Mayoral races may be important indicator of Keir Starmer’s political momentum as party seeks to turn 20-point national lead into results
If a telltale sign of a politician’s confidence is how willingly they expose themselves to direct media scrutiny, then the likely narrative of May’s local elections was on full view on Thursday in Dudley.
While Rishi Sunak had followed his Conservative launch speech last Friday with the strictly controlled and limited format of a brief TV clip, Keir Starmer answered journalists’ questions for about 40 minutes, covering everything from council spending to Angela Rayner’s tax affairs.
Continue reading...Judge orders disgraced crypto mogul to forfeit $11bn in assets and says he showed no remorse for his crimes
Sam Bankman-Fried, the disgraced cryptocurrency mogul who perpetrated one of the largest financial frauds in history, has been sentenced to 25 years in prison and ordered to forfeit $11bn in assets. His lawyer reiterated a pledge to appeal the sentence the same day.
The judge, Lewis Kaplan, issued the penalty in a Manhattan courtroom on Thursday. Bankman-Fried, the former chief executive of the now-bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX, was convicted of fraud and conspiracy to launder money late last year.
Continue reading...After regulator resists 40% increase in bills, shareholders deny request for more cash – raising spectre of nationalisation
• Who will win in standoff between Thames’s investors and watchdog?
Thames Water appears to be on the road to nationalisation after its investors signalled they were unwilling to pump more money into the debt-laden utilities company, amid a standoff with the regulator and government over raising customer bills.
Britain’s biggest water supplier said on Thursday its shareholders had refused to provide £500m of emergency funding due this week to secure ithe company’s short-term cashflow.
Continue reading...‘We don’t know if they were warned before the impact,’ says wife of one of eight construction workers who was on the bridge
The construction workers who were on the Francis Scott Key Bridge when it collapsed in the early hours of Tuesday were on break in their cars, according to the wife of one of the construction workers who survived.
Speaking to NBC on Thursday, the wife of Julio Cervantes, one of the eight construction workers who was on the bridge when it collapsed, said: “All of the men were on a break in their cars when the boat hit. We don’t know if they were warned before the impact.”
Continue reading...Maxine Peake and Sarah Schulman among signatories of open letter asking singer to withdraw from contest
More than 450 queer artists, individuals and organisations have called on the UK’s Eurovision contestant, Olly Alexander, to boycott this year’s competition in solidarity with Palestine.
The actor, Maxine Peake, and Sarah Schulman, the novelist and playwright, are among the signatories of the open letter calling on the singer to withdraw from the contest in May due to the ongoing conflict in Gaza.
Continue reading...If Thames Water collapses in the weeks ahead, there is only one smart, long-term response: public ownership
• Adam Almeida is a senior data analyst at the thinktank Common Wealth
The question mark over the future of Britain’s largest water supplier, Thames Water, has put its 16 million customers across London and south-east England – myself included – in an uncertain position. While water will still keep coming out of our taps, the price of these financial woes will probably be borne by customers and taxpayers. Meanwhile, Thames Water’s shareholders have spent the last three decades benefiting from the company’s massive financial gains. If ever we needed an example of the risks of selling essential infrastructure to investment firms, this is it.
Auditors warned in late 2023 that the debt-laden company could run out of money by April if shareholders did not inject it with much-needed cash. Now investors are saying they won’t provide Thames Water with £500m of emergency funding, leading to speculation that the company will be temporarily renationalised.
Adam Almeida is a senior data analyst at the thinktank Common Wealth
Continue reading...Krišjānis Kariņš allegedly spent up to €1.3m on private jet rentals for official trips
Krišjānis Kariņš, the Latvian foreign minister, has said he will step down after a scandal over his use of state funds to pay for private flights during his time as prime minister.
Last week, Latvia’s prosecutor general opened an investigation into the misuse of state funds after it was revealed that Karins had allegedly spent up to €1.3m (£1.1m) on private jet rentals for official trips.
Continue reading...Readers respond to an article by the Guardian’s parliamentary sketch writer about his heart attack, and share similar stories of their own
Thank you to John Crace for this article ( ‘Is this how I die?’ John Crace on his terrifying heart attack, 21 March ). It has allowed me to start the process of accepting that although my two heart attacks on Christmas Day 2022 were mild and sorted by some stents, they were still serious. Surrounded by men on my ward who were recovering from, or waiting for, various heart bypass procedures, I felt almost like a fraud – after all, a stent is at the lower end of the scale, or so I convinced myself.
I have laughed off the concern of loved ones and friends, and dined out on a good story that involved me thinking I had a bad chest infection on the day, accounting for my chest pains and breathlessness and symptoms that in general did not conform to my view of what a heart attack should be like.
Continue reading...Willy Gilder thinks the Alzheimer’s Society latest ad campaign is a mistake and would like to see it withdrawn
The chief executive of the Alzheimer’s Society has sought to justify its new ad campaign, The Long Goodbye , by saying that it “tells the unvarnished truth about the devastation caused by dementia”. It isn’t a truth that I, as a person with Alzheimer’s disease, recognise. The ad shows a family mourning their mum, and saying that she died several times in advance of her actual death as she realised that she could no longer cook a family meal, or take part in social activities.
This idea of dementia being a “living death” reinforces the most negative stereotypes of my condition, and contravenes guidance for journalists drawn up by the society itself six years ago. I share a dementia diagnosis with the star of Die Hard, Bruce Willis. I prefer to try to Live Well, or as well as I am able. It dismays me that the country’s leading dementia charity seems to want to reinforce the stigma surrounding brain disease.
Continue reading...Hearts and minds must be won in the run-up to the renegotiation of a charter that will determine the next decade of public broadcasting
With just three years to go until the renewal of its charter, after 14 years of political assaults and in a time of convulsive change, the BBC has to prove its fitness for the next 10 years of public broadcasting. Hence a wide-ranging speech this week by its director general, Tim Davie, outlining the way forward. Opinions vary as to whether this was a timely show of mettle or a once great institution gasping its last. What was clear was that the path ahead will involve yet more swingeing cuts on top of the £500m annual reduction already forced on the corporation by a two-year licence fee freeze – which ends next month – compounded by inflation.
The breadth of the challenge facing the corporation was underscored by a trio of core objectives designed to sprinkle reassurance in all political directions: the pursuit of truth with no agenda; an emphasis on British storytelling; and a mission to bring people together. All three may be admirable, but the latter two were somewhat undermined by a podcast interview with the showrunner of Doctor Who, for decades a standout example of British storytelling that brings people together. Talking about the value of a production partnership struck with Disney two years ago, Russell T Davies said that it was crucial to the show’s survival, because the end of the BBC was “undoubtedly on its way in some shape or form”.
Continue reading...Rules that favour spending on physical infrastructure over the public sector workforce should be overhauled
The UK’s public services are in a state of near-collapse. Increased spending on health, care and social security is desperately needed, as the latest shocking poverty figures make painfully obvious. But while the NHS regularly tops voters’ lists of concerns , and a majority of the public favours higher spending , most people do not pay much attention to the technical details of government accounting. In the run-up to an election and spending review, this should change. Rules as well as figures require scrutiny. Rachel Reeves’s commitment to the principle that a Labour government should borrow to invest – but not otherwise – should concern everyone who wants to see the NHS, and the public realm more generally, restored.
So should the Treasury’s definition of investment. Traditionally, this refers to capital projects such as new transport links, hospital buildings or energy infrastructure. The point is that these are understood to provide long-term benefits that extend beyond service users to the wider economy. By contrast, and according to international accounting conventions, public money spent on salaries and other running costs comes under the heading of day-to-day (or current) expenditure. What this means, in practical terms, is that it is sometimes easier to get funding for a big scheme such as HS2 than for pay packets.
Continue reading...Leader of India’s Common Man party has spent his career rooting out everyday corruption and is now in jail weeks before general election begins
When Arvind Kejriwal emerged on to India’s political scene in 2011 , he was an outsider with over a decade of activism behind him. Today he is one of the country’s most recognised opposition leaders and his political party governs two powerful states.
Yet Kejriwal’s swift rise from newcomer to political heavyweight, standing up against the might of the Narendra Modi government, has appeared to come at a cost. Last week, Kejriwal, who is the longstanding face of India’s anti-corruption movement, was detained on corruption charges – becoming the first sitting chief minister to be arrested . He will be held in custody for at least 10 days.
Continue reading...Afghan regime’s return to public stoning and flogging is because there is ‘no one to hold them accountable’ for abuses, say activists
The Taliban’s announcement that it is resuming publicly stoning women to death has been enabled by the international community’s silence, human rights groups have said.
Safia Arefi, a lawyer and head of the Afghan human rights organisation Women’s Window of Hope, said the announcement had condemned Afghan women to return to the darkest days of Taliban rule in the 1990s.
Continue reading...National security spokesperson says US passed on warnings and dismissed Russian allegations Ukraine was involved as ‘nonsense’
The US repeatedly alerted Russia that extremists were planning to attack large gatherings in Moscow ahead of last week’s concert hall attack that claimed more than 140 lives, the White House has said.
The national security spokesperson, John Kirby, said on Thursday that US officials passed on warnings – including one in writing – and dismissed Russian allegations that Ukraine was involved as “nonsense”.
Continue reading...Judges at the UN’s top court issue unanimous decision and say Palestinians are in urgent need of humanitarian assistance
The International Court of Justice has ordered Israel to allow unimpeded access of food aid into Gaza , where significant sections of the population are facing imminent starvation, in a significant legal rebuke to Israel’s claim it is not blocking aid deliveries .
A panel of judges at the UN’s top court, which is already considering a complaint from South Africa that Israel is committing genocide in the Palestinian territory, issued the ruling after an earlier emergency measure in January obliging Israel to admit emergency aid.
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City Hall, Perth
This is how to reinvent a local museum, with inspiring, fun exhibits from the Stone of Scone to a salmon boat celebrating a proud and unique history
It takes balls to transform a local collection of archaeology, art and stuffed salmon into a museum with ambitions on an international scale. And it so happens that balls are one of the new Perth Museum’s highlights, albeit prehistoric stone ones. Decorated with nodules large and small, these carved rocky spheres were a speciality of neolithic artists in Scotland. What do they mean? Nobody knows, but their carefully designed patterns evidently meant a lot to the people who lived in what is now called Scotland about 5,000 years ago.
A stone can say so much. Even a blank one. Compared with these intricately hewn prehistoric artefacts, the stone that is the centrepiece of this museum is visually dull indeed – but it is enlivened by a spectacular setting. The museum has been fashioned out of an old Edwardian city hall with an imposing classical exterior and a huge, galleried central chamber. Right in the middle rises a tall wooden tower inside which, after a dramatic build-up in a darkened antechamber, you are admitted to see Scotland’s Stone of Destiny.
Continue reading...After overseeing a transformation of the National Portrait Gallery he will need to draw on that experience in his new role
Nicholas Cullinan, who has been appointed as the new director of the British Museum, was seen as the favourite for the job due to his reputation in the art world as an energetic leader.
As the director of the National Portrait Gallery (NPG) since 2015, the 46-year-old art historian and curator oversaw the most ambitious redevelopment in the institution’s history, a £41.3m refurbishment and rehang of its collection .
Continue reading...There’s a likable, light-hearted zip to the monster mash follow-up but energy dissipates when we’re stuck with the humans
It was a strange old time when the creature feature mash-up Godzilla vs Kong was released, the first major blockbuster in cinemas since Covid shuttered them all a year prior. Expectations were low, thanks to how rotten the last two Godzilla films had been, but thirst for something, anything , truly escapist was high and the big screen equivalent of a kid smashing his toys together became an unlikely saviour, both commercially and critically.
Three years later with normality resuming, there’s arguably less audience demand for another instalment, although the industry could definitely do with another monster hit, the strikes leaving the first few months of 2024 a little weakened. There’s enough easily marketable simplicity to Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire that it should become a swift global hit (the film is tracking to make $135m worldwide in its opening weekend) but, especially in the shadow of the Oscar-winning Godzilla Minus One , there will be predictably diminishing returns for those who venture out. It’s a still fun yet far sloppier outing, a second round that’s less of a win for us and more of a draw.
Continue reading...Opposition MPs criticise changes to renters’ reform bill, which cast doubt on removal of no-fault evictions
Rishi Sunak and Michael Gove have been accused of caving in to Tory MPs lobbying in favour of landlords’ interests after it emerged that significant aspects of the renters’ reform bill are to be watered down.
Changes will include an amendment to prevent tenants ending contracts in a tenancy’s first six months, and another casting doubt on the removal of no-fault evictions, a minister told MPs in a leaked letter.
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