This week's UK news: 7 November 2014
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7 November 2014


Campaign for artwork to stay in London

The 100th anniversary of World War 1 is being remembered in London with a giant display of flowers. By November 11, there will be 888, 246 china poppies around the Tower of London. Each red flower is there to remember one soldier who died fighting for the UK in World War 1.

The plan is for the poppies to be removed from November 12, and sent to the people who have bought them.

But the display has been very popular, with crowds trying to see it. Last weekend visitors were asked to stay away during busy times. The organisers think 4,000,000 people have been to see it. The Mayor of London and the Prime Minister are now asking for the display to stay in place for longer so that more people can see it before it is taken away. Organisers are not keen to do this.

 

Look around London for the bears

Paddington Bear is a very popular children's story character. He is a bear who comes to London from Peru, wearing a label that says "Please Look After This Bear." He ends up staying with the Brown family, wearing a coat with toggle fastenings, and enjoys eating the orange jam (marmalade) that some British people like for breakfast.

There is a film about Paddington coming out later this month, and to celebrate - and raise money for children's charities - 50 models of the bear have been put around London. There is a Shakespeare bear at the Globe Theatre, a Golden Paddington at Selfridges stores and a Sherlock Bear at the Museum of London.

 

UK attracts highest number of university graduates in Europe

New research shows that the UK attracts the highest number of university-educated migrants of any country in the European Union. The study shows that 62 per cent of migrants from Western Europe (countries like France, Italy and Spain) have a university degree, compared with 24 per cent of people from the UK.

The report, done by academics at University College London, says the migrants contributed GDP 20 billion to the UK from 2001 to 2011.

 

TV drama creates demand for old-fashioned shirt collars

A hundred years ago, men wore one shirt for up to a week. But the shirts did not have collars attached to them. Instead, people wore hard, shiny "starched" collars to look smart. Rich men had a clean collar every day: poorer men wore no collars for most of the week, except Sunday when they wanted to look smart.

Now a TV drama called Downton Abbey, which tells the story of a rich family and their servants a hundred years ago, has caused a rise in the demand for starched collars.

There is one starched collar laundry left in the world, and it is now producing 80,000 of the collars a year, up from 10 a week 25 years ago.

Owner Matthew Barker says they get orders from all over the world, and he thinks increasing popularity in the US is because of people watching Downton Abbey there.

The collars are used in TV and film, such as Guy Ritchie's Sherlock films, and also when people are dressing formally.

 

 

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