Table of contents for 1582 in The Week

Back in the first century, Pliny the Elder referred to the way onions make people cry; and ever since, cooks have found novel ways – from dunking their onions in water to wearing goggles – to stop themselves weeping. Now, though, a food company in Japan is marketing a variety that, when cut, does not release the enzymes that lead to tears. The Smile Ball – which is so sweet it can be eaten raw – costs about 70 pence per bulb; but it’s not clear if it is coming to the UK. A painting of a biblical scene that hung unrecognised on the wall of a private home for years has been identified as an early Rembrandt. The father of the painting’s current owner bought it from a dealer…

Controversy of the week Victory for the Greens Polls had suggested that last week’s by-election in Gorton and Denton would be a tight race. But in the end, said James Heale in The Spectator, it wasn’t even close. The Green Party candidate, local plumber Hannah Spencer, “stormed to victory” with 41% of the vote, followed by Reform UK on 29%, and Labour on 25%. The Tories and the Lib Dems, meanwhile, lost their deposits. The result is a “microcosm of a trend we can expect to see play out across the country come May, as chunks of the Labour vote disappear to rivals on both Left and Right”. And it represents “another nail in the coffin of the legacy parties”: in all, the “three main parties”, which have served in…

Mackerel stocks, which have become so depleted that Waitrose has stopped selling it. The supermarket was responding to warnings that populations of the oily fish have fallen to their lowest levels in the northeast Atlantic for more than 20 years. Josh Simons, the Labour MP accused of involvement in a smear campaign against journalists in his previous job at a think-tank, who resigned from his front-bench role. Although he had been cleared of breaching the ministerial code, Simons said he had become a “distraction from the Government’s important work”.…

49% of British adults are opposed to Donald Trump’s strikes on Iran, while 28% support them. 50% oppose the decision to allow the US to strike Iranian missile bases from UK military bases; 32% support it. YouGov/Daily Mirror 41% of Americans say their sympathies are more with the Palestinians, while 36% sympathise more with the Israelis. A year ago, sympathy for Israel was in the lead, with 46%, versus 33% for the Palestinians. Gallup/FT 42% of Gen Z Britons (aged 18-28) think it’s acceptable to turn up at a friend or family member’s door without warning, compared with 52% of Millennials (29-44), 58% of Gen X (45-60) and 59% of Boomers (61-79). YouGov…

For months, callers to Washington state’s Department of Licensing who requested the Spanish-language option were greeted by an automated voice speaking English, in a strongly Spanish-accented voice. “Your estimated wait time is less than tres minutes,” the voice told the news agency AP. This week, the department said that the problem had been caused by a new AI-powered service, and that it had been fixed. A woman from Galway in Ireland ended up with fluorescent green eyes after a hospital eye exam went awry. Photographer Margerita Wargola said that a nurse failed to ask if she was wearing contact lenses and put drops in her eyes with a dye that stained the lenses. “Everything went yellow,” she said. Washing the lenses didn’t help, and without a spare pair, she had…

HUNGARY This thorn will not be that easy to remove Politico (Brussels) Hungary’s Viktor Orbán has long been a thorn in the side of the EU, says Ketrin Jochecová. The populist PM, Vladimir Putin’s closest ally in Europe, bills himself as a defender of Hungarian sovereignty and has regularly clashed with Brussels during the more than 15 years he has been in power. And last month he did so once again, by vetoing the €90bn EU loan to Ukraine. But if Brussels hopes this thorn will be removed if Orbán is defeated in the upcoming 12 April election – as polls suggest he might well be (Orbán is polling at 41%: his main rival, Péter Magyar, once a close confidant but now the leader of the opposition Tisza Party, is…

In 2050, pub quizzers may be asked how the Greens got their name, said Ed West in The Spectator – so far has the party moved from its origins. Indeed, in last week’s by-election in Gorton and Denton, the environment was barely mentioned beyond vague references to “the climate”. In Denton, which is mainly white working class, the party’s army of volunteers talked about low pay and stagnant living standards; in Gorton, where some 20% of the population is Muslim, the Greens distributed leaflets in Urdu, which demanded that Labour be punished for Gaza and featured a photo of their candidate, Hannah Spencer, wearing a keffiyeh. A campaign video included images of Keir Starmer shaking hands with India’s Hindu nationalist PM Narendra Modi, and a warning that Reform UK “gives…

A week after John Davidson, who has Tourette syndrome, “involuntarily blurted the N-word at the Baftas”, the row was still raging, said Michael Deacon in The Daily Telegraph. You and I may understand that Davidson did not mean to cause offence: “Of course he didn’t. That’s the nature of Tourette’s.” He was at the awards to celebrate I Swear, a film about his life that shows the trouble his inability to moderate his language has caused him. But when he shouted out the slur at two black actors, Delroy Lindo and Michael B. Jordan, who were on stage, the response from the “supposed liberals” of the movie industry was furious. Bafta and the BBC, which screened the show, were bitterly criticised. Jamie Foxx said it was “unacceptable”, and claimed that…

Green lessons for Labour To The Guardian Gorton is the place where my great-grandmother was born into a railway family in 1875. At that time, it was world-famous for making locomotives, and was one of the most industrialised and polluted places in the country. When I first knew it in the 1960s, the great engineering works were closing, putting thousands of skilled men on the dole. The terraced streets were being torn down, leaving just abandoned pubs on the street corners. It was one of many northern towns that seemed to have died. To me, it is inspiring that the locals have not, in the main, voted to elect someone who would blame the area’s misfortunes on migrants. I am still a supporter of Keir Starmer’s Government, but Labour needs…

Lost Lambs by Madeline Cash Doubleday 336pp £16.99 The Week Bookshop £14.99 “Suburbia and midlife malaise are familiar themes for fiction,” said Roisin Kelly in The Sunday Times. But in this “morbidly funny debut”, Madeline Cash “gives them a fresh twist for the internet age”. Bud and Catherine are a married couple who live in an American coastal town. The depressed Bud sleeps in his minivan and “mulls over his abandoned creative dreams of being in a rock band”. Catherine, a pot-smoking stay-at-home mother, is having an affair with a neighbour. The couple’s three teenage daughters are only marginally less dysfunctional: one is embroiled in an online relationship with a man who turns out to be a terrorist. It’s a novel full of “intelligent, funny writing”, even if it is…

The bestselling author picks his favourite books. He will be the “Author of the Day” at The London Book Fair at Olympia in London on Wednesday 11 March. His new novel, On We Go, is published by Hodder & Stoughton at £16.99 on 4 June The Essence of the Thing by Madeleine St John, 1997 (Fourth Estate £10.99). This quiet, thoughtful Booker shortlister blew me away when I first read it. Put simply, it’s the tale of a young woman finding out that the relationship she’s in isn’t quite as secure as she’d thought. Bedsit Disco Queen by Tracey Thorn, 2013 (Virago £12.99). From the Marine Girls through to Everything But the Girl, I’ve always loved Tracey Thorn’s music. And this warm and readable autobiography is an absolute must for anyone who,…

Baked Alaska traditionally consists of a cake base, an ice cream filling and a meringue topping that is browned under the grill, says Edd Kimber. This version is more of a quick assembly job: it includes shop-bought elements, plus a couple of simple homemade ones. The recipe is intended only as a guide: you can vary as you see fit. You might want to use brownie offcuts as the base, for example, and jam in place of the compote. Blueberry compote: 50g blueberries 2 tsp caster sugar 1 tbsp lemon juice Milk chocolate sauce: 20g milk chocolate, 40% cocoa solids, finely chopped 30ml (2 tbsp) whipping cream Swiss meringue: 1 large egg white 50g caster sugar small pinch fine sea salt ¼ tsp vanilla bean paste To serve: 20g (2 tbsp) salted pretzels or…

São Tomé, 150 miles off the west coast of Africa, is known as the Chocolate Island for its cocoa, so be sure to visit a plantation – and look out for flowering orchids too. There are fewer tourists in early spring, which sees highs of 31°C (visitsaotomeprincipe.st). Masirah, off the east coast of Oman, has untouched sandy beaches with nesting sea turtles from April to the summer. In March, temperatures hit 27°C, with 11 hours of sun. Try kite surfing, paddleboarding or deep-sea fishing (experienceoman.om). Porto Santo, in the Madeiran archipelago, is known as the Golden Island for its 5.5-mile beach. The whale-watching season starts in April, when humpbacks and fins arrive to feed. Temperatures peak at 20°C, with eight hours of sun (visitmadeira.com). Just four miles off Malta, Gozo…

Mandai Rainforest Resort Singapore Singapore’s parks, botanical gardens and nature reserves cover an area some 23 times bigger than Hyde Park. To make the most of all this greenery, stay at the new Mandai Rainforest Resort, says Oliver Berry in the FT – a Banyan Tree Group property on the edge of the 126-hectare Mandai Wildlife Reserve. It has 338 rooms and a “concrete-and-glass aesthetic”, but will eventually be camouflaged by the lianas that already “festoon” its balconies and walls. Particularly lovely are its rooftop infinity pool and its “capsule-shaped” treehouses on stilts, that look like the Martian invaders in The War of the Worlds. Doubles from £310 b&b; banyantree.com.…

Warner Bros./Paramount: Netflix concedes “In the dirty and very expensive fight” to buy the storied Hollywood studio Warner Bros., Paramount Skydance has come out on top, said Kelly Lawler in USA Today. Given four days to table a counter-offer to Paramount’s “huge bid” of $31 a share in cash (around $111bn), Netflix has walked. David Ellison’s Paramount deal must still be approved by regulators but – given it has been bankrolled by his father Larry, who has close ties with the Trump administration – most analysts expect it to go ahead. There are plenty of political anxieties about this tie-up, “but for now, Hollywood can exhale”: Paramount has not fallen to a streamer. In an investor call, Ellison said he plans to keep Paramount and Warner Bros. as separate movie…

The wrong way to achieve “stability” Editorial The Times Rachel Reeves’s short Spring Statement was billed as a paean to “stability”, and she doggedly stuck with the script – even as the OBR warned that the UK economy could face a “very significant” hit from the Iran war. “The timing was, to say the least, unfortunate,” says The Times. The war has jinxed both the Chancellor’s numbers and that promised stability. As things stand, “the OBR’s forecasts are dispiriting rather than awful”. Growth is forecast “to continue puttering along” at 1.5% over the next five years, while public sector borrowing falls to 1.8% of GDP, largely thanks to higher-than-expected tax receipts. Then there’s the rub: by 2030, the UK tax take is predicted to rise to a “historic high” above…

Trump’s war on Iran: his biggest gamble yet Iran in turmoil It’s hard to assess the significance of events in real time, said Peter Frankopan in The Independent, but on rare occasions, their historical import is immediately evident. I count three such events in my lifetime: the fall of the Berlin Wall; the 9/11 attacks; and now, the decision by the US and Israel to launch all-out war on Iran. Operation Epic Fury began on Saturday morning with a barrage of air strikes that eliminated the country’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, along with many other senior members of the regime. The killings were the product of a sophisticated intelligence campaign, said Mehul Srivastava in the Financial Times. Israel hacked nearly all the traffic cameras in Tehran years ago, and had…

For hundreds of years, Muslims have broken their Ramadan fast by eating a date; but now, many are choosing to drink a glass of Vimto instead. First created in Manchester in 1908, the fruit cordial has found a huge market in the Middle East. The Vimto sold there is thicker and sweeter than the UK version, and during the holy month, it typically sells more than 25 million bottles. The Pembroke in Belgravia, a soon-to-open private members’ club catering to London’s “super wealthy”, has taken out a half-page advertisement in Country Life for a “butter sommelier”. It explains that the recruit – who must have a “deep love for, and understanding of, butter” – will “curate our butter assortment”, and help train staff to use our “silver butter trolley”.…

The NHS is failing “too many” women and babies in England, an interim report into maternity care has found. Drawing on interviews with more than 400 families, Baroness Amos, who is leading the government-commissioned review, listed six areas of concern, including staff shortages, poor relationships between doctors and midwives, structural racism, a lack of compassion and outdated hospital buildings. Amos also suggested that staff may be “incentivised” to record deaths shortly after birth as stillbirths, so as to avoid scrutiny. Her final report will be published in June.…

Zeebrugge, Belgium Tanker seized: An oil tanker suspected of being part of the “shadow fleet” used by Moscow to bypass international sanctions was seized in the North Sea last week, in a joint Belgian-French operation. The vessel, named Ethera, is on the EU sanctions list, Belgian officials said. France’s President Macron described the seizure – by Belgian special forces backed by French navy helicopters – as a “major blow to the shadow fleet”. European nations, he said, “were determined to cut off the sources of funding for Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine by enforcing sanctions”. The tanker, which was flying under a false flag, reportedly had a Russian captain. It has been impounded at Zeebrugge. The shadow fleet consists of as many as 1,200 ageing tankers, most of which…

1* Three Little Birds by Bob Marley, performed by Bob Marley and the Wailers 2 Dance with My Father by Luther Vandross and Richard Marx, performed by Luther Vandross 3 I Miss You by Earl Simmons, performed by DMX featuring Faith Evans 4 The Loco-Motion by Gerry Goffin and Carole King, performed by Kylie Minogue 5 Here I Come, written and performed by Dennis Brown 6 You’re the Apple of My Eye by Ben Lewis, Freddie Bob Hart and Leo Fox, performed by Louis Armstrong and Velma Middleton 7 Roar by Katy Perry, Łukasz Gottwald, Max Martin, Bonnie McKee and Henry Walter, performed by Katy Perry 8 I’m Still Standing by Elton John and Bernie Taupin, performed by Elton John Book: The Untold Railway Stories edited by Monisha Rajesh Luxury: a Swiss Army knife * Choice if allowed only…

Before the 1979 revolution, Iran mostly maintained good relations with Israel. It was the second Muslim-majority country after Turkey to recognise the Jewish state, became its major oil supplier and cooperated on weapons programmes. Even so, anti-Zionist sentiment was widespread in Iran, stoked by its Shia clerics. And after the revolution, hostility to Israel became central to the ideology of the new Islamic Republic: Ayatollah Khomeini severed diplomatic ties, portrayed Israel as a Western colonial outpost and illegitimate occupier of Muslim land, and called for its elimination. (When Egypt made peace with Israel in 1979, Iran cut off diplomatic relations with Cairo.) Ideological opposition turned to proxy confrontation through Iran’s support for Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas, and for Hezbollah, which fought Israel during its long occupation of southern Lebanon.…

Children born in the UK today can expect to live until their late 80s – but their last 25 to 30 years are unlikely to be spent in good health, new figures suggest. According to the Office for National Statistics, boys born in 2022-2024 are expected to have only 60.7 years of good health – almost two years less than those born in 2011-2013, when healthy life expectancy (HLE) was first estimated. Girls born in 2022-2024 are projected to have 60.9 healthy years, down almost three years. There are clear regional differences, however. Scotland has the lowest HLE for males, at 59.1 years; Wales has the lowest for females, at 58.5. In England, girls born in wealthy Richmond upon Thames can expect the most years in good health, at 70.3.…

It’s extraordinary “quite how far the migration debate has moved” in recent years, said David Shipley in The Spectator. The Labour Party is now attempting to implement policies which, a few years ago, would have been “anathema in the Tory Party”. This week, the Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood pushed ahead with major reforms to the asylum and immigration system. Asylum seekers arriving in Britain will henceforth only be given temporary status: they will have their refugee status reviewed every 30 months, and will be returned home if and when their country is deemed safe. Mahmood also intends to reform indefinite leave to remain – by doubling the qualifying time that migrants have to live in the UK before they are granted permanent residence, from five years to ten. Cries of…

“If God had really intended men to fly, he’d make it easier to get to the airport.”George Winters, quoted in the San Francisco Chronicle “It is a damnable fact of life that great propaganda works even when you know it’s propaganda.”Peggy Noonan in The Wall Street Journal “A tiger does not proclaim its tigritude; it pounces.”Wole Soyinka, quoted on Capital News “You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough.”William Blake, quoted in Commentary “Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge.”Charles Darwin, quoted in The Economic Times “If you have any doubts that we live in a society controlled by men, try reading down the index of contributors to a volume of quotations, looking for women’s names.”Elaine Gill, quoted in The Spokesman-Review “Before a…

To The Economist Your arguments in favour of allowing under-16s to continue using social media treated the case for a ban with a breeziness that sits uneasily with the scale of the issue. You acknowledge the growing evidence that social media platforms harm at least some children, while noting that the evidence is mixed. Yet you imply that without overwhelming proof of universal damage, policymakers should refrain from acting. That is not how prudent societies manage risk to children. We do not wait for universal proof before setting age limits on alcohol, driving or gambling. And the suggestion that limiting access merely “delays” a child’s inevitable exposure, is also unconvincing. Age thresholds exist because maturity matters. A 12-year-old and a 16-year-old differ in impulse control and resilience to social pressure.…

Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon, until 28 Mar; Soho Place, London, 25 Apr-18 Jul Run time: 2hrs 40mins The RSC’s “inspiring” new musical is based on William Kamkwamba’s bestselling memoir, which recounts how – as a boy in Malawi – he built a wind turbine to save his village from drought. A bookish teenager who defied philistinism at home and at school, William has shades of Roald Dahl’s Matilda, and even of Billy Elliot, said Dominic Cavendish in The Daily Telegraph. But The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind is an understated show, “earthier and simpler” than those megahits. In the first half, it gets a bit bogged down, as our “sweet-natured” hero ploughs on with his project – tinkering with transistors and marvelling at the workings of bicycle dynamos – despite the…

Hever Castle in Kent, Anne Boleyn’s childhood home, “is capitalising on its Tudor connection” by assembling “the greatest number of portraits believed to be of Boleyn” ever collected, says Olivia McEwan in The Guardian. Capturing a Queen: The Image of Anne Boleyn is spearheaded by Hever’s own “Rose” Boleyn portrait, from 1583 (above), during her daughter Elizabeth I’s reign (decades after Anne’s death). “Overarching the whole enterprise is the question: what did Anne Boleyn look like?” And despite the plethora of portraits here, from the 16th to the 19th century, there are no clear answers. The curators question the popular belief that Henry VIII erased all Boleyn imagery after her 1536 execution. Even so, there is only one verified portrait, a medal, from her lifetime, but it may have been…

Programmes Gone David Morrissey and Eve Myles star in this new thriller. When his wife disappears, an upstanding headmaster finds himself under mounting suspicion. Sun 8 & Mon 9 Mar, ITV1 21:00 (60mins). Storyville: Mistress Dispeller Documentary about a recent phenomenon in China, in which wives hire “mistress dispellers”: to persuade or manipulate their husbands into ending their affairs. Tue 10 Mar, BBC4 22:00 (90mins). A Woman of Substance New eight-part adaptation of Barbara Taylor Bradford’s rags-to-riches romp. Brenda Blethyn and Jessica Reynolds star. Wed 11 & Thu 12 Mar, C4 21:00 (60mins). Films Brief History of a Family (2024) Stylish psychological drama from China about an enigmatic teen who ingratiates himself with his new friend’s parents. Sat 7 Mar, BBC4 22:40 (95mins). The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943) Powell…

Robert Duvall 1931-2026 Although he was sometimes cast in lead roles, Robert Duvall, who has died aged 95, was never regarded as a leading man. That his looks fell a bit short of “movie-star handsome” may have been a factor in this; but it was largely due to the way he disappeared into the characters he played. Whether it was the suave Mafia lawyer in The Godfather, the washed-up country music singer in Tender Mercies, or the tough military man at war with his own family in The Great Santini, Duvall was someone new in every film, said The New York Times. One director described his transformation into character as “uncanny”. Others likened him to Laurence Olivier. Duvall had no time for the Method; he relied, he said, on observation,…

Sam Altman and Dario Amodei At the India AI Impact Summit last month, two CEOs conspicuously avoided joining hands during a photo-op with PM Narendra Modi, choosing instead to raise their fists. Sam Altman and Dario Amodei’s mutual cold shoulder was a telling image of the “tense” rivalry between two former colleagues now shaping the future of AI, said Brent D. Griffiths on Business Insider. Their feud, which began after Amodei left OpenAI in 2021 to form Anthropic, has been thrown into sharper relief now the pair have come down on “opposite sides of a dispute with the Pentagon”. Amodei (pictured) – a longtime safety evangelist – would not agree to the US Department of Defence’s demand to loosen guardrails around the use of Anthropic’s AI in autonomous weapons and…

For nearly two decades, Leonie Tucker worked as a graphic designer in the British film industry, said Eir Nolsøe in The Daily Telegraph. Until recently, the 36-year-old was making more than £65,000 a year. “Then last year, it was £26,000.” Now she’s on universal credit, because the sort of design work she used to do can now be done by AI, for a fraction of the cost. “Within years, millions could experience the same fate as Tucker: a steep drop in income, carefully honed skills obsolete, an entire career path gone.” In the City, the outlook is “super-worrying” for many junior workers, said Matthew Field in the same paper, because AI bots can perform a typical due diligence task in a fraction of the time it takes a human. And…

“Has Britain entered the war against Iran,” asked Melanie Phillips in The Times. “Well, yes… and no.” Beforehand, Keir Starmer withheld permission for the US to use UK military bases in Britain and Diego Garcia to attack Iran, on the grounds that such strikes were “unlawful” and not in the national interest. (The UK, Starmer said this week, did not believe in “regime change from the skies”.) But within days, the PM had reversed his position, allowing the US to use the bases for “defensive” purposes, and to protect Britain’s allies in the region, which had been hit by Iranian retaliatory strikes; the UK’s RAF Akrotiri base in Cyprus had also been hit by a drone. This “lawyerly cop-out” did not impress Trump, who said he was “disappointed” in the…

Jeremy Corbyn, who looks set to become the parliamentary leader of Your Party, having beaten fellow MP Zarah Sultana to take control of the political party’s central executive committee (CEC). His supporters, The Many, won 14 of the 24 seats; Sultana’s Grassroots Left faction took seven. The party had opted not to have a leader, but for its members to elect a CEC instead. MPs, with the news they are to get a 5% pay rise this year, taking their salaries to £98,599 from April. The Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (Ipsa) said that in deciding the inflation-busting pay rise, it had taken account of the higher levels of complex casework MPs must deal with, and the growing “abuse and intimidation” directed at them and their staff. Lovejoy, the comedy-drama about…

Police patrols increased in schools in parts of London resulting in some students being sent home early, because of fears over viral social media posts encouraging “school wars”. The trend began when an unidentified TikTok user grouped some east London schools into “blue” and “red” teams, and told the two sides to fight each other with improvised weapons. The Metropolitan Police said this week that no actual violence had been reported, but that the force had arrested a man in his 20s and a 15-year-old boy in connection with the posts.…

Washington DC Robinson’s visit: The British far-right activist Tommy Robinson received a warm welcome from the Trump administration when he visited the US last week. Robinson (whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon) was able to enter the country despite having criminal convictions in the UK for assault, fraud, drug possession and contempt of court. In Washington, where he is regarded by some Maga Republicans as a free-speech martyr, he was given a tour of the State Department by a senior adviser, Joe Rittenhouse (pictured), and had meetings with two Republican congressmen. Washington DC AI wars: Donald Trump ordered all federal agencies to stop using the AI assistant Claude and other tools made by Anthropic this week, after the firm’s CEO pushed for commitments that the AI it had agreed to…

“Nobody I know is starting this year with much conviction. A committed socialist breaks off mid-conversation to briefly wonder whether we need to deregulate our way to growth. Another friend suggests in one slaloming chat that the Greens are the answer… or maybe Reform UK? I think the irresolution is commendable. Dogmatism is a luxury of easy times. We can all strike impressive attitudes when there’s nothing at stake. It’s why so many university students are Leninists. And I suspect it explains the vein of radicalism often encountered among comfortable pensioners – both the motorway-blocking eco-warrior and the radical nationalist variety.” James Marriott in The Times…

Coca-Cola, white gold and mass atrocities Richard Hurowitz Financial Times Gum arabic – do you know what it is? Most people don’t, says Richard Hurowitz, yet it’s a critical ingredient in everything from Coca-Cola and M&Ms to chewing gum, lipstick, pet food and throat lozenges. It’s also, alas, a key ingredient of what the UN has declared the world’s worst humanitarian disaster. Gum arabic is taken from the sap of the acacia tree and 70-80% of the global supply comes from Sudan, where, for the past three years, a brutal civil war has seen up to 400,000 killed, according to a US envoy, and pushed millions into starvation. The opposing sides, the Sudanese armed forces and the rebel Rapid Support Forces, both steal and smuggle this “white gold” to finance…

America is witnessing the first skirmishes in what looks set to be a long and bitter political battle, said Erin Doherty and Lisa Kashinsky on Politico. The bone of contention? Data centres: those warehouses full of computer servers, routers and storage systems that undergird our digital economy. They’ve proliferated and ballooned in size over recent months as the likes of Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft have sought to exploit the commercial potential of artificial intelligence. And the more these facilities have grown, the more controversial they’ve become. While many voters support the construction of data centres in principle, they’re less happy about having one in their backyard. It has already proved a hot-button issue in some local elections, and it’s fuelling “intraparty rifts”. Progressives are split over whether to impose…

A gender imbalance’s grim impact Aggressive male tortoises are creating an “extinction vortex” on a tiny island in North Macedonia, a study has suggested. Golem Grad, in Lake Prespa, is uninhabited by humans, but its 20 hectares are home to around 1,000 Hermann’s tortoises; and for reasons that are unclear, most of them are male. In fact, the authors of the new study, published in Ecology Letters, calculate that there is just one female for every 19 males. As a result, the males pursue the females very aggressively: multiple males follow single females in “copulatory trains” until the female runs out of energy – at which point the males all pile on. “She’s literally buried by males,” lead author Dr Dragan Arsovski told The New York Times. The males bump…

Boris Johnson has recalled that, as mayor of London, he met the then-Prince Andrew – who proposed various ways in which Johnson could improve the public realm. One of his suggestions was that Battersea Power Station be knocked down, not redeveloped (because it was an “eyesore”); another was that more people should be able to use the VIP suite at Heathrow. Mount-batten-Windsor also had thoughts on London’s traffic. “Suppose you wanted to leave town on a Friday afternoon,” he said. “Well you could be delayed for hours. What about rephasing the traffic lights so as to give more time on green for everyone heading off for the weekend?” When Jim Carrey made a rare public appearance at the César Awards in Paris last week, he looked so different that the…

It’s too early to tell how the military intervention in Iran is going to play out, said Emma Ashford in Foreign Policy, but we can already state one thing with certainty: this is not what Donald Trump’s “base or the American people wanted”. Trump campaigned as a peace candidate. He promised an “America First” agenda that prioritised pocketbook issues and kept the US out of dangerous foreign entanglements. His adviser, Stephen Miller, depicted him as the opposite of Kamala Harris, whose team was, he said, made up of “warmongering neocons [who] love sending your kids to die for wars they would never fight themselves”. But it seems Trump is not so different after all. Although only a quarter of Americans polled last week said they’d support military action against Iran,…

There are two certainties in the Premier League right now, said Alyson Rudd in The Times. One is that “Arsenal will find a way through a corner kick”. The other is that “Chelsea will undermine their own promise by having a man sent off”. And so it proved at the Emirates on Sunday, as the Gunners carved out a 2-1 victory over The Blues to maintain their five-point lead at the top of the table (albeit having played one more game than the team in second place, Manchester City). All three goals came from corners, and all three were scored from the heads of Arsenal defenders – two intentionally (by William Saliba and Jurrien Timber) and one an own goal just before half-time, glanced in by left-back Piero Hincapié. Chelsea,…

Rugby union England coach Steve Borthwick has made nine changes to his team for Saturday’s Six Nations clash against Italy, following losses to Scotland and Ireland. Football Tottenham suffered their fourth consecutive defeat in the Premier League, losing 2-1 to Fulham. Manchester United beat Crystal Palace 2-1 – their sixth win in seven games since Michael Carrick became interim head coach. Cycling At just 20 years old, Matthew Brennan became the first British cyclist since Mark Cavendish (in 2015) to win the Flemish classic.…

Book club podcasts are “notoriously difficult” to pull off, said James Marriott in The Times. It’s not necessarily “thrilling” to listen to people chat about novels you’ve not read. And hosts must tread carefully to avoid giving away crucial plot points. So all credit to The Book Club – the latest to have a go at this genre – which got off to a flying start with a “highly entertaining” dissection of Wuthering Heights. Produced by the Goalhanger stable, it’s essentially “The Rest Is History but for books”, and it even features one half of that duo, Dominic Sandbrook, who has teamed up here with the history podcast’s book-loving co-producer, Tabby Syrett. Sandbrook is “an all-time broadcasting talent” – funny and “preternaturally lucid” – while Syrett is “enjoyably forthright” and…

Is pizza about to change again? “Real Neapolitan pizza” is widely agreed to have arrived in Britain with the opening of the first Franco Manca in Brixton, London, in 2008, says Giulia Crouch in The Times. That kicked off a “movement” – and the UK now has “tons of authentic Italian pizzerias”. Yet is Neapolitan pizza about to be displaced by a homegrown upstart? In nearby Peckham, there is a new place that specialises in what it calls “Bri-talian” pizza. The pies served at Connie’s lack the “characteristic flop of a Neapolitan pizza”; they’re crisper and have “significantly more structural integrity”. To create this “distinctive base”, the chefs use stronger flour than normal, let the dough ferment for longer, and cook the pies not at a raging 450°C but at…

● Many skiers plateau because they don’t think they need lessons. Instructors can spot subtle mistakes and suggest adjustments that can make a big difference. ● Never stop on the slope where you can’t be seen, as you’ll risk a pile-up. Stop at the side of the piste where others can see you. ● Don’t be tempted to speed off until you’ve mastered control. Once your technique is solid, speed comes naturally and safely. ● Visibility is everything on the mountain, so make sure you have the right lens for the conditions. If you can’t see properly you’ll end up skiing defensively. ● Don’t charge over moguls; pros makes them look deceptively easy. Slow down and learn to absorb the shock from the bumps; it will make your skiing more…

Anna Murdoch Mann dePeyster 1944-2026 Anna Murdoch Mann dePeyster, who has died aged 81, was the “constant, steely, polished consort of Rupert Murdoch, as he rose from ownership of a few Australian newspapers to global media tycoon”, said The Daily Telegraph. During their 30-plus-year marriage, she played an influential role in his business dealings, and was a “fiercely protective” mother to their three children, Elisabeth, Lachlan and James. Comparisons are often made between the Murdochs and the Roy family in the TV series Succession, but Anna Murdoch had little in common with the “chilly, detached” second wife of Logan Roy – save, perhaps, for her “elegance”. Anna Maria Torv was born in Govan, a working-class suburb of Glasgow, in 1944. Her father was an Estonian seaman, who’d fallen in love…

Divine protection There’s a new “market moniker” in town. And its “manna from heaven” for investors seeking portfolio protection from the disruptive effects of AI, said Russ Mould in The Daily Telegraph. The “Halo” trade (standing for “Heavy Assets, Low-Obsolescence”) homes in on companies protected by tangible, productive assets – think miners, drillers, energy and transport infrastructure companies and other “real world” companies. The acronym, coined by Joshua Brown of Ritholtz Wealth Management, has been embraced by big players such as Goldman Sachs, said The Wall Street Journal. Goldman’s basket of Halo stocks has outperformed a group of companies “reliant on human or digital capital” by 35% or so this year. Clunking lovelies Big winners stateside include ExxonMobil, tractor-maker Deere and McDonald’s. But the London market, with its thrillingly high…

Who’s tipping what The week’s best shares Currys The Times The high-street stalwart, selling everything from laptops to drones and fridges, has modernised its 700-strong store network and improved its online platform. Sales are up, driven by the Nordic region. Buy. 157.8p. Diageo Citywire Shares in the Guinness and owner dipped on the latest earnings report. Yet Goodbody views halving of the dividend as a “clear statement on driving deleverage”, amid the new CEO’s cost-cutting and cash-generation plans. Buy. £17.51. Mony Group  The Motley Fool The MoneySuperMarket and MoneySavingExpert owner claims to have saved consumers £2.8bn in 2025. Shares fell on AI fears, but the launch of its own ChatGPT-based app is reassuring. Cheap and yields 7.4%. Buy. 172p. One Health Group Investors’ Chronicle OHG provides high-demand medical procedures for…

This week’s winner will receive Week-branded items, as well as two Connell Guides (connellguides.com). ACROSS 7 Relevant record I visit endlessly (7) 8 Char is slimmer following start of Callanetics (7) 10 Colour of a beautiful boat to get on in dock (3-5) 11 Softly allude to favour (6) 12 Dog is behind fashion – no, one’s at its forefront (5-6)  15 The very best fruit (4) 17 Bad son is not often a ____ (5) 18 Bobby’s beginning to love being in school (4) 19 Old gift that corrupts? (6,5) 22 Note dancing tune (6) 23 Wonderfully Clare and Dan date (8) 25 Writer backing song for “The Old Man of the Sea” (7) 26 The boss’s answer put in crib (7) DOWN 1 Where there’s lots of trees…

The Sharpham Trust is an internationally recognised centre for mindfulness retreats and teaching, with 40 years’ experience. We want to create a more mindful, compassionate and environmentally sustainable world. Our aim is to connect people to the natural world and foster mindfulness and well-being. We do this through: a programme of varied mindfulness retreats; mindfulness courses; public events and visits; nature-based training programmes; and managing the land organically to benefit wildlife through our rewilding project. Visit sharphamtrust.org for more information.…