced a “game changing”“ large language model that promises to reshape the AI landscape almost overnight.

    But DeepSeek’s breakthrough also has wider implications for the technological arms race between the US and China, having apparently caught even the best-known US tech firms off guard. Its launch has been predicted to start a “slow unwinding of the AI bet” in the west, amid a new era of “AI efficiency wars”.

    In fact, industry experts have been speculating for years about China’s rapid advancements in AI. While the supposedly free-market US has often prioritised proprietary models, China has built a thriving AI ecosystem by leveraging open-source technology, fostering collaboration between government-backed research institutions and major tech firms.

    This strategy has enabled China to scale its AI innovation rapidly while the US – despite all the tub-thumping from Silicon Valley – remains limited by restrictive corporate structures. Companies such as Google and Meta, despite promoting open-source initiatives, still rely heavily on closed-source strategies that limit broader access and collaboration.

    What makes DeepSeek particularly disruptive is its ability to achieve cutting-edge performance while reducing computing costs – an area where US firms have struggled due to their dependence on training models that demand very expensive processing hardware.

    Where once Silicon Valley was the epicentre of global digital innovation, its corporate behemoths now appear vulnerable to more innovative, “scrappy” startup competitors – albeit ones enabled by major state investment in AI infrastructure. By leveraging China’s industrial approach to AI, DeepSeek has crystallised a reality that many in Silicon Valley have long ignored: AI’s centre of power is shifting away from the US and the west.

    It highlights the failure of US attempts to preserve its technological hegemony through tight export controls on cutting-edge AI chips to China. According to research fellow Dean Ball: “You can keep [computing resources] away from China, but you can’t export-control the ideas that everyone in the world is hunting for.”

    DeepSeek’s success has forced Silicon Valley and large western tech companies to “take stock”, realising that their once-unquestioned dominance is suddenly at risk. Even the US president, Donald Trump, has proclaimed that this should be a “wake-up call for our industries that we need to be laser-focused on competing”.

    But this story is not just about technological prowess – it could mark an important shift in global power. Former US secretary of state Mike Pompeo has framed DeepSeek’s emergence as a “shot across America’s bow”, urging US policymakers and tech executives to take immediate action.

    DeepSeek’s rapid rise underscores a growing realisation: globally, we are entering a potentially new AI paradigm, one where China’s model of open-source innovation and state-backed development is proving more effective than Silicon Valley’s corporate-driven approach.

    The Insights section is committed to high-quality longform journalism. Our editors work with academics from many different backgrounds who are tackling a wide range of societal and scientific challenges.

    I’ve spent much of my career analysing the transformative role of AI on the global digital landscape – examining how AI shapes governance, market structures and public discourse, and exploring its geopolitical and ethical dimensions, now and far in the future.

    I also have personal connections with China, having lived there while teaching at Jiangsu University, then written my PhD thesis on the country’s state-led marketisation programme. Over the years, I have studied China’s evolving tech landscape, observing firsthand how its unique blend of state-driven industrial policy and private-sector innovation has fuelled rapid AI development.

    I believe this moment may come to be seen as a turning point not just for AI, but for the geopolitical order. If China’s AI dominance continues, what could this mean for the future of digital governance, democracy, and the global balance of power?

    China’s open-source AI takeover

    Even in the early days of China’s digital transformation, analysts predicted the country’s open-source focus could lead to a major AI breakthrough. In 2018, China was integrating open-source collaboration into its broader digitisation strategy, recognising that fostering shared development efforts could accelerate its AI capabilities.

    Unlike the US, where proprietary AI models dominated, China embraced open-source ecosystems to bypass western gatekeeping, scale innovation faster, and embed itself in global AI collaboration. China’s open-source activity surged dramatically in 2020, laying the foundation for the kind of innovation seen today. By actively fostering an open-source culture, China ensured that a broad range of developers had access to AI tools, rather than restricting them to a handful of dominant companies.

    The trend has continued in recent years, with China even launching its own state-backed open-source operating systems and platforms in 2023, to further reduce its dependence on western technology. This move was widely seen as an effort to cement its AI leadership and create an independent, self-sustaining digital ecosystem.

    Video: BBC.

    While China has been steadily positioning itself as a leader in open-source AI, Silicon Valley firms remained focused on closed, proprietary models – allowing China to catch up fast. While companies like Google and Meta promoted open-source initiatives in name, they still locked key AI capabilities behind paywalls and restrictive licenses.

    In contrast, China’s government-backed initiatives have treated open-source AI as a national resource, rather than a corporate asset. This has resulted in China becoming one of the world’s largest contributors to open-source AI development, surpassing many western firms in collaborative projects. Chinese tech giants such as Huawei, Alibaba and Tencent are driving open-source AI forward with frameworks like PaddlePaddle, X-Deep Learning (X-DL) and MindSpore — all now core to China’s machine learning ecosystem.

    But they’re also making major contributions to global AI projects, from Alibaba’s Dragonfly, which streamlines large-scale data distribution, to Baidu’s Apollo, an open-source platform accelerating autonomous vehicle development. These efforts don’t just strengthen China’s AI industry, they embed it deeper into the global AI landscape.



    Read more:
    Putting DeepSeek to the test: how its performance compares against other AI tools

    This shift had been years in the making, as Chinese firms (with state backing) pushed open-source AI forward and made their models publicly available, creating a feedback loop that western companies have also – quietly – tapped into. A year ago, for example, US firm Abicus.AI released Smaug-72B, an AI model designed for enterprises that built directly upon Alibaba’s Qwen-72B and outperformed proprietary models like OpenAI’s GPT-3.5 and Mistral’s Medium. But the potential for US companies to further build on Chinese open-source technology may be limited by political as well as corporate barriers.

    In 2023, US lawmakers highlighted growing concerns that China’s aggressive investment in open-source AI and semiconductor technologies would eventually erode western leadership in AI. Some policymakers called for bans on certain open-source chip technologies, due to fears they could further accelerate China’s AI advancements.

    But by then, China’s AI horse had already bolted.

    AI with Chinese characteristics

    DeepSeek’s rise should have been obvious to anyone familiar with management theory and the history of technological breakthroughs linked to “disruptive innovation”. Latecomers to an industry rarely compete by playing the same game as incumbents – they have to be disruptive.

    China, facing restrictions on cutting-edge western AI chips and lagging behind in proprietary AI infrastructure, had no choice but to innovate differently. Open-source AI provided the perfect vehicle: a way to scale innovation rapidly, lower costs and tap into global research while bypassing Silicon Valley’s resource-heavy, closed-source model.

    From a western and traditional human rights perspective, China’s embrace of open-source AI may appear paradoxical, given the country’s strict information controls. Its AI development strategy prioritises both technological advancement and strict alignment with the Chinese Communist party’s ideological framework, ensuring AI models adhere to “core socialist values” and state-approved narratives. AI research in China has thrived not only despite these constraints but, in many ways, because of them.

    Video: CNBC.

    China’s success goes beyond traditional authoritarianism; it embodies what Harvard economist David Yang calls “Autocracy 2.0”. Rather than relying solely on fear-based control, it uses economic incentives, bureaucratic efficiency, and technology to manage information and maintain regime stability.

    The Chinese government has strategically encouraged open-source development while maintaining tight control over AI’s domestic applications, particularly in surveillance and censorship. Indeed, authoritarian regimes may have a significant advantage in developing facial-recognition technology due to their extensive surveillance systems. The vast amounts of data collected through these networks enable private AI companies to create advanced algorithms, which can then be adapted for commercial uses, potentially accelerating economic growth.

    China’s AI strategy is built on a dual foundation of state-led initiatives and private-sector innovation. The country’s AI roadmap, first outlined in the 2017 new generation artificial intelligence development plan, follows a three-phase timeline: achieving global competitiveness by 2020, making major AI breakthroughs by 2025, and securing world leadership in AI by 2030. In parallel, the government has emphasised data governance, regulatory frameworks and ethical oversight to guide AI development “responsibly”.

    A defining feature of China’s AI expansion has been the massive infusion of state-backed investment. Over the past decade, government venture capital funds have injected approximately US$912 billion (£737bn) into early-stage firms, with 23% of that funding directed toward AI-related companies. A significant portion has targeted China’s less-developed regions, following local investment mandates.



    Read more:
    Three lessons the west can learn from China’s economic approach to AI

    Compared with private venture capital, government-backed firms often lag in software development but demonstrate rapid growth post-investment. Moreover, state funding often serves as a signal for subsequent private-sector investment, reinforcing the country’s AI ecosystem.

    China’s AI strategy represents a departure from its traditional industrial policies, which historically emphasised self-sufficiency, support for a handful of national champions, and military-driven research. Instead, the government has embraced a more flexible and collaborative approach that encourages open-source software adoption, a diverse network of AI firms, and public-private partnerships to accelerate innovation. This model prioritises research funding, state-backed AI laboratories, and AI integration across key industries including security, healthcare, and infrastructure.

    Despite strong state involvement, China’s AI boom is equally driven by private-sector innovation. The country is home to an estimated 4,500 AI companies, accounting for 15% of the world’s total.

    As economist Liu Gang told the Chinese Communist Party’s Global Times newspaper: “The development of AI is fast in China – for example, for AI-empowered large language models. Aided with government spending, private capital is flowing to the new sector. Increased capital inflow is anticipated to further enhance the sector in 2025.”

    China’s tech giants including Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent and SenseTime have all benefited from substantial government support while remaining competitive on the global stage. But unlike in the US, China’s AI ecosystem thrives on a complex interplay between state support, corporate investment and academic collaboration.

    Recognising the potential of open-source AI early on, Tsinghua University in Beijing has emerged as a key innovation hub, producing leading AI startups such as Zhipu AI, Baichuan AI, Moonshot AI and MiniMax — all founded by its faculty and alumni. The Chinese Academy of Sciences has similarly played a crucial role in advancing research in deep learning and natural language processing.

    Unlike the west, where companies like Google and Meta promote open-source models for strategic business gains, China sees them as a means of national technological self-sufficiency. To this end, the National AI Team, composed of 23 leading private enterprises, has developed the National AI Open Innovation Platform, which provides open access to AI datasets, toolkits, libraries and other computing resources.

    DeepSeek is a prime example of China’s AI strategy in action. The company’s rise embodies the government’s push for open-source collaboration while remaining deeply embedded within a state-guided AI ecosystem. Chinese developers have long been major contributors to open-source platforms, ranking as the second-largest group on GitHub by 2021.

    Founded by Chinese entrepreneur Liang Wenfeng in 2023, DeepSeek has positioned itself as an AI leader while benefiting from China’s state-driven AI ecosystem. Liang, who also established the hedge fund High-Flyer, has maintained full ownership of DeepSeek and avoided external venture capital funding.

    Though there is no direct evidence of government financial backing, DeepSeek has reaped the rewards of China’s AI talent pipeline, state-sponsored education programs, and research funding. Liang has engaged with top government officials including China’s premier, Li Qiang, reflecting the company’s strategic importance to the country’s broader AI ambitions.

    In this way, DeepSeek perfectly encapsulates “AI with Chinese characteristics” – a fusion of state guidance, private-sector ingenuity, and open-source collaboration, all carefully managed to serve the country’s long-term technological and geopolitical objectives.

    Recognising the strategic value of open-source innovation, the government has actively promoted domestic open-source code platforms like Gitee to foster self-reliance and insulate China’s AI ecosystem from external disruptions. However, this also exposes the limits of China’s open-source ambitions. The government pushes collaboration, but only within a tightly controlled system where state-backed firms and tech giants call the shots.

    Reports of censorship on Gitee reveal how Beijing carefully manages innovation, ensuring AI advances stay in line with national priorities. Independent developers can contribute, but the real power remains concentrated in companies that operate within the government’s strategic framework.

    The conflicted reactions of US big tech

    DeepSeek’s emergence has sparked intense debate across the AI industry, drawing a range of reactions from leading Silicon Valley executives, policymakers and researchers. While some view it as an expected evolution of open-source AI, others see it as a direct challenge to western AI leadership.

    Microsoft’s CEO, Satya Nadella, emphasised its technical efficiency. “It’s super-impressive in terms of both how they have really effectively done an open-source model that does this inference-time compute, and is super-compute efficient,” Nadella told CNBC. “We should take the developments out of China very, very seriously”.

    Silicon Valley venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, a prominent advisor to Trump, was similarly effusive. “DeepSeek R1 is one of the most amazing and impressive breakthroughs I’ve ever seen – and as open source, a profound gift to the world,” he wrote on X.

    For Yann LeCun, Meta’s chief AI scientist, DeepSeek is less about China’s AI capabilities and more about the broader power of open-source innovation. He argued that the situation should be read not as China’s AI surpassing the US, but rather as open-source models surpassing proprietary ones. “DeepSeek has profited from open research and open source (e.g. PyTorch and Llama from Meta),” he wrote on Threads. “They came up with new ideas and built them on top of other people’s work. Because their work is published and open source, everyone can profit from it. That is the power of open research and open source.”

    Not all responses were so measured. Alexander Wang, CEO of Scale AI – a US firm specialising in AI data labelling and model training – framed DeepSeek as a competitive threat that demands an aggressive response. He wrote on X: “DeepSeek is a wake-up call for America, but it doesn’t change the strategy: USA must out-innovate & race faster, as we have done in the entire history of AI. Tighten export controls on chips so that we can maintain future leads. Every major breakthrough in AI has been American.”

    Elon Musk added fuel to speculation about DeepSeek’s hardware access when he responded with a simple “obviously” to Wang’s earlier claims on CNBC that DeepSeek had secretly acquired 50,000 Nvidia H100 GPUs, despite US export restrictions.

    Beyond the tech world, US policymakers have taken a more adversarial stance. House speaker Mike Johnson accused China of leveraging DeepSeek to erode American AI leadership. “They abuse the system, they steal our intellectual property. They’re now trying to get a leg up on us in AI.”

    For his part, Trump took a more pragmatic view, seeing DeepSeek’s efficiency as a validation of cost-cutting approaches. “I view that as a positive, as an asset … You won’t be spending as much, and you’ll get the same result, hopefully.”

    The rise of DeepSeek may have helped jolt the Trump administration into action, leading to sweeping policy shifts aimed at securing US dominance in AI. In his first week back in the White House, the US president announced a series of aggressive measures, including massive federal investments in AI research, closer partnerships between the government and private tech firms, and the rollback of regulations seen as slowing US innovation.

    The administration’s framing of AI as a critical national interest reflects a broader urgency sparked by China’s rapid advancements, particularly DeepSeek’s ability to produce cutting-edge models at a fraction of the cost traditionally associated with AI development. But this response is not just about national competitiveness – it is also deeply entangled with private industry.

    Musk’s growing closeness to Trump, for example, can be viewed as a calculated move to protect his own dominance at home and abroad. By aligning with the administration, Musk ensures that US policy tilts in favour of his AI ventures, securing access to government backing, computing power, and regulatory control over AI exports.

    At the same time, Musk’s public criticism of Trump’s US$500 billion AI infrastructure plan – claiming the companies involved lack the necessary funding – was as much a warning as a dismissal, signalling his intent to shape policy in a way that benefits his empire while keeping potential challengers at bay.

    Not unrelated, Musk and a group of investors have just launched a US$97.4 billion (£78.7bn) bid for OpenAI’s nonprofit arm, a move that escalates his feud with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and seeks to strengthen his grip on the AI industry. Altman has dismissed the bid as a “desperate power grab”, insisting that OpenAI will not be swayed by Musk’s attempts to reclaim control. The spat reflects how DeepSeek’s emergence has thrown US tech giants into what could be all-out war, fuelling bitter corporate rivalries and reshaping the fight for AI dominance.

    And while the US and China escalate their AI competition, other global leaders are pushing for a coordinated response. The Paris AI Action Summit, held on February 10 and 11, has become a focal point for efforts to prevent AI from descending into an uncontrolled power struggle. France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, warned delegates that without international oversight, AI risks becoming “the wild west”, where unchecked technological development creates instability rather than progress.

    But at the end of the two-day summit, the UK and US refused to sign an international commitment to “ensuring AI is open, inclusive, transparent, ethical, safe, secure and trustworthy … making AI sustainable for people and the planet”. China was among the 61 countries to sign this declaration.

    Concerns have also been raised at the summit about how AI-powered surveillance and control are enabling authoritarian regimes to strengthen repression and reshape the citizen-state relationship. This highlights the fast-growing global industry of digital repression, driven by an emerging “authoritarian-financial complex” that may exacerbate China’s strategic advancement in AI.

    Equally, DeepSeek’s cost-effective AI solutions have created an opening for European firms to challenge the traditional AI hierarchy. As AI development shifts from being solely about compute power to strategic efficiency and accessibility, European firms now have an opportunity to compete more aggressively against their US and Chinese counterparts.

    Whether this marks a true rebalancing of the AI landscape remains to be seen. But DeepSeek’s emergence has certainly upended traditional assumptions about who will lead the next wave of AI innovation – and how global powers will respond to it.

    End of the ‘Silicon Valley effect’?

    DeepSeek’s emergence has forced US tech leaders to confront an uncomfortable reality: they underestimated China’s AI capabilities. Confident in their perceived lead, companies like Google, Meta, and OpenAI prioritised incremental improvements over anticipating disruptive competition, leaving them vulnerable to a rapidly evolving global AI landscape.

    In response, the US tech giants are now scrambling to defend their dominance, pledging over US$400 billion in AI investment. DeepSeek’s rise, fuelled by open-source collaboration, has reignited fierce debates over innovation versus security, while its energy-efficient model has intensified scrutiny on AI’s sustainability.

    Yet Silicon Valley continues to cling to what many view as outdated economic theories such as the Jevons paradox to downplay China’s AI surge, insisting that greater efficiency will only fuel demand for computing power and reinforce their dominance. Companies like Meta, OpenAI and Microsoft remain fixated on scaling computational power, betting that expensive hardware will secure their lead. But this assumption blinds them to a shifting reality.

    DeepSeek’s rise as the potential “Walmart of AI” is shaking Silicon Valley’s foundation, proving that high-quality AI models can be built at a fraction of the cost. By prioritising efficiency over brute-force computing power, DeepSeek is challenging the US tech industry’s reliance on expensive hardware like Nvidia’s high-end chips.

    This shift has already rattled markets, driving down the stock prices of major US firms and forcing a reassessment of AI dominance. Nvidia, whose business depends on supplying high-performance processors, appears particularly vulnerable as DeepSeek’s cost-effective approach threatens to reduce demand for premium chips.

    Video: CBS News.

    The growing divide between the US and China in AI, however, is more than just competition – it’s a clash of governance models. While US firms remain fixated on protecting market dominance, China is accelerating AI innovation with a model that is proving more adaptable to global competition.

    If Silicon Valley resists structural change, it risks falling further behind. We may witness the unravelling of the “Silicon Valley effect”, through which tech giants have long manipulated AI regulations to entrench their dominance. For years, Google, Meta,and OpenAI shaped policies that favoured proprietary models and costly infrastructure, ensuring AI development remained under their control.

    DeepSeek is redefining AI with breakthroughs in code intelligence, vision-language models and efficient architectures that challenge Silicon Valley’s dominance. By optimising computation and embracing open-source collaboration, DeepSeek shows the potential of China to deliver cutting-edge models at a fraction of the cost, outperforming proprietary alternatives in programming, reasoning and real-world applications.

    More than a policy-driven rise, China’s AI surge reflects a fundamentally different innovation model – fast, collaborative and market-driven – while Silicon Valley holds on to expensive infrastructure and rigid proprietary control. If US firms refuse to adapt, they risk losing the future of AI to a more agile and cost-efficient competitor.

    A new era of geotechnopolitics

    But China is not just disrupting Silicon Valley. It is expanding “geotechnopolitics”, where AI is a battleground for global power. With AI projected to add US$15.7 trillion to the global economy by 2030, China and the US are racing to control the technology that will define economic, military and political dominance.

    DeepSeek’s advancement has raised national security concerns in the US. Trump’s government is considering stricter export controls on AI-related technologies to prevent them from bolstering China’s military and intelligence capabilities.

    As AI-driven defence systems, intelligence operations and cyber warfare redefine national security, governments must confront a new reality: AI leadership is not just about technological superiority, but about who controls the intelligence that will shape the next era of global power.

    China’s AI ambitions extend beyond technology, driving a broader strategy for economic and geopolitical dominance. But with over 50 state-backed companies developing large-scale AI models, its rapid expansion faces growing challenges, including soaring energy demands and US semiconductor restrictions.

    China’s president, Xi Jinping, remains resolute, stating: “Whoever can grasp the opportunities of new economic development such as big data and artificial intelligence will have the pulse of our times.” He sees AI driving “new quality productivity” and modernising China’s manufacturing base, calling its “head goose effect” a catalyst for broader innovation.

    To counter western containment, China has embraced a “guerrilla” economic strategy, bypassing restrictions through alternative trade networks, deepening ties with the global south, and exploiting weaknesses in global supply chains. Instead of direct confrontation, this decentralised approach uses economic coercion to weaken adversaries while securing China’s own industrial base.

    Video: AP.

    China is also leveraging open-source AI as an ideological tool, presenting its model as more collaborative and accessible than western alternatives. This narrative strengthens its global influence, aligning with nations seeking alternatives to western digital control. While strict state oversight remains, China’s embrace of open-source AI reinforces its claim to a future where innovation is driven not by corporate interests but through shared collaboration and global cooperation.

    But while DeepSeek claims to be open access, its secrecy tells a different story. Key details on training data and fine-tuning remain hidden, and its compliance with China’s AI laws has sparked global scrutiny. Italy has banned the platform over data-transfer risks, while Belgium and Ireland launched privacy probes.

    Under Chinese regulations, DeepSeek’s outputs must align with state-approved narratives, clashing with the EU’s AI Act, which demands transparency and protects political speech. Such “controlled openness” raises many red flags, casting doubt on China’s place in markets that value data security and free expression.

    Many western commentators are seizing on reports of Chinese AI censorship to frame other models as freer and more politically open. The revelation that a leading Chinese chatbot actively modifies or censors responses in real time has fuelled a broader narrative that western AI operates without such restrictions, reinforcing the idea that democratic systems produce more transparent and unbiased technology. This framing serves to bolster the argument that free societies will ultimately lead the global AI race.

    But at its heart, the “AI arms race” is driven by technological dominance. The US, China, and the EU are charting different paths, weighing security risks against the need for global collaboration. How this competition is framed will shape policy: lock AI behind restrictions, or push for open innovation.

    DeepSeek, for all its transformational qualities, continues to exemplify a model of AI where innovation prioritises scale, speed and efficiency over societal impact. This drive to optimise computation and expand capabilities overshadows the need to design AI as a truly public good. In doing so, it eclipses this technology’s genuine potential to transform governance, public services and social institutions in ways that prioritise collective wellbeing, equity and sustainability over corporate and state control.

    A truly global AI framework requires more than political or technological openness. It demands structured cooperation that prioritises shared governance, equitable access, and responsible development. Following a workshop in Shanghai hosted by the Chinese government last September, the UN’s general secretary, António Guterres, outlined his vision for AI beyond corporate or state control: “We must seize this historic opportunity to lay the foundations for inclusive governance of AI – for the benefit of all humanity. As we build AI capacity, we must also develop shared knowledge and digital public goods.”

    Both the west and China frame their AI ambitions through competing notions of “openness” – each aligning with their strategic interests and reinforcing existing power structures.

    Western tech giants claim AI drives democratisation, yet they often dominate digital infrastructure in parts of Africa, Asia and Latin America, exporting models based on “corporate imperialism” that extract value while disregarding local needs. China, by contrast, positions itself as a technological partner for the rest of the global south; however, its AI remains tightly controlled, reinforcing state ideology.

    China’s proclaimed view on international AI collaboration emphasises that AI should not be “a game of rich countries”“, as President Xi stated during the 2024 G20 summit. By advocating for inclusive global AI development, China positions itself as a leader in shaping international AI governance, especially via initiatives like the UN AI resolution and its AI capacity-building action plan. These efforts help promote a more balanced technological landscape while allowing China to strengthen its influence in global AI standards and frameworks.

    However, beneath all these narratives, both China and the US share a strategy of AI expansion that relies on exploited human labour, from data annotation to moderation, exposing a system driven less by innovation than by economic and political control.

    Seeing AI as a connected race for influence highlights the need for ethical deployment, cross-border cooperation, and a balance between security and progress. And this is where China may face its greatest challenge – balancing the power of open-source innovation with the constraints of a tightly controlled, authoritarian system that thrives on restriction, rather than openness.

    For you: more from our Insights series:

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    Peter Bloom does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. DeepSeek: how China’s embrace of open-source AI caused a geopolitical earthquake – https://theconversation.com/deepseek-how-chinas-embrace-of-open-source-ai-caused-a-geopolitical-earthquake-249563

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Why ‘low carbon’ roses are flown around the world

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Will de Freitas, Environment + Energy Editor, UK edition

    Grown in Ecuador (Équateur en français), sold in Paris. Robert Crum / shutterstock

    As you read this, planes full of roses are heading from east Africa and South America to almost every corner of the world. If you buy someone a rose this Valentine’s Day, it may be in the air right now or perhaps in a refrigerated warehouse in the Netherlands.

    A huge logistical operation ensures those flowers are timed to be perfectly in bloom on the 14th. From flower farm to bouquet can take just a few days. In all, hundreds of millions of roses will be shipped internationally this week, and many will die before they can be sold.

    Can all this flying be justified?

    You’re reading the Imagine newsletter – a weekly synthesis of academic insight on solutions to climate change, brought to you by The Conversation. I’m Will de Freitas, energy and environment editor, covering for my colleague Jack Marley who is lovesick. This week, we’re looking at flowers.

    Many people don’t realise just how far a Valentine’s rose has probably travelled. Though roses can be grown in the UK (and some species are native), most of them won’t flower for at least another few months.

    Jill Timms and David Bek, academics at the University of Coventry who have researched the global flower trade point out: “This sort of localised growing does not satisfy the demand for volume, variety and year-round supply, or indeed guarantee sustainability in terms of energy, pesticide use and so on.”

    This means most roses are imported from countries with more land, more sunshine, and a cheaper workforce. Major growers include Colombia, Ecuador, Kenya and Ethiopia. The Netherlands is actually the biggest exporter of roses, partly due to its own production in greenhouses but mostly thanks to its position as a crucial hub for the global trade. Flowers sent to the UK from the Netherlands were probably grown elsewhere.

    To ensure they stay fresh, those flowers are kept cool as they’re transported in a series of refrigerated lorries, planes or boats, while some are sprayed with chemicals to freeze them.

    “Geography matters,” say Timms and Bek. “Some flowers travel by sea, some cargo plane and others in the hold of passenger jets, all with very different carbon footprints.”



    Read more:
    Valentine’s Day: five ways to ensure your flowers are ethical

    Low-carbon flowers, a long way away

    Figuring out a flower’s carbon footprint is not straightforward. Jennifer Lavers and Fiona Kerslake from the University of Tasmania compared cut flowers grown in heated or refrigerated greenhouses in the Netherlands with those grown in Kenya.

    “Maintaining the controlled environmental conditions inside these [Dutch] buildings requires artificial light, heat and cooling, so each rose grown in The Netherlands contributes an average of around 2.91kg of CO₂ to the atmosphere.”

    “In contrast”, they write, “a single rose grown on a farm in Kenya contributes only 0.5kg. This is largely because Kenyan hot houses do not use artificial heating or lighting, and most farm workers walk or cycle to work. As a result, flowers grown in tropical regions are sometimes considered low-carbon (of course, this doesn’t always factor in international transport).”



    Read more:
    Sustainable shopping: your guilt-free guide to flowers this Valentine’s Day

    Paul D. Larson of the University of Manitoba points out that, while local production would ground some of the international flower flights, “growing flowers in greenhouses can use as much energy as shipping them [to North America] from Colombia by air freight”.

    Larson, a professor of supply chain management, does highlight one major issue with “low carbon” flowers in the global south, however:

    “Since flowers are not classified as edible, they are often exempt from pesticide regulations. Thus, many flower production workers in Ecuador and Colombia have suffered from respiratory problems, rashes and eye infections caused by exposure to toxic chemicals in fertilizers, fungicides and pesticides.”



    Read more:
    Valentine’s Day: COVID-19 wilted the flower industry, but sustainability still a thorny issue

    The flower trade in Ecuador and Colombia was actually engineered a few decades ago to try and stem the flow of cocaine into the US, says Jay L. Zagorsky, an associate professor at Boston University’s business school.

    “One part of the strategy was to convince farmers in Colombia to stop growing coca leaves – a traditional Andean plant that provides the raw ingredient for making cocaine – by giving them preferential access to US markets if they grew something else.”

    Whether this policy helped stop drug production is unclear, says Zagorsky, but American domestic rose growing has collapsed and “many businesses in Colombia and Ecuador started growing and shipping flowers north”.



    Read more:
    Americans spend millions of dollars on Valentine’s Day roses. I calculated exactly how much

    No one expects you to know exactly how a flower was grown, what conditions were like for workers, or to conduct a full “life cycle assessment” of their carbon footprint. But what can you do to help this Valentine’s Day?

    Timms and Bek, the flower trade experts at Coventry University, wrote about five ways to ensure your flowers are ethical. They contrast flowers grown in the Netherlands and Kenya and say that “your priorities need to guide your purchase: environmental issues include carbon footprint, chemical use, ecological degradation and water use; social issues include health and safety standards, gender discrimination, precarious employment and land rights.”

    – ref. Why ‘low carbon’ roses are flown around the world – https://theconversation.com/why-low-carbon-roses-are-flown-around-the-world-249769

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Europe: EU Industry Days 2025

    Source: European Union 2

    The EU Industry Days 2025, a premier event for Europe’s industry, will take place June 5-6 in Rzeszów, Poland, with the support of the Polish Presidency of the Council of the European Union. The main language is English but some sessions will be translated to Polish.

    The event will offer policy updates, strategic discussions, and insights into EU industry. Participants can explore innovative solutions at the exhibition area, get information on relevant SME business support instruments, and foster cooperation through matchmaking sessions. Industry professionals, civil society, and support organizations are encouraged to attend. 

    Watch the 2023 highlights video and visit the EU Industry Days website for updates. Join us to shape Europe’s industrial future.

    Contact 

    EU-INDUSTRY-DAYS EC [dot] EUROPA [dot] EU (EU-INDUSTRY-DAYS[at]EC[dot]EUROPA[dot]EU)

    MIL OSI Europe News –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Commission on AWERBs and Named Information Officer

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    A commission for advice from the Home Office to the Animals in Science Committee (ASC) on strengthening the functioning of AWERBs and Named Information Officer.

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    Details

    Recommendations sought for strengthening the functioning of Animal Welfare and Ethical Review Bodies (AWERBs) and the Named Information Officer (NIO) role. Advice is sought in the following specific areas:

    • best practice guidance for AWERBs, particularly relating to their duties regarding the 3Rs (replacement, refinement, and reduction) and training
    • the questions that AWERBs should ask project applicants to check that replacement methodologies have been fully considered
    • a review of the ASC AWERB network model to assure dissemination of leading practice
    • leading practice to ensure that the NIO role functions effectively at establishments, where required

    Updates to this page

    Published 12 February 2025

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    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Education for peace: the effort to teach children how to rebuild societies after WWII

    Source: The Conversation – France – By Camille Mahé, Maîtresse de conférences en histoire, Université de Strasbourg

    While the first world war and the Spanish civil war had already drawn children in Europe and beyond into the orbit of conflict, the second world war marked a pivotal period in how young people have experienced the horrors of war.

    During the 1940s, children faced unprecedented mobilisation and violence. From bombings and massacres to forced displacement and genocide, the impact was staggering. Millions of children were directly affected by these atrocities, while countless others endured the indirect consequences: shortages, family separations and grief.

    In the aftermath of the war, childhood experts such as pediatricians, psychologists and nutritionists, as well as political leaders and humanitarian workers, feared for this potentially “lost generation”. With recognition of the vulnerability of children as a social group, there was a transnational push to implement protective measures. This shared awareness led to milestones such as the establishment of the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) in December 1946 and, later, the adoption of the Declaration of the Rights of the Child.

    The period from 1939 to 1949 not only highlighted the need to protect children worldwide, but also underscored their importance in building a peaceful future. As detailed in La Seconde Guerre mondiale des enfants (The second world war of children), published in September 2024 by Presses Universitaires de France, children embodied hope for postwar nations. They were seen not only as victims of war but also as active participants in shaping a peaceful world.

    Schools as foundations of reconstruction

    After 1945, schools became central to Europe’s social reconstruction. Seen as spaces of socialisation that included nearly all children, schools were viewed as critical for rebuilding society. Some measures mirrored those introduced after the first world war. Children, particularly those aged 6 to 14 (the typical age for compulsory education in Europe), were tasked with preserving the memory of fallen soldiers, resistance fighters and civilian victims. They cleaned and adorned graves, attended public ceremonies and paid homage to the dead.

    However, postwar education went further. In some countries, particularly those that formerly had authoritarian or totalitarian regimes such as Italy and Germany, school curricula underwent significant transformation. Lessons on democratic governance and peaceful figures were either reinforced or reintroduced, and history classes began emphasising cultural, political and economic exchanges between nations. These reforms aimed to counteract the nationalist ideologies that had fuelled war and division.

    Unlike the post-WWI era, the years after 1945 saw efforts to strengthen ties between nations by fostering connections among their youngest citizens. Programs promoting international school exchanges flourished. French students corresponded with Canadian peers, British children sent books to Germans and Swedish students traveled to Belgium.

    Germany hosted one of the most ambitious programs: the US-led “World Friendship Among Children Program”. This initiative included pen-pal projects, student travel and even the symbolic adoption of war orphans by classrooms. The program also established the “World Friendship Council of the Future”, where young people proposed initiatives for international dialogue, mimicking the operations of newly formed organisations such as the United Nations, UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) and the World Health Organization.

    It was also in Germany that Houses of America, or Youth Centres, were established. While the goal was to offer children sports and cultural activities, they were primarily seen by Americans as tools of soft power and political instruments to (re)educate youth about the principles of democracy.

    Active pedagogy for European education

    Indeed, after 1945, educating children for peace also meant educating them about democracy. Across Western Europe, teaching methods inspired by progressive education movements – championed by figures such as Maria Montessori, Ovide Decroly and John Dewey – became widespread.

    For educational leaders, merely teaching democratic principles wasn’t enough: children needed to practice them. Classrooms became miniature societies where students elected class representatives, voted on school matters and debated everyday and political issues. This active engagement aimed to cultivate civic responsibility and critical thinking.

    Some postwar experiments went further. Communities of children or “children’s republics” emerged across Europe to provide homes for children who had lost their homes and parents. While their primary mission was humanitarian, these communities were also intended to form the foundations of new, peaceful societies. Self-governance was central to their goal of preparation for active citizenship. In the Repubblica dei Ragazzi (boys’ republic) in Santa Marinella, near Rome, children ran their own court, deliberative assembly and union.

    Ideological differences

    While schools are indeed the cornerstone of global peacebuilding, debates about fostering peace go beyond the classroom to encompass all aspects of children’s lives. This includes the private sphere, as evidenced by numerous transnational legislative efforts to ban violent comic books and war-themed toys, which are accused of inciting aggression in children and thus threatening a peaceful future.

    This surge of post-WWII initiatives underscores the fact that educating for peace and democracy was a European – if not global – project. However, its interpretation varied depending on country and region. In France, West Germany and Italy, the project was rooted in liberal ideals; in Eastern Europe, it reflected a different understanding of democracy.


    In the West, the focus was on the individual, with boys and girls assigned traditional, gendered roles: girls were encouraged to become future mothers, while boys were groomed to be workers contributing to economic growth. In contrast, the Eastern model emphasised collective values within a socialist framework, promoting more egalitarian relationships between boys and girls, albeit in service of political objectives.

    Regardless of ideological differences, these post-1945 initiatives left a lasting legacy. Their influence can still be seen today in school activities such as student elections and class trips, which continue to echo the democratic ideals of that era.

    Camille Mahé ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d’une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n’a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.

    – ref. Education for peace: the effort to teach children how to rebuild societies after WWII – https://theconversation.com/education-for-peace-the-effort-to-teach-children-how-to-rebuild-societies-after-wwii-246087

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: The UN must play a vital role in stabilising and rebuilding Syria: UK statement at the UN Security Council

    Source: United Kingdom – Government Statements

    Statement by Ambassador Barbara Woodward, UK Permanent Representative to the UN, at the UN Security Council meeting on Syria.

    I will make three points today.

    First, a little over two months have passed since the interim authorities took control of Damascus, offering hope for a brighter future and a more peaceful future for the Syrian people. 

    We are encouraged by efforts made in the weeks since and we welcome the interim authorities’ pledges to form an inclusive transitional government, leading to free and fair elections.

    We welcome the engagement between the Special Envoy, his office and the interim authorities and his plans to return to Damascus shortly. 

    As the Special Envoy has said, Syria’s political transition cannot afford to fail.

    As Syrians take the next steps towards a political process, we expect to see appointments to the transitional government and the recently announced Legislative Council and the Preparatory Committee which represent the diversity of Syrian society.

    We hope there will be a clear process and timeline for this next phase of the transition, which respects the rights and safety of all Syrians.

    Second, we have been clear, as others have too, that Syrians should chart their own future and that a political process should be Syrian-owned and Syrian-led.

    However, as Special Envoy Pederson and ASG Msuya both reminded us, it is essential that the international community step in and support as the challenges are vast and humanitarian needs acute.

    It is imperative that the UN, alongside the international community, plays a vital role in supporting Syrians to stabilise and then rebuild their country. 

    The deep scars and the damage of over a decade of conflict cannot be healed in a matter of months.

    Last week the UK, working with the World Food Programme, committed over $3.7 million to the ‘Grain from Ukraine’ initiative which will enable Ukraine to support the most vulnerable Syrians and alleviate suffering.

    So we endorse the Special Envoy’s call that we must also take this opportunity to scale up early recovery and sustainable programming to enable Syrians to feed themselves, to keep the lights on, to create jobs and build a better future.

    Finally, we welcome the visit to Damascus of the Director-General of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons on 8 February.

    This marks a positive step forward.

    We must use this window of opportunity and the work to support the OPCW and Syria to declare and destroy Assad’s remaining chemical weapons programme, for a more stable and secure Syria.

    Updates to this page

    Published 12 February 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI Global: M23’s capture of Goma is the latest chapter in eastern Congo’s long-running war

    Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Evelyn Namakula Mayanja, Assistant Professor, Interdisciplinary Studies, Carleton University

    At a recent summit in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, leaders of eight African states released a statement calling for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

    The statement comes after a flareup in fighting in eastern DRC that has killed hundred and wounded thousands.

    On Jan. 31, 2025 the rebel group known as the March 23 Movement (M23) captured the city of Goma in the eastern DRC. At a news conference, Corneille Nangaa, leader of the Congo River Alliance that includes M23, declared that they were there to stay and would march to the DRC’s capital of Kinshasa.

    The World Health Organization reported 900 bodies had been recovered from the streets of Goma, with about 3,000 people injured and thousands forced to flee. The Congolese government said that it had started burying more than 2,000 people and thousands had been displaced.

    On Feb. 4, 2025, the Congo River Alliance declared a ceasefire. This isn’t the first time M23 attacked Goma and then declared a ceasefire. The renewed violence is the latest in a long-running conflict in the region that has grown to involve local militias, regional countries and foreign companies seeking to exploit Congo’s mineral wealth.

    What is M23?

    M23 is an armed group made up predominantly of ethnic Tutsis. It emerged as an offshoot of the National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP), which disbanded in March 2009 after the Goma peace agreement. The agreement stipulated the integration of CNDP soldiers into Congo’s military and police, while its political wing would be recognized as an political party.

    However, a faction within the CNDP disapproved of the Goma agreement and created a militia group in 2012 that came to be known as M23. A United Nations group has said senior government officials from Rwanda and Uganda have provided M23 with weapons, intelligence and military support.

    Multiple reports from the UN Group of Experts on the DRC have noted Rwanda’s and Uganda’s support for M23 and other militias such as the Alliance of the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of the Congo Zaire, the Congolese Rally for Democracy and the CNDP.

    The roots of the conflict lie in the history of Belgium’s colonial rule of the region that pitted the Tutsi and Hutu ethnic groups against each other. In 1956, ethnic tensions in Rwanda forced many Tutsis to seek refuge in Congo (then Zaire), Uganda, Tanzania and beyond.

    Tutsis who fled to Congo and Uganda were not accorded full citizenship rights, and this led to resentment.

    In the mid-1990s, Rwandan President Paul Kagame and Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni collaborated with Congolese rebel leader Laurent-Désiré Kabila to create the AFDL. The group waged the First Congo War from October 1996 to May 1997 that ended with the overthrow of the DRC’s long-time ruler, Mobutu Sese Seko. Kabila became president.

    Kagame and Museveni fought along with Congolese Tutsis to assert their citizenship once the war ended. However, when Kabila turned against his backers, it led to the waged Second Congo War from 1998 to 2003, with Rwandan and Ugandan-backed militas fighting against the DRC government.

    M23 claims that it wants to defend the interests of Congolese Tutsis, and to protect them against the Congo government and the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR).

    The FDLR was implicated in orchestrating the 1994 Rwandan genocide that killed 800,000 people, most of whom were Tutsi. The FDLR has been based in eastern Congo since 1996, after the Rwandan Patriotic Front, led by Kagame and others, pushed them out of Rwanda.

    Fear of the FDLR was one of the drivers for the First Congo War. In a recent interview with CNN, Kagame said:

    “If you want to ask me, is there a problem in Congo that concerns Rwanda? And that Rwanda would do anything to protect itself? I’d say 100 per cent.”

    Control of minerals

    Before the fall of Goma in February 2025, M23 captured mineral-rich areas like Rubaya, the largest coltan mine in the Great Lakes region; Kasika and Walikale, where there are numerous gold mines; Numbi, which is rich with tin, tungsten, tantalum and gold; and Minova, which is a trade hub.

    In December 2024, a UN expert group noted that M23 exported about 150 tonnes of coltan to Rwanda, and was involved with Rwanda’s production, leading to “the largest contamination of mineral supply chain.”

    One of the central dynamics of this conflict is the control and profit from natural resources. The DRC is rich in minerals and metals needed around the world, including the critical minerals used in the technology and renewable energy industries.

    The World Bank has noted that the “DRC is endowed with exceptional mineral resources.” However, administration of the sector is dysfunctional and handicapped by insufficient institutional capacity.

    This problem is exacerbated by the interference of neighbouring countries, foreign corporations and their international backers who destabilize the DRC to balkanize and control resources.

    The way forward

    Ending the M23 insurgency requires taking Tutsi citizenship seriously. Politics researcher Filip Reyntjens has argued that any peaceful transition in the DRC needed to take regional countries seriously. He emphasized:

    “By turning a blind eye to Rwanda’s hegemonic claims in eastern Congo, the future stability of the region remains in doubt. Rwanda may once again, in the not too distant future, become the focal point of regional violence.”

    A factor contributing to the violence is the lack of measures to ensure ceasefires are respected by different parties engaged in conflicts. In addition, armed groups and their backers have not been effectively prosecuted. A 2010 UN mapping report describes 617 alleged war crimes, crimes against humanity and human rights between March 1993 and June 2003. No perpetrators have never been prosecuted.

    Furthermore, there must be strong international efforts to prevent conflict minerals from getting into international supply chains. M23 and other militias smuggle Congo’s minerals through regional neighbours, where they are considered conflict-free.

    Tech giants that rely on these minerals must do more to scrutinize where they come from. Equally, all of us, as consumers of products made from the DRC’s minerals, must demand accountability.



    Read more:
    Overcoming racism depends on respect for every person’s dignity

    It’s usually only men who participate in such talks. Women, who endure the brutality of sexual violence and other human rights violations, must be represented in peace and security talks.

    In his 2018 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, Congolese physician and human rights activist Dr. Dennis Mukwege noted that:

    “What is the world waiting for before taking this into account? There is no lasting peace without justice. Yet, justice in not negotiable. Let us have the courage to take a critical and impartial look at what has been going on for too long in the Great Lakes region.”

    To effectively respond to the plight of the people of eastern Congo will take more than situational and short-term intervention. National, regional and international parties must negotiate peaceful and just access to minerals. Peace and security in Congo will happen when sectarian and partisan politics is replaced with commitment to democracy, sovereignty and peoples’ well-being.

    Evelyn Namakula Mayanja receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Canada and Carleton University.

    – ref. M23’s capture of Goma is the latest chapter in eastern Congo’s long-running war – https://theconversation.com/m23s-capture-of-goma-is-the-latest-chapter-in-eastern-congos-long-running-war-248833

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Gozetotide approved for the treatment of prostate cancer

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    Gozetotide binds to the cancer cells with prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA) on their surface, making them visible during the PET scan.

    The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has today, 12 February 2025, approved gozetotide (brand name Illuccix) to be used in a type of medical imaging procedure called a Position Emission Tomography (PET) scan which is used to detect specific types of cancer cells in adults with prostate cancer.

    Gozetotide binds to the cancer cells with prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA) on their surface, making them visible during the PET scan.

    This gives healthcare professionals valuable information about the disease to help inform treatment options.

    The pharmaceutical form of this medicine is administered as one solution for injection.

    Julian Beach, MHRA Interim Executive Director of Healthcare Quality and Access, said:

    “Patient safety is our top priority, which is why I am pleased to confirm approval of gozetotide to detect specific types of cancer cells in adults with prostate cancer.

    “We’re assured that the appropriate regulatory standards of safety, quality and effectiveness for the approval of this new formulation have been met.

    “As with all products, we will keep its safety under close review.”

    A number of pivotal and supportive studies from the literature were presented to demonstrate efficacy and safety in the proposed indication, which are summarised in the Summary of Product Characteristics (SmPC). 

    Like all medicines, this medicine can cause side effects, although not everybody gets them.

    Some of the potential side effects include a temporarily increased blood level of a digestive enzyme (amylase), constipation, feeling weak, and warmth where the injection site is given.

    For the full list of all side effects reported with this medicine, see Section 4 of the Patient Information Leaflet (PIL) or the SmPC available on the MHRA website.

    Anyone who suspects they are having a side effect from this medicine are encouraged to talk to their doctor, pharmacist or nurse and report it directly to the MHRA Yellow Card scheme, either through the website (https://yellowcard.mhra.gov.uk/) or by searching the Google Play or Apple App stores for MHRA Yellow Card.   

     ENDS   

    Notes to editors   

    • The new marketing authorisation was granted on 12 February 2025 to TELIX PHARMACEUTICALS (UK) LIMITED

    • This product was submitted and approved via a national procedure. 

    • More information can be found in the Summary of Product Characteristics and Patient Information leaflets which will be published on the MHRA Products website within 7 days of approval. 

    • The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) is responsible for regulating all medicines and medical devices in the UK by ensuring they work and are acceptably safe.  All our work is underpinned by robust and fact-based judgements to ensure that the benefits justify any risks. 

    • The MHRA is an executive agency of the Department of Health and Social Care. 

    For media enquiries, please contact the newscentre@mhra.gov.uk, or call on 020 3080 7651.

    Updates to this page

    Published 12 February 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Westbourne Green chosen for the central London’s largest Japanese style mini forest | Westminster City Council

    Source: City of Westminster

    London’s largest inner city forest has been planted just metres from the A40 Westway in Westbourne Green. The 426 new trees- known as a micro forest- will help to mitigate the effect of climate change by boosting biodiversity and reducing air and noise pollution in the local area.

    The project, a partnership between Westminster City Council, Ruth Wilmott Associates, and Creating Tomorrows Forests, sees nine different species of native trees including blackthorn, field maple, and crab apple introduced to the Westbourne Green Open Space in the central London’s biggest micro forest. The sapling trees were specifically chosen for their qualities in absorbing air pollution particulates, reducing noise, and adding to the area’s biodiversity by providing shelter, pollen, nectar, and fruit for local wildlife. Funding for the project has been provided through partnership with businesses working to provide community and environmental initiatives.

    Micro forests follow the Miyawaki Method, developed by Japanese biologist Akira Miyawaki, where saplings are densely planted to encourage ten times more rapid growth. Research suggests this method results in 18 times higher biodiversity than more widely spaced plantations as the faster growth rates accelerate the establishment of the micro forests.

    The council is aiming to plant a further 5000 more saplings in six micro forests new trees in the area, bringing Westminster’s total tree population to over 24,000. The new woodland area is part of the local authority’s broader environmental strategy to improve air quality and increase green space.

    Local primary schools are getting involved in the project, with children helping to name the new micro forest and sowing a wildflower meadow. Additional funding through the Rewild London Fund will provide materials to build animal boxes giving local children and their families the opportunity to learn about wildlife and get involved in conservation first hand.

    More information about Westminster City Council’s fairer environment strategy can be found on the council’s website. Creating Tomorrow’s Forests are also looking for businesses to get in touch to learn more about the project and funding.

    Councillor Ryan Jude, Cabinet Member for Climate Action, Ecology and Culture said:

    Not many people would think that a micro forest could be so central, but I’m thrilled that we are adding central London’s biggest plantation of trees to Westbourne Green. This is a huge step forward in mitigating climate change and helping our city become net zero by 2040.”

    “Westminster is home to some of London’s best green spaces so increasing biodiversity and plant life across the city underlines how serious we are improving biodiversity, protecting communities from harmful emissions and teaching younger residents about the value of nature.”

    Jack Gordon, a local resident to Westbourne Green added:

    Community based projects are the lifeblood of any close community and this is such an important way to help green the local area.”

    “More needs to be done understand how important trees and how they help mitigate the excesses of climate change and this can benefit us in so many different ways.”

    Elisabeth Boivin, Managing Director at Creating Tomorrow’s Forests said:

    We are delighted to be involved in this innovative project that will bring such direct benefits to residents around Westbourne Green Open Space, funded by our partnerships with businesses such as Wilmott Dixon and Ecologi. It will be fantastic to show how planting trees has such a positive impact on the local environment, and it is great to have this opportunity to educate people on the advantages of increasing biodiversity in our urban green spaces. We cannot wait to see how the micro forests grow and develop over time.”

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Preston City Council supports Rough Sleepers with first steps towards Independence

    Source: City of Preston

    With the acquisition of a central Preston property, Preston City Council is launching a night service.

    The aim of the service is to work with rough sleepers in taking steps to get them off the streets and into accommodation, whilst offering them safety, support and advice to help them gain independence.

    Supported by MEAM (Making Every Adult Matter) a consultation was carried out over a six-month period, by Preston City Council’s Housing Advice Services and Rough Sleeper Initiative team (RSI).

    Led by Preston City Council’s Service User Involvement Worker, a small peer group made up of frontline workers and service users, gave feedback on what a nighttime provision could offer.

    The most common answer from service users when asked what was needed was ‘more beds’.

    Preston City Council is committed to delivering this, especially for vulnerable, homeless women, whose numbers are growing, and who need gender specific accommodation alongside trauma-informed help and recovery.

    Based on the feedback, the night service, which plans to open its doors in March 2025, will comprise of cubicles for up to 14 people, and allocate places based on referrals from the Outreach Team working with our partners.

    The plans around increasing accommodation options for rough sleepers will see a focus on trauma informed recovery and breaking the cycle. Preston City Council will build on the successes of the Rough Sleeper Initiative Outreach

    The team who have worked relentlessly for positive change on challenging cases. From the Target Priority Group identified in 2021, 90% are now in accommodation.

    Alongside recovery models, Preston City Council will be addressing ways to aid prevention due to an increase in single homeless applications, and to avoid them becoming entrenched rough sleepers.

    Working with partner agencies to offer support around mental health, drugs and alcohol addiction in a supportive and inclusive environment, service users will also be able to partake in activities and support groups, helping them take positive steps towards gaining independence.

    Councillor Nweeda Khan, Cabinet Member for Communities and Social Justice at Preston City Council said:

    Preston City Council firmly believes that any individual sleeping on the streets in our city is unacceptable, and we stand committed to getting people off the streets and into secure and safe accommodation. National challenges around homelessness and housing have risen dramatically in recent years and we work hard with our community partners to stem the tide of increasing numbers of homelessness in Preston.

    We thank all our partners who time to take part in the research that was carried out.

    Currently there is limited emergency accommodation in the city and the Council have made opening a new Night Shelter Service a priority project, supported as part of a wider package, by the limited funding it has available, to tackle the problem.

    The Night Service will also provide longer term help and solutions through gender specific pathways, to more permanent housing and work with clients to break the cycle of an ‘on the street lifestyle.

    Preston City Council has invested significant resource in this priority area to date and has a strong long-term relationship with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG).

    The Council continues to explore all avenues for additional funding to support homelessness and rough sleeping.

    An agreement has now been reached with the Foxton Centre, a charity that supports vulnerable communities in Preston. The Council will continue to support the Foxton Day Centre which is, according to data from the Foxton Centre, is used mainly for food during the breakfast session, some showers and some laundry.

    John Parkinson, Chair of the Trustees at the Foxton Centre said:

    We welcome PCC investment in a night shelter in the city. This adds to the range of facilities provided in Preston to support rough sleepers and address the growing problem of homelessness.

    The agreement between PCC and The Foxton to continue to invest in the Foxton Day Centre and create a steering group to coordinate and build on the range of partnerships is a positive step forward. This will enable the further development of joined up services including medical, mental health, addiction and legal support which are currently in place at the Day Centre.

    Multi-agency coordination between statutory and voluntary sector providers is the most effective way to use the resources needed to support rough sleepers.

    As well as nighttime support, Preston’s Severe Weather Emergency Protocol (SWEP), was activated in early January and has seen 44 people assisted during its operation, 10 have moved on for a variety of reasons and 34 of those currently in accommodation will be allocated support workers.

    SWEP is a good practice requirement offered by Preston City Council Housing and Homelessnes Services to ensure that people sleeping rough are not at risk of harm during extreme cold or severe weather.

    Drop-in Sessions

    Preston City Council is holding a series of drop-in sessions at the Town Hall between 4 – 8pm, in collaboration with MEAM for local businesses, answering questions and offering more information about the night service.

    Follow-up workshops are being offered for those interested in being involved or discussing ways in working together with the Council and MEAM.

    Awareness session

    • Thursday 27 February

    Workshops

    • Tuesday 4 March
    • Wednesday 5 March
    • Thursday 13 March

     

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: New road safety measures following tragic accident

    Source: City of Plymouth

    Safety measures, including an extension of the 30mph speed limit along part of the A374 Embankment Road in Plymouth, along with the removal of a number of mature trees, will be implemented following a tragic accident where a driver sadly lost his life.

    In 2023, a young man was fatally injured in a road traffic collision. At the inquest last year, the coroner raised concerns about trees that line the road, particularly after hearing evidence from a forensic collision investigator, road safety engineer and a motor police officer, who all agreed that the location of the trees was “dangerous” and one of the contributing factors in the accident.

    As a result, the coroner wrote to the Council and requested that measures be taken to improve safety for pedestrians and all road users.

    The Council cannot ignore the recommendations of the coroner. Officers have assessed the road and in order to address the safety concerns, is planning on extending the existing 30mph speed limit along the western section of Embankment Road by around 800 metres on both sides, from its current terminal north-east of Stanley Place to a point north-east of the rowing club.

    In addition, the assessment found that not only are the trees sited very close to the road, but they have grown so big the footway is now incredibly narrow. Unfortunately, it is not possible to widen the footway or provide a safety barrier between the trees and the highway. Therefore, the Council plans to remove around 25 trees along the outbound side from the Glendinning cement depot to Arnold’s Point. These works will not involve any road closures but will eventually require complete reconstruction of the carriageway and footway over around 450 metres of road.

    The trees will be removed during February half-term (Monday 17 to Friday 21 February), when traffic levels will be reduced. 

    The Council is looking to plant replacement trees away from the road.

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Consultation for visitor levy scheme for Aberdeen approved

    Source: Scotland – City of Aberdeen

    A public consultation for a potential visitor levy scheme in Aberdeen which would raise revenue to be used for improvements for the visitor economy in the city has been agreed.

    Aberdeen City Council’s Finance and Resources Committee today approved the move which would see the scheme charge a percentage fee on overnight stays in accommodation.

    Convener of Finance and Resources Councillor Alex McLellan said: “Aberdeen City Council has developed the visitor levy scheme with key stakeholders which will now go out to consultation.

    “There is the potential for the scheme to raise significant funds to help support our ambition to be a leading visitor destination.

    “Our decision around whether or not to introduce a visitor levy will be informed by the consultation as it is important to consider the views of the trade, and a key part of that discussion will be around how the council could use the funds to boost the city’s economy, increase visitor numbers, and, in turn, fill hotel rooms.”

    Chair of the Aberdeen City and Shire Hotels Association Frank Whitaker said “It is fair to say that the hotel sector lobbied hard against legislation for a visitor levy. However, the law now enables local authorities across Scotland to implement a visitor levy, so it is incumbent on industry to work with local authorities to develop effective schemes that support local economic growth.

    “The introduction of a visitor levy scheme in Aberdeen City has the potential to be a positive economic growth lever if correctly invested, benefitting not just all types of visitors to Aberdeen but also local residents.”

    The report to committee said The Visitor Levy (Scotland) Bill allows local authorities in Scotland to charge a fee or tax on overnight stays in some types of accommodation. The levy would be calculated as a percentage of the chargeable transaction for accommodation, after deducting any commission costs.

    The main purpose of the bill is to invest more in the local economy in ways that will benefit business and leisure visitors as well as residents.

    The local authority has the discretion to set what the rate is and the legislation allows for local authorities to set different rates for different purposes or areas meaning that different rates can be set for particular events, such as arts festivals or special conferences and that local authorities can vary the area in which the levy applies within their boundary.

    Local authorities cannot vary the type of accommodation that the levy would apply to and that includes hotels, bed and breakfasts, hostels, guest houses, self-catering accommodation, camping sites, caravan parks, accommodation in a vehicle, or on board a vessel which is permanently or predominantly situated in one place.

    Cruise ships and motor homes are not subject to the levy. The levy is not payable where the visitor or any other person utilising the right to reside in the overnight accommodation is in receipt of benefits, payments, or allowances for a disability.

    The report said if it goes ahead, the absolute earliest a visitor levy scheme can come into effect in Aberdeen is 1 April 2027. For public consultation, a rate of 7% is proposed which would produce a levy of £5 per night on an average hotel room of £70 a night.

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Council unveils new £25m HGV and welfare bus fleet with enhanced safety features

    Source: Scotland – City of Edinburgh

    Transport and Environment Convener, Councillor Stephen Jenkinson alongside fleet colleagues at Bankhead Depot.

    Safety is at the heart of the Council’s fleet, with our entire fleet of new Heavy Goods Vehicles (HGVs) along with our welfare buses all equipped with enhanced safety features.

    We’re investing over £25m into our new HGVs and welfare buses as part of our wider £56.8m Fleet Asset Management Plan 2023-2029.  

    We’ve taken inspiration from the Progressive Safe System (PSS) which was implemented by Transport for London (TfL) in October 2024 to enhance vehicle awareness and reduce the likelihood of collisions. There are seven key requirements under PSS:

    • Camera monitoring system fitted to the vehicle’s nearside
    • Class V and VI mirrors
    • Blind spot sensors fitted to the vehicles nearside
    • Moving off sensors fitted to the front of the vehicle
    • Side under-run protection on both sides of the vehicle
    • Audible warning alerts when vehicles turn left
    • Prominent visual warning signage

    In addition to adhering to PSS requirements, all our new vehicles are fitted with an Advanced Emergency Braking System (AEBS). AEBS uses sensors to monitor a vehicle’s surroundings and automatically apply the brakes if a collision is likely.

    Whilst there are no such safety requirement anywhere else in the UK outside of London, we took the decision to ensure all HGVs purchased as part of the replacement programme were equipped with the technology to meet this standard.

    Our 152 strong HGV fleet is comprised of refuse collection vehicles, road sweepers, road gritters, mobile library uses, construction vehicles in roads services, and utility trucks for maintaining streets and greenspace.

    Whilst our 27 welfare buses, which transport children with Additional Support Needs (ASN), are not classed as HGV we took the decision to order these buses with the new safety features. These vehicles operate in and around schools and built-up areas during peak travel times so it’s important they are as safe as possible for everyone.

    We’ve now taken delivery of over 70 of our new HGVs, with all new refuse collection vehicles due to arrive by the end of March 2025 and all other HGVs due to be in service this year.

    Transport and Environment Convener, Councillor Stephen Jenkinson said:

    I was delighted to go down to Bankhead this morning to see some of these new vehicles firsthand and talk to our colleagues who operate them. We have a responsibility to our colleagues and our residents to make sure our fleet is as safe as possible. This is why we’re investing tens of millions of pounds into our fleet.

    With these changes I’m confident that we have the most advanced local authority fleet in Scotland when it comes to safety features. I hope that other parts of Scotland and the UK will look to London and Edinburgh’s example and follow suit.

    Safety is an absolute priority for us when delivering our services and I have no doubt that these new features will have a positive impact.

    Published: February 12th 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Works underway to upgrade Enfield Road play area

    Source: City of Norwich

    Published on Wednesday, 12th February 2025

    A new, refurbished play area at Enfield Road is to open in the Spring, after a £100,000 contract was awarded to local firm Premier Playgrounds to undertake the works.

    Starting this month, the work will involve replacing the equipment to make sure the playground is a safe, fun and accessible space for everyone to enjoy.

    The project will involve replacing the current equipment and flooring, creating an inclusive, engaging and accessible space for children of all abilities.

    The work comes following a local consultation, with feedback from more than 200 residents who responded to our consultation, including 44 young people aged 2-12: Enfield Road Playground Upgrade (on Get Talking Norwich).

    “Enfield Road playground is a much-loved community asset, demonstrated by the high number of respondents to the consultation,” says Cllr Emma Hampton, Cabinet Member for a climate responsive Norwich. “We’re committed to updating and maintaining our play areas, to encourage active young lives and outdoor play.”

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Consultation launched to define Liverpool’s 15-year economic vision

    Source: City of Liverpool

    A public consultation has been launched asking businesses and residents to comment on a vision to grow Liverpool’s multi-billion-pound economy over the next 15 years.

    The Inclusive Economic Growth Strategy will set the framework for growth up to 2040 and the eight-week consultation, hosted by Liverpool City Council, aims to inform the development of the resulting action plan.

    The vision for Liverpool 2040 is to create a strong and inclusive economy that leaves no one behind.

    The strategy focuses on strengthening foundations to build a fairer, more prosperous, and sustainable city that creates opportunities for a good life for all its residents.

    The draft strategy focuses on several key themes, including:

    • Strengthening key sectors to drive growth, innovation, investment and productivity
      Key sectors include: Health & Life Sciences, Creative and Digital industries, Advanced Manufacturing and Maritime.
    • Build a vibrant, productive and resilient business base
    • Ensure access to skills development, employment opportunities and career building
    • Place people at the heart of growth activity and supporting aspirations and networks

    Several public engagement events will be staged over the coming months to gather views from the public. People can also go online at www.liverpool.gov.uk/growthstrategyconsultation to find out more and give their feedback.

    Liverpool currently powers a £16.7 billion economy, with over 14,000 businesses and around 230,000 people in employment.

    However, significant challenges remain, including low productivity and investment, financial pressures on public services, inequality of opportunity in some communities, and health challenges.

    In light of these challenges, the Council, which recently submitted a New Town bid to Government to regenerate a huge part of North Liverpool, is committed to supporting businesses and residents. Delivering an inclusive economy a core pillar for Liverpool’s Strategic Partnership plan for 2040.

    This draft inclusive growth strategy will also complement other key aims such as the city’s Net Zero commitment, the actions outlined in the 2040 Health of the City report as well as the Council’s Local Plan, Housing Plan and Transport Plan.

    To further underline the Council’s commitment, since June 2023, its Business Support Service has provided advice and guidance to over 1,000 Liverpool businesses and supported 300+ residents with direct advice on starting up a new business.

    The Adult Learning and Skills team has also supported over 4,500 residents to develop essential workplace skills, and the Ways to Work team has supported 1,708 economically inactive and unemployed residents with employment and skills services.

    Councillor Nick Small, Liverpool City Council’s Cabinet Member for Development and Growth, said: “This draft Inclusive Economic Growth Strategy is a vital piece of work and one which will come to define the conditions that support our businesses to grow.

    “Feedback to this draft strategy is crucial, it needs to reflects the views and needs of our businesses, non-profit organizations, charities, and voluntary organization – be it education, transport, housing or digital connectivity.

    “We also want to hear residents’ views to ensure we create a strong, relevant and deliverable strategy, one that will inform the initiatives, interventions and investment into the infrastructure the city needs to underpin our future economy.

    “All of this feedback will help us strengthen the strategy, ensure we deliver the right action for economic growth, and best placing us to build inclusivity so residents and communities thrive.”

    Councillor Lila Bennett, Liverpool City Council’s Cabinet Member for Employment, Educational Attainment and Skills, said “The success of this strategy will be deeply rooted in the strength and diversity of our partnerships and our collective commitment and action. All our partners have a key role in driving economic growth and ensuring benefits are felt across all communities.

    “We also want our partners, including the business community, to embrace and deliver for our residents by realising opportunities and addressing challenges, from climate change to AI, to train and upskill their workforce to be ready for the economy of the future.”

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Opening Remarks by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth at Ukraine Defense Contact Group (As Delivered)

    Source: United States Department of Defense

    Good afternoon, friends.

    Thank you, Secretary Healy for your leadership, both in hosting and now leading the UDCG. 

    This is my first Ukraine Defense Contact Group. And I’m honored to join all of you today.  

    And I appreciate the opportunity to share President Trump’s approach to the war in Ukraine.

    We are at, as you said Mr. Secretary, a critical moment. As the war approaches its third anniversary, our message is clear: The bloodshed must stop.  And this war must end.

    President Trump has been clear with the American people – and with many of your leaders – that stopping the fighting and reaching an enduring peace is a top priority.

    He intends to end this war by diplomacy and bringing both Russia and Ukraine to the table. And the U.S. Department of Defense will help achieve this goal. 

    We will only end this devastating war – and establish a durable peace – by coupling allied strength with a realistic assessment of the battlefield.

    We want, like you, a sovereign and prosperous Ukraine. But we must start by recognizing that returning to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective.  

    Chasing this illusionary goal will only prolong the war and cause more suffering.  

    A durable peace for Ukraine must include robust security guarantees to ensure that the war will not begin again.  

    This must not be Minsk 3.0. 

    That said, the United States does not believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement. 

    Instead any security guarantee must be backed by capable European and non-European troops. 

    If these troops are deployed as peacekeepers to Ukraine at any point, they should be deployed as part of a non-NATO mission. And they should not covered under Article 5.  There also must be robust international oversight of the line of contact.

    To be clear, as part of any security guarantee, there will not be U.S. troops deployed to Ukraine. 

    To further enable effective diplomacy and drive down energy prices that fund the Russian war machine, President Trump is unleashing American energy production and encouraging other nations to do the same. Lower energy prices coupled with more effective enforcement of energy sanctions will help bring Russia to the table. 

    Safeguarding European security must be an imperative for European members of NATO. As part of this Europe must provide the overwhelming share of future lethal and nonlethal aid to Ukraine.

    Members of this Contact Group must meet the moment.  

    This means:  Donating more ammunition and equipment. Leveraging comparative advantages.  Expanding your defense industrial base. And importantly, leveling with your citizens about the threat facing Europe.

    Part of this is speaking frankly with your people about how this threat can only be met by spending more on defense.  

    2% is not enough; President Trump has called for 5%, and I agree.

    Increasing your commitment to your own security is a down payment for the future. A down payment as you said Mr. Secretary of peace through strength.

    We’re also here today to directly and unambiguously express that stark strategic realities prevent the United States of America from being primarily focused on the security of Europe.

    The United States faces consequential threats to our homeland.  We must – and we are – focusing on security of our own borders.

    We also face a peer competitor in the Communist Chinese with the capability and intent to threaten our homeland and core national interests in the Indo-Pacific. The U.S. is prioritizing deterring war with China in the Pacific, recognizing the reality of scarcity, and making the resourcing tradeoffs to ensure deterrence does not fail. 

    Deterrence cannot fail, for all of our sakes.

    As the United States prioritizes its attention to these threats, European allies must lead from the front. 

    Together, we can establish a division of labor that maximizes our comparative advantages in Europe and Pacific respectively.

    In my first weeks as Secretary of Defense, under President Trump’s leadership, we’ve seen promising signs that Europe sees this threat, understands what needs to be done, and is stepping up to the task.

    For example, Sweden recently announced its largest ever assistance package. We applaud them for committing $1.2 billion in ammunition and other needed materiel.

    Poland is spending 5% of GDP on defense already, which is a model for the continent.

    And 14 countries are co-leading Capability Coalitions. These groups are doing great work to coordinate Europe’s contributions of lethal assistance across eight key capability areas.

    These are first steps. More must still be done.  

    We ask each of your countries to step up on fulfilling the commitments that you have made.  

    And we challenge your countries, and your citizens, to double down and re-commit yourselves not only to Ukraine’s immediate security needs, but to Europe’s long-term defense and deterrence goals. 

    Our transatlantic alliance has endured for decades. And we fully expect that it will be sustained for generations to come. But this won’t just happen.  

    It will require our European allies to step into the arena and take ownership of conventional security on the continent.  

    The United States remains committed to the NATO alliance and to the defense partnership with Europe. Full stop.   

    But the United States will no longer tolerate an imbalanced relationship which encourages dependency.  Rather, our relationship will prioritize empowering Europe to own responsibility for its own security. 

    Honesty will be our policy going forward – but only in the spirit of solidarity.   

    President Trump looks forward to working together, to continuing this frank discussion amongst friends, and to achieve peace through strength – together.

    Thank you.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Security: Prolific shoplifter jailed in east London

    Source: United Kingdom London Metropolitan Police

    A prolific shoplifter who repeatedly targeted stores in east London has been convicted following a Met Police investigation.

    Officers were called to Tesco Express on High Road in Leytonstone at 16:00hrs on Tuesday, 7 January, following a report a man had been apprehended by staff after attempting to steal a large amount of alcohol.

    The offender was detained by officers outside the store, with the incident captured on CCTV and the footage recovered as part of the investigation.

    Lee Moise, 46 (12.04.86), of no fixed address, was further charged with nine other thefts and common assault on a member of staff at the same location, as well as a theft at Co-op on Homerton High Street.

    He appeared at Thames Magistrates’ Court on Thursday, 9 January where he was sentenced to 12 months in jail, suspended for 18 months.

    Inspector Mohammed Uddin, from the Neighbourhood Policing Team in Homerton, said:

    “We know shoplifting has a significant impact on businesses which also extends to staff, and successful cases like this highlight our commitment to bringing offenders to justice as we focus on the crimes that matter most to Londoners.

    “Our Safer Neighbourhood Teams continue to work alongside local stores big and small on effective crime prevention initiatives, as well as carrying out more arrest enquiries and liaising with the council to identify shoplifters with the help of their CCTV operations.

    “We are also working with drug and homeless outreach teams who provide support to people known for shoplifting which is often used to fund their drug habits. It’s these targeted approaches that is making a difference in communities across London.”

    A Tesco spokesperson said:

    “Our colleagues work hard to serve our customers every day, and each member of our team deserves to feel safe at work.

    “We would like to thank all the officers and our internal security team who have worked collaboratively on this case.

    “We continue to liaise closely with our partners, such as the Metropolitan Police, to share information and invest in new ways to keep our stores, like the High Road Leytonstone Express, safe places to work and shop.”

    The conviction of Moise is another example of the intelligence-led approach Safer Neighbourhood teams in east London are taking to remove prolific shoplifters from their respective wards.

    In Homerton alone, neighbourhood officers have made 15 arrests relating to more than 50 crimes since September 2024, of which six people are currently serving prison terms.

    More widely, the Met is collaborating with the business community to target those who continuously shoplift, using data and technology such as phone tracking and surveillance techniques.

    MIL Security OSI –

  • MIL-OSI: Societe Generale: shares and voting rights as of 31 January 2025

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    NUMBER OF SHARES COMPOSING CURRENT SHARE CAPITAL AND TOTAL NUMBER OF VOTING RIGHTS AS OF 31 JANUARY 2025

    Regulated Information

    Paris, 12 February 2025

    Information about the total number of voting rights and shares pursuant to Article L.233-8 II of the French Commercial Code and Article 223-16 of the AMF General Regulations.

    Date Number of shares composing current share capital Total number of
    voting rights
    31 January 2025 800,316,777

    Gross:    885,499,593

    Press contacts:

    Jean-Baptiste Froville_+33 1 58 98 68 00_ jean-baptiste.froville@socgen.com
    Fanny Rouby_+33 1 57 29 11 12_ fanny.rouby@socgen.com

    Societe Generale

    Societe Generale is a top tier European Bank with more than 126,000 employees serving about 25 million clients in 65 countries across the world. We have been supporting the development of our economies for 160 years, providing our corporate, institutional, and individual clients with a wide array of value-added advisory and financial solutions. Our long-lasting and trusted relationships with the clients, our cutting-edge expertise, our unique innovation, our ESG capabilities and leading franchises are part of our DNA and serve our most essential objective – to deliver sustainable value creation for all our stakeholders.

    The Group runs three complementary sets of businesses, embedding ESG offerings for all its clients:

    • French Retail, Private Banking and Insurance, with leading retail bank SG and insurance franchise, premium private banking services, and the leading digital bank BoursoBank.
    • Global Banking and Investor Solutions, a top tier wholesale bank offering tailored-made solutions with distinctive global leadership in equity derivatives, structured finance and ESG.
    • Mobility, International Retail Banking and Financial Services, comprising well-established universal banks (in Czech Republic, Romania and several African countries), Ayvens (the new ALD I LeasePlan brand), a global player in sustainable mobility, as well as specialized financing activities.

    Committed to building together with its clients a better and sustainable future, Societe Generale aims to be a leading partner in the environmental transition and sustainability overall. The Group is included in the principal socially responsible investment indices: DJSI (Europe), FTSE4Good (Global and Europe), Bloomberg Gender-Equality Index, Refinitiv Diversity and Inclusion Index, Euronext Vigeo (Europe and Eurozone), STOXX Global ESG Leaders indexes, and the MSCI Low Carbon Leaders Index (World and Europe).
    For more information, you can follow us on Twitter/X @societegenerale or visit our website societegenerale.com.

    Attachment

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI: LECTRA: 2024: improved financial results in what remains a degraded environment

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    2024: improved financial results in what remains a degraded environment

    • Revenues: 526.7 million euros (+10%)*
    • EBITDA before non-recurring items: 91.1 million euros (+15%)*
    • Net income: 29.6 million euros (-9%)*
    • Free cash flow before non-recurring items: 72.1 million euros (+59%)*
    • Dividend**: €0.40 per share (+11%)

    * Change at actual exchange rates (%)
    ** Proposed to the Annual Shareholders’ Meeting on April 25, 2025

         
    In millions of euros October 1 – December 31 January 1 – December 31
      2024(1) 2023 2024(1) 2023
    Revenues 132.5 119.3 526.7 477.6
    Change at actual exchange rates (%) 11%   10%  
    EBITDA before non-recurring items(2) 22.6 19.8 91.1 79.0
    Change at actual exchange rates (%) 14%   15%  
    EBITDA margin before non-recurring items
    (in % of revenues)    		 17.1% 16.6% 17.3% 16.5%
    Income from operations before non-recurring items(2) 11.9 12.3 49.3 49.1
    Change at actual exchange rates (%) -3%   0%  
    Net income 8.4 7.7 29.6 32.6
    Free cash flow before non-recurring items(2) 22.2 13.2 72.1 45.3
             

    (1)   2024 figures include Launchmetrics since January 23,2024
    (2)   The definition for performance indicators appears in the Management Discussion of December 31, 2024

    Paris, February 12, 2025. Today, Lectra’s Board of Directors, chaired by Daniel Harari, reviewed the consolidated financial statements for the fiscal year 2024. Audit procedures have been performed by the Statutory Auditors. The certification report will be issued at the end of the Board of Director’s meeting of February 27, 2025.

    To facilitate analysis of the Group’s results, the accounts of Lectra excluding Launchmetrics (the “Lectra 2023 scope”) are analyzed separately from the Launchmetrics accounts. The detailed 2024 vs 2023 comparisons for the Lectra 2024 scope and for Launchmetrics are based on actual exchange rates, whereas the comparisons for the Lectra 2023 scope are stated on a like-for-like basis.

    1.    SUMMARY OF THE YEAR 2024

    The year 2024 was marked by a severely degraded macroeconomic and geopolitical environment, prompting the Group’s customers to exercise prudence in their investment decisions, though situations varied across geographies and market sectors.

    Under these conditions, for the Lectra 2023 scope, orders for new systems were stable, and new SaaS subscriptions grew by 8%, confirming their success and increasing adoption by the Group’s customers.

    2024 earnings in line with recent estimates

    On October 30, the Group reported that revenues and EBITDA before non-recurring items were expected to be near the lower end of the ranges indicated on February 14, i.e., revenues of 480 million euros and EBITDA before non-recurring items of 85 million euros for the Lectra 2023 scope; and 42 million euros in revenues and EBITDA margin before non-recurring items of over 15% for Launchmetrics, i.e., revenues of 522 million and 91.3 million euros of EBITDA margin before non-recurring items for the Lectra 2024 scope.

    In total, full-year 2024 revenues grew 10% to 526.7 million euros and EBITDA before non-recurring items increased 15% to 91.1 million euros.

    Successful integration of Launchmetrics

    Launchmetrics achieved revenues of 41.2 million euros and an EBITDA before recurring items of 7.0 million euros, and exceeded the Group’s profitability expectations with an EBITDA margin before non-recurring items of 16.9%.

    What’s more, this acquisition has considerably expanded Lectra’s SaaS activity, providing the basis for a twofold increase in SaaS revenues to 77.4 million euros at end-2024 and strengthening SaaS’s future potential.

    The integration — in terms of processes, teams and products — is already a proven success and enables Lectra to form a coherent set of SaaS activities. Launchmetrics has also contributed its top-level practices in the area of SaaS, thus enriching the customer experience across the Group.

    Continuing improvement in the fundamentals of the Group’s business model

    The fundamentals of the Group’s business model were substantially improved, notably on the basis of the strict cost control policy implemented since May 2023, and the contribution of Launchmetrics. Recurring revenues increased by 18%, with margins covering nearly all fixed costs. The EBITDA margin before non-recurring items rose 0.8 percentage point, to 17.3%. Free cash flow before non-recurring items generated in 2024 came to 72.1 million euros (+59%) and the Group’s net debt was brought down to 20.6 million euros at December 31, 2024.

    2.    Q4 2024

    Q4 2024 revenues were up 11% compared to Q4 2023, at 132.5 million euros, with Launchmetrics contributing 11.0 million euros.

    EBITDA before non-recurring items (22.6 million euros) was up 14% and the EBITDA margin before non-recurring items came to 17.1% (+0.5 percentage points).

    Free cash flow before non-recurring items rose sharply to 22.2 million euros (+68%).

    Lectra 2023 scope

    Currency changes had only a limited impact on revenues and results.

    Orders for new systems were stable compared to Q4, 2023, at 38.6 million euros, and new SaaS subscriptions came up to 3.6 million euros (+17%).

    Revenues came to 121.5 million euros, up 1%: revenues for new systems were down 6%, while recurring revenues were 5% higher.

    EBITDA before non-recurring items was 21.0 million euros and the EBITDA margin before non-recurring items came to 17.3%, up 0.3 percentage point.

    3.    2024

    Full-year 2024 revenues came to 526.7 million euros, up 10% with the following breakdown: 28% of total revenues for new systems, down 5%, 72% of total revenues in recurring revenues, up 18%, including Saas revenues of 77.4 million euros (x2.5).

    Launchmetrics, which has been consolidated since January 23, 2024, contributed 41.2 million euros to 2024 revenues.

    Gross profit came to 376.9 million euros, up 13%, and the gross profit margin was 71.6%, up 1.8 percentage points over 2023.

    EBITDA before non-recurring items came to 91.1 million euros, up 15%, and the EBITDA margin before non-recurring items rose 0.8 point to 17.3%.

    Income from operations before non-recurring items amounted to 49.3 million euros, stable compared to 2023. This included a 22.7-million-euro charge for amortization of intangible assets arising from the acquisitions carried out since 2021.

    Research and development costs, which were fully expensed in the period and included in fixed overhead costs, represented 12.8% of revenues (11.7% in 2023).

    Financial income and expenses represented a net charge of 6.0 million euros (2.8 million euros in 2023) due to higher interest rates and the financing of the Launchmetrics acquisition.

    Foreign exchange gains and losses generated a net loss of 2.2 million euros.

    Taking into account the amortization of intangible assets, the increase in financial expenses, and an income tax expense of 10.9 million euros, net income amounted to 29.6 million euros, down 9% compared to 2023.

    Free cash flow before non-recurring items was significantly higher, at 72.1 million euros (+59%).

    A particularly robust balance sheet

    At December 31, 2024, the Group had a particularly robust balance sheet with a consolidated shareholders’ equity of 374.4 million euros, a negative working capital requirement of 25.2 million euros and net debt of 20.6 million euros. The net debt consisted of financial debt of 102.5 million euros and cash of 81.9 million euros.

    Lectra 2023 scope

    Currency changes had only a limited impact on revenues and results.

    Orders for new systems (144,9 million euros) were stable compared to 2023.

    Orders for perpetual software licenses (11.4 million euros) fell by 18% — as most new software is now sold in SaaS mode— while orders for equipment and accompanying software (113.0 million euros), and for training and consulting (17.3 million euros) rose by 2% and 9%, respectively.

    Revenues were up 2% at 485.5 million euros, and recurring EBITDA was up 7% at 84.2 million Euros.

    4.    DIVIDEND

    The Company maintained its attractive shareholder compensation policy with dividends representing a payout ratio of about 40% of net income in 2023 and, as a result of the strong increase in free cash flow, the company has decided on a payout ratio of 50% of net income for the year 2024.

    The Board of Directors will propose to the Shareholders’ Meeting of April 25, 2025 the payment of a dividend at €0.40 per share in respect of fiscal year 2024.

    5.    CHANGES IN GOVERNANCE

    Following a disagreement with the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer regarding the role of the Lead Director, Ross McInnes has decided to resign from his position as Director, effective April 24, 2025. The Board of Directors thanks him for his contribution over the past three years. 

    As of April 25, 2025, the Board of Directors of Lectra will consist of 7 members: Daniel Harari (Chairman and Chief Executive Officer), Nathalie Rossiensky (Lead Director, Independent Director), Céline Abecassis-Moedas (Independent Director), Karine Calvet (Independent Director), Pierre-Yves Roussel (Independent Director), Jérôme Viala (non-Independent Director) and Hélène Viot-Poirier (Independent Director). 

    6.    ASSESSMENT OF THE 2023-2025 STRATEGIC ROADMAP – SECOND PROGRESS REPORT

    Launched in 2017, the Lectra 4.0 strategy aims to position the Group as a key Industry 4.0 player in its three strategic market sectors: fashion, automotive and furniture, before 2030. The strategy has been implemented up to now through three strategic roadmaps.

    The first strategic roadmap, which covered the 2017-2019 period, established the key fundamentals for the future of the Group.

    The second roadmap, which ran from 2020 through 2022, achieved a new dimension for the Group – primarily through the acquisition of Gerber in June 2021 – and opened new perspectives, with a financial position stronger than ever before, an extended worldwide presence, a broader customer base, a powerful product portfolio, a growing number of customers using its new offers for Industry 4.0, and a new brand image.

    The Group’s ambition over the 2023-2025 period is to take full advantage of its change in dimension to accelerate growth, to significantly increase the volume of SaaS in revenues, and to seize acquisition opportunities.

    Despite the unstable economic and geopolitical climate, Lectra successfully maintained its long-term strategic orientations. Further, all the fundamentals of the Group’s business model improved significantly and customer adoption of the SaaS model accelerated. The Group acquired Launchmetrics and strategic partnerships were concluded with Six Atomic and AQC.

    With the commitment of employees and recognition by customers, Lectra stands at the forefront in building a more sustainable future. The Group has taken numerous steps to enhance its offering to reduce environmental impact for its customers, notably through material traceability for fashion, thanks to the acquisition of a majority stake in TextileGenesis in early 2023.

    Details of the second progress report on this 2023-2025 strategic roadmap can be found in the December 31, 2024 “Management Discussion and Analysis” document, available on Lectra.com.

    7.    OUTLOOK

    In the challenging environment of 2024, Lectra proved to be highly resilient, confirming the relevance of its strategy and the quality of its fundamentals—crucial assets for the Group’s continued development.

    Outlook for 2025

    While initial positive signs can be detected, the lack of visibility in what remains an uncertain economic and geopolitical context, could continue to weigh on investment decisions by the Group’s customers going forward.

    In this context, the Group has begun the year 2025 with confidence and will pursue its strategy by meeting the needs of its customers as closely as possible via the quality of its offers for Industry 4.0 and by developing its SaaS activity.

    As in the previous two years, visibility regarding orders for new systems remains low, with no way of anticipating the timing or magnitude of a possible rebound, which could nevertheless occur during the course of the year.

    Recurring revenues, which accounted for 72% of total revenues in 2024, are expected to grow further in 2025, largely on the strength of expanding SaaS activity.

    Furthermore, the Group will maintain strict cost controls and anticipates a mix of orders that will favorably impact the gross margin.           

    In light of the above, Lectra has set the 2025 objective of achieving recurring revenues of over 400 million euros, including 90 million euros of SaaS revenues.

    Overall, revenues are expected to be between 550 and 600 million euros, with an EBITDA margin before non-recurring items close to 20%, based on exchange rates at December 31st, 2024, particularly of $1.04/€1.

    The Management Discussion and Analysis of Financial Conditions and Results of Operations and the financial statements for Q4 and the fiscal year 2024 are available on lectra.com. First quarter earnings for 2025 will be published on April 24. The Annual Shareholders’ Meeting will take place on April 25, 2025.

    About Lectra

    As a major player in the fashion, automotive and furniture markets, Lectra contributes to the Industry 4.0 revolution with boldness and passion by providing best-in-class technologies.The Group offers industrial intelligence solutions – software, equipment, data and services – that facilitate the digital transformation of the companies it serves. In doing so, Lectra helps its customers push boundaries and unlock their potential. The Group is proud to state that its 3,000 employees are driven by three core values: being open-minded thinkers, trusted partners and passionate innovators.Founded in 1973, Lectra reported revenues of 527 million euros in 2024. The company is listed on Euronext, where it is included in the following indices: CAC All Shares, CAC Technology, EN Tech Leaders and ENT PEA-PME 150.

    For more information, visit lectra.com.

    Lectra – World Headquarters: 16–18, rue Chalgrin • 75016 Paris • France
    Tel. +33 (0)1 53 64 42 00 – www.lectra.com
    A French Société Anonyme with capital of €37,966,274 • RCS Paris B 300 702 305

    Attachment

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI: LECTRA: Q4 and Full Year 2024 financial report available

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    Q4 and Full Year 2024 financial report available

    Paris, February 12, 2025 – Lectra informs its shareholders, in compliance with article 221-4-IV of the General Regulation of the Autorité des marchés financiers, that the Management Discussion and Analysis of Financial Conditions and Results of Operations for the fourth quarter and the full year 2024 is available on the company’s website: www.lectra.com

    It is also available, upon request, at the company’s headquarters 16-18 rue Chalgrin, 75016 Paris (email: investor.relations@lectra.com)

    About Lectra

    A major player in the fashion, automotive and furniture markets, Lectra contributes to the development of Industry 4.0 with boldness and passion, fully integrating Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) into its global strategy. The Group offers industrial intelligence solutions – software, cutting equipment, data analysis solutions and associated services – that facilitate the digital transformation of the companies it serves. In doing so, Lectra helps its customers push boundaries and unlock their potential. The Group is proud to state that its 3,000 employees are driven by three core values: being open-minded thinkers, trusted partners and passionate innovators. Founded in 1973, Lectra reported revenues of 527 million euros in 2024. The company is listed on Euronext, where it is included in the following indices: CAC All Shares, CAC Technology, EN Tech Leaders and ENT PEA-PME 150. For more information, visit lectra.com.

    Lectra – World Headquarters: 16–18, rue Chalgrin • 75016 Paris • France
    Tel. +33 (0)1 53 64 42 00 – www.lectra.com
    A French Société Anonyme with capital of €37,966,274• RCS Paris B 300 702 305

    Attachment

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI: RUBIS: Launch of an employees shareholding plan “Rubis Avenir 2025”

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    Paris, 12 February 2025 – 5:45 pm

    The Management Board, at its meeting of 2 January 2025, decided to launch an employee shareholding plan “Rubis Avenir 2025” by way of the sale by the Company of treasury shares reserved for eligible employees of companies participating in the Rubis Avenir Company Savings Plan (Group companies based in France) under the conditions described below.

    The shares offered are existing treasury shares previously repurchased by the Company pursuant to the share buyback programme authorised by the Ordinary Shareholders’ Meeting on 11 June 2024 (22th resolution).

    The shares offer, established under Articles L. 3332-18 et seq. of the French Labor Code, will cover a maximum of 400,000 shares.

    The acquisition price, set at €17.15, corresponds, in accordance with Article L. 3332-19 of the French Labor Code, to 75% of the average share price over the 20 trading days preceding the decision of the Management Board.

    The subscription period will run from 17 March to 4 April 2025.

    The funds invested in Rubis shares through the “Rubis Avenir” mutual fund will be available at the end of a five-year lock-up period, except in cases where early release is allowed in accordance with Article R. 3324-22 of the French Labor Code.

    The acquired shares under the offer are existing ordinary shares fully assimilated with the existing shares comprising Rubis’ share capital.

    The “Rubis Avenir” mutual fund was set up in 2002 to allow employees to invest in Rubis’ capital, and thereby to strengthen the link between employees and the company. Rubis has performed an employees shareholding plan each year since the fund’s establishment.

    As of 31 December 2024, employees of the Group held 2.17% of Rubis’ share capital through the “Rubis Avenir” mutual fund.

      Contact
      RUBIS – Legal department
      Tel: +(33) 1 44 17 95 95

    Attachment

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI: Innofactor updates its Dividend Distribution Policy

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    Innofactor Plc Other information disclosed according to the rules of the Exchange, on February 12, 2025, at 18:00 Finnish time

    Innofactor Plc’s Board of Directors has confirmed the company’s updated Dividend Distribution Policy on February 12, 2025. According to the renewed policy, the company will generally not pay dividends in the future but will instead use the retained earnings for growth-enhancing measures.

    According to the previous policy, the aim of the company was to pay a dividend regularly each year. The goal was to pay about half of the result for the financial period in dividends, taking into account the company’s financial position, possible corporate reorganizations and other development needs.

    Espoo, February 12, 2025

    INNOFACTOR PLC

    Sami Ensio, CEO

    Additional information:
    Sami Ensio, CEO
    Innofactor Plc
    Tel. +358 50 584 2029
    sami.ensio@innofactor.com

    Distribution:
    NASDAQ Helsinki
    Main media
    www.innofactor.com

    Innofactor
    Innofactor is the leading driver of the modern digital organization in the Nordic Countries for its about 1,000 customers in commercial and public sector. Innofactor has the widest solution offering and leading know-how in the Microsoft ecosystem in the Nordics. Innofactor has about 600 enthusiastic and motivated top specialists in Finland, Sweden, Denmark and Norway. www.innofactor.com #AIDriven #PeopleFirst #BeTheRealYou

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: River Tame stocked with thousands of fish

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    The Environment Agency has boosted the populations of dace, chub and roach in Greater Manchester as 4,000 fish have been released into the River Tame.

    Photo shows Luke Theaker, Environment Agency Fisheries Officer, on the left, and Chris Clarke, Chair of the River Tame Anglers, releasing fish into the River Tame.

    The fish were released at two locations in the river, near Hyde.

    The Fisheries Improvement Programme, which is paid for by rod licence sales, has funded work with the River Tame Anglers to create fish refuges and boost habitat to support fish survival in this area.

    Stocking occurs in winter because water temperatures are low and this minimises any stress on the fish, giving them the best possible survival rates.

    February is a good time to introduce the fish into rivers, as it enables them to acclimatise to their new surroundings, ahead of their spawning season in the spring.

    Fish also play a critical role in sustaining a river’s finely-balanced eco-system, so the wider natural environment will also get a helping hand, as a result of the restocking.

    ‘Amazing opportunity’ to boost fish numbers

    Mark Easedale, Area Environment Manager for the Environment Agency in Greater Manchester, said:

    The carefully coordinated releases on the River Tame provides an amazing opportunity to further boost fish numbers and support our local angling clubs.

    Our officers work closely with partners across Greater Manchester to protect and enhance local fish populations.

    This includes responding to reports of fish in distress, gathering evidence at pollution incidents, protecting or enhancing habitats for fish, improving angling access and addressing barriers to fish migration.

    We hope this stocking in the River Tame will encourage even more people to give fishing a go, but before you do go out to the banks, remember it’s important to buy a rod licence, as you could end up with a fine if you don’t.

    Photo shows Luke Theaker, Environment Agency Fisheries Officer, on the right, and Chris Clarke, Chair of the River Tame Anglers, releasing fish into the River Tame.

    Surveys help ensure fish released in right locations

    The new recruits to the Tame have all been reared at the Environment Agency’s National Coarse Fish Farm in Calverton, Nottinghamshire.

    Every year, the Environment Agency stocks almost half a million fish of nine different species into England’s rivers. Being the principal supply of coarse fish for 32 years, the fish farm plays a crucial role to help improve fisheries around the country.

    Fisheries officers use data from national surveys to identify where there are problems with poor breeding, issues with survival rates, or where numbers have been impacted following a pollution incident.

    These surveys help the officers ensure that fish are released into the right locations and where the need is greatest as well as supporting angling clubs to boost local fishing spots.

    Fisheries Officers inspect rod licences 24/7 throughout the North West, and work continually on cases of illegal fishing and other associated fisheries crime. Fishing illegally can result in a fine of up to £2,500, and offenders can also have their fishing equipment seized.

    It’s easy to buy a rod fishing licence online. Get yours here: Buy a rod fishing licence

    Illegal fishing and other offences can be reported to the Environment Agency’s Incident Hotline on 0800 807060.

    Background

    • Rod fishing licence income is vital to the work of the Environment Agency to maintain, improve and develop fisheries.
    • Revenue generated from rod fishing licence sales is reinvested to benefit angling, with work including tackling illegal fishing, protecting and restoring habitats for fish and improving facilities for anglers.
    • The Fisheries Improvement Programme invests in English rivers by funding projects to protect and improve fish stocks and habitats, provide new facilities for anglers, and give more people the opportunity to try fishing.

    Updates to this page

    Published 12 February 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: expert reaction to study looking at once-weekly semaglutide in adults with alcohol use disorder

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    A study published in JAMA Psychiatry looks at the use of semaglutide in adults with alcohol use disorder. 

    Dr Riccardo De Giorgi, Clinical Lecturer at the Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, said:

    “There has been much sensation (and even more noise) about GLP-1 drugs such as semaglutide in the medical field, especially regarding mental health.  However, their potential use as a mechanistically novel treatment for addiction is perhaps one of the most promising research avenues.  This investigator-initiated phase 2 randomised, placebo-controlled trial was small (48 people) but sound and well-designed.  It looked at several outcomes of importance to alcohol misuse. It represents, at present, the most robust and yet preliminary piece of evidence suggesting that these medications may indeed be useful for the care of people with alcohol use disorder – an extremely disabling condition. Semaglutide appeared to be safe and well-tolerated, though it should be noted that the administered dose was not large (0.5mg) and it was given over a relatively short period of time (8 weeks). This is the kind of study of which we need to see more if we are to see progress in this key research area.”

    Prof Matt Field, Professor of Psychology, University of Sheffield, said:

    “Some recent research suggests that semaglutide can reduce alcohol consumption in people with alcohol use disorders.  Those studies were observational, which means it is difficult to attribute the reduction in alcohol consumption to semaglutide rather than to confounding factors.  The present study overcomes these limitations by randomising adults with alcohol use disorder to receive weekly injections of either low-dose semaglutide or placebo over 9 weeks.  Participants recorded how much alcohol they drank over this period, and they also completed laboratory sessions at the beginning and end of the study period in which they could consume alcoholic drinks.  The research team found that, compared to the placebo group, the group who had received semaglutide drank significantly less alcohol in the lab.  Furthermore, although the semaglutide and placebo groups did not differ in how often they drank alcohol during the study period (outside the lab), on days when they did drink alcohol the semaglutide group drank less alcohol than the placebo group.

    “Overall, this randomised study goes beyond previous observational studies which tended to look at people who were prescribed semaglutide for other reasons (usually diabetes) and evaluate how the drug affected their alcohol consumption.  With those types of observational studies, it is difficult to know if any effects on alcohol consumption were attributable to the drug or to confounding factors.  This study overcomes those limitations by demonstrating, for the first time, a causal effect of semaglutide on the amount of alcohol that people drink.  This study will hopefully serve as a springboard for further research.  Furthermore, the nature of the semaglutide effect (reducing the amount of alcohol consumed, whilst having no effect on the number of days that people drank alcohol) is consistent with the idea that semagludide reduces the reward or pleasure that people get from drinking alcohol, which is why they drink less.

    “Some limitations of the study include the characteristics of the sample, who were not seeking treatment and were not motivated to reduce their alcohol consumption or stop drinking.  Most new treatments for alcohol use disorder are evaluated in people who ask for treatment because they want help to stop drinking altogether or reduce their drinking, so it will be important to test the effects of semaglutide on people with these characteristics.  A cautionary tale is that, when promising medications are tested in people with alcohol use disorder who are trying to cut down their drinking, we often see a large placebo response (i.e. a reduction in drinking among people taking placebo), which can obscure any additional effect of the drug.  Other considerations are that participants in this study had a body mass index (BMI) of at least 23, and most had a BMI of 30 or higher (which is in the obese range).  It will be important to establish if semaglutide can also reduce alcohol consumption in people who are not obese, particularly given that many people who seek treatment for alcohol problems are underweight.  This study had a small sample size and a short follow-up period, so it will be important to see if the effects of semaglutide are maintained over a longer time period, and, crucially, what happens when people stop taking the medication.  It will also be important to consider if and how semaglutide can be incorporated into conventional treatment for alcohol use disorder which might include detoxification, counselling or talking therapies, other types of medications, and involvement with mutual aid groups such as alcoholics anonymous.”

    ‘Once-Weekly Semaglutide in Adults With Alcohol Use Disorder: A Randomized Clinical Trial’ by Christian S. Hendershot et al. was published in JAMA Psychiatry at 16:00 UK time on Wednesday 12 February 2025. 

    DOI: 10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2024.4789

    Declared interests

    Dr Riccardo De Giorgi: “I am supported by the NIHR Oxford Health Biomedical Research Centre and currently conduct research on GLP-1 medications (NIHR OH BRC funded; no industry or any other kind of funding).”

    Prof Matt Field: “I have no conflicts of interest to declare.”

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Lord Chancellor sets out her vision for the probation service

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, the Rt Hon Shabana Mahmood MP, made a speech outlining her vision for the future of the probation service.

    Please note the political content has been removed from this speech.

    Today, we are in Southwark, the home of London’s probation service, one of the busiest in the country.

    Here in London, the Service supervises more than 36,000 offenders.

    And, every day, in this building, there are a thousand untold stories of how our probation service protects the public and makes our streets safer.

    I want to talk about the future of our probation service today.

    But to look to that future, I think we must first look to the past.

    Because it was here, in Southwark, that the probation service first took root.

    Over 150 years ago, the Church of England’s temperance movement posted a man called George Nelson to Southwark’s police court.

    Nelson was the first of a band of missionaries, driven by their faith and strict teetotalism, who gave up their time to help offenders give up the drink.

    Addiction then, as addiction now, drove much criminal behaviour…

    And the approach worked.

    In fact, it worked so well that the courts came to rely on missionaries like Nelson.

    A system soon developed where offenders would be released on the condition that they kept in touch with these volunteers.

    Because what began as a moral cause proved to have a practical purpose:

    These missionaries led to less crime and fewer victims.

    As this Government might say: they made our streets safer.

    By the early twentieth century, this voluntary service was so greatly valued that it was placed on a statutory footing.

    The 1907 Probation of Offenders Act established the first formal structure for probation…

    And the volunteers became professionals.  

    In the years that followed, the service grew:

    The 1925 Criminal Justice Act paid probation officers a regular wage.

    By the 1950s, probation’s work expanded to offenders on parole.

    And by the 1980s, the service was focused increasingly on prison releases.

    Over time, the role developed.

    Where the early missionaries were focused on crimes driven by addiction…

    In time, they took responsibility for the management of ever more, and ever more complex, offenders.

    Too often overlooked, with our focus invariably falling on the police or on prisons…

    Probation became an indispensable part of a criminal justice system that keeps us safe.

    It remains so today, now a service that is more than 20,000 strong…

    And probation officers supervise almost a quarter of a million offenders – around three times the number currently serving time in our prisons.

    Each year, they oversee more than 4 million hours of community payback.

    They monitor around 9,000 offenders on a tag at any given moment.

    They provide sentencing advice to hundreds of courts every single day.

    And they also provide a vital link to tens of thousands of victims, through the Victim Contact and the Victim Notification schemes.

    But while there have been bright moments in the service’s past, we must acknowledge the dark days too.

    In 2014 the service was split:

    Part remained in the public sector, managing the highest-risk offenders.

    The rest was hived off, to be run by the private sector, who would supervise those of low and medium risk.

    Community Rehabilitation Companies would bring the ingenuity of the private sector to solve the problem of reoffending.

    The rhetoric was of a revolution in how we manage offenders.

    The reality was far different.

    Workloads increased, as new offenders were brought under supervision for the first time…

    The number of people on probation increased between December 2014 and December 2016, with almost 50,000 offenders newly under its remit.

    Scarce resources were stretched further than ever…   

    Morale plummeted.

    And worrying numbers voted with their feet, leaving the service altogether…

    With the Inspector of Probation declaring a “national shortage” of probation professionals in 2019. 

    The new companies woefully underperformed.

    Between 2017 and 2018, just 5 of 37 audits carried out by HMPPS demonstrated that expected standards were being met.

    In 2019, 8 out of 10 companies inspected received the lowest possible rating – “inadequate” – for supervising offenders.

    The Chief Inspector called them “irredeemably flawed”.

    And the service was labelled ‘inadequate’.

    In 2021, it was finally, rightly, re-unified and re-nationalised.

    Now, make no mistake…

    Every day, across the country, probation staff make this country safer.

    This was clearly evident in the service’s response to the prison capacity crisis.

    With prisons just days from collapse, this Government was forced to introduce an emergency release programme, which saw some offenders leave prison a few weeks or months early.

    The alternative, as I said at the time, did not bear thinking about:

    We would have been forced to shut the front door of our prisons…

    An act that would have sent dominoes tumbling through our justice system:

    Courts unable to hold trials…

    Police forced to halt arrests…

    And the eventual path to a total breakdown of law and order.

    In making that decision, I knew the probation service would have to carry an even heavier load.

    They would have to put in place plans for the safe release of prisoners in just a few weeks.

    I tried to give them as much time as I possibly could to prepare:

    An eight-week implementation period.

    It wasn’t long to prepare, but the probation service used it with great skill.

    But now is also a moment to be honest about the challenges the service faces.

    And the simple fact is this:

    The service was burdened with a workload that was, quite simply, impossible.

    When we took office, we discovered that orders handed out by courts were not taking place.

    In the 3 years to March 2024 around 13,000 Accredited Programmes, a type of rehabilitative course, did not happen.

    This wasn’t because an offender had failed to do what was expected of them…

    But instead because the Probation Service had been unable to deliver these courses.

    As I have shown already in this job, I believe in confronting problems, not pretending they are not there.

    And so, we will ensure only those offenders who pose a higher risk, and who need to receive these courses, will do so.

    This isn’t a decision I take lightly.

    But it is a decision to confront the reality of the challenges facing the probation service.

    I should be clear:

    For those who will not complete an accredited programme, they remain under the supervision of a probation officer…

    And all the other requirements placed upon them will remain in place.

    Any breach of a community sentence could see them hauled back into court.

    Any breach of a licence condition could see them back behind bars.

    Addressing individual issues like these, however, is no long-term solution to the challenges the probation service faces.

    Today, across the country, probation officers are spread too thin – responsible for caseloads and workloads that exceed what they should be expected to handle.

    Probation officers are drawn to the profession not because it is just another job.

    This job is a vocation, even a calling…

    They are, after all, the inheritors of those missionaries of 150 years ago.

    They are experts in their discipline…

    Who want to know that their work is protecting the public…

    And keeping offenders on the straight and narrow.

    Over-stretched, they can’t work with offenders in the way they need to.

    And the burden placed on probation officers’ shoulders grow heavier and heavier.

    It has driven people away from the job…

    It has made the public less safe…

    And it has to change.

    It is clear we need to bring more people into the probation service.

    In July, I committed to bringing on 1,000 trainee probation officers by March of this year.

    But we must go further.

    Today, I can announce that, next year, we will bring on at least 1,300 new, trainee probation officers.

    New probation officers are the lifeblood of the service, and they will guarantee its future.

    But they are not enough alone.

    It is also clear we must remove the administrative burden that weighs probation officers down…

    And makes them less effective in their roles.

    Today, too many hours of probation officer time are wasted each day.

    They are drowning in paperwork.

    And I don’t mean metaphorical paperwork.

    I mean literal pen and paperwork.

    This takes up valuable time, that would be better spent working with offenders…

    And it also introduces the risk of error – the failure to identify the critical piece of information that might shape a professional’s judgement of the risk that an offender poses.

    Where digital processes do exist in the probation service, they can be difficult to navigate.

    Information is stored in multiple different systems that do not speak to each other.

    And probation officers are forced, laboriously, to type the same information time and again.

    We will soon pilot a digital tool that will put all the information a probation officer needs to know into one place.

    Over time, this will include information from other agencies, like the police as we need to make sure data is more readily shared, so that probation can make better decisions.

    We’re also trialling a new system for risk assessing offenders, to make it more straightforward for probation officers to make robust decisions.

    A group of officers in Brighton started using this in December last year…

    And we estimate it will cut up to 20 percent of the time it takes to do this crucial activity.

    It might sound simple, but the impact could be considerable.

    Every minute saved is more time probation officers can spend working with offenders.

    Less simple, but even more transformational, there’s the potential of artificial intelligence.

    We are currently looking into voice transcription.

    This would automatically record and transcribe supervision conversations by taking notes in real time…

    Allowing probation officers to focus on building relationships, while also removing the need for them to enter handwritten notes into a computer afterwards.

    In time, we believe that AI could play a more active role in supporting staff to supervise offenders – for example, drawing on the data we have on an offender to suggest a supervision plan tailored to them.

    This new technology will ensure probation officers provide what only they can:

    The human factor.

    The ability to work with an offender, one-to-one, to understand the risk they pose…

    To develop a plan for how to manage it…

    Ultimately, to turn them away from a life of crime – and so protect the public.

    That is what remains true about the probation officer’s job now, just as it was 150 years ago.

    The courts didn’t turn to the temperance movement’s missionaries because they were great at paperwork.

    They did so because of how they worked with offenders.

    They knew – in the words of the Government Minister who brought in the 1907 Probation Act – how “to guide and admonish” an offender to make the public safer.

    But while new staff and better technology are necessary to the future of our probation service…

    They are not sufficient.

    With a caseload of nearly a quarter of a million offenders…

    We must also look at the work that probation officers are doing…

    And we must ask:

    Where should their time be spent…

    And, more specifically, who should their time be spent with to have the greatest impact?

    In this, it is clear there are two types of offender.

    On the one hand, we have those who pose a higher risk to society.

    In this group, we have those who are dangerous – posing a real risk of harm to the public.

    We also have those whose offending is prolific – the one in every ten offenders who is guilty of nearly half of all sentenced crime.

    On the other hand, we have offenders who pose a lower risk.

    They are not serial offenders, with a high risk of reoffending.

    Their crimes are instead often fuelled by addiction, homelessness, and joblessness.

    These crimes are not excusable.

    All crimes must be punished.

    But these two groups – the higher and lower risk – are different.

    If we want to reduce reoffending, cut crime and have safer streets, we have to treat them differently.

    And too often today, we don’t.

    We have a one size fits all approach.

    That must change.

    For higher-risk offenders, a probation officer’s time and focus is essential.

    It is no exaggeration to say that effective supervision of this cohort can be the difference between life and death.

    We all know the tragedies:  

    I think of Terri Harris, her children John Paul and Lacey Bennett and Lacey’s friend Connie Gent, savagely murdered by Damien Bendall in 2021, when Bendall was serving a community sentence.

    And I think of Zara Aleena, murdered by Jordan McSweeney in 2022, just nine days after he had left prison on licence.

    We will never be able to stop every tragedy.  

    But we have to stop more.

    There are improvements that we can and must make to the processes probation officers follow, and the technology they use.

    We have introduced new training, to better identify risk…

    New digital tools, as I have mentioned already, will draw together the critical pieces of information from partner organisations, like the police.

    But the vital ingredient is time:

    The time of a professional probation officer…

    Devoted to identifying the risk an offender poses…

    Creating a plan to manage it…

    And supervising, closely, that offender to ensure they do not deviate from it.

    That is the human factor that only a probation officer can provide.

    If probation officers are to have this valuable time with these offenders, we must be more efficient with the time they devote to lower-risk offenders.

    At the very end of their time in office, my predecessor introduced a policy called Probation Reset.

    This saw supervision of lower-risk offenders end after two-thirds of their licence period.

    This was a step in the right direction.

    The interventions that work best with lower risk offenders are not necessarily those provided by probation officers.

    So that is where we must now direct the attention of their supervision.

    We need to get these offenders off drugs and booze – reoffending rates are 19 points lower when an offender completes a drug treatment programme.

    We need to ensure they have a roof over their heads – reoffending rates double for those released homeless.  

    And finally, we need to get them working – reoffending rates are up to 9 points lower when an offender is employed.

    The probation service has a role to play here…

    But their unique value is in referring offenders to the intervention that is required to address the cause of their offending.                

    And so today, I can announce that we will build on the work of Reset.

    This Government will focus the probation service on the interventions that have the greater impact.

    For lower risk offenders, we will task probation officers with providing a swifter intervention.

    They will spend more time with an offender immediately after their release:

    First, assessing the root causes of an offender’s crime…

    Then referring them to the services that will address that behaviour:

    Which could be education, training, drug treatment or accommodation…

    Delivered by the probation service, our partners across Government, and through the brilliant work done by the voluntary sector.

    Once offenders are following that direction, as long as the offender stays on the straight and narrow, we must then focus probation officer’s time more effectively:

    That means more time spent with the offenders who pose the greater risk…

    More time with offenders who pose a risk of a serious and violent further offence…

    And more time with offenders whose prolific offending causes so much social and economic damage to local communities.

    That is how we will reduce reoffending…

    That is how we will cut crime…

    And that is how we will make our streets safer.

    These measures are necessary today, but they will be even more important in the months and years to come.

    David Gauke’s independent review of sentencing will report soon.

    He has been asked to ensure we never run out of prison places again.

    There is no doubt that this will increase pressure on probation.

    As I made clear when I announced the review, I have asked David to consider how we make more use of punishment outside of prison.

    In my view, technology is likely to play a key role – taking advantage of advances in the tech that is being used here and in other jurisdictions:

    Like sobriety tags, which can measure the alcohol levels in offenders’ sweat every 30 minutes, and have a 97 percent compliance rate…

    And GPS tags, which can put in place exclusion zones to alert authorities if offenders enter areas we have banned them from.

    There are also likely to be more sentences served in the community…

    And more drug, alcohol and mental health treatment requirements placed on offenders.

    These are the tools that must be at the judiciary’s disposal to deal with criminals…

    And judges must have trust and confidence that the probation service can deliver them.

    The changes I have announced today are about support for the probation service:

    1,300 new trainee probation officers…

    New technology to lighten the administrative burden…

    And a new focus of their time on where it has the greatest impact.

    Today, I have set out what I think the future direction of the probation service must be.

    And I think we must, finally, consider the alternative. 

    What would happen if we allowed probation to carry on as it is?

    What would happen if we allowed the service to be stretched so thin, trying to do too much with too many offenders…

    Too much time spent doing the wrong things, and not enough time doing what is right and what works.  

    We know what the consequences would be.

    We’ve seen it in the stories of far too many victims…

    And the pain their friends and families have experienced – and continue to experience – every single day. 

    When the probation service isn’t able to properly assess the risk of offenders or supervise them…

    Innocent people pay a terrible price.

    The first job of the state is to keep its people safe.

    We are willing to take the difficult decisions, where they must be taken.

    I will support probation officers, both the new recruits we will bring in and the professionals of whom we have asked so much in recent years.

    While they are professionals these days, and experts in their field…

    They are drawn to the profession by the same desire that called to those missionaries a hundred and fifty years ago:

    To encourage offenders to turn their backs on crime…

    And to make our streets and the public safer.

    To fulfil that purpose now, we must do things differently.

    And that begins today.

    Thank you.

    Updates to this page

    Published 12 February 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI Canada: Strengthening transatlantic partnerships and securing Canada’s AI advantage

    Source: Government of Canada – Prime Minister

    Working together, Canada and its transatlantic partners have created good-paying jobs for our peoples, strengthened our economies, and advanced progress on key priorities, including climate change and international security. With increasing geopolitical instability and economic disruptions, including proposed U.S. tariffs, it is critical to accelerate these partnerships, now and into the future.

    The Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, today concluded a successful visit to Paris, France, and to Brussels, Belgium, where he strengthened Canada’s ties with transatlantic partners and made progress on shared priorities, including artificial intelligence (AI).

    In Paris, the Prime Minister participated in the AI Action Summit, co-chaired by France and India, where he engaged with business and policy leaders on how we unlock opportunities and growth for Canadians. As part of our 2025 G7 Presidency, the Prime Minister underlined Canada’s commitment to responsibly power, adopt, and share AI. This includes helping partners access clean and reliable energy to power AI, finding ways to leverage AI and build more reliable energy grids, supporting small and medium-sized businesses’ use of AI to improve their productivity, and sharing the AI revolution with the world so our prosperity remains inclusive.

    At the Summit, Prime Minister Trudeau signed a joint Leaders’ Declaration on inclusive and sustainable AI, which reinforces Canada’s approach to AI development and ensures it aligns with human rights, public interest, and environmental protection. The Prime Minister also met with over a dozen CEOs and leading AI business leaders to position Canada as an ideal partner for innovation and investment while helping deepen Canada’s commercial relations with its partners across the U.S. and the European Union (EU).

    While in Paris, the Prime Minister also chaired a roundtable on infrastructure and energy requirements for AI and participated in the closing ceremony of a ministerial meeting of the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence, of which Canada is a founding member.

    In Brussels, Prime Minister Trudeau took part in a Canada-EU Leaders’ Meeting with the President of the European Council, António Costa, and the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen. The leaders reaffirmed the strong ties between Canada and the EU and discussed the progress made in recent years for the benefit of people on both sides of the Atlantic. This includes a strengthened trade relationship under the Canada-EU Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA), which continues to create significant opportunities for businesses and good-paying jobs for workers in Canada and the EU. They also discussed the imposition of U.S. tariffs as well as Canada and the EU’s responses.

    At the meeting, the leaders reaffirmed their commitment to building on the Canada-EU relationship and continuing to deliver results on a range of shared priorities. This includes promoting global economic security and stability, strengthening bilateral and global trade and investment – including in response to expected tariffs by the U.S. – defending the rule of law, advancing defence and security co-operation, and supporting Ukraine. They also discussed developments in the Middle East, including in Gaza and Syria, stressing the importance of an inclusive Syrian-led political governance structure.

    While in Brussels, the Prime Minister also met with the Secretary General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Mark Rutte. He reaffirmed Canada’s commitment to working with NATO Allies to strengthen Euro-Atlantic security and continue supporting Ukraine in the face of Russia’s unjustifiable war of aggression. He also highlighted Canada’s contributions to NATO’s collective defence efforts across Europe, including through Operation REASSURANCE.

    Shared challenges require shared solutions. By working together, we can make the world safer, create good-paying jobs for our peoples, harness the potential of the greatest innovations, and ensure that growth is inclusive. As a leader in AI and a steadfast member of the NATO Alliance, and as part of our G7 Presidency this year, Canada is taking action to create a better, safer, and more prosperous world.

    Quote

    “During my trip to Paris and Brussels, I had one message – if you’re looking for a strong, reliable, and trustworthy partner, Canada is it. We’re advancing progress on AI, strengthening our defence alliances, creating good-paying jobs, and making sure businesses, innovators, and partners choose Canada.”

    Quick Facts

    • This was Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s 11th official visit to France.
    • Held on February 10 and 11, 2025, the Artificial Intelligence (AI) Action Summit in Paris was the third global summit of its kind. It followed the AI Seoul Summit, which Prime Minister Trudeau attended virtually last year, and the AI Safety Summit that was hosted by the UK in 2023.
    • Entitled “Inclusive and Sustainable AI for People and the Planet”, the AI Action Summit joint Leaders’ Declaration is focused on the inclusive governance of AI that reflects the public interest, human rights, the environment, and the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It also highlights the need for inclusive dialogue and co-operation on AI governance and alignment with ongoing governance efforts by the UN Global Digital Compact, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and the network of safety institutes.
    • Launched in 2020, the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence (GPAI) supports the development and use of AI based on human rights, inclusion, diversity, innovation, and economic growth, while seeking to advance the UN SDGs. As a founding member of the GPAI, Canada is working closely with international partners to ensure that AI is developed and used responsibly to the benefit of all citizens.
    • Canada was the first country in the world to introduce a national AI strategy. Since 2016, the Government of Canada has announced over $4.4 billion to support AI and digital research infrastructure, including $2.4 billion announced in Budget 2024 to scale-up AI compute infrastructure, support AI adoption programs, and launch an AI Safety Institute.
    • In November 2024, the Government of Canada launched the Canadian Artificial Intelligence Safety Institute to bolster Canada’s capacity to address AI safety risks, further positioning the country as a leader in the safe and responsible development and adoption of AI technologies.
    • Last year, Canada and France signed the Canada-France Declaration on Artificial Intelligence, reiterating our countries’ commitment to the responsible, safe use of AI that respects human rights and democratic values.
    • In 2024, France was Canada’s third-largest merchandise export market in the European Union (EU) and its 10th-largest trading partner globally, with two-way merchandise trade totalling $14.1 billion.
    • During his visit to France, the Prime Minister also met with the President of France, Emmanuel Macron.
    • This was Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s sixth official visit to Belgium.
    • With its 27 Member States, the EU is Canada’s second-largest destination for merchandise exports, after the United States of America. In 2024, two-way merchandise trade between Canada and the EU reached a total of $119 billion.
    • The Canada-EU Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) was signed in 2016 and has been provisionally applied since 2017. Since 2016, bilateral merchandise trade between Canada and the EU has grown by 58 per cent.
    • Canada is a founding member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The Alliance is a cornerstone of Canadian security and defence policy and an important platform for Canada’s contributions to international peace and security.

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    MIL OSI Canada News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Adjusting Imports of Aluminum into The United States

    US Senate News:

    Source: The White House
    class=”has-text-align-center”>BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA A PROCLAMATION
         1.  On January 19, 2018, the Secretary of Commerce (Secretary) transmitted to me a report on his investigation into the effect of imports of aluminum on the national security of the United States under section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, as amended (19 U.S.C. 1862) (section 232).  The Secretary found and advised me of the Secretary’s opinion that aluminum is being imported into the United States in such quantities and under such circumstances as to threaten to impair the national security of the United States.
         2.  In Proclamation 9704 of March 8, 2018 (Adjusting Imports of Aluminum Into the United States), I concurred in the Secretary’s finding that aluminum was being imported into the United States in such quantities and under such circumstances as to threaten to impair the national security of the United States, and decided to adjust the imports of aluminum articles by imposing a 10 percent ad valorem tariff on such articles imported from most countries.  Proclamation 9704 further stated that any country with which the United States has a security relationship is welcome to discuss alternative ways to address the threatened impairment of the national security caused by imports from that country, and noted that, should the United States and any such country arrive at a satisfactory alternative means to address the threat to the national security such that I determine that imports from that country no longer threaten to impair the national security, I may remove or modify the restriction on aluminum articles imports from that country and, if necessary, adjust the tariff as it applies to other countries, as the national security interests of the United States require.
         3.  In Proclamation 9704, I also directed the Secretary to monitor imports of aluminum articles and inform me of any circumstances that in the Secretary’s opinion might indicate the need for further action under section 232 with respect to such imports.  Pursuant to Proclamation 9704, the Secretary was authorized to provide relief from the additional duties, based on a request from a directly affected party located in the United States, for any aluminum article determined not to be produced in the United States in a sufficient and reasonably available amount or of a satisfactory quality, or based upon specific national security considerations.  Proclamation 9776 of August 29, 2018, and Proclamation 9980 of January 24, 2020, similarly authorized the Secretary to provide relief from certain tariffs on other aluminum products and derivatives set forth in those proclamations.
         4.  In subsequent proclamations, the President adjusted the tariffs applicable to aluminum articles imports from Argentina, Australia, Canada, Mexico, the European Union (EU), and the United Kingdom (UK), after engaging in discussions with each of those parties on alternative ways to address the threat to the national security from such imports.
         5.  The Secretary has informed me that, notwithstanding the 10 percent ad valorem tariff imposed by Proclamation 9704 that mitigated the threatened impairment of our national security, aluminum imports into the United States have continued at unacceptable levels as the global aluminum excess capacity crisis continues.  In addition, the exclusion of certain countries and products from the tariff and efforts by foreign producers to circumvent the tariff have undermined the purpose of Proclamation 9704, which was to adjust the level of imports of aluminum to remove the threatened impairment of the national security.  This has again resulted in aluminum smelter capacity utilization rates in the domestic aluminum industry that are well below the target level recommended in the Secretary’s January 19, 2018, report.  This indicates that the initial tariff of 10 percent ad valorem is not high enough to address the threatened impairment to our national security posed by aluminum imports. 
         6.  In particular, the Secretary has informed me that global primary aluminum capacity has continued to increase, fueled by expansions in the People’s Republic of China (China) and South America, which is seen in rising aluminum imports that continue to weigh on the price domestic aluminum producers may charge.  There has also been a significant increase in Chinese investment in Mexico, driven by massive Chinese government subsidies and the continued ability to exploit loopholes in U.S. trade policy.  
         7.   Domestic aluminum producers have been forced to idle additional production and shut down facilities.  Two primary aluminum smelters within the United States have closed since Proclamation 9704 was promulgated.  In addition, U.S. primary aluminum production decreased by 30 percent from 2020 to 2024, and U.S. smelter capacity utilization was only 52 percent in 2024.  Overcapacity for primary aluminum has harmed downstream aluminum producers, including producers of aluminum extrusions and aluminum sheet.  To allow U.S. aluminum producers to restart production and to incentivize new capacity, additional adjustments to section 232 tariffs on aluminum need to be made, including limiting exemptions and increasing the tariff rate.
         8.  The Secretary has informed me that imports of aluminum articles from countries that are excluded from the tariff regime or have alternative arrangements have remained significantly elevated at levels that once again threaten to impair the national security of the United States.  The volume of U.S. imports of aluminum articles from Argentina, Australia, Canada, Mexico, EU countries, and the UK in 2024 was approximately 14 percent higher than the average volume of such imports in 2015 through 2017.  In particular, the volume of U.S. imports of primary aluminum from Canada in 2024 was approximately 18 percent higher than the average volume for 2015 through 2017.
    Notwithstanding Proclamation 10782 of July 10, 2024, which imposed higher tariffs on certain aluminum imports from Mexico, imports of aluminum from Mexico have continued to surge beyond historical volumes. The volume of U.S. imports of aluminum articles from Mexico in 2024 was approximately 35 percent higher than the average volume for 2015 through 2017. Proclamation 10782 did not resolve the surge of imports of aluminum from Mexico.  Mexican producers are using unfair trade to gain market share in the United States and are leveraging their access to unfairly traded global primary aluminum to do so.  I understand that Mexican producers are commingling primary aluminum from China and the Russian Federation (Russia) with primary aluminum from other countries to produce downstream aluminum articles.  These practices are distortive and provide continued outlets to absorb the massive amount of global excess capacity and must be remedied.  The volume of U.S. imports of primary aluminum from Australia has also surged and in 2024 was approximately 103 percent higher than the average volume for 2015 through 2017.  Australia has disregarded its verbal commitment to voluntarily restrain its aluminum exports to a reasonable level.
         9.  These volume increases occurred even though demand for aluminum in the United States and Canada (the market measured by industry) has generally remained flat, averaging about 20 percent since 2018.
         10.  These increasing import volumes support the conclusion that aluminum producers in countries subject to the additional ad valorem tariff proclaimed in Proclamation 9704 are engaging in transshipment or further processing of upstream aluminum products in countries that have since been exempted from that tariff.  Foreign producers have shifted assembly or manufacturing operations to third countries, such as Mexico.  For example, Chinese producers are using Mexico’s general exclusion from the tariff to funnel Chinese aluminum to the United States through Mexico while avoiding the tariff. 
         11.  The Secretary has informed me that producers in countries that remain subject to the ad valorem tariff have continued to evade the tariff by processing covered aluminum articles into additional downstream derivative products that were not included in the additional ad valorem tariffs proclaimed in Proclamation 9704 and Proclamation 9980.  Foreign producers are continuing to expand downstream production to absorb the global excess capacity.  Imports of additional derivative aluminum products have increased significantly since the issuance of Proclamation 9704 and Proclamation 9980, eroding the domestic industry’s customer base and resulting in depressed demand for aluminum articles produced in the United States.
         12.  The Secretary has also informed me of the impact of the product exclusion process authorized by Proclamation 9704, Proclamation 9776, and Proclamation 9980 and implemented by subsequent regulations.  This process has resulted in exclusions for a significant volume of imports, in a manner that undermines the purpose of the section 232 measures and threatens to impair the national security of the United States.  Certain general approved exclusions remain in effect for entire tariff lines of aluminum imports, notwithstanding the domestic industry’s potential to produce many excluded products. 
         13.  I determine that these developments and modifications to the original tariff regime as proclaimed in Proclamation 9704 have undermined the regime’s national security objectives by preventing the domestic aluminum industry (including derivatives) from achieving sustained production capacity utilization of at least 80 percent, as determined in the Secretary’s January 19, 2018, report.  I also determine that the modifications failed to achieve their articulated objectives.  As a result, I determine that these modifications have resulted in significantly increasing imports of aluminum articles that once again threaten to impair the national security of the United States.
         14.  In light of the Secretary’s findings, I have determined that it is necessary and appropriate to adjust the tariff proclaimed by Proclamation 9704, as amended, and the tariff proclaimed by Proclamation 9980, as amended, to increase the tariff rate from 10 percent ad valorem to 25 percent ad valorem.  These actions are necessary and appropriate to remove the threatened impairment of the national security of the United States. 
         15. In light of the Secretary’s findings regarding the alternative agreements with Argentina proclaimed in Proclamation 9758 of May 31, 2018; Australia proclaimed in Proclamation 9758; Canada proclaimed in Proclamation 9893 of May 19, 2019, and Proclamation 10106 of October 27, 2020; Mexico proclaimed in Proclamation 9893 and Proclamation 10782 of July 10, 2024; the European Union proclaimed in Proclamation 10327 of December 27, 2021, and Proclamation 10690 of December 28, 2023; and the United Kingdom proclaimed in Proclamation 10405 of May 31, 2022, I have decided that it is necessary to terminate these agreements as of March 12, 2025.  As of March 12, 2025, all imports of aluminum articles and derivative aluminum articles from Argentina, Australia, Canada, Mexico, EU countries, and the UK shall be subject to the additional ad valorem tariff proclaimed in Proclamation 9704, as amended, with respect to aluminum articles and Proclamation 9980, as amended, with respect to derivative aluminum articles.  Imports of aluminum articles and derivative aluminum articles from Argentina, Australia, Canada, Mexico, EU countries, and the UK shall be subject to the revised tariff rate of 25 percent ad valorem established in clause 2 of this proclamation, commensurate with the tariff rate imposed on such articles imported from most other countries.  In my judgment, these modifications are necessary to address the significantly increasing imports of aluminum articles and derivative aluminum articles from these sources, which threaten to impair the national security of the United States.  Replacing the alternative agreements with the additional ad valorem tariffs will be a more robust and effective means of ensuring that the objectives articulated in the Secretary’s January 19, 2018, report and subsequent proclamations are achieved.
         16.  In light of the information provided by the Secretary that the significant increase of imports of certain derivative aluminum articles has depressed demand for aluminum articles produced by domestic aluminum producers, I have determined that it is necessary to adjust the tariff proclaimed in Proclamation 9704 and Proclamation 9980 to apply to additional derivative aluminum articles.
         17.  I have also determined that it is necessary to terminate the product exclusion process as authorized in clause 3 of Proclamation 9704, clause 1 of Proclamation 9776, and clause 2 of Proclamation 9980. 
         18.  Section 232, as amended, authorizes the President to take action to adjust the imports of an article and its derivatives that are being imported into the United States in such quantities or under such circumstances as to threaten to impair the national security of the United States.
         19.  Section 604 of the Trade Act of 1974, as amended, authorizes the President to embody in the Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States (HTSUS) the substance of statutes affecting import treatment, and actions thereunder, including the removal, modification, continuance, or imposition of any rate of duty or other import restriction.
         NOW, THEREFORE, I, DONALD J. TRUMP, President of the United States of America, by the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including section 301 of title 3, United States Code, section 604 of the Trade Act of 1974, as amended, and section 232, do hereby proclaim as follows:
         (1) The provisions of Proclamation 9758 with respect to imports of aluminum articles from the Argentina; Proclamation 9758 with respect to imports of aluminum articles from the Australia; Proclamation 9893 and Proclamation 10106 with respect to imports of aluminum articles from Canada; Proclamation 9893 and Proclamation 10782 with respect to imports of aluminum articles and derivative aluminum articles from Mexico; Proclamation 10327 and Proclamation 10690 with respect to imports of aluminum articles and derivative aluminum articles from the European Union; and Proclamation 10405 with respect to imports of aluminum articles and derivative aluminum articles from the United Kingdom shall be ineffective as of 12:01 a.m. eastern time on March 12, 2025.  The provisions of clause 1 of Proclamation 9980 as applicable to imports of derivative aluminum articles from Argentina, Australia, Canada, and Mexico shall be ineffective as of 12:01 a.m. eastern time on March 12, 2025; all imports of aluminum articles and derivative aluminum articles from these countries shall be subject to the additional ad valorem tariffs proclaimed in Proclamation 9704, as amended, and Proclamation 9980, as amended.  Imports of aluminum articles and derivative aluminum articles from Argentina, Australia, Canada, Mexico, EU countries, and the United Kingdom will be subject to the revised tariff rate of 25 percent ad valorem established in clauses (2) and (3) of this proclamation, commensurate with the tariff rate imposed on such articles imported from most countries, as amended by this proclamation.
         (2) As of 12:01 a.m. on March 12, 2025, the tariff proclaimed by Proclamation 9704, as amended, and the tariff proclaimed by Proclamation 9980, as amended, are adjusted to increase the respective tariff rates from an additional 10 percent ad valorem to an additional 25 percent ad valorem. 
         (3) Clause 2 of Proclamation 9704, as amended, is further amended in the second sentence by deleting “and” before “(k)”; replacing “11:59 p.m. eastern standard time on December 31, 2025” after (k) with “12:01 a.m. eastern time on March 12, 2025”; and inserting before the period at the end: “, and (l) on or after 12:01 a.m. on March 12, 2025, at a revised rate of an additional 25 percent ad valorem rate, from all countries except from Russia.”
         (4) The first two sentences of clause 1 of Proclamation 9980 are revised to read as follows:
         (5) Except as otherwise provided in this proclamation, all imports of derivative aluminum articles specified in Annex I to this proclamation or any subsequent annex published in the Federal Register pursuant to this Proclamation shall be subject to an additional 25 percent ad valorem rate of duty, with respect to goods entered for consumption, or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption, on or after the Commerce certification date in accordance with clause 9.  For any derivative aluminum article identified in Annex I that is not in Chapter 76 of the HTSUS, the additional ad valorem duty shall apply only to the aluminum content of the derivative article.  These rates of duty, which are in addition to any other duties, fees, exactions, and charges applicable to such imported derivative aluminum articles, shall apply to imports of derivative aluminum articles described in Annex I to this proclamation from all countries, except Russia, but shall not apply to derivative aluminum articles processed in another country from aluminum articles that were smelted and cast in the United States.  Further, all imports of derivative aluminum articles specified in Annex I to this proclamation that are the product of Russia and all imports of derivative aluminum articles specified in Annex I to this proclamation where any amount of primary aluminum used in the manufacture of the derivative aluminum articles is smelted in Russia, or the derivative aluminum articles are cast in Russia, shall be subject to the 200 percent ad valorem rate of duty established in Proclamation 10522, with respect to goods entered for consumption, or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption, on or after the Commerce certification date in accordance with clause 9.  Primary aluminum is defined as new aluminum metal that is produced from alumina (or aluminum oxide) by the electrolytic Hall-Heroult process.  The Secretary shall continue to monitor imports of the derivative articles described in Annex I to this proclamation, and shall, from time to time, in consultation with the United States Trade Representative, the Secretary of Defense, or other officials as appropriate, review the status of such imports with respect to the national security of the United States.
         (6)  The Secretary shall not consider any new product exclusion requests under clause 3 of Proclamation 9704, clause 1 of Proclamation 9776, or clause 2 of Proclamation 9980, or renew any such product exclusions in effect as of the date of this proclamation.  Granted product exclusions shall remain effective until their expiration date or until excluded product volume is imported, whichever occurs first.  The Secretary shall take all actions, including publication in the Federal Register, necessary to terminate the product exclusion process.  In addition, all general approved exclusions shall be ineffective as of March 12, 2025, and the Secretary shall publish a notice in the Federal Register to this effect.  I have determined that this is necessary to ensure that these general exclusions do not allow high volumes of imports, including of products that the domestic industry can produce and supply, to undermine the objectives articulated in the Secretary’s January 2018 report and relevant subsequent proclamations.  Following the elimination of quantitative restrictions on certain sources pursuant to this proclamation, and subject to any restrictions set forth in or pursuant to other provisions of applicable law, imports of any aluminum article or derivative article from any source and in any quantity will be available to domestic importers, provided that the additional ad valorem tariffs are paid upon entry or withdrawal from warehouse for consumption. For purposes of implementing the requirements in this proclamation, importers of aluminum derivative articles shall provide to CBP any information necessary to identify the aluminum content used in the manufacture of aluminum derivative articles imports covered by this Proclamation.  CBP is hereby authorized and directed to publish regulations or guidance implementing this requirement as soon as practicable.
         (7)  Within 90 days after the date of this proclamation, the Secretary shall establish a process for including additional derivative aluminum articles within the scope of the ad valorem duties proclaimed in Proclamation 9704, as amended, Proclamation 9980, as amended, and clause 5 of this proclamation.  In addition to inclusions made by the Secretary, this process shall provide for including additional derivative aluminum articles at the request of a producer of an aluminum article or derivative aluminum article within the United States, or an industry association representing one or more such producers, establishing that imports of a derivative aluminum article have increased in a manner that threatens to impair the national security or otherwise undermine the objectives set forth in the Secretary’s January 19, 2018 report or any Proclamation issued pursuant thereto.  When the Secretary receives such a request from a domestic producer or industry association, it shall issue a determination regarding whether or not to include the derivative aluminum article or articles within 60 days of receiving the request. 
         (8)  The provisions of clause 3 of Proclamation 9704, clause 1 of Proclamation 9776, and clause 2 of Proclamation 9980, or any other provisions authorizing the Secretary to grant relief for certain products from the additional ad valorem duties or quantitative restrictions set forth in the prior proclamations described herein are hereby revoked, except to the extent required to implement clause 5 of this proclamation. 
         (9) The modifications made by this proclamation with respect to derivative aluminum articles identified in the annex that are not in chapter 76 of the HTSUS shall be effective upon public notification by the Secretary of Commerce, that adequate systems are in place to fully, efficiently, and expediently process and collect tariff revenue for covered articles. 
         (10) Any aluminum article or derivative article, except those eligible for admission under “domestic status” as defined in 19 CFR 146.43, that is subject to the duty imposed by this proclamation and that is admitted into a U.S. foreign trade zone on or after the Commerce certification date, in accordance with clause 9, may be admitted only under “privileged foreign status” as defined in 19 CFR 146.41, and will be subject upon entry for consumption to any ad valorem rates of duty related to the classification under the applicable HTSUS subheading.
         (11)  The United States International Trade Commission, in consultation with the Secretary, the Commissioner of United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) within the Department of Homeland Security, and the heads of other relevant executive departments and agencies, shall revise the HTSUS so that it conforms to the amendments and effective dates directed in this proclamation within ten days of the date of this proclamation.  The Secretary is authorized and directed to publish any such modifications to the HTSUS in the Federal Register.
         (12) CBP shall prioritize reviews of the classification of imported aluminum articles and derivative aluminum articles and, in the event that it discovers misclassification resulting in loss of revenue of the ad valorem duties proclaimed herein, it shall assess monetary penalties in the maximum amount permitted by law.In addition, CBP shall promptly notify the Secretary regarding evidence of any efforts to evade payment of the ad valorem duties proclaimed herein through processing or alteration of aluminum articles or derivative aluminum articles as a disguise or artifice prior to importation.In such circumstances, the Secretary shall consider the processed or altered aluminum articles or derivative aluminum articles for inclusion as derivative aluminum articles pursuant to clause 5 of this proclamation.
         (13) No drawback shall be available with respect to the duties imposed pursuant to this proclamation.
         (14) The Secretary may issue regulations and guidance consistent with this proclamation, including to address operational necessity.
         (15)  Any provision of a previous proclamation or Executive Order that is inconsistent with the actions taken in this proclamation is superseded to the extent of such inconsistency.
         IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand thistenth day of February, in the year of our Lord two thousand twenty-five, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and forty-ninth.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Company which claimed to market adult films is shut down for suspected direct debit scam

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    Consumers appeared to be misdirected into paying monthly direct debits

    • Investigations into Drawntear Limited showed that the company appeared to take direct debit payments from consumers without their knowledge or authorisation 
    • Drawntear claimed in previous accounts that it marketed adult movies but no evidence was provided about how the company traded or who really controlled its business activities 
    • The company has now been wound-up in court following an application by the Insolvency Service 

    A company which claimed to sell adult films has been shut down following concerns it was being used as a direct debit scam.  

    Drawntear Limited was wound-up at a hearing of the High Court in Manchester on Wednesday 12 February. 

    The company, which said it was based in Hull before moving its registered office address to Kings Langley in Hertfordshire just last month, failed to co-operate with investigations by the Insolvency Service. 

    Investigators however found evidence that those behind the company were actually based in the Czech Republic and Monaco. 

    Complaints made to Action Fraud also indicated that the company took unauthorised payments from members of the public. 

    David Usher, Chief Investigator at the Insolvency Service, said: 

    There was a complete lack of transparency over who controlled Drawntear, the real nature of its trading activities, and unexplained payments of more than £280,000 from its bank account. 

    We were concerned that the company was being used as a vehicle for fraud and the absence of any accounting records meant it was necessary for us to take decisive action to prevent further harm to the public. 

    The Insolvency Service will not hesitate to take robust action to protect consumers and we would encourage everyone to be vigilant against such objectionable rogue operators.

    Drawntear was incorporated on Companies House in November 2019, describing its business as “other retail sale in non-specialised stores”. 

    Accounts for the period up to the end of November 2022 however stated that its principal activity was “the online marketing of adult movies”. 

    There is also some suggestion it provided some form of undisclosed digital streaming services. 

    Attempts by the Insolvency Service to establish the true nature of the company’s trading activities were met with insufficient co-operation. 

    The failure to produce accounting records also meant that payments into Drawntear’s account of £283,098 and receipts of £294,234 were not explained. 

    Complaints from consumers indicated the company was taking direct debit payments without their permission. 

    In one example, a complainant identified recurring payments of £29.99 from their bank account to Drawntear which they were unaware of authorising.

    A second consumer said that monthly payments which totalled £333.50 had been taken from their account. 

    The Official Receiver has been appointed as liquidator of Drawntear Limited. 

    All enquiries concerning the affairs of the company should be made to the Official Receiver of the Public Interest Unit: 16th Floor, 1 Westfield Avenue, Stratford, London, E20 1HZ. Email: piu.or@insolvency.gov.uk. 

    Further information 

    Updates to this page

    Published 12 February 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Lord Chancellor’s sets out her vision for the probation service

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, the Rt Hon Shabana Mahmood MP, made a speech outlining her vision for the future of the probation service.

    Please note the political content has been removed from this speech.

    Today, we are in Southwark, the home of London’s probation service, one of the busiest in the country.

    Here in London, the Service supervises more than 36,000 offenders.

    And, every day, in this building, there are a thousand untold stories of how our probation service protects the public and makes our streets safer.

    I want to talk about the future of our probation service today.

    But to look to that future, I think we must first look to the past.

    Because it was here, in Southwark, that the probation service first took root.

    Over 150 years ago, the Church of England’s temperance movement posted a man called George Nelson to Southwark’s police court.

    Nelson was the first of a band of missionaries, driven by their faith and strict teetotalism, who gave up their time to help offenders give up the drink.

    Addiction then, as addiction now, drove much criminal behaviour…

    And the approach worked.

    In fact, it worked so well that the courts came to rely on missionaries like Nelson.

    A system soon developed where offenders would be released on the condition that they kept in touch with these volunteers.

    Because what began as a moral cause proved to have a practical purpose:

    These missionaries led to less crime and fewer victims.

    As this Government might say: they made our streets safer.

    By the early twentieth century, this voluntary service was so greatly valued that it was placed on a statutory footing.

    The 1907 Probation of Offenders Act established the first formal structure for probation…

    And the volunteers became professionals.  

    In the years that followed, the service grew:

    The 1925 Criminal Justice Act paid probation officers a regular wage.

    By the 1950s, probation’s work expanded to offenders on parole.

    And by the 1980s, the service was focused increasingly on prison releases.

    Over time, the role developed.

    Where the early missionaries were focused on crimes driven by addiction…

    In time, they took responsibility for the management of ever more, and ever more complex, offenders.

    Too often overlooked, with our focus invariably falling on the police or on prisons…

    Probation became an indispensable part of a criminal justice system that keeps us safe.

    It remains so today, now a service that is more than 20,000 strong…

    And probation officers supervise almost a quarter of a million offenders – around three times the number currently serving time in our prisons.

    Each year, they oversee more than 4 million hours of community payback.

    They monitor around 9,000 offenders on a tag at any given moment.

    They provide sentencing advice to hundreds of courts every single day.

    And they also provide a vital link to tens of thousands of victims, through the Victim Contact and the Victim Notification schemes.

    But while there have been bright moments in the service’s past, we must acknowledge the dark days too.

    In 2014 the service was split:

    Part remained in the public sector, managing the highest-risk offenders.

    The rest was hived off, to be run by the private sector, who would supervise those of low and medium risk.

    Community Rehabilitation Companies would bring the ingenuity of the private sector to solve the problem of reoffending.

    The rhetoric was of a revolution in how we manage offenders.

    The reality was far different.

    Workloads increased, as new offenders were brought under supervision for the first time…

    The number of people on probation increased between December 2014 and December 2016, with almost 50,000 offenders newly under its remit.

    Scarce resources were stretched further than ever…   

    Morale plummeted.

    And worrying numbers voted with their feet, leaving the service altogether…

    With the Inspector of Probation declaring a “national shortage” of probation professionals in 2019. 

    The new companies woefully underperformed.

    Between 2017 and 2018, just 5 of 37 audits carried out by HMPPS demonstrated that expected standards were being met.

    In 2019, 8 out of 10 companies inspected received the lowest possible rating – “inadequate” – for supervising offenders.

    The Chief Inspector called them “irredeemably flawed”.

    And the service was labelled ‘inadequate’.

    In 2021, it was finally, rightly, re-unified and re-nationalised.

    Now, make no mistake…

    Every day, across the country, probation staff make this country safer.

    This was clearly evident in the service’s response to the prison capacity crisis.

    With prisons just days from collapse, this Government was forced to introduce an emergency release programme, which saw some offenders leave prison a few weeks or months early.

    The alternative, as I said at the time, did not bear thinking about:

    We would have been forced to shut the front door of our prisons…

    An act that would have sent dominoes tumbling through our justice system:

    Courts unable to hold trials…

    Police forced to halt arrests…

    And the eventual path to a total breakdown of law and order.

    In making that decision, I knew the probation service would have to carry an even heavier load.

    They would have to put in place plans for the safe release of prisoners in just a few weeks.

    I tried to give them as much time as I possibly could to prepare:

    An eight-week implementation period.

    It wasn’t long to prepare, but the probation service used it with great skill.

    But now is also a moment to be honest about the challenges the service faces.

    And the simple fact is this:

    The service was burdened with a workload that was, quite simply, impossible.

    When we took office, we discovered that orders handed out by courts were not taking place.

    In the 3 years to March 2024 around 13,000 Accredited Programmes, a type of rehabilitative course, did not happen.

    This wasn’t because an offender had failed to do what was expected of them…

    But instead because the Probation Service had been unable to deliver these courses.

    As I have shown already in this job, I believe in confronting problems, not pretending they are not there.

    And so, we will ensure only those offenders who pose a higher risk, and who need to receive these courses, will do so.

    This isn’t a decision I take lightly.

    But it is a decision to confront the reality of the challenges facing the probation service.

    I should be clear:

    For those who will not complete an accredited programme, they remain under the supervision of a probation officer…

    And all the other requirements placed upon them will remain in place.

    Any breach of a community sentence could see them hauled back into court.

    Any breach of a licence condition could see them back behind bars.

    Addressing individual issues like these, however, is no long-term solution to the challenges the probation service faces.

    Today, across the country, probation officers are spread too thin – responsible for caseloads and workloads that exceed what they should be expected to handle.

    Probation officers are drawn to the profession not because it is just another job.

    This job is a vocation, even a calling…

    They are, after all, the inheritors of those missionaries of 150 years ago.

    They are experts in their discipline…

    Who want to know that their work is protecting the public…

    And keeping offenders on the straight and narrow.

    Over-stretched, they can’t work with offenders in the way they need to.

    And the burden placed on probation officers’ shoulders grow heavier and heavier.

    It has driven people away from the job…

    It has made the public less safe…

    And it has to change.

    It is clear we need to bring more people into the probation service.

    In July, I committed to bringing on 1,000 trainee probation officers by March of this year.

    But we must go further.

    Today, I can announce that, next year, we will bring on at least 1,300 new, trainee probation officers.

    New probation officers are the lifeblood of the service, and they will guarantee its future.

    But they are not enough alone.

    It is also clear we must remove the administrative burden that weighs probation officers down…

    And makes them less effective in their roles.

    Today, too many hours of probation officer time are wasted each day.

    They are drowning in paperwork.

    And I don’t mean metaphorical paperwork.

    I mean literal pen and paperwork.

    This takes up valuable time, that would be better spent working with offenders…

    And it also introduces the risk of error – the failure to identify the critical piece of information that might shape a professional’s judgement of the risk that an offender poses.

    Where digital processes do exist in the probation service, they can be difficult to navigate.

    Information is stored in multiple different systems that do not speak to each other.

    And probation officers are forced, laboriously, to type the same information time and again.

    We will soon pilot a digital tool that will put all the information a probation officer needs to know into one place.

    Over time, this will include information from other agencies, like the police as we need to make sure data is more readily shared, so that probation can make better decisions.

    We’re also trialling a new system for risk assessing offenders, to make it more straightforward for probation officers to make robust decisions.

    A group of officers in Brighton started using this in December last year…

    And we estimate it will cut up to 20 percent of the time it takes to do this crucial activity.

    It might sound simple, but the impact could be considerable.

    Every minute saved is more time probation officers can spend working with offenders.

    Less simple, but even more transformational, there’s the potential of artificial intelligence.

    We are currently looking into voice transcription.

    This would automatically record and transcribe supervision conversations by taking notes in real time…

    Allowing probation officers to focus on building relationships, while also removing the need for them to enter handwritten notes into a computer afterwards.

    In time, we believe that AI could play a more active role in supporting staff to supervise offenders – for example, drawing on the data we have on an offender to suggest a supervision plan tailored to them.

    This new technology will ensure probation officers provide what only they can:

    The human factor.

    The ability to work with an offender, one-to-one, to understand the risk they pose…

    To develop a plan for how to manage it…

    Ultimately, to turn them away from a life of crime – and so protect the public.

    That is what remains true about the probation officer’s job now, just as it was 150 years ago.

    The courts didn’t turn to the temperance movement’s missionaries because they were great at paperwork.

    They did so because of how they worked with offenders.

    They knew – in the words of the Government Minister who brought in the 1907 Probation Act – how “to guide and admonish” an offender to make the public safer.

    But while new staff and better technology are necessary to the future of our probation service…

    They are not sufficient.

    With a caseload of nearly a quarter of a million offenders…

    We must also look at the work that probation officers are doing…

    And we must ask:

    Where should their time be spent…

    And, more specifically, who should their time be spent with to have the greatest impact?

    In this, it is clear there are two types of offender.

    On the one hand, we have those who pose a higher risk to society.

    In this group, we have those who are dangerous – posing a real risk of harm to the public.

    We also have those whose offending is prolific – the one in every ten offenders who is guilty of nearly half of all sentenced crime.

    On the other hand, we have offenders who pose a lower risk.

    They are not serial offenders, with a high risk of reoffending.

    Their crimes are instead often fuelled by addiction, homelessness, and joblessness.

    These crimes are not excusable.

    All crimes must be punished.

    But these two groups – the higher and lower risk – are different.

    If we want to reduce reoffending, cut crime and have safer streets, we have to treat them differently.

    And too often today, we don’t.

    We have a one size fits all approach.

    That must change.

    For higher-risk offenders, a probation officer’s time and focus is essential.

    It is no exaggeration to say that effective supervision of this cohort can be the difference between life and death.

    We all know the tragedies:  

    I think of Terri Harris, her children John Paul and Lacey Bennett and Lacey’s friend Connie Gent, savagely murdered by Damien Bendall in 2021, when Bendall was serving a community sentence.

    And I think of Zara Aleena, murdered by Jordan McSweeney in 2022, just nine days after he had left prison on licence.

    We will never be able to stop every tragedy.  

    But we have to stop more.

    There are improvements that we can and must make to the processes probation officers follow, and the technology they use.

    We have introduced new training, to better identify risk…

    New digital tools, as I have mentioned already, will draw together the critical pieces of information from partner organisations, like the police.

    But the vital ingredient is time:

    The time of a professional probation officer…

    Devoted to identifying the risk an offender poses…

    Creating a plan to manage it…

    And supervising, closely, that offender to ensure they do not deviate from it.

    That is the human factor that only a probation officer can provide.

    If probation officers are to have this valuable time with these offenders, we must be more efficient with the time they devote to lower-risk offenders.

    At the very end of their time in office, my predecessor introduced a policy called Probation Reset.

    This saw supervision of lower-risk offenders end after two-thirds of their licence period.

    This was a step in the right direction.

    The interventions that work best with lower risk offenders are not necessarily those provided by probation officers.

    So that is where we must now direct the attention of their supervision.

    We need to get these offenders off drugs and booze – reoffending rates are 19 points lower when an offender completes a drug treatment programme.

    We need to ensure they have a roof over their heads – reoffending rates double for those released homeless.  

    And finally, we need to get them working – reoffending rates are up to 9 points lower when an offender is employed.

    The probation service has a role to play here…

    But their unique value is in referring offenders to the intervention that is required to address the cause of their offending.                

    And so today, I can announce that we will build on the work of Reset.

    This Government will focus the probation service on the interventions that have the greater impact.

    For lower risk offenders, we will task probation officers with providing a swifter intervention.

    They will spend more time with an offender immediately after their release:

    First, assessing the root causes of an offender’s crime…

    Then referring them to the services that will address that behaviour:

    Which could be education, training, drug treatment or accommodation…

    Delivered by the probation service, our partners across Government, and through the brilliant work done by the voluntary sector.

    Once offenders are following that direction, as long as the offender stays on the straight and narrow, we must then focus probation officer’s time more effectively:

    That means more time spent with the offenders who pose the greater risk…

    More time with offenders who pose a risk of a serious and violent further offence…

    And more time with offenders whose prolific offending causes so much social and economic damage to local communities.

    That is how we will reduce reoffending…

    That is how we will cut crime…

    And that is how we will make our streets safer.

    These measures are necessary today, but they will be even more important in the months and years to come.

    David Gauke’s independent review of sentencing will report soon.

    He has been asked to ensure we never run out of prison places again.

    There is no doubt that this will increase pressure on probation.

    As I made clear when I announced the review, I have asked David to consider how we make more use of punishment outside of prison.

    In my view, technology is likely to play a key role – taking advantage of advances in the tech that is being used here and in other jurisdictions:

    Like sobriety tags, which can measure the alcohol levels in offenders’ sweat every 30 minutes, and have a 97 percent compliance rate…

    And GPS tags, which can put in place exclusion zones to alert authorities if offenders enter areas we have banned them from.

    There are also likely to be more sentences served in the community…

    And more drug, alcohol and mental health treatment requirements placed on offenders.

    These are the tools that must be at the judiciary’s disposal to deal with criminals…

    And judges must have trust and confidence that the probation service can deliver them.

    The changes I have announced today are about support for the probation service:

    1,300 new trainee probation officers…

    New technology to lighten the administrative burden…

    And a new focus of their time on where it has the greatest impact.

    Today, I have set out what I think the future direction of the probation service must be.

    And I think we must, finally, consider the alternative. 

    What would happen if we allowed probation to carry on as it is?

    What would happen if we allowed the service to be stretched so thin, trying to do too much with too many offenders…

    Too much time spent doing the wrong things, and not enough time doing what is right and what works.  

    We know what the consequences would be.

    We’ve seen it in the stories of far too many victims…

    And the pain their friends and families have experienced – and continue to experience – every single day. 

    When the probation service isn’t able to properly assess the risk of offenders or supervise them…

    Innocent people pay a terrible price.

    The first job of the state is to keep its people safe.

    We are willing to take the difficult decisions, where they must be taken.

    I will support probation officers, both the new recruits we will bring in and the professionals of whom we have asked so much in recent years.

    While they are professionals these days, and experts in their field…

    They are drawn to the profession by the same desire that called to those missionaries a hundred and fifty years ago:

    To encourage offenders to turn their backs on crime…

    And to make our streets and the public safer.

    To fulfil that purpose now, we must do things differently.

    And that begins today.

    Thank you.

    Updates to this page

    Published 12 February 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI Europe: AI Action Summit: Ensuring the development of trusted, safe and secure AI to benefit of all (Paris, 12.02.2025)

    Source: Republic of France in English
    The Republic of France has issued the following statement:

    Artificial intelligence (AI) is profoundly transforming our society, opening up unprecedented opportunities in many fields. For this technological revolution to benefit everyone, it is crucial to ensure its responsible and ethical development, with trust at its heart. AI raises major concerns regarding safety and security, as clearly demonstrated by the summits in Bletchley Park (United Kingdom – November 2023) and Seoul (South Korea – May 2024). Whether in anticipating extreme risks or addressing those already visible, a resolutely ambitious approach to building trust in AI is essential on an international scale.

    Technological advances in AI also offer exceptional possibilities in the field of security. With this in mind, the AI Action Summit is committed to promoting safe and secure AI, particularly by providing the necessary tools to mitigate these risks.

    For AI to fulfill its promises, a collaborative approach is essential. The AI Action Summit calls on public, private, and academic stakeholders to work together to build a trusted AI ecosystem.

    This global approach is based on three pillars: science, solutions, and standards. With a robust international scientific consensus on AI, the time has come to develop technical solutions that are open and accessible to all, while creating common international standards recognized by the entire ecosystem. This will help prevent fragmentation and encourage convergence at all levels.

    As part of the AI Action Summit, the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs and the General Secretariat for Defence and National Security have supported the action of the thematic envoy, Guillaume Poupard, to federate an ecosystem of stakeholders, both nationally and internationally, mobilised to strengthen the safety and security of AI.

    MIL OSI Europe News –