Table of contents for 1491 in The Week

What happened Nigel Farage stunned Westminster on Monday by announcing that he had decided to return to front-line politics, by taking over as leader of his Reform UK party for the next five years. Less than a fortnight after he’d said that he planned to sit out the UK general election in order to focus his attention on Donald Trump’s campaign in the US, Farage declared that he’d changed his mind – “It’s allowed you know” – and would be standing for the seat of Clacton, in Essex. “Nothing works” in Britain, said the former Brexit Party and UKIP leader; it was up to him to lead a “political revolt”. Farage’s surprise announcement landed between two major polls indicating that the Conservative Party is on course for a punishing defeat…

Controversy of the week Whatever one thinks of Diane Abbott, there is no doubt that the Labour MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington “occupies a special place in British history”, said The Times. As the first black female MP, elected to the Commons in 1987, she “blazed a trail” for women from ethnic minorities. Her politics have often been extreme; and Keir Starmer, who has worked hard to “rid Labour of the stain of antisemitism” from the Jeremy Corbyn years, was “bound to act harshly” when she wrote a letter to The Observer last April, claiming that minorities such as Jews and Travellers could not suffer from racism, and likened the prejudice they face to the experience of redheads. Abbott duly had the party whip removed. What was not…

Rupert Murdoch, the 93-year-old media mogul, who tied the knot for the fifth time. His bride is Elena Zhukova, 67, a retired scientist. The pair met at a family event last year. China’s space programme, with the landing of its Chang’e-6 lunar probe on the “dark” side of the Moon. The robot touched down on Sunday and gathered samples of rocks and soil, before lifting off again on Tuesday. China is the only country to have landed a probe on the Moon’s far side, and now looks set to be the first to bring samples back from there. City lawyers, who can now hope to start their careers on salaries exceeding the prime minister’s. According to new analysis, newly qualified solicitors at several US firms with offices in the City…

Paris Coffin threat: Five coffins draped with French flags were dumped next to the Eiffel Tower this week, each inscribed with the words “French soldiers of Ukraine” – an apparent reference to President Macron’s recent refusal to rule out sending French troops to Ukraine. The French authorities suspect the three men arrested in the case – a Bulgarian, a German and a Ukrainian – had all been paid by Russian security services as part of a concerted dirty tricks campaign. One of them is also linked to the vandalising of the Holocaust Memorial in Paris last month, when 35 red hands were painted on the monument. A leaked French intelligence memo also implicates Russia’s security service in another recent incident: the stencilling of 250 Stars of David on walls in…

1 Just the Way You Are by Bruno Mars, Philip Lawrence, Ari Levine, Khalil Walton and Khari Cain, performed by Bruno Mars 2 Greatest Love of All by Michael Masser and Linda Creed, performed by Whitney Houston 3* Always Look on the Bright Side of Life by Eric Idle, performed by Monty Python 4 I Missed the Bus by Jermaine Dupri, performed by Kris Kross 5 We Belong by David Eric Lowen and Dan Navarro, performed by Pat Benatar 6 Let Me Entertain You by Guy Chambers and Robbie Williams, performed by Robbie Williams 7 Can You Feel the Love Tonight by Elton John and Tim Rice, performed by Elton John 8 Here Comes the Sun by George Harrison, performed by The Beatles Book: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl Luxury: a bath tub and bath salts…

The weather forecast for D-Day was perhaps the most important ever made. A team of meteorologists, led by Group Captain James Stagg of the RAF, were tasked with identifying the dates when the conditions at Normandy would be optimal for landing. The key requirement, as one of them recalled, was that it had to be “a quiet day with not more than moderate winds and seas and not too much cloud for the airmen, to be followed by three more quiet days”. But there also had to be a full Moon, to provide light for the aircraft pilots and paratroopers. Stagg’s team came up with four suitable dates in June, and the planners chose 5 June. Days before the invasion was to begin, however, Stagg warned that the weather was…

How college sports have been despoiled Christian Schneider National Review College sports are a big deal in America, says Christian Schneider. Their popularity derives not just from the skills on show on the field, but from nostalgia. We cheer on our alma mater because the players study in the same buildings we once sat in, hang out in the drinking spots we once frequented. When they succeed, “we, as alumni, get to credit all the college memories we made with producing a superior brand of athlete”. But recent rule changes affecting college sports are destroying this romantic link. First came the US supreme court decision allowing college athletes to be paid for the use of their name, image and likeness. Then came the “transfer portal”, allowing athletes to swap between…

The number of people diagnosed with melanoma skin cancer in the UK has risen by almost a third in the past decade – and is expected to top 20,000 for the first time this year. The biggest increase was in adults over 80, among whom rates increased by 57%, while the smallest rise – of just 7% – was in people aged 25-49. Cancer Research UK, which carried out the analysis, said that young people today are likely more aware of the importance of staying safe in the Sun than the older generation were when they took advantage of the boom in cheap package holidays that occurred in their youth. The ageing population and increased awareness of the signs and symptoms of skin cancer will also have contributed to the…

Better late than never, said The Daily Telegraph. For weeks, President Zelensky has been begging Washington to allow Ukrainian forces to use US-supplied missiles against targets inside Russia. The ban on doing so had left Ukraine’s second city, Kharkiv, exposed to a cross-border bombardment and led to “the patently absurd scenario that Moscow’s forces could gather, unmolested, as little as four kilometres from the targets in Ukraine they were about to attack en masse”. Last week, under pressure from European allies, President Biden relented, permitting Kyiv to use US weapons against military targets inside Russia – but only in areas bordering the Kharkiv region. Elsewhere, their use will still be limited to Ukrainian territory. The easing of restrictions will be of “significant tactical benefit” to Ukraine, said Matthew Savill on…

“The only thing I can control is how hard I work.”Kobe Bryant, quoted in The Daily Telegraph “If you can’t annoy somebody with what you write, I think there’s little point in writing.”Kingsley Amis, quoted in The Knowledge “In Hollywood, a marriage is a success if it outlasts milk.”Rita Rudner, quoted on iNews “Irreverence is easy – what’s hard is wit.”Tom Lehrer, quoted on The Conversation “Whoever you vote for, the government always gets in.”Old anarchist slogan, cited in The Daily Telegraph “Love is only a dirty trick played on us to achieve continuation of the species.”W. Somerset Maugham, quoted in The Times “Talent hits a target no one else can hit; genius hits a target no one else can see.”Arthur Schopenhauer, quoted in Forbes “We sleep safely at night…

Running time: 1hr 20mins The Royal Court’s new artistic director, the playwright David Byrne, has launched his tenure with a production “so technically sophisticated that it leaves the head spinning, but so full of poetic feeling that it penetrates the heart”, said Sarah Crompton on What’s on Stage. Adapted from Maggie Nelson’s book of prose poems, Bluets has been staged by director Katie Mitchell using her “live cinema” concept – a mix of live action and video screens. The result is an “experimental and engrossing” evening, which takes us inside the head of a woman who is heartbroken and unmoored, and obsessed with the colour blue – and whose consciousness is embodied on stage by three actors: Emma D’Arcy, Kayla Meikle and Ben Whishaw. Bluets “isn’t always easy to fathom”.…

“Four centuries after it was painted… and three years after it came perilously close to going under the hammer for just €1,500, a lost, luminous and lovingly restored Caravaggio has gone on display at the Prado in Madrid,” says Sam Jones in The Guardian. The Ecce Homo, “painted in the Italian master’s dark and desperate last years”, was spotted by experts at the museum in an auction catalogue, where it had been attributed to the circle of the 17th century Spanish artist José de Ribera. They rang Spain’s culture ministry, which slapped an export ban on it, allowing experts to undertake “a painstaking examination and restoration”. It has since transpired that the work was owned by Spanish viceroys in Naples. It shows Christ being presented to the crowd by Pontius…

At the T20 cricket, Harrison apologises to Pat and asks Tracy to become team vice-captain. He tries to reach out to Fallon by sharing a poem. Vince learns that deliveries are going missing and tells Freddie to get to the bottom of it. Freddie goes out with Casey Meats’ driver Jason, who talks about the overtime cash he needs for his family. Lynda comes up with an idea to mark the D-Day anniversary and, with her usual powers of persuasion, gets Chelsea, Fallon and Ben involved. Fallon opens up to Lynda and says she misses Harrison, who’s still sleeping on the sofa. There’s more trouble for Lillian as Jakob diagnoses a horse at The Stables with a contagious disease – he recommends a full lockdown. Vince and Freddie try to…

Morgan Spurlock 1970-2024 Morgan Spurlock, who has died aged 53, “owed his career to a Big Mac”, said The Times. In 2002, he saw a TV news story about two young women who were suing McDonald’s for allegedly misleading them about the nutritional content of its burgers and fries, causing them to gain excess weight. In response, a spokesman for the fast-food giant insisted that McDonald’s food could not be linked to obesity, because it was healthy and nutritious. This gave him the idea for a documentary, in which he would test that claim by eating only food from McDonald’s for 30 days. The rules he set himself also stipulated that if he was asked by the server if he’d like to “super-size” his food or drink, he’d always say…

What happened Donald Trump became the first former US president to be convicted of a criminal offence when a New York jury found him guilty last Friday on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records, with an intent to conceal the violation of campaign finance and tax laws. The case centred on a $130,000 payment made to the adult-film actress Stormy Daniels, shortly before the 2016 election, to stop her speaking publicly about an alleged sexual encounter she’d had with Trump in 2006. At his sentencing hearing on 11 July he could be jailed for up to four years, but is more likely to receive a fine or community service. In an explosive press conference, Trump – who has already vowed to appeal – called the trial “rigged” and “disgraceful”,…

The NHS declared a “critical incident” this week after several major hospitals in London were affected by a cyberattack. Reportedly, the hackers targeted software used by a private lab that has partnered with NHS hospitals to provide pathology services. With blood test results not coming through, operations had to be rescheduled and blood transfusions delayed. The list of affected hospitals includes Guy’s, St Thomas’ and King’s College. GP services in several boroughs were also disrupted. The hackers are believed to have demanded a ransom to remove a piece of software that had locked the Synnovis partnership’s IT system. Cybersecurity experts said they suspected that Russian cybercriminals were behind the attack.…

Marylebone Cricket Club, after its former president told an audience at the Hay Festival that it stinks of “privilege and classism”. The writer and actor Stephen Fry said the MCC had a “public face that is deeply disturbing”, and characterised its members as “beetroot-coloured gentlemen” in blazers. He was taking part in an event about diversity in cricket. Some MCC members have since called for his membership to be suspended. Britain’s honeybees, with reports that Asian hornets have survived a British winter for the first time. Sightings of the hornets – which lurk outside the entrances to hives in order to feast on honeybees – reached a record high last year, and beekeepers have warned that they could soon become established in the UK.…

Wilmington, Delaware Trial begins: The trial of Hunter Biden got under way this week, creating an unwelcome distraction for President Biden as he sought to capitalise on Donald Trump’s criminal conviction. Joe Biden’s only surviving son, Hunter, 54, is accused of violating federal gun laws by allegedly lying about his illegal use of drugs while attempting to buy a gun in Delaware in 2018. He has pleaded not guilty, but could go to jail if convicted. As the trial began, Joe Biden released a statement professing his “boundless love” for his son, who is facing a second trial in September on federal tax charges. Washington DC Turning up the pressure: Days after unveiling a new plan for a ceasefire in Gaza (see page 20), President Biden hinted this week that…

“Of course Labour’s plan to charge VAT on private school fees is all about throwing a bit of red meat to the Left. But I wish I could sympathise with private schools more than I do. The policy would strike me as a bit more of an outrage had private schools not spent the past 30 years steadily pricing out the middle classes. Since 2003, the real-terms fees rise has been 55%. What the independent sector has been crying out for is a Ryanair or a Lidl: a chain providing education at an affordable price. Normally, the private sector undercuts the costs of the state sector, but private schools are an exception: they’ve become interested only in providing an upmarket product.” Ross Clark in The Spectator…

The reckless timidity of our political class Martin Sandbu Financial Times The other lot will put your taxes up – but don’t worry, we won’t. That’s the cry from the two main parties in this election; and it’s just what the country doesn’t need, says Martin Sandbu. Labour once had plans to borrow big in order to invest in green energy and infrastructure; but now that interest rates are no longer near zero, it has ditched them and is making a thing of its commitment to stability. It’s a needless retreat. Britain’s poor infrastructure is a major drag on productivity: investing to upgrade it would deliver a far higher rate of return than the 2% real annual rate at which the Treasury can borrow long-term. Labour’s commitment to fiscal rectitude…

As the ultimate arbiters of US law, on whose rulings presidential elections can hang, supreme court justices are meant to be models of integrity and impartiality, said Ankush Khardori on Politico. Who, now, could claim that Justice Samuel Alito fits that description? He has attracted criticism in the past for going on luxury holidays with conservative donors who have business before the court; he also allegedly leaked the result of a major case to conservative activists before the decision was announced. And he now stands accused of flying insurrectionist flags linked to the far-right. The New York Times has revealed that an upside-down Stars and Stripes flew outside his Virginia home after the 6 January attack on the Capitol; and that an “Appeal to Heaven” pine tree flag was raised…

The sharp rise in teen vaping A dramatic rise in vaping among young people can be clearly traced back to the introduction of disposable e-cigarettes, a new study warns. The analysis, published in The Lancet, looked at data from surveys carried out before and after single-use e-cigarettes became available in summer 2021. This showed that the number of 18- to 24-year-olds who vape more than tripled over this period, from 9% in May 2021 to 29% in May 2023. Smoking rates did fall slightly, from 25% to 21%, but the popularity of disposable vapes, which are cheap and often come in bright colours and fruity flavours, meant that nicotine use rose overall in young adults – many of whom may “otherwise have avoided nicotine entirely”, said the researchers, from University…

The LBC host Iain Dale abruptly withdrew his bid to become the Tory candidate for Tunbridge Wells last week, less than 48 hours after it emerged that he has not always been very fond of the town. In a 2022 episode of his podcast For the Many, Dale said he’d lived in Tunbridge Wells for 25 years “slightly against my will”, because it’s where his partner is from. “I’ve never liked the place,” he added. “Still don’t, and would happily live somewhere else.” Keir Starmer’s chief of staff Sue Gray has a fearsome reputation, reports The Guardian. Junior shadow ministers have learnt that you “don’t say no” to Gray, and she is said to be in such control that, at an event last year, she took it upon herself to…

The Lib Dem leader Ed Davey has come up with a novel way of ensuring that his party gets news coverage during the election campaign, said Jawad Iqbal in The Spectator. “His wheeze is to ensure that, each and every day, he is pictured doing something silly.” One day last week he repeatedly fell off a paddleboard on Lake Windermere in Cumbria, to highlight the issue of sewage discharge. The next day, he freewheeled down a hill in Powys, to launch the party’s Welsh campaign. The day after that he rode down a children’s water slide in Somerset in a rubber ring. The message that time was “anyone’s guess”. The Lib Dems used to be a serious party, said Tanya Gold in the Evening Standard. They opposed the Iraq War;…

The rugby league player Rob Burrow liked proving people wrong, said Riath Al-Samarrai in the Daily Mail. Growing up in West Yorkshire, he was repeatedly told he was too small ever to make it as a rugby player. Yet the “Mighty Atom”, as he was soon nicknamed, went on to become a legend of the sport, playing for Leeds Rhinos for 16 years and winning eight Super League Grand Finals and two Challenge Cups. He also had a successful international career and won the player of the series award when Great Britain trounced New Zealand in 2007. Burrow retired in 2017: two years later he was diagnosed with motor neurone disease and was told by doctors that he had less than two years to live. Yet despite becoming a prisoner…

Clearing the backlog To The Daily Telegraph I can do better than Alisdair Keats-Rawling’s 12-week wait for an echocardiogram (Letters). I have just received a letter from Bedford Hospital stating that “due to the current situation, the waiting time for your echocardiogram is approximately 95 weeks”. I suppose that waiting for patients to die before they are seen is one way of clearing the backlog. Julie Findlay, Cardington, Bedfordshire The cost of education… To the Financial Times If Labour is elected and imposes VAT on school fees, the simple solution would be for the schools with charitable status to tell fee payers that, in future, schools will not invoice parents for fees or extras but instead will request a donation. For example, if a year’s fees were £40,000, schools would…

by Sebastian Junger 4th Estate 176pp £16.99 The Week Bookshop £13.99 Sebastian Junger, the author of The Perfect Storm and of award-winning reportage from Afghanistan, has been shot at by the Taliban, and a bomb once exploded in his Humvee. But on 16 June 2020, he “found himself face-to-face with mortality in a way he’d never been” before, said Elisabeth Egan in The New York Times. While staying with his wife in his remote cabin on Cape Cod in Massachusetts, Junger (pictured) experienced abdominal pains that spiralled into unconsciousness. Luckily, an ambulance was summoned; he nearly died of what turned out to be a ruptured pancreatic artery. About a third of his new memoir, In My Time of Dying, recreates this experience as “a terrifically detailed medical thriller, as suspenseful…

The intriguing premise of The History of Bad Ideas, a new series of Professor David Runciman’s podcast Past Present Future, is “to take bad ideas seriously”, said James Marriott in The Times. A century on, for example, the case for women’s suffrage seems “logical, unanswerable and morally virtuous”. But at the time, as Helen Lewis shows in her fascinating episode on the “anti-suffragettes”, the case against letting women vote had its own complex, if flawed, logic, and “attracted intelligent and civilised advocates, including many women”. Some argued that women were “above political partisanship”; others that because women didn’t serve in the military, they shouldn’t vote on laws that had to be defended with force. The episode shows how a bad idea “can be quite easily decked out in sophisticated argument”.…

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, 1868 (Vintage £6.99). This is the girls’ coming-of-age novel, documenting the lives of the March sisters – Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy – their family and friends; a story of love and loss, of the challenges faced by women in a changing world. It is the writer and independent-thinking Jo who guides the reader, and her voice is as fresh now as it ever was. Montaillou by Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, 1975 (Penguin £12.99). This is a pioneering work of microhistory, shining a spotlight on a tiny and isolated village in Ariège from 1294 to 1324. Based on the records of inquisitor Jacques Fournier, who prosecuted and victimised Cathars in southwest France during the 13th century, this extraordinary book puts ordinary people centre stage…

Programmes Tom Jones: Later… with Jools Holland Jones joins Holland to co-host the final episode of the series, with performances by Harry Styles, Noel Gallagher and FKA twigs. Sat 8 Jun, BBC2 20:30 (60mins). Jana: Marked for Life New Swedish crime drama. Jana, a newly appointed prosecutor, investigates the murder of an immigration official – and a family friend. Sat 8 Jun, BBC4 21:00 and 21:50 (50mins each). On Thin Ice: Putin v Greenpeace Six-part series using unseen footage to document Putin’s brutal crackdown on a 2013 protest on a Russian oil rig. Sun 9, Mon 10 & Tue 11 Jun, BBC2 21:00 and 21:30 (30mins each). Chinook: Zulu Delta 576 In 1994, a helicopter crash in the Mull of Kintyre killed six of Northern Ireland’s top intelligence officials; the…

● Choose your moment. Find a time when your manager isn’t too busy. Obviously, if the firm is making redundancies, it’s best to wait. Start by emailing to ask for a meeting to discuss pay, so she or he isn’t blindsided. ● Get prepped before the meeting. Keep a “loud list” of your achievements and how you are bringing value to the company. ● Research the typical salary for your role in your location. There is plenty of free data about salaries, by role and area, online. ● If you feel awkward, rehearse your opening lines. Remember everyone has these discussions; you’re not being rude. ● Come to the meeting with a number in mind. Give your boss that number, and then be quiet. Let them fill the awkward silence.…

Ángeles Flórez Peón 1918-2024 Ángeles Flórez Peón, who has died aged 105, is thought to have been the last living republican militia woman of the Spanish Civil War. Known as Maricuela, she served on the front line against General Franco’s nationalist forces; after the republican defeat, she spent four years in prison and 55 years in exile. Late in life, her memoirs helped to make her “a symbol of the Spanish women who fought against fascism”, said The Daily Telegraph. Ángeles Flórez Peón was born in Blimea, in Asturias in northern Spain, in November 1918, to a miner and a midwife. “I never had a doll and I never went to school,” she said; she eventually learnt to read in prison. During the general strike of October 1934, her eldest…

Shares in Trainline plunged by nearly 10% in April when Labour announced plans to bring the railways into public ownership, says Oliver Gill in The Sunday Times. But the London-listed ticketing app has won a reprieve – and a tidy bit of business to boot. Labour has confirmed there are “no plans” to revive the current government’s proposal for “a national retailing app” for train tickets, meaning Trainline will now play “a pivotal role” in Labour’s plans “to accelerate the death of paper tickets” on a “nationalised” railway. Investors, however, seem unimpressed. Having jumped by over 20% over the past year, shares have been stuck in a siding as of this week.…

BHP has aborted its £38.6bn bid for the FTSE-listed miner Anglo American. But the main prize – copper – is booming, said Lex in the FT. Prices of “the red metal” are up by about a fifth this year; hedge fund manager Pierre Andurand reckons they could almost quadruple to $40,000/tonne in the near future. Police report a 20% rise in the theft of copper cable in southern England. Staying power It dug humanity out of the Stone Age and its industrial applications made it “a proxy” for economic health – hence the nickname “Dr Copper”. The current boom reflects its role powering the energy transition. The “greening economy” should see demand double by 2035, according to S&P Global Commodity Insights. Threats The market is greatly influenced by the world’s…

Sam Altman The OpenAI chief “has a day job and a side gig”, said The Wall Street Journal. “Only one of them is making him rich” – and it isn’t his role leading the AI revolution. Sam Altman, 39, owns no stake in the ChatGPT startup, last valued at $86bn, “saying he doesn’t want the seductions of wealth to corrupt the safe development of artificial intelligence”. He earns an annual salary of just $65,000. But he compensates with an “opaque” investment empire that is now “raising questions of conflicts”. Altman has stakes in 400-plus companies – including Airbnb, Stripe and Reddit, whose shares popped 10% on news of an OpenAI partnership. He has quietly become “one of Silicon Valley’s most prolific investors”, said The Times. Naturally, he has pledged to…

THE WEEK CROSSWORD 1417 Two Connell Guides and three Week-branded items will be given to the sender of the first correct solution to the crossword and the clue of the week opened on Monday 17 June. Send it to The Week Crossword 1417, 121-141 Westbourne Terrace, London W2 6JR, or email the completed grid/listed solutions to crossword@theweek.co.uk. Tim Moorey (timmoorey.com) This week’s winner will receive Week-branded items including a notebook, coffee mug and tote bag, as well as two Connell Guides (connellguides.com). ACROSS 1 What could be the aim on table dance after protest (6,4) 6 Partner for life in branch (4) 9 What starts this clue is excellent (7) 10 Paper trousers for scruffy types (3-4) 12 Partly clear the ground (5) 13 Leader, one in oil trade supply…

Almost half of British adults are trying to supplement their income by taking on a “side hustle”, research has suggested. According to a poll commissioned by the software company Sage, 47% of adults have more than one income stream, such as selling used clothes; and 10% are actively looking for one. The average amount that 16- to 34-year-olds pocket from their side hustle is £546 a month. The number of children who enjoy writing in their spare time has fallen to a record low, as they spend more time on smartphones and other devices, a survey by the National Literacy Trust (NLT) has found. Fewer than three in ten (28.7%) of children aged eight to 18 say they enjoy writing when they’re not at school, down from 46.8% in 2010.…

42% of British adults say they’ve decided how they’re going to vote in the election. 27% say they’re leaning towards a party but may change their mind; 13% say they’ll probably vote but are completely undecided about whom to vote for; 13% say they probably won’t vote. Lord Ashcroft/Daily Mail Only 23% of 18- to 26-year-olds support the Tories’ plan for a new form of national service; by contrast, 63% of those aged 75 and over do. Across all adult age groups, 40% support the idea, and 37% oppose it. More in Common/The News Agents 50% of Americans agree with the jury in New York’s decision to convict Donald Trump. 27% disagree, and 23% are unsure. ABC News/Ipsos…

Reviving Charles I Over the past eight years, Daniel Williams, a history enthusiast from Sutton Coldfield, has spent much of his time dressed up as Charles I, visiting more than 70 sites in the UK linked to the monarch, says BBC News. Sporting a luxuriant beard and bedecked in finery, he has been everywhere from Dunfermline Palace in Scotland, where Charles was born, to Aston Hall in Birmingham, where he spent a night in 1642. Williams’ aim is to “help the great history and heritage of this country get more of a stage”. He was inspired to start when a friend noticed he looked like Charles; but he says he has to psych himself up “tremendously” to get into character, before he can spend a whole day as the king.…

A priest in Florida has been charged with biting a woman during a fight that erupted while he was administering Communion. The incident occurred when Father Fidel Rodriguez, a vicar in the city of St Cloud, refused to give the woman a Communion wafer, possibly – according to a witness – because he was bothered by her revealing clothing. The woman then reportedly tried to grab the wafers and crush them in her fingers, leading Rodriguez to bite her hand. He had been “trying to protect the Holy Communion from this sacrilegious act”, his diocese explained. A man accused of driving without a licence dialled into his remote court hearing in Michigan while behind the wheel of a car. Corey Harris, 44, joined the hearing on Zoom and was asked…

TAIWAN The threat to democracy from within Liberty Times (Taipei) China has been rattling its sabre in the Taiwan Strait again, says Wu Sezhi. The inauguration of the island’s independence-leaning president Lai Ching-te has prompted China to conduct more military drills there. The more alarming threat to our democracy, however, comes from within. Lai’s Democratic Progressive Party lost its majority in January’s elections, and two opposition parties – the pro-China Kuomintang, and the populist People’s Party – have now joined forces to ram through new laws boosting the power of MPs at the president’s expense. The most troubling of their reforms, passed in defiance of constitutional norms, is the introduction of a vaguely worded criminal offence: “contempt of congress”. It’s not hard to imagine this being used to silence political…

Eight months after Hamas “unleashed the dogs of war” with its murderous attacks of 7 October, Joe Biden gave a speech last week in which he argued, with “unusual clarity”, that it was time for the Israeli government to seek peace, said The Independent. An “indefinite war in pursuit of an undefined notion of total victory” is not in Israel’s interests, he said: it will not bring the hostages home; it will not lead to an “enduring defeat” of Hamas; and it will not bring “lasting security”. At the same time, Biden unveiled a peace plan he said had been proposed by Israeli negotiators. “Familiar in shape”, the deal starts with a six-week ceasefire – which would be extended if talks on a lasting peace were ongoing; a partial withdrawal…

Going to university is not merely “a crude financial calculation”, said The Times. But it is, today, “a serious financial undertaking”. The average student can expect to leave with student debt amounting to £45,600. And, unfortunately, many universities recruit young people onto sub-standard courses that will not boost their long-term earnings, and which offer little in the way of educational value. Only 27% of the 2022/23 intake are expected to earn enough to pay off their loans; many will pay an effective graduate tax for their whole lives. This is why Rishi Sunak has pledged that, if re-elected, his government would shut down failing degree courses. About 130,000 “low-value” university places would be cut, saving the taxpayer £910m by 2030, which would be used to fund 100,000 new apprenticeships over…

Over the past decade, no team in world football has been more adept than Real Madrid at winning games they looked to be losing, said Sam Wallace in The Daily Telegraph. And so it proved once again in the Champions League final on Saturday night: though Real’s opponents, Borussia Dortmund, put in a “fine performance” and were the better side for most of the match, it still didn’t seem like a surprise that they ended up on the losing side. Real’s 2-0 victory was marked by a characteristic “economy of effort”, both their goals coming in the final 20 minutes – a header by veteran right-back Dani Carvajal and a coolly taken finish by their “great young Brazilian”, Vinícius Júnior, the standout player of the final. Remarkably, this was Real’s…

To The Times Your report of a GP surgery using the ambulance service every morning to cope with the 8am deluge of telephone requests for appointments is not a success story, but a response to the failure to provide sufficient appointments with a GP who is a fully trained registered medical practitioner. Time and again it has been shown that continuity of care with “my doctor” improves mortality and reduces the risk of hospital admission. If patients know they can get a prompt appointment whenever they phone they will not need to enter the daily morning lottery. We were promised thousands of extra doctors years ago but they have failed to materialise. Until such time as the funding model changes to allow this additional recruitment, the safe care of patients…

by Rachel Cusk Faber 208pp £16.99 The Week Bookshop £13.99 The novelist and memoirist Rachel Cusk is “an acquired taste worth acquiring”, said Kate Kellaway in The Observer. Since reinventing herself with the novel Outline in 2014, she has grafted fiction onto autobiography “with a fluency that made you wonder why more novels were not written this way”. Parade, a mosaic of stories about sex, death and gender, featuring disparate artists who are all referred to as “G”, is “a brilliant, stark and unsettling feat”, approaching its subjects with an “intellectual intensity” rare in English fiction. “I have admired, sometimes loved, all of Cusk’s books,” said Johanna Thomas-Corr in The Sunday Times. This one, however, is a plotless, introspective, humourless piece of writing “about how hard it is being Rachel…

Jacqueline de Jong at Pippy Houldsworth Gallery Much like her US contemporary Judy Chicago, the Dutch artist Jacqueline de Jong (b.1939) has always created anarchic, politically charged work that ignores received ideas of good taste or fashion. This show, La Petite Mort, brings together a new series of paintings created in response to the war in Ukraine alongside a handful of pieces dating from her days as a 1960s radical. What’s immediately clear is that her youthful anger remains unblunted: all her paintings give us the same claustrophobically framed menageries of Boschian man-monsters, warped perspectives and toxically bright colours. The difference is that while the early pictures were explicitly absurdist, the new works could almost pass for realism. Figures bunch closely, as flames engulf the borders of one painting; while…

Why Greek food is having “a moment” Its culinary offerings have long been viewed with considerably less excitement than those of France and Italy, says Tony Turnbull in The Times. Yet now, in Britain, Greek cuisine is finally “enjoying a moment in the sun”. According to the London-born, Greek-Cypriot food writer Georgina Hayden, our curiosity about Greek food was slow to develop because of the package-holiday boom of the 1970s and 1980s. “Somewhere like Italy was more middle class, so its food was put on a pedestal,” she says. By contrast, an “anglicised” version of Greek food – “all kebabs and grilled meat” – became the norm in Britain. But now, a new generation of “well-travelled diners” is discovering “how elegant and varied Greek food can be”. Exemplifying this trend…

Set in pristine woodland near Southwold, Suffolk, Thorington Theatre was built during the pandemic in an old WWII bomb crater, using local timber. The 360-seat venue hosts plays and talks throughout the summer (until 31 Aug; thoringtontheatre.co.uk). Brighton Open Air Theatre, a 400-seat amphitheatre with a diverse repertoire from theatre and comedy to drag and circus acts (until 22 Sep; brightonopenairtheatre.co.uk). This year’s programme at the amphitheatre in the Explorers Garden at Pitlochry Festival Theatre in Perth and Kinross includes a magical adaptation of The Secret Garden (12 Jul-22 Aug; pitlochryfestivaltheatre.com). Hidden in a glade, Kilworth House Theatre, in Lutterworth, Leicestershire, has dramatic sail-shaped canopies to shelter the audience (18 Jun-25 Aug; kilworthhouse.co.uk). The historic Minack Theatre is cut into the rugged cliffs in Porthcurno, Cornwall. Bring a cushion, as…

The Georgian Santa Monica, Los Angeles With its iconic turquoise art-deco facade, “Santa Monica’s First Lady” was a “star magnet” when it opened in 1933. Later, it got a little tired, says Lizbeth Scordo in Condé Nast Traveller – but a revamp has restored the old magic. “Velveteen opulence and whimsical hedonism” predominate, from the powder-blue bellboys’ uniforms to the pastel decor in the 84 rooms, and the champagne buttons that guests in suites can press to summon a bar cart. There are two restaurants – one with “Italian-meets-SoCal dishes” and a lovely oceanfront terrace, the other, a “speakeasy-style” basement joint with a 1918 Steinway. Doubles from £550; thegeorgian.com.…

Services have triumphed since Brexit… Chris Dorrell City AM Is it time to ditch the doom and gloom about Brexit? In a rare piece of good news for the Government, an in-depth study has suggested that the UK’s services economy “has been more resilient than almost all other advanced economies” since the vote to leave the EU, says Chris Dorrell. Exports of services have increased by nearly 29% since February 2020, according to UK in a Changing Europe (hardly a eurosceptic think-tank), with “business services” powering the way. The boom has been driven by accountancy, management consultancy and legal services, which unlike finance are “less reliant on EU membership” and generally less regulated than financial services, so Brexit has imposed fewer barriers. Still, better news on services merely highlights the…

Who’s tipping what The week’s best shares Auto Trader Group The Times The online car marketplace’s “largely fixed” cost-base has helped it scale profits quickly – the core business has margins north of 70%. Not cheap, but “high quality” – with sales up 14% and “promising avenues” for growth. Buy. 825p. International Consolidated Airlines Group The Daily Telegraph The BA owner’s Q1 profits have jumped to €68m (from €9m last year), thanks to recovering global travel, and debt is down. Should benefit from falling inflation and rate cuts. “Dirt-cheap.” Buy. 173.7p. JP Morgan Global Growth and Income The Times This “well-established” investment trust aims to beat global market benchmarks and has, so far, delivered. Holdings include Microsoft, Amazon and Nvidia. Trades at a “modest premium”. Yields a prospective 3.4%. Buy.…