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https://www.theguardian.com/science/life-and-physics/2014/sep/15/five-sigma-statistics-bayes-particle-physics

Science

2014-09-15T11:52:13.000Z

Jon Butterworth

Five sigma and all that | Jon Butterworth | Life & Physics

Even when I’m close to overwhelmed with other work, I try to check the arxiv once a day, to scan through the hot new releases in high energy physics experiment and phenomenology. It’s fun, seeing what people are doing, and usually stress-free (unless I’m working on a paper myself that I am anxious might be scooped). I even do it on holiday sometimes, though this is “discouraged” by my family. The notes released this way are mostly new research paper, simultaneously submitted to journals for review, or write-ups of talks at various conferences. Many conference write-ups are pretty pointless rehashes of existing papers and known results, and they often appear so long after the conference in question that even if the talk itself contained exciting new physics, the results will be well-known by the time the proceedings emerge. Every now and then though, there’s a valuable exception, when someone who is an expert in a particular area of science takes the opportunity to collect their overall impression of the state-of-play. These contributions can take the form of entertaining rants, didactic treatises or high-minded visions, and for my taste (in contrast to a real scientific paper), the more colour and personality exhibited, the better. Louis Lyons, a world expert in the application of statistical science to particle physics, produced one of these last week. It’s a very economical (six pages) skip through a series of issues which have taken up far too many hours of discussion time within and between big particle physics collaborations, and it is full of choice quotes. Amongst the issues he zips through is the interpretation of “p-values”. These are a way of quantifying the probability that a given observation is consistent with a given hypothesis. There is a tempting confusion to invert these; for instance if a p-value says “the probability of these data arising, given that the Standard Model of particle physics is correct, is very small”, that’s fair enough, but that is absolutely not the same thing as saying “given these data, the probability of the Standard Model being correct is very small”. I tried to describe this issue in this article about medical screening. Louis’ article also goes for a medical analogy: If anyone still believes that P(A|B) = P(B|A) [probability of A given B = probability of B given A], remind them that the probability of being pregnant, given that the person is female, is ∼3%, while the probability of being female, given that they are pregnant, is considerably larger. Another of Lyons’ themes in the article is to address the rather arbitrary “five sigma” (5σ) significance traditionally required by particle physicists to claim a discovery of a new particle or some other new effect. This was the threshold passed by the Higgs boson on 4 July 2012, and so while it has always been a big deal within the field of particle physics, it is now a bit more widely known. It corresponds to about a one-in-2million chance that your result is just noise*, which seems a bit excessive and sometimes makes statisticians snigger. The justification for this value is a nice mixture of pragmatism and rigour. The first reason given is History: There are many cases of 3σ and 4σ effects that have disappeared with more data. True, that. Another reason is the so-called ‘Look elsewhere effect’, which is a rather fuzzy way of trying to account for the fact that if you make many measurements, there are likely to be some outliers - likely to be some unlikely events, as it were. This has the unwelcome effect of introducing some kind of need for judgement, with more than a whiff of subjectivity, since someone has to decide what is the “elsewhere” that has been studied. Is it a range mass values in some distribution? Or is it all particle physics experiments ever that might have shown up a weird result? Or is it all experiments ever, whatever the field? Sometimes the answer seems obvious, other not so. The third reason is that it is an attempt to stay well clear of the difficult-to-quantify impact of systematic uncertainties. See here for some discussion of those. The final reason comes back to the p-value business above, via Bayes’ theorem, of which more in a future post. Lyons says that 5σ incorporates what he calls a ‘Subconscious Bayes factor’, or alternatively an attempt to quantify the statement that ‘Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.’ I confess that in my early in my career as a physicist I was rather cynical about sophisticated statistical tools, being of the opinion that “if any of this makes a difference, just get more data”. That is, if you do enough experiments, the confidence level will be so high that the exact statistical treatment you use to evaluate it is irrelevant. This is probably why I never paid enough attention to Louis’ lecture course that I sat through when I was a research student. That is a fair enough standpoint if you have the luxury of unlimited data. However, in a race (for example the race between the Tevatron, ATLAS and CMS to find out whether the Higgs Boson existed), a better statistical treatment can give you the edge over your rivals. In other circumstances, more data may not be easily available and guidance might be urgently needed. In particle physics scenarios with incomplete or inconclusive data, the balance of probabilities will influence the direction of major experimental (and theoretical, though they are cheaper) efforts, and so understanding the available statistical treatments is well worth the investment. Outside of physics, the decisions being made could have more direct impact; medical diagnoses or political policies could hang in the balance. In these cases, there’s a need to be clear-eyed about the limitations and advantages of the statistical treatment, wonder what is the “elsewhere” you are looking at, and accept that your level of certainty may never feasibly be 5σ. In fact, if the claims being made aren’t extraordinary, one-in-2million may indeed be overkill, as well being unobtainable. And you have to factor in the consequences of acting, or failing to act, based on the best evidence available - evidence that should include a good statistical treatment of the data. * meaning, a one in two-million chance that the data would be like this assuming the null hypothesis (in this case, no Higgs boson). Or, even more precisely, this. I realise I fell into the the very trap I was trying to describe... Jon Butterworth’s book, Smashing Physics, is out now. Some interesting events where you might be able to hear him talk about it etc are listed here. Also, Twitter.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2012/mar/16/joy-of-six-managers-in-europe

Sport

2012-03-16T11:31:00.000Z

Scott Murray

Joy of Six: British and Irish managers in Europe | Scott Murray

1) George Raynor (Sweden) The greatest English manager ever to grace the international stage? Sir Alf Ramsey, without question. There's no point in iconoclasm for its own sake, and there's no arguing with the Jules Rimet Trophy. Even so, a legitimate case could be made for George Raynor, who arguably – using a wholly unscientific totting-up procedure – had a record of achievement that equalled Sir Alf's, and maybe even surpassed it. As manager of Sweden, Raynor won the gold medal at the 1948 Olympic Games; led a side idiotically depleted by its own FA to the final pool of the 1950 World Cup; became the first tactician to figure out how to stop Hungary's golden team in 1953; and inspired the Swedes to the final of the 1958 World Cup where, if only for five magical minutes, they threatened to upset the famous Brazil of Vava, Pelé and Garrincha. Raynor, born near Barnsley in 1907, was a nondescript lower-league player of the 1930s who ended up teaching PE in Baghdad during the second world war. Having put together and coached an Iraqi representative side, he came to the attention of the Swedish FA, who offered him the chance of coaching their national team. Raynor – whose only other option was Aldershot reserves – did not hang about. He found a squad of players willing to entertain new ideas. "They are a very studious people and they analysed everything," he observed. "For instance, you could say 'get some bloody running done', and an English team would run. But the Swedes wanted to know where they should run." Well ahead of the curve, Raynor's Swedes played 4-2-4 and 4-3-3, depending on opposition. "We pulled both wingers back into the middle of the park, and nobody could fathom it." With a team blessed with the Gre-No-Li trio of Gunnar Gren, Gunnar Nordahl and Nils Liedholm, Sweden won gold at the 1948 Olympics. Sweden would surely have been the equals of the famous Hungarian side of the early 1950s, but the Swedish FA had other ideas, insisting the team remain fully amateur, staffed only with home-based players. That meant no Gre-No-Li at the 1950 World Cup – they'd been snapped up by Milan – but even then, Raynor managed to lead the Swedes to the final pool, beating Italy along the way and thus becoming the first team to beat a World Cup holder in the tournament's history. The Swedish players were rewarded, almost to a man, with full-time contracts with Italian clubs. The Swedish FA's pathetic policy scuppered Raynor's efforts at the 1952 Olympics, though Sweden did win bronze. The side then drew 2-2 with new gold medallists Hungary in November 1953, Raynor having worked out that neutralising Nandor Hidegkuti was the key. He famously relayed this discovery to England, due to face the Hungarians later that month, only to be ignored. Oh, England! Raynor then had spells at Juventus and Lazio, then Coventry City, but assorted levels of boardroom nonsense put paid to all those gigs. He went back to Sweden, and his greatest hour, with the hosts of the 1958 World Cup – now containing the professional but slightly over-the-hill Gren and Liedholm. Raynor had done what Ramsey would do eight years later, insisting before the tournament that his side could reach the final, and possibly win the cup. Unlike Ramsey, he couldn't quite pull it off: Sweden did the first, reaching the final against Brazil, but couldn't manage the victory, though on the morning of the final, Danny Blanchflower observed that "it is reasonably accepted by the experts that the two best teams have won through". "The Swedish team," reported Blanchflower's colleague at the Observer, HA Pawson, "for all its individual ability, has undoubtedly been helped by Raynor's leadership. His instructions to players are simple and direct, and even at press conferences, where others are non-committal or evasive, he is frank and clear. He talks of his team as a slow side who rely on the ball to do the running. This is certainly true of Gren and Liedholm, the insides who build the attack, but there is speed where it matters most in defence and the whole team is quick and intelligent in its reactions." Raynor went back to England, expecting work. "George Raynor, the finest coach in the world, requires a job", ran one newspaper headline. He was offered £10 a week to run Skegness Town (who he played for aged 57). "Everywhere I went in Britain, I found a blank wall. No one wanted to risk trying new ideas." There would be one last World Cup campaign with Sweden, his team blowing qualification for the 1962 finals, and a last hurrah at Doncaster Rovers. But he was happy enough. "I haven't made a lot of money out of the game, but I've looked after it," he said. "Bought this place [a bungalow near Doncaster racecourse] out of my savings, and I can buy a new car when I want. Don't smoke or drink, you see." 2) Vic Buckingham (Ajax, Barcelona) During the course of the 1953-54 season, Hungary ripped England 13 new ones. But someone at home was paying attention. Vic Buckingham's coaching ideas had been given their first national airing when he took Pegasus to the 1951 FA Amateur Cup final. "Don't worry about who was meant to have marked whom," he said, "but just remember that if you are the nearest player then you go for the opponent with the ball. Whether you are playing well or badly, all of you must want the ball and look for it." All very Total Football, and three years later his pretty West Bromwich Albion side was walking it like he'd been talking it. They came within a hair's breadth of becoming the first team in the 20th century to win the double, playing some classy pass-and-move stuff, with short, accurate passing the watchword. "The basis of Albion's style – and for that matter of Hungary's – is simply the business of keeping possession of the ball," noted the Observer. "This demands accuracy in passing, and such accuracy demands in turn reasonably short passes that seldom rise much above the ground ... every man, from the goalkeeper forward, is expected to find a team-mate when he makes a pass. Seldom does the man in possession hold the ball for long ... his team-mates are always moving into position for a pass." Ray Barlow (who died this week) and Jimmy Dudley attacked down the wings from deep. Up front, Ronnie Allen popped up all over the place with his powerful shot, Johnny Nicholls the poacher. By March, the pair had scored 55 goals between them. But injuries scuppered their league chances and they finished second, behind the more prosaic Wolverhampton Wanderers of Stan Cullis, though purists will be pleased that they did win the FA Cup (albeit at the expense of Tom Finney). Buckingham moved to Ajax, where he won the league in 1960 with another attack-minded side. "They played proper football, but they didn't get this from me," he modestly said, with a nod to the technical work of his compatriot and predecessor at Ajax, Jack Reynolds. "It was waiting to be stirred up, it was just a case of telling them to keep more possession." Buckingham also had modern ideas regarding fitness, booking in his players for weight training with the Olympic weightlifter Bill Watson, and adding two days of afternoon training to the five-morning schedule. Buckingham moved to Sheffield Wednesday in 1961, a club showing questionable ambition, before moving back to Ajax three years later. He didn't enjoy the same levels of success second time around, though he did blood Johan Cruyff in the first team; Rinus Michels benefited from the foundations he laid. In 1970, after an uninspired period at Fulham, Vic was given the coach's job at Barcelona. It was a short but eventful stay, during which his side, in his one full season of 1970-71, came second in the league behind Valencia and won the Spanish Cup. He also ensured Barça retained their dignity during the infamous Guruceta match in the 1969-70 Spanish Cup, when he persuaded his players, who had walked off the Camp Nou pitch after a dubious penalty was awarded to Real Madrid, to play on. (This is not to say the tweed-coated English gent always acted impeccably; one pre-match team-talk consisted of "Fuck Betis!" and a karate kick that laid waste the tactics blackboard. Roy Keane would have been proud.) Buckingham also lobbied hard to get the ban on foreign players lifted by the Spanish FA. To this end, he negotiated a first refusal with Ajax on Cruyff should the ban end. Again, Michels would reap the dividend of some fine preparatory work by arguably – arguably – the unsung father of modern Ajax and Barça. 3) Jimmy Hogan (MTK) The English FA really did make a show of themselves that November day against Hungary in 1953. That they had refused to listen to George Raynor's advice re: Hidegkuti was hardly a surprise; a 71-year old man sitting in the stands was testament to their institutionalised small-minded arrogance and myopia. Jimmy Hogan was in the cheap seats with the Aston Villa kids he was coaching, though really he should have been a VIP. The Hungarians certainly wanted to roll out the red carpet for him. "As the match was staged by the FA, we felt we could not invite him ourselves," explained Alexander Barcs, president of the Hungarian FA, after his team had skelped the hosts 6-3. "I would like to say that Hungary will invite Jimmy Hogan to come to Budapest next May when we meet England again, and then we will honour him." Hogan would have to wait for his fancy tickets, but a tribute that would ring down the ages was not so long in coming. "Jimmy Hogan taught us what we know of the best British football," added Barcs. "He came to us in the first place nearly 30 years ago and you can see how we have learned his lessons. If I may say so, England could with advantage take to themselves some of the hints which Mr Hogan gave us. We are grateful to him and for his influence on our game." Hogan's managerial career began in Holland, though it really took off when he moved to central Europe. His plans to help Hugo Meisl coach Austria at the 1916 Olympics were kiboshed by the war, the outbreak of which caused him to be flung in the jug. He was extricated from that scrape by the British vice-president of MTK in Budapest, a club he helped to titles in 1917 and 1918 before heading back home – and being branded a traitor by the mandarins of the FA for his absence during the war. Hogan was soon back in Europe, where ideas were appreciated, working in Switzerland, Hungary again, and Germany, influencing a young Helmut Schön while at SC Dresden. Eventually he ended up back with Meisl in Austria, coaching the Wunderteam at the height of their powers in the early 1930s. In 1934, Hogan took over at Fulham, who treated him abysmally, sacking him after 31 games. The senior players, it transpired, had decided they didn't need any technical coaching. Fulham, needless to say, won bugger all in the wake of his dismissal. Hogan went back to Austria, helping them to the 1936 Olympic final, then took over at Aston Villa, in a state after suffering relegation for the first time. Hogan won the Second Division championship, and took the team to the semi-finals of the FA Cup. After the war, as well as teaching the kids at Villa, Hogan spent some time at Celtic as coach. Tommy Docherty, just starting out in the game when Hogan was there, once explained the old man's methods with a lyrical simplicity: "He used to say it was like a Viennese waltz, a rhapsody. One, two, three. One, two, three. Pass, move, pass. Pass, move, pass. We sat there all glued, because we were so keen to learn." If only the Doc had been in charge of the FA, eh? 4) Patrick O'Connell (Real Betis, Barcelona) Seeing as we're talking about different countries, the past was one. It was a place where players of Manchester United and Liverpool got on with each other, for a start. In April 1915, a few of them met up in a pub before a crucial league fixture – United were in relegation bother – and decided to fix the score of the upcoming game. They decided on 2-0 to United, and lumped on. The result? Need you ask? Though it would have been 3-0, had the United defender Patrick O'Connell not hoicked a risible penalty "yards wide" (source: your super soaraway Manchester Guardian) of the goal. O'Connell was implicated in the resulting scandal, but avoided charges, unlike some of his saucy pals from both teams, who were slammer bound. The war, more so than the scandal, did for O'Connell's United career. His slapstick spot-kick shenanigans would have given him a footnote in history, but O'Connell wanted more than that. Perhaps in the spirit of adventure, or more probably in an attempt to escape an Ireland about to plunge into civil war, he left his homeland in 1922 for Spain. Out of the frying pan, and all that. O'Connell quickly became a managerial success in Spain, taking over at Racing Santander from Fred Pentland, an Englishman off to become a legend at Athletic Bilbao. Like Pentland, O'Connell married the local Spanish dribbling skills to an organised defence, a heady mix in the early days of the game in Spain. He took Racing into the top flight, before flitting off to Real Oviedo, and then Real Betis. O'Connell led Betis into the Primera Division in 1932, and to the title three years later. Some habits die hard, though, and before the crucial final game with his old club in Santander, he popped by for a drink, and suggested Racing throw the game. Luckily for O'Connell, there would be no scandal this time, as his former team simply weren't interested: they'd been offered a large cash prize by their own president, who happened to support the only other team who could pip Betis to the title: Real Madrid. Betis won 5-0 anyway; it remains their only title. Barcelona's interest was piqued, and the title-winning manager was enticed to Camp Nou. There were no La Liga titles for O'Connell at Barça – but then there was no La Liga to compete for, the Spanish Civil War causing its suspension. Mediterranean and Catalan league titles would have to suffice – but O'Connell's greatest act was to take the cash-strapped club away on tour to Mexico and the USA in the summer of 1937. The series of friendlies helped to spread the Republican word, took the players out of Franco's firing line, and raised enough funds to guarantee Barça's future. Only four from a squad of 16 returned to Spain with O'Connell, staying on in the Americas or heading off to France, but the club was widely regarded to have been saved by some very astute management. Winning Betis's sole league title? Saving one of the largest clubs in the world during a time of political and social tumult? You'd have thought that would ensure O'Connell's exalted place in history. But no. The man died in the grip of booze-addled penury in London in 1959, and is nowadays considered a footnote at best in Barça's story. There is a statue of him in Seville – but not at Betis's Benito Villamarin stadium. It's effectively in the middle of nowhere. 5) Willy Garbutt (Genoa) The daddy of organised football in Italy? He couldn't have any other name: James Richardson Spensley. Less AC Jimbo and more Jimbo CFC, Spensley was a British surgeon, and sometime Italian correspondent of the Daily Mail, who opened the footballing wing of Genoa Cricket and Athletics Club (now Genoa Cricket and Football Club). He became Genoa's first manager, organising the first scudetto – an all-in-one-day affair in 1898 – and leading his team to victory from his position as goalkeeper. But while it's difficult to have a greater influence on a club than the bloke who founded it, William Garbutt manages it. Garbutt had played for Reading, Arsenal and Blackburn Rovers, and was spotted turning out for the latter by future Italian World Cup winning coach Vittorio Pozzo. Exactly how the 29-year-old Garbutt ended up taking charge at Genoa in 1912 is not known – the smart and obvious money is on a Pozzo recommendation – but take charge he did, becoming the first professional manager in Italy. Garbutt wasted no time in introducing cutting-edge English techniques, such as structured warm-ups, dribbling drills, hot showers in the dressing rooms, and the waving of brown envelopes stuffed with cash under the noses of transfer targets. Genoa won six national titles from 1898 to 1904, but had subsequently struggled. Garbutt soon had them winning again. They won the northern championship in 1913 and then, when north-and-south play-offs were reintroduced after the war, back-to-back scudettos in 1923 and 1924. Garbutt's side should have won another title in 1925, but they were diddled out of it by the fascists, who had recently taken power. In the northern final, against Bologna in Milan, events were manipulated by the Bolognese fascist leader, Leandro Arpinati. With Bologna 2-0 down, Arpinati's blackshirts invaded the pitch. The flustered referee gave in to claims that a goal had been pulled back. Bologna went on to "equalise", and after two replays, the second staged behind closed doors at seven in the morning, Genoa were defeated 2-0. Bologna went on to win the scudetto match 6-0, claiming a title that had surely been Garbutt's. That 1925 championship has since become known as The Great Theft, and gained extra poignancy in 1958, when teams were first allowed to wear a golden star in honour of every 10 titles they had won. To this day – and with no little thanks to Arpinati – Genoa are stuck on nine scudettos, one short of a golden star. 6) Terry Venables (Barcelona) We end where we began, with one of the greatest English managers to grace the international stage. There's not too many, after all, who have taken a team to the semi-final stage of a major tournament, as Terry Venables did at Euro 96. Unlike the aforementioned Ramsey and Raynor, however, Venables also got his chops up on the club scene. We have to head back to Spain, and to Barcelona, but we make no apologies for that. Venables is worth a mention because, like so many of our heroes up-page, he's something of a forgotten figure in Barcelona now. His side's comically inept performance in the 1986 European Cup final – when Barça hoped to end 30 years of hurt, finally winning a trophy their arch rivals had snaffled six times, but put in a disjointed performance against Steaua Bucharest before missing every one of their penalties in the resulting shoot-out – has obliterated all that went before it. And there's no questioning that, up until that fateful day in Seville, Venables had done a pretty good job. Upon joining from QPR in 1984, he had started shakily: selling Diego Maradona, turning down the chance to sign Hugo Sanchez, and buying Steve Archibald as a replacement. But he bought time with sceptical fans by genuinely attempting to converse with them in Catalan, and then won 3-0 at Real Madrid, Archibald scoring once and being involved in the other two. Archibald went on to score 16 goals. Barça walked the league, their first title in 11 years, and the only success not to involve Johan Cruyff in some capacity between 1960 and 1998. It was all downhill from there. Real Madrid, fuelled by the goals of Sanchez, won the first of five titles in a row in 1985-86. Barça's star player, Bernd Schuster, walked out of the stadium after being substituted during the 1986 European Cup final debacle. El Tel had a chance to leave for Milan in the summer of 1986, Nils Liedholm having fallen out with Silvio Berlusconi, but stayed on. The signature signings of Gary Lineker and Mark Hughes didn't take. Dundee United beat them home and away in the Uefa Cup. By September 1987, Venables was gone. But it had been some ride. Just don't mention Crystal Palace, Portsmouth, Leeds or Australia. Many thanks to Sid Lowe and Ger Gilroy.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2023/mar/03/anthony-watson-try-england-six-nations

Sport

2023-03-03T22:00:06.000Z

Gerard Meagher

Anthony Watson hails power of visualisation in England return

Anthony Watson’s try for England against Wales last week came with a sense of deja vu. An obvious feeling of cathartic release, too, after spending so long out with injury, but underlying it all, a familiarity. For Watson had scored the try before, diving into the left-hand corner and dotting the ball down with his right hand. In fact, he had done so only days earlier during one of his visualisation blocks – a preparation method the 29-year-old winger swears by. “I don’t really judge my quality of games by tries but to be able to score in the corner was nice and something I had spent a lot of the week visualising,” he says. “That is how I try to calm myself down before games. It is weird how it happened exactly how I had pictured it. Literally in that corner, because I was playing on the left wing and it was finishing with the ball in my right hand in that kind of style.” Watson has been using visualisation techniques – as both a way to prepare for matches and cope with long-term injuries – for years. It started from his work with the renowned mind coach Don Macpherson and he does it a handful of times, 20 minutes on each occasion, in the buildup to a game. Jack Willis leaves England camp over Toulouse injury crisis Read more An NFL fan, Watson chuckles when it is put to him how the Green Bay quarterback Aaron Rodgers recently spent four days in a darkness retreat – “I don’t think I’m ready for that” – but techniques such as those he does use are increasingly commonplace in sport. Wayne Rooney used to talk about having a “memory” before the game and would seek out the kit man to find out what colour he would be wearing to enhance the process, and Watson believes it is of increasing importance in rugby. “It has happened a few times when I have scored,” he says. “The power of visualisation is so important. I have scored tries and it has ended up exactly how I had it in my head. It starts off with just what it would look like from a bird’s eye view and then what it would feel like for me. It all starts with my work with Don Macpherson, that stuff puts me in good stead for what lies ahead and it just calms me. That is the only time I think about the game, in those periods of visualisation. It gives me blocks, periods of allowing myself to focus on what I need to then letting it go. Anthony Watson trains with England in Brighton during the second fallow week of the Six Nations. Photograph: Steve Bardens/Getty Images “It is common now. There is a greater respect for the power of mental techniques to prepare for games. Everyone is different, what will be useful for some people and completely useless for others. I just found it really helpful in terms of blocking out periods to think about the game, and it allows me to be chilled out and do whatever I want to do outside that. More and more people are finding techniques that work for them, as opposed to trying to rev up to 100 five minutes before a game. “There is value in athletes just connecting back to themselves, but things move at a million miles an hour in sport and unfortunately you can get caught up in what [the media] writes, both positive and negative. I think that sometimes it’s important to step away from that entirely and remember who you are, not what people think you are.” Sign up to The Breakdown Free weekly newsletter The latest rugby union news and analysis, plus all the week's action reviewed Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Watson was making his first England start for almost two years against Wales having suffered a debilitating ACL injury in October 2021 before niggling calf, hamstring and quad problems struck at the wrong time as far as international windows were concerned. The road to recovery has been difficult but visualisation has helped along the way. “It’s something that I have done a bit with long-term injuries,” he says. “More to calm me down when thoughts start spiralling, that’s when I try to go back to that kind of stuff and come back to a more relaxed mindset. Sometimes it’ll be just to calm myself down, for sure. But most of the time it’s scheduled, I’ll know if I need to do it this evening or tomorrow evening. It’s on my own. If you saw me doing it you would probably think I look crazy!” With England enjoying a training camp in Brighton during the second fallow week of the Six Nations the focus has been on continuing Steve Borthwick’s rebuild before attentions turn to France’s visit to Twickenham when they reconvene in Bagshot on Monday. So what does Watson have planned for next Saturday? He laughs and insists the script has not been finalised, but France should be wary of a player finally fit again and reaping the rewards of seeing things differently.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/jan/22/oscars-2016-charlotte-rampling-diversity-row-racist-to-white-people

Film

2016-01-22T12:19:33.000Z

Ben Child

Oscars 2016: Charlotte Rampling says diversity row is 'racist to white people'

Ignore Rampling and Caine. It's industry inertia that minorities need to fear Ashley Clark Read more Oscar nominee Charlotte Rampling has claimed the current campaign to boycott the 2016 Academy Awards over claims of a diversity deficit is racist to white people. Rampling, 69, is up for the best actress prize for her role in the British drama 45 Years, from director Andrew Haigh, where she will compete against Room’s Brie Larson, Carol’s Cate Blanchett, Joy’s Jennifer Lawrence and Brooklyn’s Saoirse Ronan. Asked for her take on the current furore over all-white lists of nominees on French Radio network Europe 1 on Friday morning, the British actor did not mince her words. “It is racist to whites,” she said. “One can never really know, but perhaps the black actors did not deserve to make the final list,” added Rampling. Asked if the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences should introduce quotas, a proposal which no current advocate of increased diversity has mooted, she responded: “Why classify people? These days everyone is more or less accepted ... People will always say: ‘Him, he’s less handsome’; ‘Him, he’s too black’; ‘He is too white’ ... someone will always be saying ‘You are too’ [this or that] ... But do we have to take from this that there should be lots of minorities everywhere?” When the interviewer explains that black members of the film industry feel like a minority, Rampling replies: “No comment.” An interview with Rampling about 45 Years, for which she is Oscar nominated Guardian Rampling’s stance on diversity stands in stark contrast to the position taken by a number of her fellow nominees. After last week’s announcement of an all-white list of Oscar nominees in acting categories for the second year running, both Larson and Mark Ruffalo, who is up for best supporting actor, spoke out on Thursday in support of efforts to improve opportunities for actors from black and ethnic minority communities in the film industry. Former Oscar winners and nominees such as George Clooney, Viola Davis, Reese Witherspoon and Whoopi Goldberg have also backed calls for change. Matt Mueller, editor of film industry trade magazine Screen International, said Rampling’s comments were unlikely to help her Oscars cause in the current environment. “Charlotte is the rank outsider in this category so I don’t think her Oscar chances were all that strong even before the French radio interview,” he said. “But certainly these comments aren’t going to help her cause. They will not go down well with American Oscar voters at all.” Others concurred. THE BIG SHORT is the story of a group of free-thinking outsiders who made millions by betting against Charlotte Rampling winning an Oscar. — Matt Singer (@mattsinger) January 22, 2016 I guess Charlotte Rampling really wants Brie Larson to win as much as I do. — Damon (@houx) January 22, 2016 The response to Rampling’s comment on social media was swift. “MISSING: a set of marbles,” wrote the journalist and commentator Piers Morgan on Twitter. “If found, please return to Charlotte Rampling.” MISSING: a set of marbles. If found, please return to Charlotte Rampling. https://t.co/71O6fd8gxl — Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) January 22, 2016 Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science president Cheryl Boone Isaacs has vowed to address the diversity issue, with the New York Times reporting that changes to the number of nominees in some categories and moves to prune older, less active voters could soon be brought in. Meanwhile, Jada Pinkett Smith, her husband Will Smith and the Oscar-winning director Spike Lee have all said they will not be attending next month’s ceremony in protest at the recurrence of an all-white list of acting nominees. Charlotte Rampling: I regret that Oscars racism comment was 'misinterpreted' Read more Rampling, who began her career as a model in the swinging sixties before being discovered and cast in the 1966 drama Georgy Girl starring Lynn Redgrave, is known for her leading turns in Woody Allen’s Stardust Memories, Sidney Lumet’s The Verdict and Liliana Cavana’s The Night Porter. She has been nominated for France’s highest film awards, the Cesars, four times, twice for director François Ozon, in 2000 bereavement drama Under the Sand and 2003 erotic thriller The Swimming Pool - but has never before reached the final stage of the Oscars race. Mark Ruffalo says the US is rife with ‘white privilege racism’ Guardian 45 Years, in which Rampling stars opposite the Oscar-nominated English actor Tom Courtenay, is the tale of a retired couple whose life together appears transformed forever when the husband is told by the Swiss authorities that the body of his long-lost girlfriend has been found, five decades after she slipped into an alpine crevasse. The film, hailed as a compelling drama of lost love and missed opportunity, won both actors Silver Bears at the 2015 Berlin film festival and remains in the running for the outstanding British film prize at next month’s Baftas. The Oscars graciously recognised Crash and Halle Berry. Is that not enough? Read more Speaking on the Today Show on Radio 4 on Friday, Rampling’s fellow sixties icon Michael Caine advised black actors to “be patient”, and said it had taken him “years to get an Oscar, years.” Added Caine, 82: “There’s loads of black actors. In the end you can’t vote for an actor because he’s black. You can’t say ‘I’m going to vote for him, he’s not very good, but he’s black, I’ll vote for him’,” said the star of The Italian Job and Get Carter. He continued: “You have to give a good performance and I’m sure people have. I saw Idris Elba [in Beasts Of No Nation] ... I thought he was wonderful.” Will Smith on Oscars boycott: ‘It’s going the wrong direction’ Guardian Comment: Ignore Rampling and Caine. It’s industry inertia that minorities need to fear

Full

https://football.theguardian.com/match-redirect/4423716

Football

2024-02-12T22:08:37.000Z

Ed Aarons

Conor Gallagher haunts Crystal Palace by salvaging late victory for Chelsea

This must have felt like a punch in the guts for Roy Hodgson. In his 200th match in charge, Crystal Palace succumbed to a 13th successive Premier League defeat by Chelsea after two goals from Conor Gallagher sealed a dramatic late comeback for Mauricio Pochettino’s side. It was the cruellest blow for a manager who has already suffered so much this season as his team have struggled with injuries and a poor run of form that now stretches to two wins in their last 14 matches. But while things will not get any easier for Hodgson as his under-pressure team prepare for a trip to Everton, a club they have not beaten in their last seven attempts and currently occupy the final relegation spot, it was a different story for Pochettino’s team as they wrapped up the points in stoppage time with a third from Enzo Fernández. That capped an unbelievable turnaround after a first half that saw Chelsea plumb new depths having failed to muster a single shot on target despite dominating the ball and conceding the opening goal to a thunderbolt from Jefferson Lerma. At least they can always rely on Gallagher – who scored eight times while on loan at Palace and now has four in six appearances against them. Hodgson had described Palace’s current predicament as “the toughest period of my career for one reason, and that is that the fans have turned so much against us”. So a series of banners being held by home supporters as the teams kicked off, one of which took aim at “weak club culture and direction”, was not exactly what he needed. The major criticism of the 76-year-old has been his unwillingness to give Palace’s young players an opportunity but on this occasion, Matheus França and Adam Wharton epitomised their fighting spirit on their full debuts that got the crowd on their side. Pochettino opted to start Cole Palmer as a false 9 with Nicolas Jackson operating down the left flank, while Gallagher was back at the ground where he enjoyed such success on loan two seasons ago. Not that it seemed to make much difference to Chelsea’s spluttering attack as neither side looked capable of raising the temperature on a chilly night in south London. Thirteen of Palace’s 26 league goals this season have been scored or created by the injured Eberechi Eze or Michael Olise but Wharton showed his ability on his first full start since joining from Blackburn with a raking ball that almost played in ­Jean-Philippe Mateta. The French forward should have done better when he robbed the ball off Axel Disasi from a Chelsea throw-in but could only direct his shot straight at Djordje Petrovic. Conor Gallagher’s stoppage-time strike gives Chelsea the lead. Photograph: Andrew Boyers/Action Images/Reuters If ever a game needed a lift then this was it and Lerma duly obliged. Tyrick Mitchell’s resilience made it all possible after a brilliant double tackle on Noni Madueke and Moisés Caicedo, although Chelsea were aggrieved that Lerma had fouled the Ecuador midfielder before hammering the ball into the net from 25 yards out. Selhurst Park erupted in a rare moment of celebration against their London rivals after a losing run that stretches back to a 2-1 win here in October 2017 courtesy of a winning goal from Wilfried Zaha. He is long gone these days of course but despite their patched-up side, it was Palace who continued to pose more of a threat as a nonplussed Pochettino watched his side create nothing. Almost 80% of possession had yielded precisely one shot – skewed wide by Gallagher – by half-time. It could have been worse for Chelsea had the referee, Michael Oliver, ruled against Thiago Silva after he appeared to shove Daniel Muñoz over inside the area. Sign up to Football Daily Free daily newsletter Kick off your evenings with the Guardian's take on the world of football Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Both sets of fans joined in with a rendition of Bob Marley’s Three Little Birds during a delay to the start of the second half due to technical issues for Oliver. It seemed to spark Chelsea’s players into life as within 90 seconds, Gallagher had slammed home Malo Gusto’s cross to equalise and suddenly everything was all right again. Sort of. With the half-time substitute Christopher Nkunku to the fore, Chelsea showed renewed attacking purpose as Palmer dragged his effort wide from another Gusto cross. Mateta saw his effort from a França through ball blocked by Silva following a late lunge from the veteran Brazilian that signalled the end of his night’s work. Petrovic had to be alert to tip França’s shot from outside the area around his post, while Palmer could not beat Dean Henderson from a tight angle after an excellent interchange with Gusto. Mateta was denied a penalty late on after going down under a challenge from Levi Colwill before Gallagher struck with his hammer blow from Palmer’s pass in the first minute of stoppage time and Fernández sent Chelsea’s jubilant fans celebrating into the night.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/05/covid-19-could-be-endemic-in-deprived-parts-of-england

World news

2020-09-05T20:00:04.000Z

Toby Helm

Covid-19 ‘could be endemic in deprived parts of England’

Covid-19 could now be endemic in some parts of the country that combine severe deprivation, poor housing and large BAME communities, according to a highly confidential analysis by Public Health England. The document, leaked to the Observer, and marked “official sensitive”, suggests the national lockdown in these parts of the north of England had little effect in reducing the level of infections, and that in such communities it is now firmly established. The analysis, prepared for local government leaders and health experts, relates specifically to the north-west, where several local lockdowns have recently been put in place following spikes in numbers. But it suggests that the lessons could be applied nationally. Based on detailed analysis of case numbers in different local areas, the study builds links between the highest concentrations of Covid-19 and issues of deprivation, poor and crowded accommodation and ethnicity. If we accept the premise that in some areas the infection is now endemic – how does this change our strategy? Public Health England study Produced in the last few weeks and containing data up to August, it states: “The overall analysis suggests Bolton, Manchester, Oldham and Rochdale never really left the epidemic phase – and that nine of the 10 boroughs [of Greater Manchester] are currently experiencing an epidemic phase.” Four of the five worst-hit areas are all currently in the north-west. Bolton had 98.1 cases per 100,000 people last week, with 56.8 in Blackburn and Darwen, 53.6 in Oldham and 46.7 in Salford. The other area is Bradford with 63.2. Milton Keynes, by comparison, had 5.9 per 100,000, and it was 5.2 in Kent and 3.2 in Southampton. Comparing other English regions, the study says: “Each region has experienced its own epidemic journey with the north peaking later and the NW [north-west], Y&H [Yorkshire and Humber] and EM [East Midlands] failing to return to a near zero Covid status even during lockdown, unlike the other regions which have been able to return to a near pre-Covid state.” It also questions, under a heading marked for “discussion”, why anyone should expect fresh local lockdowns to work in these areas now: “If we accept the premise that in some areas the infection is now endemic – how does this change our strategy? If these areas were not able to attain near zero-Covid status during full lockdown, how realistic is it that we can expect current restriction escalations to work?” The comments point to friction between Public Health England and the government over the strategy to tackle local outbreaks as a potential second wave of Covid-19 threatens. Doing something about housing conditions for someone who has an active infection cannot be handled by a call centre run by a commercial company hundreds of miles away Gabriel Scally, Bristol University Last night, Gabriel Scally, visiting professor of public health at the University of Bristol and a member of the independent Sage committee, described the findings of the leaked report as “extremely alarming” after being shown them by the Observer. “The only way forward is to build a system which provides much better, more locally tailored responses,” Scally said. “There is no integrated find, test, trace, isolate and support system at the moment. The data on housing is extraordinarily important. Overcrowded households are part of public health history. Housing conditions are so important and always have been, whether it was for cholera or tuberculosis or Covid-19. “Doing something about housing conditions for someone who has an active infection is extremely important and it is not something that can be handled by a call centre run by a commercial company hundreds of miles away.” Scally said that helping people to isolate by giving financial support was also crucial: “Taking two weeks off if you are on a zero-hours contract is not an option for people.” Matthew Ashton, director of public health at Liverpool city council, said on seeing the study: “This report shows a strong link between our most deprived areas, our BAME communities and poor housing communities, and that can lead to the virus becoming endemic. I absolutely agree with that. But I think it is also more complicated in that there are different types of outbreaks and different types of ways in which the virus could become endemic, such as opening the night-time economy and young people getting the virus asymptomatically and then passing it on.” Last night, amid continuing confusion over rules on quarantining when returning to the UK, Labour called for a “rapid review” to restore public confidence. In a letter to the home secretary, Labour is urging the government to consider introducing a “robust testing regime in airports” that could help to safely minimise the need for 14-day quarantine. How deprivation in the north has led to a health crisis Read more There have been more than 340,000 confirmed cases of coronavirus so far in the UK, and more than 40,000 people have died, according to government figures. Local lockdowns are now being implemented or relaxed across the country in response to surges. The most recent have seen Norfolk, Rossendale and Northampton added as “areas of enhanced support”, meaning the government will work with local authorities to provide additional resources – such as testing or contact tracing – to help bring infection numbers down. Improvements in Newark and Sherwood in Nottinghamshire, Slough in Berkshire and Wakefield. West Yorkshire, mean they have been removed from the watchlist. Restrictions already in place in parts of Greater Manchester, Lancashire and West Yorkshire have been eased. In Scotland, restrictions on visiting other households were reintroduced this week in Glasgow, West Dunbartonshire and East Renfrewshire. This article was amended on 6 September 2020 to clarify that only four of the five worst-hit areas are in the north-west of England. The fifth, Bradford, is in West Yorkshire. An error during editing meant an earlier version of the article listed all five as being in the north-west.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/may/30/dear-mariella-frostrup-i-cant-find-a-partner-how-can-i-learn-to-love-my-single-life

Life and style

2021-05-30T05:00:45.000Z

Mariella Frostrup

I can’t find a partner. How can I learn to love my single life?

The dilemma I am a 48-year-old single woman with a full and independent life. I’m close to my family and have a 15-year-old daughter. I have a good group of friends and several hobbies. I’ve had struggles with mental health in the past, but am doing better now than ever. I’d also love to be in a relationship, but it’s something I’m just not able to find success in. I’ve had relationships, but I’ve spent the majority of my time single. I’ve been online dating for many years, but it seems to bring out the absolute worst in men. It’s such a cliché, but it seems that everyone is married and there are no parties or natural social occasions (including before Covid) that allow for meeting someone in a natural way. I have reached the point where it all feels hopeless and I want to explore ways of feeling happier single, to quell this desire to find a mate. My daughter is the most wonderful thing to have happened to me but, growing up, it was a relationship I thought about and desired more than motherhood. I’d like to want that less, to spend less time thinking about it, to be happier with my lot and accept that I may live out my days single. Is it possible to achieve something like this? To dial down my desire to find a partner and find a better life as a result? Mariella replies Most definitely. In fact, your letter pushed me off on a meander down memory lane. I sometimes find myself describing my 20s and 30s as my “single” years and yet there were plenty of romances and even co-habitations through those adventuring decades. Saying I was single during years that were full of relationship opportunities, some short-lived, some elongated far past their ability to withstand my expectations, now seems a programmed response to the myth we are sold from birth of stars colliding and violins serenading, followed by a lifetime of perfect partnership. In our unreconstructed romantic narratives, a few false starts in youth can be tolerated, but after that the idea of a long, straight road through long-term commitment, parenting, retirement and maybe gardening together until death us do part is the convention that remains. Yet does that really reflect the relationship experience of anyone under 60 today? There is no blueprint and certainly no such thing as normal when it comes to 21st-century coupling Many of us may have at least one marriage or long-term co-habitation under our belt, plenty more will be embarking on a second such “committed future” by midlife, and some will have chosen a path free of the constraints of monogamy. My point is that there is no blueprint and certainly no such thing as normal when it comes to 21st-century coupling. I’ve started to think differently about my “wasted decades”. Far from being a period of relationship failure, those years were brim-full of romantic richness, when I dated people who have become part of my extended family. Rather than being ill-fated those years were a period of experimentation and learning. I tell you because I see you doing the same thing, at a different stage in life, treating this period of self-reliance as though you’re in a holding pattern where “escape” means finding a mate. Yet look at the life you have. Yours is a rich existence: good friends, close family, hobbies, a career and a teenage daughter. So how about you delete the dating apps, stop considering a new mate as an outstanding bucket-list ambition and revel in the life you have now? There’s no question you will stumble on your next partner at a bus stop, or in a bar, at a dinner party or on a walking weekend. That another mate will come along is a given, but how you spend the intervening time, whether it’s weeks, months or even years is far more important. Finding fulfilment in our own company and contentment in our own lives is the greatest investment we can bring to our romantic liaisons. Lessening the expectation of any union makes it all the easier to forge something valuable and enriching when the time comes. We’re raised as aspirant monogamists; coupling up is what our species is programmed to do. That doesn’t mean we have to live like swans, mating for life. It can be hard to take a step back from harsh judgment and look at our lives with a degree of perspective. You’re in that place now, buried under the burden of your expectations. In my 39th year, having failed to find a father for my hoped-for children, I decided to take advantage of what I did have, which was independence and solvency. For 12 months I forgot entirely about dating and instead sought stimulation elsewhere, a sabbatical in Brazil, an acting stint in The Vagina Monologues and a trek in Nepal. It was in those foothills that I met the man with whom I now have two kids. I am grateful to this day for my decision to stop seeking more and enjoy what I had. By default, it brought me everything I had secretly hoped for. Thanks for reminding me! And I hope that you find similar satisfaction. If you have a dilemma, send a brief email to mariella.frostrup@observer.co.uk. Follow her on Twitter @mariellaf1

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2016/nov/06/ivo-van-hove-i-give-it-all-like-bowie-gave-it-all-in-a-masked-way-lazarus-interview

Stage

2016-11-06T08:00:11.000Z

Kate Kellaway

Ivo van Hove: ‘I give it all as Bowie gave it all – in a masked way’

Ivo van Hove is everywhere: his production of Lazarus – David Bowie’s swansong musical, which in New York sold out within hours of tickets being available at the box office, has arrived in London. Van Hove’s production of Hedda Gabler, starring Ruth Wilson, is to be a highlight of the National Theatre’s new season. He is bringing several pieces to the Barbican with his theatre company, Toneelgroep Amsterdam, including a double bill based on Ingmar Bergman films, a reprise of his Roman Tragedies and an adaptation of Visconti’s film Obsession which will star Jude Law. Multitasking must be second nature, I think, as I catch sight of him, striding into London’s Jerwood Space, in perfect time for our meeting. Bowie was a very quiet man. A real English gentleman, a serious artist… He never used his power, he was collaborative Dressed in a navy, double-breasted overcoat, Van Hove is, at 58, tall, lean and clean-shaven with a non-experimental look. Ask the unenlightened to imagine what his career might be and no one would guess avant-garde theatre director. He could pass as the lawyer he once intended to become. Born in Heist-op-den-Berg, in rural Belgium, he now lives in Amsterdam. His company travels the world and his productions excite rave notices, occasional dissenters, strong opinions. All his shows – including Juliet Binoche’s Antigone, Scenes from a Marriage, A View from the Bridge (for which he won an Olivier for best director) – are designed by his partner (in life and work) of more than 30 years, Jan Versweyveld. They share a daring, immaculate, less-is-more style: subtraction is their way of laying drama bare. Sometimes literally – their legendary 1998 Streetcar involved full-frontal nudity and was organised around a claw-footed bathtub. Michael C Hall performs David Bowie's Lazarus – video Read more Van Hove’s decision about where we are to sit in the empty cafe is swift. An unimportant decision yet there is no mistaking the reflexes of an autocrat – he is every inch a director. Accompanying this impression, I have a suspicion that he expects, at any moment, to be irritated. When answering questions, he has a long-suffering air, as if one were about to throw dust in his eyes or otherwise impede the progress of his day. He is at his most likable when he hesitates, seeming to dig deeper, as if waiting for a truth to be revealed. How much was David Bowie involved in your production of Lazarus? He was very involved: it was his life-long dream to put on what he called “a play with my music”. He got in touch with the producer Robert Fox – who was an old friend of his – and then the writer Enda Walsh spent a few days with him in New York talking about the story [a sequel to Walter Tevis’s novel The Man Who Fell to Earth]. David made a selection of 60-70 songs. Then they told Robert: “Now we need a director.” They did not want a conventional director or a big Broadway musical, they wanted something innovative and Robert Fox said: “I have Ivo here.” What was Bowie like to work with? One thinks of him as a theatre in himself… Not at all – he was a very quiet man. A real English gentleman, a serious artist. I’ve always been a fan [Van Hove used Bowie’s song The Motel for his Angels in America]. After Bowie became sick, we had a camera installed during workshops, so he could follow. Every day, he’d call me to say: “Wow, this is great”, or: “I think you should think about this”. And what was a happy surprise was that he never used his power, he was collaborative. He had strong but constructive opinions. Perhaps it was good for him in his last months to be working on such a project? It is clear from his album Blackstar that it was a creative period. He wanted these things [play and album] to happen, they were very important to him. Watch the video for Lazarus, from David Bowie’s last album, Blackstar. Guardian You must miss him. Does the musical now feel like a homage? I do miss him. It is clear. But listen, I don’t want to pretend we were friends. I never was at his home. And the show has not become a homage, that was never my intention. But I do think the show will make even more sense now than it ever has. That is interesting because Lazarus was described in the Guardian as “thrilling” but “incomprehensible”? Is there anything you don’t understand about it yourself? There is nothing I don’t understand. I immediately got the sense of it as an existentialist play about a man who is living dead, in eternal mourning for the love of his life, wondering how to make sense of it all. It was not so distant from Bergman who, although totally different from Bowie, is also asking about existence. The last line of Bowie’s album Blackstar is: “I can’t give everything away.” Do you worry about giving your all and about giving too much away? I give it all as Bowie gave it all – in a masked way. I have called my productions masked autobiographies. They say something about how I feel, what I am afraid of, what I am hoping for – utopia, lost paradises – that is what my productions are about. So this is a very personal production but I cannot give it all away. You are known for your extremely physical, challenging, hands-on direction. Yet you seem aloof – reserved. Do you change when you go into the rehearsal room? I’m the same person. Listen, how to say this? I’ve just come from a Skype meeting, planning next season, and was behaving differently from the way I’m behaving with you now. And when I go into a rehearsal room, my philosophy is that once you close the door, everything is allowed because you are living in an imaginary world. You are playing – yet it is serious. A play needs to entertain but also do more, it must go deeper. In that room, every fantasy is allowed. Exploration is what good actors are interested in, they don’t want to spend their lives in their comfort zone. Michael C Hall and Sophia Anne Caruso in Lazarus. Photograph: Johan Persson You trained as a lawyer. What made you jump tracks? The seed was planted when I was young. When I was 11, I was sent to an old-fashioned Belgian boarding school of 800 boys. On Wednesday afternoons, there were no lessons. There were beautiful football fields but I didn’t choose to play in them. You were allowed to go into the small town for the girls, which I also did not do. Impulsively, I joined a theatre group. There was no reason to choose theatre in that I did not come from an artistic background – my father was a pharmacist, my mother a housewife. I made a choice, I don’t know why – that is the miracle of life. And I very quickly discovered the warmth of theatre. At boarding school, it was all walls – you couldn’t get out. Boarding school was a world within a world and this theatre group was a world within that world, within the big world outside. I discovered the warmth of creating something together that no one else knew about. And then, at the end of the school term, we put on our production and got applause for it. But it was not the applause that interested me so much as the secrecy and warmth. Does your working marriage with your set designer, Jan Versweyveld, ever get too close for comfort? No – although we have our ups and downs. I can illustrate this with a story. Dora van der Groen, the most famous of Belgian actresses – our equivalent to Sarah Bernhardt – was in love with one of my first productions, Agatha, by Marguerite Duras. We became friends. She said: “Ivo, between you and theatre it is a very good marriage.” The bad times should not destroy the good. He and I are good at enjoying the good times and not allowing ourselves to be crushed by the bad. We are together in stress but also in joy. You have been called by the New York Times critic Ben Brantley a “maximalist minimalist” – does he have that right? I can’t improve on that. Ruth Wilson, who is playing the title role in Ivo van Hove’s new production of Hedda Gabler at the National theatre next month. Photograph: Lea Nielsen Is being faithful to a text important? I don’t know what “being faithful to a text” means. There’s not one truth. As a director or actor, you have to give an interpretation of a line. I get 10 different people to say “I love you” – three words, an objective truth – and yet each time it is spoken it is different. I’m known for my preparation. For actors, this is not a threat, it is freedom. I like to create the world in which the text will blossom best. You directed Hedda Gabler in 2004 and won an Obie. Why return to it? I like sometimes to revisit. This National Theatre production will be conceptually the same but have a London flavour. Ruth [Wilson] and I have been talking about Hedda. What is brilliant is that Ibsen, writing over a century ago, saw so clearly. Hedda is a frustrated housewife but different from Nora in A Doll’s House. Nora becomes clear in her choices, Hedda remains enigmatic. Ruth and I have to answer the “why” but not reveal it. And we have found something which I could show you from the text but will not do so… What are the advantages of being artistic director of your own theatre company? How do you cope with crazy overload? I sleep seven hours a night. I call the group, which regularly visits the Barbican, my laboratory on a large scale. I have 21 fully employed actors and we play all over the world in Dutch – often four hours with subtitles, and people stay. We can make a difference in the world, actors are still celebrated. Your range of work seems eclectic: Shakespeare, Sophocles, Arthur Miller, Tony Kushner, E Annie Proulx… I’m not eclectic. I’m interested in two basic things. Our existence, as in Lazarus. Why are we here? Can we make sense of it? We could commit suicide. Why don’t we? And then I am interested in politics but only in the Greek way – polis meaning society. After 9/11, it became more important to deal with huge texts. Kings of War involved thinking about leadership, the issue of this and the next decades. In the US, they are lost... something really has to change. Watch the video for I Can’t Give Everything Away, from David Bowie’s last album. You are about to direct Jude Law in Obsession. We’re used to plays being turned into film, what are the challenges of going in the opposite direction? It is two different languages. I made movies [Thuisfront for Dutch TV and Amsterdam in 2009]. With movies, every day is the premiere. In a movie, you are god of creation and, at the end, make the edit. I still remember an off day after which I assumed the work would be unusable. It turned into the best scene in the film. That could never happen in the theatre. Turning film into theatre is a huge challenge – it is like being the first ever director of Hamlet. I have to establish a theatrical world, a world premiere. I do it because movies have an extremity I’ve rarely found in theatre. I’m doing Obsession with three English and three English-speaking Dutch actors. I wanted Jude Law, who was shooting in Rome. When we met, I impulsively thought of Obsession. And it was immediately clear he wanted to work with me. He read Obsession and really liked it – it is visceral... You’ve had audiences at the edges of the stage and even mingling with actors. Is the relationship with audiences something you think a lot about? Some people say theatre will not survive the 21st century, I say it will be the art form. Why? Because it is live. It is a world of magic, so-called. Theatre is a venue and we can do whatever we want in it. If you don’t want to take risks, don’t be in the theatre. The same, perhaps, is true of life. Lazarus is at King’s Cross Theatre South, London N1, until 22 January; Hedda Gabler is at the National theatre, London SE1, from 5 December

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2022/feb/14/premier-league-10-talking-points-from-the-weekends-action

Football

2022-02-14T08:00:12.000Z

Guardian sport

Premier League: 10 talking points from the weekend’s action

1) Cornet has wings clipped in wide position Jürgen Klopp has described this as the strongest Liverpool squad he has had at his disposal. That Joe Gomez, Curtis Jones, Takumi Minamino and Divock Origi could not even make the bench supported the theory. Sean Dyche has lesser resources but by his own standards, he had a luxury of riches. Dwight McNeil was dropped for the first time this season. Tuesday’s scorer Jay Rodriguez and new signing Wout Weghorst started in attack. But both missed chances and the reality is that Burnley have scored three goals in nine games. Meanwhile, Maxwel Cornet took McNeil’s spot on the left. The Ivorian can seem a one-man goal-of-the-season contest, but a berth on the wing gave him less chance to let fly. Cornet rarely formed much of a strike partnership with the sold Chris Wood, but at least he offered explosive shooting. For Dyche, the decision is whether to restore him to the forward line. Richard Jolly Match report: Burnley 0-1 Liverpool West Ham cope with Zouma’s no-show while Foxes’ failings laid bare again Read more 2) Wolves a few goals short of a top-four challenge At what point do we start taking Wolves seriously as challengers for the top four? They don’t have the resources of Manchester United, Arsenal, Tottenham or even West Ham, but what they do have is a defence. Under pressure in the second half against Spurs, they were admirably unruffled. The bigger issue is goals; only Burnley and Norwich have scored fewer this season than Wolves’ 21 – which puts them on track for a paltry 36. To put that in context, no side has finished in the top four of the Premier League with fewer than the 45 Everton managed in 2004-05. Perhaps Daniel Podence, if he gets off the mark, will go on a spree or perhaps the return of Hwang Hee-chan will bring goals. Either way, if they are to qualify for the Champions League they probably need some from somewhere, no matter how good the rearguard. Jonathan Wilson Match report: Tottenham 0-2 Wolves 3) City show faint hints of weakness In an entertaining first half-hour of Manchester City’s visit to Norwich, there were a few elements that might have aroused Jürgen Klopp’s curiosity. City were sometimes sloppy under pressure inside their own half, giving away possession cheaply, while it was clear enough that Oleksandr Zinchenko and Nathan Aké are downgrades on Aymeric Laporte and João Cancelo. Those concerns proved short-lived, Grant Hanley missing Norwich’s big chance when he headed against the post and City ultimately winning with characteristic ease. They show no sign of letting up and, once they go ahead, invariably control games masterfully. The crumb of comfort for Liverpool is that they are not flawless and, just as Arsenal did last month before shooting themselves in the foot, better opponents might punish those laxer moments. It needs to happen soon if we are to see a title race: Klopp will hope Harry Kane and Son Heung-min are primed to pounce on any early errors at the Etihad next weekend. Nick Ames Match report: Norwich 0-4 Manchester City Nathan Aké showed City have some weaknesses. Photograph: Tim Keeton/EPA 4) Race for fourth is starting to look crowded West Ham showed their spirit again with a late equaliser at Leicester but it left them only just clinging to fourth place. Now that there’s a clear bottom three, the race for fourth ought to be the most interesting thing about the Premier League. There’s just one problem: the contenders don’t seem very bothered. Spurs have lost three games on the trot, Manchester United have become draw specialists and West Ham’s only win in four is a meagre 1-0 against Watford. Chelsea, who led the table on 1 December, have slumped so badly that they may yet join the dogfight. And so could Wolves, who suddenly have four wins in five. They are now above Spurs. The same goes for Arsenal, whose winner at Molineux on Thursday was their first goal since New Year’s Day. If any of these clubs can go on a decent run, they’ll find themselves in the Champions League. Tim de Lisle Match report: Leicester City 2-2 West Ham United 0:44 Ralf Rangnick says Manchester United players still 'care' after draw with Southampton – video 5) Question marks over United’s fitness Ralf Rangnick admits he is worried about Manchester United’s prospects of a top-four finish. “It has always been a concern since Ole [Gunnar Solskjær] left the club. That was one of the reasons why he probably had to leave,” the 63-year-old said. This was a third time in the last five league matches Rangnick’s team have let a second-half lead slip, Aston Villa and Burnley also coming from behind to share a draw. After 24 matches United are fifth on 40 points. One theory proposed to the German is that his footballers tire late on in games due a lack of fitness that stops them maintaining his high-pressing style. “To be honest I don’t know if we are fit enough to play that way because I came in the middle of the season, we had no pre-season [together] - in essence we had in total two weeks in total where we could train in a normal way,” Rangnick said. “I wouldn’t allow myself to say we are not fit enough to play like that.” Jamie Jackson Match report: Manchester United 1-1 Southampton 6) Irrepressible Lamptey buoys Brighton Beyond the three points and an impressive team performance for Brighton, a first 90 minutes of the year and a second assist of the season made Saturday’s a landmark game for Tariq Lamptey, who continued his return from serious hamstring injury. “It’s hard for any player to expect to be fantastic every week,” Graham Potter said. “Today I thought he had everything.” It was telling that both Watford’s left-back, Hassane Kamara, and Emmanuel Dennis, who played on the left wing in the second half, were booked for fouling Lamptey as the home side struggled to control his surges; he has only had more touches in three other Premier League games than he did on Saturday, and never pressed players in possession on more occasions. It was also a key game for another player recovering from injury, Ismaïla Sarr playing for the first time since damaging a knee ligament in his club’s last victory, three months ago next week; he had Watford’s one shot on target, in the 88th minute. If his seems to have been a swift and impressive recovery, his club is running out of time to stage one of their own. Simon Burnton Match report: Watford 0-2 Brighton Tariq Lamptey impressed once more against Watford. Photograph: Simon Traylen/ProSports/REX/Shutterstock 7) Gordon shining under Lampard’s mentorship Frank Lampard joined the standing ovation for Anthony Gordon when the 20-year-old was substituted towards the end of a precious win over Leeds. A host of Everton players deserved such acclaim – any of Alex Iwobi, Jonjoe Kenny, Donny van de Beek and Richarlison could also have laid claim to the man of the match award – but the blossoming talent, involved in all three goals and in Leeds’ faces from the first whistle, enthralled his supporters and manager. “He can go a really long way in the game and his job now is to keep his head down and keep working,” said Lampard. “But I’ve no worries about that. I can see he wants it.” The feeling is mutual. As Gordon said of his new manager: “I feel the trust he has got in me. He tells me daily. He has surprised me, really, with how good he is tactically. We need to start giving recognition to young English managers such as the gaffer. He is a tactical genius and I am thriving off that. I’m learning from him every day, stuff I hadn’t heard before.” Andy Hunter Match report: Everton 3-0 Leeds 8) Vieira calls on Zaha for goals Crystal Palace’s draw with Brentford meant it is now just one win in eight Premier League matches since beating Everton on 12 December – a statistic that does not please Patrick Vieira. Having passed up the opportunity to seal what could have been a crucial three points against Norwich in midweek after slipping while taking a penalty, Wilfried Zaha was singled out by his manger as someone who can provide a regular goal threat for a team that has scored only three in the last four games. “There was a cross delivered by Joel Ward at the end when I wanted Wilfried to be there. To compete for that cross,” said Vieira. “We have to work on that, as well as the desire for other players to get into the box.” Ed Aarons Match report: Brentford 0-0 Crystal Palace 9) Burn makes glorious hometown return At the final whistle Dan Burn looked almost shellshocked. Twenty years after being released by Newcastle’s academy as a nine-year-old he had just made his debut after a £13m move from Brighton and shone in central defence. Small wonder that, as Burn joined his new teammates in applauding all corners of St James’ Park, he sometimes stopped and simply stared. Born and brought up in Northumberland, Burn used to cheer Newcastle on from the stands he now gazed at and, as he began his career with Blyth Spartans and then Darlington, he can rarely have imagined one day returning as man of the match. Eddie Howe may have failed with January bids for Lille’s Sven Botman and Sevilla’s Diego Carlos but on this evidence Newcastle’s manager could not have bought a defender with more assured positional sense. Louise Taylor Match report: Newcastle 1-0 Aston Villa The Fiver: sign up and get our daily football email. 10) Wasteful Saints have not replaced Ings Manchester United’s misfiring marksmen hogged the headlines as usual, but at Old Trafford it was actually Southampton who were more culpable. Only four of their 13 attempts were on target (United managed seven out of 12). Ralf Rangnick rightly argued that United should have scored three by half-time, but failed to add that the same was true of their opponents. On the right, Stuart Armstrong kept bustling into good positions without finding the finishing touch. In the middle, Armando Broja bothered the United centre-backs with his strength and ingenuity but only troubled David de Gea once. The other centre-forward, Che Adams, took the equaliser beautifully but only after wasting a couple of early chances, one of them when he slipped in front of a near-open goal and ended up heading the ball sideways. For all their energy and cohesion, Southampton are missing Danny Ings. Struggling to break into Steven Gerrard’s Villa side, he would surely be starting if he’d stayed at St Mary’s. Tim de Lisle Pos Team P GD Pts 1 Man City 25 47 63 2 Liverpool 24 42 54 3 Chelsea 24 30 47 4 West Ham 25 11 41 5 Man Utd 24 6 40 6 Arsenal 22 9 39 7 Wolverhampton 23 4 37 8 Tottenham Hotspur 22 -1 36 9 Brighton 23 2 33 10 Southampton 24 -7 29 11 Leicester 22 -5 27 12 Aston Villa 23 -5 27 13 Crystal Palace 24 -3 26 14 Brentford 25 -14 24 15 Leeds 23 -19 23 16 Everton 22 -10 22 17 Newcastle 23 -19 21 18 Norwich 24 -36 17 19 Watford 23 -20 15 20 Burnley 21 -12 14

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2024/jan/30/share-details-of-a-slow-travel-break-you-could-win-a-holiday-voucher

Travel

2024-01-30T13:13:22.000Z

Guardian community team

Share details of a slow travel break – you could win a holiday voucher

It’s hard to imagine a time when life was generally lived at 3mph – walking pace and the average speed of a horse-drawn boat. When the railways were being built, some critics warned that that the human body was incapable of withstanding speeds of 30mph. Fast forward – literally – 200 years and everything is done at pace; we’re always up against the clock. Which is why slow travel has become something of a movement, bolstered by the trend for mindfulness. We’d like to hear about your favourite ways of slowing things down a bit – whether it be puttering along a stretch of a canal, walking from village to village, camping in the woods, or going out berry picking in the local hedgerows. If you have a relevant photo, do send it in – but it’s your words that will be judged for the competition. Keep your tip to about 100 words The best tip of the week, chosen by Tom Hall of Lonely Planet, will win a £200 voucher to stay at a Coolstays property – the company has more than 3,000 worldwide. The best tips will appear in the Guardian Travel section and website. We’re sorry, but for legal reasons you must be a UK resident to enter this competition. The competition closes on 5 February at 9am Have a look at our past winners and other tips Read the terms and conditions here

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/13/europes-ideals-values-eu-lost-on-its-citizens

Opinion

2014-05-13T09:15:42.000Z

Andrej Nikolaidis

Europe's ideals and values seem lost on its own citizens | Andrej Nikolaidis

Recently I was celebrating the so called Europe Day by taking part in the European Writers Conference in Berlin. They drove us through the town in new black BMW 7 Series limousines; Frank-Walter Steinmeier, federal minister of foreign affairs, gave the opening remarks; and it was held in the Deutsche Bank International Forum … everything we writers secretly like while we pretend to be hard boiled leftists. The conference was all about ideals, humanism, European values and the meaning of Europe. My favourite line of the first day was, "Compared to the Europe of concentration camps, this Europe brings hope." It seems that the people outside Europe don't have a problem defining what Europe is. People in the Maidan in Ukraine were dying with the world "Europe" on their lips; people from Europe's periphery, like myself, are waiting in line to become EU citizens; immigrants from Africa are drowning in the Mediterranean trying to get to Europe. But it seems that by "European values", outsiders and Europeans mean different things. Hegel wrote that the secrets of the ancient Egyptians were a secret to the ancient Egyptians themselves. It might just be that European values are a secret to the Europeans, too. A few years ago I was in Prato, Italy, attending a conference called Is the EU dead? We, the participants, agreed that, yes, it was. Waiters in cafes, receptionists in hotels and ticket-sellers in theatres agreed, too. Actually, all the citizens of Prato I talked to firmly believed that the final countdown for EU-doom had begun. The morning after the conference I woke early and took a walk. Prato was free of people, and therefore irresistible. It was a cold morning – even Toscana can be cruel in February – but I had my coffee outside so that I could smoke. I was thinking about how the smoking ban is a travesty of European values – if our civilisation was good at anything, it was killing people. Smoking kills, of course, but so does the state. In the smoking ban I saw the tendency of the state to monopolise the right to legal killing. Then came an African. He was carrying a few lighters, a plastic watch and three Snickers bars, and was offering them for sale. He tried to sell me his goods speaking Italian, and was delighted when I said "no" and, in English, offered him a coffee instead. "Don't be confused by the fact that I'm an educated man," he said to me. He was a master of electrical engineering. He left Nigeria after his parents were killed. He was talking about the equilibrium constant, about Immanuel Wallerstein's theory of the world system, about the weak integrative forces of the EU … "Are you sure you don't need a lighter?". I was sure. Then he said, "Enough of this chit chat, I have business to do," and he left. During the day, many African immigrants are walking on the streets of Prato selling frippery. At night they go to cafes and restaurants selling roses to couples in love: one rose, €2. The same day Predrag Matvejević, a wonderful Yugoslav leftist, said to me, "You know, I peeked into the cathedral where a priest from Africa was holding a service – it brings hope." Matvejević is a good man – a good man tends to see hope in everything. For 63 years straight the left won all the elections in Prato. Then the centre-right won. They won because of fear. We all know how it goes: the left wins because of hope, the right because of fear. The citizens of Prato were afraid of the Chinese – they told us that tens of thousands came to Prato. They were afraid of Africans, too. Some of them approved a ban of all non-Italian restaurants in the city centre. I was thinking in Prato the same thing that I was thinking in Berlin: are European values universal, or are they reserved only for Europeans? If the second answer is correct, then Europe is more like a gentleman's club. And if that's the case, why should anybody outside of that club care about it and its "values"?

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/jun/11/world-cup-fiver-brazil-2014

Football

2014-06-11T14:39:14.000Z

Paul Doyle

World Cup Fiver | No stone must be left unturned in the search for stones that could be turned

PANIC AT THE WORLD CUP DISCO With just a day to go before the Big World Cup kick-off, fears are rising that the international media have not yet spread enough fear. Faced with mounting criticism of inadequate scare-mongering, assorted publications across the globe have engaged in frantic last-ditch doom-peddling lest they be accused of ruining a major sporting event by failing to abide by the time-honoured tradition of hysterically pointing out every tiny detail that could conceivably fall below perfection before the tournament finally gets under way. There’s justified social discontent, of course, but there is scope for so much more mayhem! No stone must be left unturned in the search for stones that could be turned. The English media have not been found wanting, heroically ignoring the slim possibility of electrocuting themselves to death as they plugged in their computers before submitting alarmist articles about the possible side-effects of anti-malaria tablets prescribed to the England squad by medical experts (headaches, diarrhoea and cramps, apparently, which as Roy Hodgson noted with uncalled-for sensibleness “is better than having someone contract malaria”), the maybe somewhat-less-than-pristine condition of the pitch in Manaus (which underwent “emergency repairs” in recent months due to “seriously undernourished grass”) and the potential hazards of traffic in Brazil, weather in Brazil, police in Brazil, airports in Brazil, people in Brazil and desperate frothing bawling hacks in Brazil. Extreme vigilance is not just the preserve of the media, of course. Members of France’s backroom staff, for instance, held urgent talks last night after noticing a suspected spy drone hovering above Les Bleus’ training ground. This sparked all manner of interrogation, such as: were Honduras trying to snatch a sneak preview of France’s tactics? Should Les Bleus think of a counter-strategy, like ordering Patrice Evra to take shots at goal in the expectation that one of his efforts will knock out the drone suspended way up in the sky? And if Didier Deschamps looks ant-sized from one foot away, is he even visible from the air? Cameroon officials have no problem with spying, however. In fact, manager Volker Finke has asked the owner of the team hotel to use CCTV to ensure the Indomitable Lions stay calm. “Everything will be monitored by cameras,” disclosed Baltazar Saldanha of the Sheraton hotel in Vitoria. “The order came from the team manager himself. The manager and three other people from the delegation will have access to all of the footage from the five floors set aside for the team. The players will not be able to get women into the rooms. If they are looking for pleasure, they will have to find another way.” That sounds dangerously like a challenge. A BIGGER PLUG THAN ONE FROM THE BFG’S BATH Big Website has got a new YouTube football channel, featuring this very nice short film about Edin Dzeko. Subscribe today! And there’s also a new app for iOS and Android – details of the football offering are here. QUOTE OF THE DAY “I don’t understand why they will not include us among the fans who will travel to Brazil. We are also Ghanaians and have a lot to offer to the players and the fans as well. We’ll be there to entertain the players and the fans. We shall reduce the price so everybody will be happy” – leader of the Ghanaian ladies of the night association, Maame Esi, demands her members are included among 500 supporters being flown to Brazil by the Ghanaian Sports Ministry. O FIVERÃO LETTERS “Re: the East Stirling v Chelsea friendly (yesterday’s Quote of the Day). I have to point out that getting clubs to fulfil these easily-made commitments can still be hard. As part of Ipswich Town’s deal to sell over-priced custodian Matteo Sereni to Lazio in 2003, the Italians glibly committed to play not one but two friendly matches at Portman Road. The first match took place three years later, in 2006, allegedly after Ipswich cried ‘foul’ to the FA, which complained to the Italian Football Association. After a few more years of rumours and counter-rumours, we’re still waiting for the second friendly, 11 years after the initial commitment was made” – Dermot Wickham. “Re: John Mackay on ‘the belittling of Scotland from the London-based media as the independence referendum approaches’ (yesterday’s Fiver letters). The Scots have always had their football independence and look what has happened. (Not to mention Italian rugby). Be warned, ‘aye’ voters” – Peter McTaggert. “Thanks for the mention in Big Paper about Sheffield Wednesday’s takeover by Hafiz Mammadov. Oh, sorry, you didn’t. At least we got to find out Joe Cole is going to Villa and Leo Messi pukes due to nerves. Next up: England team in we need to defecate after eating food shocker” – Iain Goodwin. Send your letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. And if you’ve nothing better to do you can also tweet O Fiverão. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’the day is: Dermot Wickham. JOIN GUARDIAN SOULMATES We keep trying to point out the utter futility of advertising an online dating service “for interesting people” in the Fiver to the naive folk who run Guardian Soulmates, but they still aren’t having any of it. So here you go – sign up here to view profiles of the kind of erudite, sociable and friendly romantics who would never dream of going out with you. RECOMMENDED VIEWING AC Jimbo narrates on the latest of our World Cup animated histories … Italy. And if your eyes can take it, Sepp’s been dancing again. BITS AND BOBS East London hipsters are rejoicing following the news Andrea Pirlo, 86, and his beard will stroll magisterially around the Juventus Stadium for another couple of years after the midfielder applied his pen to legal documents they thrust at him. Galatasaray club scarf manufacturers are braced for a sales fall after Roberto Mancini was released as manager in an agreement which may or may not have been more mutual in favour of one of the parties concerned. Modern Football dept: the announcement to confirm One Direction star Louis Tomlinson’s takeover of Doncaster Rovers has been delayed over issues pertaining to the 22-year-old pop star’s image rights. Nasty Leeds owner Massimo Cellino has swapped the keys to Cagliari’s stadium for a sack containing £36m. “I want to thank everyone that has accompanied me in this journey,” he parped, fortunately not naming each of the 36 managers he sacked during his 22-year reign. Liverpool keeper Pepe Reina has hinted he may stay on loan at Napoli. “It will depend on Liverpool, Napoli and on Reina,” he third-personned to within an inch of his life. David Beckham’s Miami soccerball franchise is in doubt after the city’s mayor vetoed plans for a waterfront stadium. “The slip is off the table,” honked Mayor Tomás Regalado bafflingly. Potential Sepp Blatter rival Michel Platini has backed European condemnation of the Fifa president’s criticism of the British media. “I was very proud of the Europeans,” he electioneered. And Blackpool have appointed José Riga as manager. “It’s not an easy challenge,” he doom-mongered. STILL WANT MORE? Big Paper writers have gamely predicted who they think will be the World Cup’s leading scorer, its player to watch and various other things just so you can tell them how wrong they were when Carlo Costly wins the lot in a few weeks’ time. Another lovely interactive just in time for the World Cup: a history of Golden Boot winners. Did Chile do Swiss folk-dancing to prepare for a match against Switzerland? Did the Soviet Union once line up before a match clutching umbrellas? Try John Ashdown’s fiendish World Cup quiz to find out. In the last of our series of stunning World Cup moments, Scott Murray gets misty eyed over the Cruyff Turn. Proper Journalism’s David Conn and the equally brilliant Marina Hyde take aim at Sepp Blatter: ouch and ooyah. Chapter three of our video history of the Seleção: how Brazil’s shirts went from white to yellow. Out-of-contract international players and when was the last England World Cup side to line-up in shirts numbering 1-11? Find out in the Knowledge. Oh, and if it’s your thing, you can follow Big Website on Big Social FaceSpace. SIGN UP TO O FIVERÃO (AND THE FIVER) Want your very own copy of our free tea-timely(ish) email sent direct to your inbox? Has your regular copy stopped arriving? Click here to sign up. Oh, and it’ll be landing at midday BST as of tomorrow. SHOW-OFF

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2014/mar/09/good-people-imelda-staunton-versailles-orlando-revew

Stage

2014-03-09T00:07:15.000Z

Susannah Clapp

Good People; Versailles; Orlando – review

There are no sad green monsters in David Lindsay-Abaire's new play. But they are not far away. The author of Good People is also the author of Shrek, the anti-looksist musical. He knows about exclusion and unfairness. This knowledge infuses his angry comedy and makes it into outstanding drama. In Jonathan Kent's wonderfully quick, detailed production, Imelda Staunton again proves herself an indispensable actor. She plays Margie, a woman who grew up in tough south Boston and got stuck there, chucked out of her job at the $ Store, looking after her disabled daughter. In her whip-sharp delivery, Staunton makes you hear what she might have been. She shows what she has become in a poultry walk and a face that constantly fights off crumpling. Lorraine Ashbourne and June Watson are marvellous as her beady chum and her battle-axe landlady who sells rabbit ornaments made from Styrofoam balls. The evening would be worth it just to watch them at bingo. Still, the debate is elsewhere. Hildegard Bechtler's ingenious design revolves to show the other side of Boston: the rich bit, to which Staunton's high-school boyfriend, now a doctor, has migrated. The doc's idea of an ornament is an expensive blob of glass, given to his wife as a "push present". Lloyd Owen cleverly makes him both complacent and rough. The scenes between him and Staunton, who cajoles and carps after a job, are wincingly embarrassing, funny and laden with grief. Most impressively, they spin the audience's sympathies around. This is that unusual spectacle: an American play about class. Which is – since this dramatist knows about these things – a play about money. No one comes out unscathed. You can tick off influences. The dialogue zings rapidly: slightly David Mamet – though not very, as so female. The characters circle each other in wary competitiveness: fairly Bruce Norris. Tremendous nastiness threatens: very Neil Labute. Yet Good People is far warmer and more intimate than the work of these other male dramatists. It should have a life beyond Hampstead. Gwilym Lee in Versailles at the Donmar Warehouse: ‘makes every minute of the knotty debate worth attending to’. Photograph: Johan Persson How has "talky" become a recognised term of criticism for a play? Quite apart from that irritating wiggle of a suffix (when did "y" start meaning bad?), what is wrong with chat on the boards? Discussion and savoury phrases are something that the theatre has over cinema, at least most of the time. Of course Peter Gill sails close to the wind with his loquacious, tendentious, fascinating new play. He risks making his characters into mouthpieces. He wants audiences to detect the drama in argument as well as action. Versailles shows that the ghosts in our heads are also events with consequences. It is reasonable that as the stage re-examines the first world war, a play should deal with the treaty that ended it. It's surprising that it should take this form at the trend-conscious Donmar: two intervals, one aspidistra, extended arguments about whether reparations demanded from Germany would cause future conflict, detailed examinations of the Silesian coal mines. The once revolutionary Oh What A Lovely War has slid into the mainstream of theatrical consciousness. Now it is Gill's traditional structure and setting – at one with the plays of the period – that looks audacious. Gwilym Lee, astute and fluent, evokes Maynard Keynes in the part of a liberal-minded homosexual economist: he makes every minute of the knotty debate worth attending to. Why shouldn't you learn some facts in the stalls? Just as remarkable is the utterly individual texture – a testament to Gill's gifts as a director as well as a writer. The pace is leisurely but not languid. Paul Pyant's mellow lighting, and a frugal use of far-off music, induce raptness. Yet there is also acerbity from Barbara Flynn as a bereaved mother, head cocked like a bird of prey, holding her grief down under a parade of prejudice, a well-worn crustiness from Simon Williams and an extraordinary relaxed period performance from Helen Bradbury. Josh O'Connor is masterly as a soldier who can no longer bear to be alone with his memories: he is his own ghost. How on earth can anyone adapt Virginia Woolf's novel Orlando? It is internal but epic. It skips centuries. Its central event is a sex change. Orlando is Woolf's love letter to Vita Sackville-West, a tale about making yourself up, about time being stopped by art. It is actually well suited to the theatre, but it hasn't always worked. Angela Carter left only fragments of her operatic treatment. One of her ideas had been to set the action in the soft furnishing department of Marshall & Snelgrove. The ‘infinitely various’ Suranne Jones in Orlando at the Royal Exchange. Photograph: Jonathan Keenan Sarah Frankcom's daring Royal Exchange makes the story fly. At its centre is the infinitely various Suranne Jones. She is calf-like in doublet and hose, awkward in her crinoline and slinky in a slip. Part of Woolf's point was that garments can be dictators: clothes might wear us rather than the other way round. Orlando, skittish and proselytising, was published in 1928, the same year as Radclyffe Hall's The Well of Loneliness, and at the time when Woolf was getting to know Noël Coward. It is both prophetic and playful. Max Webster, a beneficiary of the Exchange's bursary for young directors, is a man to watch. His fleet production catches both the lushness and the peculiarity of the novel. Gloriana is a burly bloke in a transparent orange farthingale, lit from within with tiny lights. Ti Green's design pulls sumptuousness out of spareness. London is an illuminated doll's house and a skeleton puppet. The Great Frost is summoned up in a white sheet. Constantinople, where Orlando goes to bed as a coltish boy and wakes up as a voluptuous woman, is a curtained bed. The entrancing Russian princess spins on a cable high over the heads of the audience. As if whisked up on the wings of love. Star ratings (out of 5) Good People **** Versailles **** Orlando ****

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/jun/18/ripe-for-disruption-female-film-makers-rally-for-industry-overhaul-bfi-women-with-a-movie-camera-summit

Film

2018-06-18T15:48:04.000Z

Pamela Hutchinson

Ripe for disruption': female film-makers rally for industry overhaul

Ava DuVernay may not have been at the BFI Southbank in London this weekend, but her films and her words were. Not to mention the number of people walking around with her name emblazoned on their chests. The film-maker’s assertion that “activism is inherently a creative endeavour” was quoted more than once from the stage at the Woman With a Movie Camera summit. And it’s an idea that works just as well forwards and backwards. For many women in the film industry, simply creating can be an act of disruption or activism in itself. The theme of the day, which included panels, presentations and performances, and took over all four screens of the BFI Southbank, was power – and how to change the unbalanced power dynamic in the creative industries. In that light, it was a disappointment that activist and model Munroe Bergdorf, booked as the event’s keynote speaker, was unable to attend. While signatories of an online petition had objected to a trans woman having a platform at the event, the speakers and organisers of the summit signalled their support of her invitation, standing on stage together when she was due to speak, in a gesture of solidarity, to applause from the audience. “Her words would have set the tone for reclaiming the BFI as an inclusive space with radical potential,” said Observer film critic Simran Hans in a statement. Holly Tarquini, executive director of FilmBath, also noted how Bergdorf’s name was mentioned admiringly in each panel, and said: “It’s essential that we celebrate when women like Munroe Bergdorf are given a platform by public organisations.” The screening rooms still felt more inclusive than usual, with an audience mostly made up of women packing out spaces often filled with men. Journalist, activist and screenwriter Kate Muir spoke about her experiences as a critic, looking around press screenings to see “20 men and me – and they are all white”. Muir was part of a panel discussing the state of the film industry following the #MeToo and #TimesUp social media movements. While the panel applauded the opportunities online activism gave marginalised voices to speak out, and acknowledge that many positive changes had begun, they said there was still a long way to go. Cheering the fact that many public bodies have shown support by working towards a 50-50 gender balance by 2020, Mia Bays of the Birds Eye View film festival said the next steps were to “penetrate the studio system”, and to look at distribution and marketing. BFI’s Woman with a Movie Camera summit. Photograph: Angus Steele Both on stage and off, there was a buoyant tone to proceedings, helped no doubt by more lighthearted side events such as a feminist tattoo parlour and nail salon, a celebration of zine culture and even video games. Hair Nah is an addictive 8-bit game where the objective is to swat white hands away from a woman of colour’s hair. Alternatively, the Algorithmic Gaze teaches players how to fool the computers that censor images of female nipples online. Anna Bogutskaya, who programmes the BFI’s monthly Woman With a Movie Camera strand of films at Southbank and curated the summit, spoke to the Guardian about her aims for the event: “The main goal for me was to ignite conversation, and not just in the film and TV industry, but also in other creative industries.” One of the most enjoyable events of the day was writer and producer Catherine Bray’s funny and sharp dissection of the strong female character trope. (Spoiler: it helps to be Angelina Jolie). This presentation, featuring montages of high-kicking, hair-flicking glamazons with guns, was all the more compelling for ending with the message that “we have to get complex in our pursuit of equality”. For Bray, that means unpredictable, diverse female characters on screen, but looking beyond the screen to ensure fair pay for women working in film in less visible roles, such as studio cleaners. ...and for the uninitiated, the mind of Dr @tr0ublemayer is an extraordinary place. Paying homage to the phenomenal activism of @ava's @ARRAYNow, @TaranaBurke's #MeToo, @kalifilms' @alicewalkerfilm & beyond at @BFI #WomanWithAMovieCamera Summit 2018 pic.twitter.com/u6uWxy314D — CultureKinetica (@CultureKinetica) June 16, 2018 The most talked-about event of the day was possibly writer, curator and activist So Mayer’s incendiary presentation about dismantling the film canon. Mayer presented a provocative new approach to auteurs, classic films, festivals and even cinemas. A series of punchy slides (which you can view on Dropbox) revealed a set of tools, forming a kit with which to dismantle established ideas and industry practices – as well as the inequalities and abuses lurking within the system. Choose from the “Asia Argento finger”, which features a quote by the actor, who was among the first to publicly accused Harvey Weinstein of rape, empowering survivors of abuse to voice their accusations. Most compelling of all, Mayer offered the slide titled “Ruth Bader Ginsburg Scales”. The Supreme Court justice has said she is often asked when there will be enough women in her role and her reply is “when there are nine”, a 100% ratio that takes some people aback. “But there’d been nine men, and nobody’s ever raised a question about that.” Mayer extrapolates that idea to the film industry: “We’re done with 50-50.” Where the Competition of the Cannes film festival has so far featured 95% male directors and 5% female directors, Mayer calls for a complete reversal: 95% of films should have been made by women, and soon. It takes more than activism to get to that ratio, or even approach it. It requires money to back up gestures, and perhaps a reworking of the entire industry. The conversation about these topics may only be starting to get radical enough to see results. This summit felt like something of a stealth tactic – a day of entertaining events, vivid conversation and inclusive spaces that had the capacity to inspire profound change, triggering the “radical imagination” described by DuVernay. The momentum gathered by online activism, the leading virtue of which is visibility, needs to be pulled offline and turned into action, according to Simran Hans in a panel on film criticism. As Bogutskaya said at the opening of the summit, media industries are “ripe for disruption”.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/feb/06/calls-to-ease-syrian-border-controls-as-offers-of-aid-pour-in-after-earthquake

World news

2023-02-06T17:46:13.000Z

Patrick Wintour

Calls to ease Syrian border controls as offers of aid pour in after earthquake

International pledges of emergency aid have poured in for Turkey and Syria, leading to calls for the international community to relax some of the political restrictions on aid entering north-west Syria, the country’s last rebel-held enclave and one of the areas worst hit by the earthquake. With the support of Russia at the UN, the government in Damascus allows aid to enter the region through only one border crossing. The Syrian Association for Citizens Dignity said all crossings must be opened on an emergency basis. The crisis is likely to be a test of whether a divided international community riven by the war in Ukraine and conflicts in the Middle East can temporarily bury its differences in the interests of addressing a humanitarian emergency. The Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who is facing an election in a few months, said offers of aid to Turkey had come from 45 countries ranging from Kuwait to Israel, Russia and the UK. Syria said it had received offers of help from China, Russia, Lebanon, Algeria and the United Arab Emirates. But the scale of the aid being offered will require a large coordination effort, as well delicate diplomatic manoeuvres to supply aid to Syria where the leadership of Bashar al-Assad is not recognised in the west. By Monday afternoon the number of dead in northern Syria had reached 840, about a half of the fast-rising death toll in Turkey of 1,541. The Syrian side of the border may provide a greater aid challenge since some of the worst-affected areas contain hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees locked in a war zone and facing attacks from Syrian government forces. Aid agencies reported that some of the roads from Turkey into Syria were blocked, including the main cross border crossing used by international aid agencies. The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said the US was already assessing its comprehensive response options, “and had directed my team to remain in close contact with our Turkish allies and our humanitarian partners in the coming days to determine what the region needs”. He added: “We are determined to do all that we can to help those affected by these earthquakes in the days, weeks, and months ahead.” The EU said it had mobilised its emergency coordination centre and rescue teams in the Netherlands and Romania. The bloc’s foreign affairs chief, Josep Borrell, said: “Ten urban search and rescue teams have been quickly mobilised from Bulgaria, Croatia, [the Czech Republic], France, Greece, the Netherlands, Poland [and] Romania to support the first responders on the ground. Italy and Hungary have offered their rescue teams to Turkey as well.” The EU’s Copernicus satellite system has been activated to provide emergency mapping services. Other countries offering help included Ukraine, whose president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, sent a message offering condolences. The French President Emmanuel Macron said he was despatching a 139 strong civilian rescue team and the US announced it was sending two search and rescue teams each 79 strong. Soldiers from Azerbaijan were the fist to arrive in Turkey to offer practical support sending 400 fully equipped soldiers. Russia said it had emergency rescue Ilyushin-76 planes on standby to fly to the two countries. Its defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, ordered Russian forces in Syria to help with the rescue effort, including from the naval base at Tartus. Tobias Billström, the Swedish foreign affairs minister, tweeted: “I deeply regret the terrible consequences of the earthquake in Turkey and Syria with a high loss of lives. As Sweden holds the EU presidency we are going to reach out to the Turkish foreign affairs minister, Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, and to Syria for the coordination of EU efforts to aid these countries in this disaster.” Sweden has been at loggerheads with Turkey over Erdoğan’s refusal to allow it into Nato. Erdoğan’s ability to oversee the crisis and to cooperate with countries that he sometimes antagonises will be a critical test for him before the presidential election due on 14 May. The opposition, seeking to capitalise on the dire state of the economy, was due to select its candidate next Monday, but depending on how the crisis unfolds in the next few days it may have to postpone making its choice. The White Helmets, the western-backed NGO that has rescued thousands of people from bombed buildings during the Syrian civil war, said adverse weather conditions including freezing temperatures had compounded the crisis. It urged the Assad regime and Russia to refrain from military activity in the affected areas to allow international groups to unify to help people affected. A spokesperson in Syria said: “Our teams responded and until now many families are under the rubble. Our teams are trying hard to help all the casualties. North-west Syria is now a disaster area. We need help from everyone to save our people.” Last month, the UN security council agreed to allow aid into north-west Syria from Turkey across one border crossing, at Bab al-Hawa. Syria has been resistant to allowing aid into a region serving more than 4 million people because it regards the aid as undermining Syrian sovereignty and reducing its chances of winning back control of the region. “The areas worst affected by the earthquake inside Syria look to be run by the Turkish-controlled opposition and not by the Syrian government,” said Mark Lowcock, the former head of UN humanitarian affairs. “It is going to require Turkish acquiescence to get aid into those areas. It is unlikely the Syrian government will do much to help.” It is hoped that the relatively sophisticated network of aid agencies that operate in Syria and southern Turkey means help can arrive relatively quickly. But the infrastructure of some of the aid groups themselves has been disrupted. The epicentre of the initial earthquake was near Gaziantep, where aid agencies including Syria Relief, the UK’s largest Syria relief charity, have their offices. Video from a hospital posted by the Syrian American Medical Society (SAMS) on Monday showed it immensely crowded. The society said: “Our hospitals are overwhelmed with patients filling the hallways. There is an immediate need for trauma supplies and a comprehensive emergency response to save lives and treat the injured.” Initial needs are for tens of thousands tents, heaters for the tents, tens of thousands blankets, thermal clothes, ready-to-eat food and basic first aid kits. Rick Brennan, the World Health Organization’s regional director of emergencies for the eastern Mediterranean, said the UN body would increase the number of its staff in Gaziantep and is looking at options for sending emergency medical teams to the region. “I think we can expect the death toll to increase significantly,” he said. Tanya Evans, the Syria country director for the International Rescue Committee, said: “Many in north-west Syria have been displaced up to 20 times, and with health facilities strained beyond capacity even before this tragedy, many did not have access to the healthcare they critically need”. She said the Syria humanitarian response plan for this year was already severely underfunded, with less than 50% of the required $4bn funded. The UK said it was sending 76 search and rescue specialists, four dogs and equipment to arrive in Turkey on Monday evening. An emergency medical team will also be sent to assess the situation on the ground. Ministers said they were in contact with the UN about the provision of emergency humanitarian support to those affected in Syria. Germany’s Federal Agency for Technical Relief (THW) is preparing to deliver emergency generators, tents and blankets to Turkey. Emergency shelters and water treatment systems could also be provided, the German interior minister, Nancy Faeser, said. Greece, Israel, Egypt, Qatar and the UAE have also offered aid.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2024/apr/13/bordeaux-harlequins-champions-cup-rugby-union-match-report

Sport

2024-04-13T16:20:00.000Z

Robert Kitson

Harlequins edge out Bordeaux in thriller to reach Champions Cup semi-final

There are some daunting venues in Europe but none more formidable this season than this atmospheric and character-laden old stadium. Factor in temperatures nudging 30C, and the prospect of Harlequins enjoying a vintage quarter-final weekend in Bordeaux were supposedly on a par with a local sommelier returning from the cellar with a bottle of Chateau Twickenham. So much for that theory, with Quins now able to toast the club’s first Champions Cup semi-final as reward for clinching one of the all-time great knockout contests. Rugby union does not come much more gloriously watchable, with a lion-hearted forward effort and two tries from Will Porter edging out a home side who racked up 100 points in two games against Saracens here this year. Ramm inspires nine-try Northampton to emphatic victory against Bulls Read more Bordeaux did not have the brilliant Damian Penaud or Matthieu Jalibert, both sidelined by injury, but, equally, Quins were lacking Danny Care, Joe Marler and Joe Launchbury, who withdrew just prior to the game with a calf strain. It mattered not as Alex Dombrandt, Chandler Cunningham-South, Will Evans and Fin Baxter, the latter performing heroically in the scrums opposite the mountainous Ben Tameifuna, showed why Quins’ future is increasingly bright. It amounted to the most staggering entertainment, with Quins’ pack proving the unexpected stars of a spectacular 12-try show. That said, there was drama and intrigue until the very last with Maxime Lucu lining up a very kickable conversion to clinch potential victory. To the horror of a packed home crowd, however, the French international scrum-half’s angled kick sailed wide and Quins will meet either Toulouse or Exeter in the last four. Only the memorable Munster v Wasps semi-final in 2004 runs this see-sawing epic anywhere close as the most exhilarating latter-stage game the tournament has known. The visitors’ preferred plan was clear from the outset: run Bordeaux and their big forwards around for as long as possible. As early as the third minute, after an initial surge from Cunningham-South, André Esterhuizen found space down the blindside and Porter, lurking on his inside, cantered over unopposed. Quick Guide Leinster eliminate La Rochelle Show It was only the start. A hard-running Oscar Beard stretched a complacent home defence and just as a hitch-kicking Marcus Smith was about to put an unmarked Tyrone Green over on the right, a deliberate knockdown by Matéo Garcia conceded a yellow card and a fully justified penalty try. The hosts were 14-0 down and urgently needed to wake up. They duly did so, Lucu diving over in the left corner and the decision being allowed to stand despite Porter having been taken out just behind the ruck. Suddenly it was a completely different jeu and all the decisions were going the way of Bordeaux, with Romain Buros being credited with a close-range try the Italian referee had initially declined to give. Tyrone Green touches down the sixth try for Harlequins. Photograph: David Rogers/Getty Images Quins needed to conjure something special to wrest back momentum and, bang on cue, it arrived. The visitors launched a daring raid from the own 22 and Cadan Murley cleverly twisted away from a couple of tacklers before finding Dombrandt in support. The No 8 stood firm in the tackle long enough to throw a world-class offload to Porter who rounded off a spectacular move by regathering his own chip ahead for a classic score. By half-time the lead was 28-12, with Evans burrowing over after a purposeful lineout drive and Smith drilling over another conversion. Quins, though, have a long history of blowing hot and cold and the signs were distinctly ominous when Bordeaux’s French international centre Nicolas Depoortère scooped a Lucu offload off his toes and scored in the left corner four minutes after the restart. Sign up to The Breakdown Free weekly newsletter The latest rugby union news and analysis, plus all the week's action reviewed Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. But once again Quins’s scrum rode to the rescue, another penalty getting their maul rumbling again to send Dombrandt over. One missed tackle on Buros, though, was all it took to set up Louis Bielle-Biarrey for Bordeaux’s fourth try and, in the blink of an eye, the home side were ahead for the first time thanks to a try from replacement Madosh Tambwe with 15 minutes remaining. Quick Guide How do I sign up for sport breaking news alerts? Show The last act, though, was to prove even more compelling. Sam Riley lost the ball as he was about to score from another rolling maul before another sweeping Quins move saw Louis Lynagh put Green over to seize the lead again. Could they cling on? Tambwe scored again with four minutes left but Lucu’s near miss allowed Quins to celebrate unquestionably their finest victory on French soil.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/may/31/us-fires-opening-salvo-in-trade-war-with-eu-canada-and-mexico

Business

2018-05-31T18:56:46.000Z

Larry Elliott

US on brink of trade war with EU, Canada and Mexico as tit-for-tat tariffs begin

The United States and its traditional allies are on the brink of a full-scale trade war after European and Canadian leaders reacted swiftly and angrily to Donald Trump’s decision to impose tariffs on steel and aluminium producers. World leaders hit back at Trump over 'totally unacceptable' tariffs – as it happened Read more The president of the European commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, promised immediate retaliation after the US commerce secretary, Wilbur Ross, said EU companies would face a 25% duty on steel and a 10% duty on aluminium from midnight on Thursday. Europe, along with Canada and Mexico, had been granted a temporary reprieve from the tariffs after they were unveiled by Donald Trump two months ago. However, Ross sent shudders through global financial markets when he said insufficient progress had been made in talks with three of the US’s traditional allies to reduce America’s trade deficit and that the waiver was being lifted. Wall Street slumped as the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed down more than 250 points as investors sold off shares in manufacturers and corporations with global reach. Shares across Europe also declined. The move from Washington – which comes at a time when Trump is also threatening protectionist action against China – triggered an immediate and angry response from Canada, Brussels and from individual European capitals. Juncker called the US move “unjustified” and said the EU had no choice but to hit back with tariffs on US goods and a case at the World Trade Organisation in Geneva. Trade war? What you need to know about US steel tariffs Read more “We will defend the Union’s interests, in full compliance with international trade law,” he added. Brussels has already announced that it would target Levi’s jeans, Harley-Davidson motorbikes and bourbon whiskey. The UK, which has hopes of agreeing a trade liberalisation deal with the US after Brexit, expressed alarm at Ross’s announcement. Liam Fox, the international trade secretary, said Britain would not rule out countermeasures or taking Washington to the WTO, which arbitrates on global trade disputes. Speaking to Sky News he attacked the tariffs as “patently absurd” and urged the US to think again. “It would be a great pity if we ended up in a tit-for-tat trade dispute with our closest allies.” A spokesman for Number 10 said the government was “deeply disappointed” the US had decided to apply the tariffs and that Theresa May would raise the issue with Trump at next week’s meeting of the G7 industrial nations in Canada. “The UK and other European Union countries are close allies of the US and should be permanently and fully exempted from the American measures on steel and aluminium.” The French president, Emmanuel Macron, called the US tariffs illegal and a mistake, while the Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, issued an immediate like-for-like response – announcing tariffs of up to 25% on US imports worth up to 16.6bn Canadian dollars (£9.6bn), which was the total value of Canadian steel exports to the US last year. The tariffs will cover steel and aluminium as well as orange juice, whiskey and other food products. With the White House having used national security legislation to introduce the tariffs, Trudeau called the measures an “affront” to Canadians who had fought alongside their American comrades in arms. “That Canada could be considered a national security threat to the US is inconceivable.” Canada’s foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, went further calling her country’s $16.6bn retaliatory tariffs “the strongest trade action Canada has taken in the postwar era. This is a very strong response. It is a proportionate response, it is perfectly reciprocal ... this is a very strong Canadian action in response to a very bad US decision.” Mexico also denounced the move, saying it “deeply regrets and disapproves” the US decision. The economics minstry said it would adopt equivalent measures on a variety of products, including flat steel, lamps, pork legs and shoulders, sausages and food preparations, apples, grapes, cranberries, various cheeses, and other products, “up to an amount comparable to damage caused by the United States’ action”. It added: “This measure will be in force for as long as the US government maintains the imposed tariffs.” Hopes remain that the fallout could be contained. Analysts at the research firm Oxford Economics said the economic hit for Europe would be well below 0.1% of GDP, as steel and aluminium only make up a small part of the bloc’s overall exports around the world. However, they warned a tit-for-tat escalation leading to tariffs on other goods, such as cars, would have dire consequences for global trade. Last week, the Trump administration launched a national security probe into car imports on national security grounds that could lead to tariffs on cars from Europe, Japan and South Korea, should trade tensions spiral further out of control. For the struggling UK steel industry, the news of US tariffs prompted fresh alarm. The director of UK Steel, Gareth Stace, said: “President Trump had already loaded the gun and today, we now know that the US administration has unfortunately fired it and potentially started a damaging trade war. “Since President Trump stated his plans to impose blanket tariffs on steel imports almost three months ago, the UK steel sector had hoped for the best but still feared the worst. With the expiration of the EU exemption now confirmed to take effect tomorrow [Friday, 1 June], unfortunately our pessimism was justified and we will now see damage not only to the UK steel sector but also the US economy.” Representatives for the US metal industry also expressed disappointment. “Make no mistake: restricting the raw material supply in the U.S. and imposing tariffs on imports from our closest trading partners places American manufacturers directly in harm’s way,” said Paul Nathanson of The Coalition of American Metal Manufacturers and Users. Trump trade tariffs: Europe threatens US bikes, bourbon and bluejeans Read more The CBI warned the EU against overreacting to Washington’s move. Ben Digby, international director at the employers’ organisation, said: “The president’s measures are deeply concerning for firms in the UK, for close trading partners and across supply chains.” Trump announced his tariffs in March as a way of protecting US firms from cheap imports but Digby said the problem was caused by global overproduction of the metals and needed to be tackled jointly by Brussels and Washington. “There are no winners in a trade war, which will damage prosperity on both sides of the Atlantic. These tariffs could lead to a protectionist domino effect, damaging firms, employees and consumers in the US, UK and many other trading partners. Now is not the time for any disproportionate escalation, and we urge the EU to consider this when initiating its response.” But neither side showed any immediate sign of being willing to defuse the tension. Cecilia Malmström, the European trade commissioner, said the Brussels response would be proportionate and in accordance with WTO rules. Ross shrugged off the threat of EU retaliation, saying it would have little impact on the US economy. Manfred Weber, the leader of the European People’s party, the largest group in the European parliament and a key ally of German chancellor Angela Merkel, warned that treating the EU as the “enemy” would damage US consumers. “Europe does not want a trade conflict. We believe in a fair trade regime from which everybody benefits,” he said. Sign up to the daily Business Today email or follow Guardian Business on Twitter at @BusinessDesk “We have tried everything to make dialogue and mutual understanding prevail. If President Trump decides to treat Europe as an enemy, we will have no choice but to defend European industry, European jobs, European interests.” Ross blamed insufficient progress in talks with Mexico and Canada over changes to the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta) for the US’s decision to slap tariffs on its two neighbours. Mexico’s under-secretary of foreign trade, Juan Carlos Baker, tweeted: “Mexico categorically rejects any unilateral, protectionist measures that distort trade in North America.” China, too, warned that it would respond with tit-for-tat action of its own.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2014/aug/28/actors-secrets-advice-from-the-players-book-laura-barnett

Stage

2014-08-28T06:00:00.000Z

Laura Barnett

Actors' advice to actors: 'Costumes catching fire can be fun'

On motivation Take a pessimistic look at your chances of getting work. You have to be prepared to live a hand-to-mouth existence; to take work that you don't really want to do; or to spend months going round in a van, performing to a group of moody teenagers for £2. Only a tiny minority of actors actually get through to the good, well-paid jobs. If you want it enough, you'll be prepared to put up with all the crap – but you need to accept that it's going to be really hard. Jo Brand Be honest with yourself. Ask yourself, "Can I possibly be stopped?" If you're going into acting on a whim, or for spurious reasons – because you want to be famous, or you think there might be money in it – then just turn around. You'll just get a kicking. Only the people that can't possibly be dissuaded from acting should be doing it. That's almost the minimum requirement. Paul McGann On drama school The important thing about training is that it buys you space – three years, ideally – in which to make an absolute and total berk of yourself, in front of your fellow actors, who are going through the same thing. It's a controlled environment in which you can slowly unpack your own neuroses, your inhibitions, your resistances. And if it's a well-devised course, you can slowly – having, as it were, disassembled yourself – reach back towards the light. Simon Callow It's awful that you can't get grants to go to drama school any more: it's going to be a profession full of middle-class people. I know it's expensive: if it was me now going into drama school, I wouldn't be able to go. But please still do it, whatever your background. We need you. Julie Walters Acting is not therapy. Be very sure that if the drama school does a lot of work on your personality – if it's going to take you apart – that it puts you back together again afterwards. Samuel West On auditions Imagine that you've already got the job: that they've said to you, "Great, you've got the part; can you just come in and read with the director?" It takes the pressure off. Luke Treadaway Lenny Henry: 'Learn your lines when the director tells you to.' Photograph: Sarah Lee for the Guardian I'm hopeless at auditions. I can count on two hands the number of parts I've got that way. On an audition, I wouldn't get into an amateur production of Bunty Pulls The Strings. Bill Paterson On working with directors Take notes not just graciously, but gratefully. Don't argue back. You get actors who, as soon as a director starts to give a note, will say, "Ah, what I was trying to do …" What you were trying to do is irrelevant – just listen to what the director, if it's a good director, is saying, because it's worth gold. I love notes; I thrive on then. I can't wait for someone to help me go further than I can by myself. Antony Sher Treat directors (and writers) as innocent until proven guilty. The good ones, if you don't resist them, will take you places you never thought you could reach. Harriet Walter On learning lines Learn your lines when the director tells you to. The director will sometimes say, "I want everybody to be off the book by the first day of rehearsals": so do that. Try writing your lines out, at least 10 times for each scene. Or repeat them, or have somebody run them with you. However you do it, you need to be off the book when the director says you should be. Lenny Henry Learn your lines with a friend the night before filming. Say them looking into your friend's eyes. Your friend will be distracting you. You will think you know the scene because you can do it looking at the floor, but human contact is distracting – and you want there to be human contact when you film the scene. Samuel West On Shakespeare The actor's primary responsibility is to make the text understandable at first hearing. That's quite a big thing, and quite difficult, especially if it's a fairly complicated text. Know the rules about verse-speaking. After that, I don't care whether you break those rules – just make me understand what you're saying, the first time you say it. Simon Russell Beale Luke Treadaway: 'Remember that, often, no one else knows something has gone wrong.' Photograph: Sarah Lee for the Guardian Think of long speeches as a series of connected thoughts, not one big clump of dialogue. Each thought, each sentence, is a separate piece of your armoury. Think through each sentence: about how you glue it together; what it means; how you feel when you say each thing. You'll find it comes together like a kind of delicious soup. Lenny Henry On stage fright You need to be nervous. You'd be the walking dead if you weren't. Acting is a frightening job – stepping out in front of a thousand people and saying "Watch me" for the next two-and-a-half hours. I hate people who call us "luvvies". I'd love them to learn Hamlet and then stand next to them backstage waiting to go on for the first time. Then they can talk to me about being a "luvvy". Antony Sher Accept that you're going to have nerves to begin with. I don't know many actors who aren't nervous the first time they do a performance on stage. You're nervous about whether you can remember your lines; whether you can get through it; whether the audience are going to like it; whether the other actors are going to remember their lines, or you'll have to bail somebody out. But after that, the nerves should get better. If I continually suffered with agonising, tortuous nerves, I would probably rethink my profession. Lesley Manville On when things go wrong Things going wrong makes live theatre fun. In my days at the RSC, there were some really funny mistakes: people's headdresses catching fire; people forgetting their lines. Every disastrous show you're in will yield by far the best anecdotes, and possibly the best friends. Imogen Stubbs Remember that often, no one else knows something has gone wrong. Once, during a performance of War Horse, we had a technical malfunction, and the horse didn't come out. I held out my hand as if this was absolutely meant to happen, and went, "Come on, boy." It was the longest 10 seconds of my life – another five seconds and I'd have had to start tap-dancing. But eventually they got the thing working. Afterwards, I saw Michael Morpurgo [the writer of the book on which War Horse is based] in the bar. He hadn't even noticed. Luke Treadaway On playing the long game Be nice to people on the way up. I heard a great story once. There were two sparks who really bullied this young runner. About a year later, he came on set and the same sparks were there. They started on him, told him to get them a tea. He said, "No, you get your own tea – and you're fired. I'm the producer." That's how quickly things turn around in TV. You have to be very aware of that. Mathew Horne On coping with rejection There's a philosophical nature to acting. My mother used to say, "What's for you will not go by you." It's a great phrase to keep in mind when you don't get a job. Brian Cox Remember you will fail in 99 out of 100 auditions. All actors do. Jane Asher On staying positive Acting is the best job in the world. It's miserable, and horrible, and 80% of actors are out of work. But it's also endlessly fascinating, and diverse, and without it, I would never have known about string theory, or currency exchange speculation, or Alzheimer's. And even if 80% of actors might be out of work, that means that 20% are in work. Simon Russell Beale You'll get all kinds of advice about what you should do. I'm doing it now. But to me, the main thing is just persistence. It really is. It's remarkable the number of people you'll meet in a room at a party who'll moan about their lost chances, and you'll think, they didn't really stick at it. Really, it's a combination of persistence and luck. Mark Gatiss This is an extract from Advice from the Players, by Laura Barnett, published on 18 September by Nick Hern Books, price £9.99. To order a copy for £7.99, including UK p&p, go to guardianbookshop.co.uk More theatre coverage Monologue: Actors open up about pivotal moments in their career Quiz: match the stage directions to the play Mum's the word: Helen McCrory and Diana Rigg on playing Medea The sound of Pina Bausch Will Eno: 'It takes work to sound like a real person talking'

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2015/apr/13/press-split-a-tory-tax-promise-versus-a-labour-budget-pledge

Media

2015-04-13T09:06:36.000Z

Roy Greenslade

Press split: a Tory tax promise versus a Labour budget pledge

“A t last”, says the Daily Mail today. “After two largely insipid weeks”, the Tory election campaign burst into life with the party’s promise to remove family homes worth up to £1m from inheritance tax. It praises David Cameron for freeing “more and more middle-class families” from “paying a punitive death charge that was intended only for the very wealthy”. The Daily Express is also delighted by the proposal, claiming that it amounts to “another epic stride forward” for the paper’s “crusade to end inheritance tax”. This is reinforced in an editorial and in an op-ed column by Leo McKinstry. Boris Johnson, a Tory candidate, devotes his Daily Telegraph column to praise for the idea: “Hooray. Great move, Blue team! At last we are doing something to end the unfairness of a tax that has crept up on countless ordinary families”. The Times’s editorial welcomes the promise. “Inheritance taxes are rightfully loathed”, it says while pointing out that it is “actually less of a pledge than the one made in the last Conservative manifesto”, which was blocked by the Liberal Democrats in coalition. And Trevor Kavanagh, the Sun’s associate editor, also greets the proposal. He reminds readers that the party’s similar pledge in 2007 killed off Gordon Brown’s plan for a snap election. He points out that it appeals not only to older voters but also to “inheritors in their 40s and 50s”. The Sun goes it alone with its main story of the day - on its front page, across two pages inside and an editorial. It concerns its orchestration of “a letter to Sun readers” from 100 small traders (aka “100 hard-working entrepreneurs”). The burden of the letter is that Labour’s leader Ed Miliband “would be a disaster for business”: “We feel the Conservative party is best placed to continue overseeing the recovery of the economy - while a change to Labour will have a negative impact on British business”. Its editorial bolsters the point, belabouring “Red Ed” for whose policies that “treat business as some sort of enemy: “For small, medium and large businesses, Labour is the problem, not the solution”. The central message in both the Times and the Mail is about what the latter calls an injection of passion into the campaign to beat “a left-wing Labour party obsessed with taxing and spending ever more of your money”. The Times’s splash is even headlined Passionate Cameron outlines his Tory dream and talks of the prime minister having “struck a notably more passionate and optimistic tone” in his inheritance tax speech as he tried “to jump-start his party’s campaign with a more upbeat message”. And the Daily Star’s main political story is headlined, “Put more passion into it, Cameron!” and claims it reflects a call within the Consercvative party. What it clearly does reflect is the power of Tory spin doctors to set the agenda in their briefings. Passion was obviously the word whispered to the political correspondents. Although one of the Mail’s political spreads plugs Cameron’s pledge, PM: I’ll stand up for aspiration, another one leads off with a warning from the Institute for Fiscal Studies that tax proposals by both the Tories and Labour “risk having a ‘longterm malign influence’ on the economy”. It also headlines the TV interview by Andrew Marr with the chancellor, George Osborne, in which he “repeatedly ducked questions” about how a Tory government would find the extra £8bn it has promised the NHS. The Telegraph’s choice of splash is interesting: Labour plea to voters: the economy is safe with us. It’s built around the leak of one page of Labour’s manifesto, entitled “Budget Responsibility Lock”. It reveals that Miliband will “put Labour’s fiscal credibility at the heart of the party’s manifesto” by cutting the deficit every year to get national debt falling and obtain a surplus on the current budget as soon as possible in the next parliament. The Guardian, here, the Financial Times, here, and the Independent, here, carry similar stories on their front pages. The Daily Mirror is positively ectastic in running a poster-style front page with Miliband’s picture and the headline, “My pledge”, plus an inside spread.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2012/jul/10/beach-boys-children-tribute-band

Music

2012-07-10T11:42:23.000Z

Sean Michaels

Beach Boys' children form tribute band

The Beach Boys' children have started their own group. Billed as "the next chapter in the story of America's band", California Saga is a tribute act formed by eight of the Beach Boys' offspring, as well as the late Carl Wilson's brother-in-law. "We're not just getting up there because we're 'the children of …'" Adam Jardine told the Ventura County Star. "We're celebrating these songs that we love." It's this love – and a headline-grabbing pedigree – that brought together Al Jardine's sons Adam and Matt, Brian Wilson's daughters Carnie and Wendy, Mike Love's children Ambha and Christian, and the sons of Carl and Dennis Wilson, Justyn and Carl B. The band is rounded out by Billy Hinsche, a longtime side-man whose sister was married to Carl, and Carnie's husband Rob Bonfiglio. "The songs that we're doing are so fucking beautiful, and so stunning, and the harmonies are so complex that it's taking an enormous amount of effort to make them just right," said Carnie Wilson, the group's "pitch master". "It's gruelling and it's tedious, but it's worth it." California Saga performed their first two shows in June, opening for the reunited Beach Boys, and they will play again on Tuesday at Los Angeles' Grammy Museum. They have focused on rare and lesser-known songs from the Beach Boys' back catalogue, such as I Can Hear Music, Darlin' and Anna Lee, The Healer. Although the band have yet to announce any UK shows, they are represented by the Beach Boys' management and Carnie, at least, would like to see them record their own albums. "We are hoping to go places with the sound and the material – offering people something that has never been offered … [and] maybe even [writing] an original or two," she said. "We just have to see what makes sense." Earlier this year, Paul McCartney's son, James, said he had discussed forming a band with some of the other Beatles progeny. Ringo Starr has since thrown cold water on that idea, telling WENN that neither of his sons "are going to do it".

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/feb/04/neomelodica-the-italian-pop-loved-by-the-mob-and-hated-by-the-law

Music

2022-02-04T10:00:25.000Z

Giorgio Ghiglione

Neomelodica: the Italian pop loved by the mob and hated by the law

Tony Colombo is one of the biggest names in neomelodica, an Italian music style combining elements of traditional Neapolitan song (think O Sole Mio) with modern pop influences. He has released more than 20 albums, held concerts across Italy, Germany, Canada and the US, and has hordes of fans. It is also alleged that part of his fortune comes from laundering money for the Camorra, the Neapolitan mafia , made famous through its depiction in Roberto Saviano’s book Gomorrah and its TV adaptation. On 21 December, the Italian police confiscated goods from Colombo including an apartment, two cars and €80,000 (£66,000). In 2019, Colombo married the widow of a Camorra boss and he has reportedly been seen at parties thrown by the Camorra; prosecutors believe he has received dirty money from his wife’s clan and attempted to pass them as proceeds from his music career. He has always denied any involvement with organised crime. It isn’t an isolated case. Neomelodica singers are often accused of colluding with the Camorra – sometimes by their actions, sometimes through their music. And, as the authorities circle around Colombo, the Italian parliament is also discussing a law criminalising the glorification of the mob that seems specifically drafted to target some neomelodici. Tony Colombo performing in Naples in 2016. Photograph: Pacific Press Media Production Corp./Alamy It somewhat mirrors other disputes across the globe. London drill rappers, for example, are censored by police fearful that their songs could instigate gang violence; Spanish rapper Pablo Hasel was arrested for glorifying terrorism and insulting the monarchy in his lyrics, while musicians led by Jay-Z argued this month for a change in New York law to mean lyrics cannot be used as criminal evidence. “These days, you go on TikTok and it’s all guns and money,” says Gianni Fiorellino, another popular neomelodici – who has no links to organised crime, but is dismayed at the idea his style could be censored. “I don’t see why that should be allowed and lyrics about organised crime should not.” Neomelodica was born in the 1980s as a reaction to societal change and the crisis of the canzone napoletana, the traditional, hyper-sentimental Neapolitan song (sometimes accompanied by mandolin or guitar) that bloomed in the early 19th century. By the 70s canzone napoletana had fallen out of fashion, and around the same period its hotbed, Naples, underwent a transformation, with the creation of neighbourhoods completely segregated from the city’s polite society. “In a way, neomelodica was to Naples what hip-hop was to America, it gave a voice to impoverished neighbourhoods,” says Marcello Ravveduto, a history professor at the University of Salerno. Whereas canzone napoletana was representing a picture-perfect, idealised Naples, neomelodici began depicting the harsh reality of its peripheries. Neomelodica was to Naples what hip-hop was to America, it gave a voice to impoverished neighbourhoods Marcello Ravveduto Blending Neapolitan dialect with Italian, neomelodici sing of lost lovers and betrayal, teenage sex and divorce, drugs and broken homes. Some of them also sing of organised crime, a topic the fanbase would be familiar with, touching issues such as latitanza, mob soldiers going into hiding; and pentitismo, arrested mob soldiers collaborating with the police. “It’s a music rooted in the territory, with great melodies, where lyrics are central – they are like a mirror of Neapolitan sentiment,” says Fiorellino, who has released about 12 albums. Emiliana Cantone at Napoli Pride last year. Photograph: Pacific Press Media Production Corp./Alamy Fiorellino is one of the few neomelodici who has performed in Italy’s most important music festival, Sanremo, but, aside from a few exceptions such as him and Gigi D’Alessio, Italy’s mainstream culture frowns upon neomelodica. For one, it is associated with urban poverty, while some neomelodica hits openly describe the Camorra, and more rarely the Sicilian Cosa Nostra. Tommy Riccio’s Nu’ Latitante is about hiding from justice, away from your family. Then there’s Lisa Castaldi’s Il Mio Amico Camorrista (My Camorra Friend), and Gianni Vezzosi’s ’O Killer or Carcere Minorile (Juvenile Prison). Ravveduto describes such songs as “a way to justify a way of being”. On one hand, those songs are critiques of society, and the way it pushes people toward crime; on the other, they take pride in otherness, and in resorting to violence to get what you want. Some view these songs as a propaganda tool for the mob, and this criticism has become more vocal. Before streaming, neomelodica used to be broadcast by small local radio stations, sometimes directly controlled by organised crime, but the internet has turned the genre into a near-national phenomenon. Last April, protests by anti-mafia activists forced Niko Pandetta to cancel a concert in Ostia, near Rome. Pandetta, a Sicilian who stands out for combining neomelodica with trap, is also the nephew of a prominent Cosa Nostra boss, Salvatore “Turi” Cappello. He dedicated his first hit to his uncle. The lawmaker Stefania Ascari has presented a bill that would make it illegal to glorify the mafia. She says she doesn’t want to target neomelodica as a genre, but only those artists “who are close to organised crime”, and points out that Camorra has exploited neomelodica to send veiled messages. For instance, two years ago, a group of mobsters detained in a high-security prison near Avellino shot a video to the beat of the song Si Sto’ Carcerato (The Inmate, by Tommy Riccio) to send the message that their clan stood strong, even behind bars. “Yes, I am an inmate, it was a life choice,” went the lyrics, as they waved to their families. “If you’re in a high-security prison and all detainees ask for neomelodica songs, you start wondering why,” says Ascari. Fiorellino is sceptical of the bill, even though it would not target his purely romantic songs. Ravveduto says the idea makes sense, at least in theory – “when songs glorify mafia powers, they should get them out of the market” – but in practice, he believes, there’s a risk that such a measure could turn into a boomerang. There’s a precedent in Mexico, where some northern states banned narcocorridos, the songs glorifying drug smugglers, and ended up turning them into the hymns for rebel youth. “If you crack down on music, you could end up providing the mob with new propaganda ammunition,” he says. “They could end up with even more leverage on the youth: ‘See, authorities don’t even let you express yourself.’”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/aug/09/alistair-darling-rbs-said-they-would-run-out-of-money-in-early-afternoon

Business

2017-08-09T07:59:03.000Z

Angela Monaghan

Alistair Darling: 'RBS said it would run out of money in early afternoon'

Alistair Darling has revealed his “most scary moment” of the financial crisis, which began a decade ago. The former Labour chancellor of the exchequer said he received a shocking phone call from Royal Bank of Scotland in 2008, revealing a run on the bank. He told the BBC: “I had to go to one of these meetings of European finance ministers, and I was asked to come out and take a call from the then chairman of RBS [Tom McKillop], who said the bank was haemorrhaging money. “Remember this was not only the biggest in the world, it was about the same size as the entire UK economy. “I said to him: ‘How long can you last?’ And what he said to me shook me to the core. He said: ‘Well we’re going to run out of money in the early afternoon.’” Lord Darling said there would have been “blind panic” had the government not intervened. RBS was bailed out by taxpayers later that year, and the government still owns a 71% stake in the bank. He added that the biggest danger regarding a future crisis was complacency. “In a few years’ time, when institutional memories start to fade and the people around have all gone and retired, then that’s where the risk occurs,” he said. Wednesday marks the 10th anniversary of the decision by BNP Paribas to suspend three of its funds with major exposure to bonds backed by US sub-prime mortgages. The French bank said at the time it was unable to place a value on them because the market for these products, or “securities”, had dried up. Jack Lew, the former US Treasury secretary and an adviser to Barack Obama during the financial crisis, recalled the intensity of the situation as it unfolded. “I’d never seen a situation where every single day numbers were so much different and worse than the day before that you had to come back and keep revisiting how much fiscal stimulus the economy would need in order to stimulate a recovery,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. He said there was a danger in the US of an emerging resistance against tougher banking regulations introduced in the aftermath of the crisis, as memories of the turmoil begin to dim. “One thing I worry about is that the memory of the financial crisis, as we approach the 10-year mark, is starting to fade a bit. Crash course: what the Great Depression reveals about our future Read more “We all know that crises will come in the future, what we don’t know is when and how. What Wall Street reform did was for the first time since the Great Depression gave us the ability to have tools where we could deal with an evolving financial system to have the safeguards that we need. Even before [the US presidential] election you saw a great pushback among many, saying this has gone too far.” He said it would be difficult to predict how a future crisis might unfold. “The risks of the future are unlikely to come from the precise places that they’ve come in the past. In a rapidly evolving financial system new risks can develop out of things that don’t appear initially, that don’t appear to contain that kind of possibility.” The former US treasury secretary Jack Lew said he was worried that memories of the financial crisis were starting to fade. Photograph: Gary Cameron/Reuters Meanwhile, Sir John Gieve said there would be no rerun of the 2008 financial crisis. The Bank of England’s deputy governor for financial stability between 2006 and 2009 told Today: “I don’t think we’ll see a repeat of what happened 10 years ago because banks have far more capital, there are far more regulations on their liquidity and funding which was a big issue then, and of course they have spent the last 10 years dealing with the problems raised ... so there isn’t the exuberance that we certainly saw then.” He said debt levels in the UK were more manageable than a decade ago, but flagged up concerns about China. “In the UK and most of the west the debt levels are more manageable now. We’ve yet to see how they will be affected by a return of positive interest rates, because we’ve had 10 years of super-expansionist monetary policy and we’ve yet to see how we can get out of that. “The main debt which threatens a sudden break is probably in the far east and China which has been running a credit binge now for a decade and is showing signs of over-extension.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2023/sep/27/european-roundup-napoli-inter-milan-girona-real-madrid

Football

2023-09-27T21:58:57.000Z

Guardian sport

Victor Osimhen on target in Napoli win, Sassuolo end Inter’s unbeaten start

Victor Osimhen was on the scoresheet for Napoli as the defending Serie A champions earned a welcome 4-1 home win over Udinese on Wednesday. The Nigeria forward struck in the first half and offered a muted celebration, after a week where his agent has discussed “the right to take legal action” after Napoli posted a bizarre video on TikTok that seemingly mocked the player. The video, which has now been deleted, featured a clip of the striker’s penalty miss from their 0-0 draw with Bologna on Sunday. Before Wednesday’s victory, Napoli manager Rudi Garcia admitted to tension caused by “awkward things on social media” but insisted Osimhen would “do his best for Napoli”. Victor Osimhen could take legal action against Napoli over TikTok video Read more This was a welcome return to form for Napoli after three league games without a win, with Piotr Zielinski striking from the penalty spot before Osimhen slotted home from Matteo Politano’s pass. Khvicha Kvaratskhelia struck both posts before finally ending his goal drought with a dinked finish in the 74th minute. Lazar Samardzic pulled a goal back for Udinese but Napoli quickly reopened their three-goal lead as Giovanni Simeone, brought on in the second half for Osimhen, headed home Kvaratskhelia’s cross. Internazionale’s perfect start to the season came to an abrupt end as they were beaten 2-1 by Sassuolo at San Siro. Denzel Dumfries put Inter in front with a low shot just before the break, but the visitors levelled nine minutes into the second half when Yann Sommer allowed Nedim Bajrami’s angled shot over the line. Domenico Berardi sealed victory for the visitors nine minutes later with a powerful strike from distance into the bottom corner, and Simone Inzaghi’s side could not find an equaliser as they suffered their first defeat of the Serie A season. Domenico Berardi celebrates with teammates at the final whistle. Photograph: Gabriel Bouys/AFP/Getty Images Milan moved level on points with their local rivals after fighting back to win 3-1 at promoted Cagliari, with English duo Fikayo Tomori and Ruben Loftus-Cheek both on target. Zito Luvumbo fired the hosts in front with a left-footed rocket into the top corner after 29 minutes, but Noah Okafor levelled for Milan 10 minutes later. Tomori bundled the ball home from close range to give Stefano Pioli’s side the half-time lead, before keeper Boris Radunovic denied Loftus-Cheek with an outstretched foot. The former Chelsea midfielder did get on the scoresheet on the hour mark, firing home with a powerful strike from outside the penalty area. “I’m very happy. It was a difficult game, we knew they’d come out fast, they got the first goal, but we stuck together and stayed strong mentally,” Loftus-Cheek told Dazn. Earlier on Wednesday, Milan announced plans to leave San Siro and build a new 70,000-seater stadium in the suburb of San Donato. Sign up to Soccer with Jonathan Wilson Free weekly newsletter Jonathan Wilson brings expert analysis on the biggest stories from European soccer Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Austria Salzburg refuse to play second fiddle to Red Bull 18 years after split Read more Elsewhere, Matias Vecino and Mattia Zaccagni were on target for Lazio as they earned a 2-0 home victory over Torino. Teun Koopmeiners’ early goal proved enough for Atalanta to hold on to their top-four place with a 1-0 win at Verona. La Liga: Girona go top, Real bounce back Girona are the surprise new La Liga leaders as they continued their unbeaten start to the season with a comeback victory at Villarreal. Dani Parejo put the hosts ahead with a 49th-minute penalty kick, but Artem Dovbyk levelled with a far-post header in the 56th minute. Eric García, on loan from Barcelona, put the visitors in front five minutes later with another header and Girona held on to sit one point clear of Real Madrid. Eric García headed the winner as Girona made it six La Liga wins in succession. Photograph: Andreu Esteban/EPA Carlo Ancelotti’s side bounced back from their painful derby loss to Atlético with a 2-0 home win over lowly Las Palmas, with Brahim Díaz and Joselu on target. The hosts were guilty of missing a host of chances in the first half before Díaz broke the deadlock with a close-range strike from Lucas Vázquez’s pass just before the interval. Joselu then headed home from Rodrygro’s lofted cross in the second half to secure victory for Real, who visit Girona on Saturday evening. Kieran Tierney’s quick free-kick set up Carlos Fernández for the winner as Real Sociedad earned a 1-0 win at Valencia, who had Selim Amallah sent off. Athletic Bilbao were twice pegged back by Getafe in a 2-2 draw at San Mamés.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2016/apr/01/this-weeks-new-theatre

Stage

2016-04-01T12:00:28.000Z

Mark Cook

This week’s new theatre

Buzzcut, Glasgow This experimental performance festival boasts an unrivalled programme of radical work hailing from both Scotland and further afield. There are 60 shows, selected from more than 400 applications, and the range of work means that there’s something for everyone. Look out for returning artists such as Nic Green, Emma Frankland, Foxy and Husk, Richard Layzell and Getinthebackofthevan’s Lucy McCormick, with newcomers heading to Glasgow for the first time including Ria Hartley and Scrimshaw Collective. The set-up is pay what you can and the atmosphere relaxed. Pearce Institute, Wed to 10 Apr LG Clybourne Park, Colchester Lorraine Hansberry’s 1959 play A Raisin In The Sun tells the story of the Youngers, an African American family who put down a deposit on a house in the fictional suburb of Clybourne Park in Chicago, a majority white neighbourhood. In Hansberry’s work, the Youngers are not to move in. Conversely, in Bruce Norris’s 2010 spin-off, while the white vendors are encouraged not to sell to the Youngers, we fast forward to the present day to find that the area is now predominately black. As such, a white couple attempting to move in find themselves unwelcome. Norris’s drama is sharply funny and skewers all sorts of liberal pieties. An incendiary mix of class and race, this is a bold choice for the Mercury. Mercury Theatre, Fri to 23 Apr LG Boy, London BOY An ordinary youth at a bus stop is the starting point for Leo Butler’s new play, appropriately entitled Boy, which uses his journey as a portrait of coming of age in austerity-hit London. For 10 years, Sheffield-born Butler worked with young writers at the Royal Court, which was where his second play, Redundant, was premiered in 2001. This production, involving 25 actors, is also the jumping-off point for a joint project with the Arsenal Foundation to get young people from north London involved in theatre. It’s directed by Sacha Wares, who returns to the Islington venue alongside award-winning designer Miriam Buether after last year’s highly praised Game, about the negative effects of rising property prices. Almeida Theatre, N1, Tue to 28 May MC Goosebumps Alive, London Although RL Stine’s Goosebumps books are the second most popular children’s series ever behind Harry Potter – having shifted 400 million copies worldwide – this new piece of immersive theatre is an altogether more grown-up affair. On entering The Vaults, an arts space nestled in disused tunnels beneath Waterloo Station, punters will be buried alive and manhandled by monsters as they journey through a series of 19 rooms. Scenes are based on tales such as Stay Out Of The Basement, Night Of The Living Dummy and Say Cheese, And Die! There’s an original score, too, from The Tiger Lillies of Shockheaded Peter fame, who will perform live at some performances. Although visitors 12 and up are welcome, children must be accompanied by a guardian – a parallel experience for younger audiences, Goosebumps Kids, opens 14 May. The Vaults, SE1, Wed to 4 Sep MC Men & Girls Dance, Folkestone Fevered Sleep. Photograph: Karen Robinson The title shouldn’t be a provocation, but of course it is. The idea of men over the age of 35 dancing with prepubescent girls is not one that is easily accepted in a society where adult relationships with children are, however innocent, often viewed with suspicion and fear. The project, aimed at adult audiences and hoping to raise discussion and debate, is the brainchild of Fevered Sleep, the fine cross-art form company that has made some excellent work over the last 20 years, much but not all of it for children. This work will prompt many questions: what does it mean for an adult man to dance in public with a young girl? How will it be viewed? Will you feel uncomfortable watching? The show will be performed by male professionals working with local children who dance for fun, and tour to venues across the country (to 29 Oct). Quarterhouse, Fri to 9 Apr LG Laila: The Musical, Watford British Asian theatre company Rifco had a big hit with 2010 musical Britain’s Got Bhangra, so there are high hopes for this production inspired by the ancient Persian story of unconsummated love, which is often described as the Romeo And Juliet of the east. In fact, it predates Shakespeare’s play by many centuries, and is best known because of a 12th-century poem by Nizami Ganjavi. This modern retelling is written and directed by Pravesh Kumar with music by Sumeet Chopra and lyrics by Dougal Irvine. It sees a young woman called Laila take refuge from the rain in a bookshop, where she finds a book that has her name on it. Soon she is swept up in the story and the tragedy that ensues. Or does it? Can Laila’s fate can be rewritten? Palace Theatre, Sat to 17 Apr LG

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/jan/10/whats-the-secret-of-packing-light-for-a-holiday-ask-my-mum

Opinion

2024-01-10T16:30:46.000Z

Adrian Chiles

What’s the secret of packing light for a holiday? Ask my mum | Adrian Chiles

I’m rubbish at packing. Be it for a night away or for several months, I’m hopeless. I never, but never, fail to forget something essential. A toothbrush, medication, pants, the suitcase itself – you name it. And always, but always, more than half of what I take isn’t needed. I’ve given up worrying about this. When I was a younger man I was foolish enough to harbour hopes of one day wanting for nothing while I was away. Never happened; never will. But I’d rather be me than one of those clever dicks who fits enough for a month in the tiniest, piddliest little cases which, notwithstanding their laughable smallness, are nevertheless equipped with no fewer than four wheels. Four! You see them in airports, these things, their smug owners wheeling them around like they’re walking prim little poodles off to the shops. I curse them all, apart from my mum. She has many gifts, and this is her greatest. Weeks before going off to Croatia for months on end, she will begin packing the very tiniest of wheelie bags. Honestly, I take a bigger bag to work. I bought it for her, partly as a joke. “This is too small, even for you,” I said. I was wrong. She doesn’t so much pack it as curate it. Over many weeks, bits go in, come out, are turned around and upside down and endlessly rearranged. Come departure day I am summoned to sit on the thing to facilitate zip closure. By now this tiny bit of luggage is improbably heavy, like one of those remarkably dense metals. She can barely wheel it, let alone lift it. If flying alone, she is reliant on the kindness of strangers to get it up into the overhead bin. Many a poor chap has had his holiday ruined, his back in spasm having been fooled by the size and assumed light weight. Meanwhile all I can do is take the biggest suitcases I can carry and stuff them with anything and everything that comes to hand. The more I pack, the fewer things it’ll turn out I haven’t got. Pitiable logic, I know, but it’s how I have found my peace. How liberating it is to travel without hope. Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster, writer and Guardian columnist Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2022/jun/02/a-pirate-captain-cook-and-his-own-head-in-a-jar-the-subversive-satire-of-daniel-boyd

Art and design

2022-06-01T17:30:17.000Z

Steve Dow

A pirate Captain Cook and his own head in a jar: the subversive satire of Daniel Boyd

The stories of Aboriginal warriors who fought British colonisation, among them Windradyne, Yagan and Jandamarra, provide cultural affirmation for many Indigenous Australians. For the artist Daniel Boyd, it was Pemulwuy, the Bidjigal clan man who led a long guerrilla war that began shortly after the arrival of the First Fleet, who became a personal source of strength. Rare Aboriginal art to return to Australia after Victorian government chips in $500,000 at last minute Read more “He was one of the first visible people to lead the resistance against the colony,” says Boyd, a 40-year-old Kudjala, Gangalu, Wangerriburra, Wakka Wakka, Gubbi Gubbi, Kuku Yalanji and Bundjalung man with ni-Vanuatu heritage. The Sydney-based artist is preparing to open his first major career survey, Treasure Island, at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. We’re seated in his industrial studio in Marrickville; his partner, the “retired artist” Belle Charter, and their four-year-old daughter – the youngest of four children – have dropped by to bring him a morning coffee. Perhaps most recognisable for his detailed dot paintings of Indigenous leaders, Australian landscapes and his own family, Boyd also has a satirical streak that dates back to his university days, when he first saw a portrait of Captain James Cook, by the British artist John Webber, in the National Portrait Gallery. Boyd wanted to “make sense of the power this painting has on the Australian public” and, through his art, began to undermine the hero myth of British explorers. Colonial figures suddenly had eye patches, wooden legs and cutlasses, Boyd likening imperial annexation to acts of piracy. We Call Them Pirates Out Here, 2006, oil on canvas. Photograph: © Daniel Boyd “The language of power that were in those 18th and 19th century portraits, the power of representation – these are things that I was particularly interested in,” he says. “I was interested in the language of how we’re represented as people.” Pemulwuy was not honoured with portraiture. When the warrior was shot dead in 1802, after 12 years of raids on the colonists, his severed head was sent to Sir Joseph Banks, the British botanist who accompanied Cook’s south sea expedition to mark the transit of Venus. Having nominated NSW as a settlement, Banks was a powerful figure, and crucial for the expansion of the British empire, a trading economy of tea, sugar, agriculture – and slavery. By the time Banks received Pemulwuy’s head preserved in a jar of alcohol, he was back in London, where he served as the first president of the Royal Society. The whereabouts of Pemulwuy’s head today is unknown, his skull perhaps removed forever from view – while Banks and Cook linger on, in oils and in textbooks. Sir No Beard 2007, Art Gallery of New South Wales. Photograph: © Daniel Boyd Boyd painted his own head in his 2007 work Sir No Beard, at the feet of Banks, who is depicted wearing an eye patch. The painting ties colonisation to a larger landscape of oppression against Aboriginal people in which church and state were complicit. Boyd’s parents, part of the stolen generations, had their earliest movements controlled and documented when they were forced to live on the Anglican Yarrabah mission, just south of Cairns (which Boyd has also painted.) “I inserted my decapitated head in a jar into these portraits as a tool to acknowledge how, when I was growing up, I’d be trying to understand why people engage with [Indigenous people] the way they do,” Boyd says. “The suppression of cultural inheritance that comes with the state and the church … my language was denied to me because the church and the state wouldn’t allow that transference of culture.” Against a wall in his studio leans a new work depicting the late US boxer Muhammad Ali, outside the Redfern Legal Service during a trip to Australia in 1979. That painting is destined for a group show in Los Angeles that will draw connections between the US civil rights movement and Indigenous Australians’ ongoing fight for truth telling. The global sweep of the Black Lives Matter movement was “extremely important”, says Boyd: “[Australians] let their guards down when they saw what was happening elsewhere, not understanding that [injustice] was happening here. And it’s been happening here forever.” Untitled (SCAMSCI), 2018, oil and archival glue on linen. Photograph: © Daniel Boyd With Treasure Island, Boyd hopes to unpack the unacknowledged history of slavery in Australia. His own great-great-grandfather, Samuel, was kidnapped from Pentecost Island in Vanuatu, and enslaved on Queensland’s sugar cane fields. “He had my great-grandfather with a Kuku Yalanji woman, and their son was removed from their care, because they were a mixed-race couple,” says Boyd. “Their relationship fell apart after he was stolen from them.” Samuel was buried in Maryborough. Later, some of Boyd’s maternal ancestors survived massacres in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, amid conflict over land use as the cotton industry was established in Queensland, alongside wool and cattle. Did Boyd, born in 1982, feel a connection to Country? While pandemic lockdowns have restricted his travel back to Cairns of late, Boyd has been learning more about his ancestral connections to different places. “You create associations if you’re dislocated. You have to,” he says. Untitled (TBOMB), 2020, oil, synthetic polymer paint and archival glue on canvas. Photograph: © Daniel Boyd Several years ago, he travelled to London’s Natural History Museum and made art from archival boxes that had contained Indigenous human remains that had been shared among anatomists and anthropologists. “I make works about histories that are negated, or don’t necessarily get the attention they deserve,” he says. “Global dialogues around equity and diversity are very present at the moment. The centres are collapsing … the repetition of dominant narratives is a thing of the past. We have to embrace diversity now.” Does he mean we ignore Indigenous knowledge at our own peril? “Yeah, exactly. This country has a legacy of imposing its will on the environment. We should listen to experience. My studio here floods, because it’s built on swamp, you know? If it gets too wet, like it did recently, and there’s a high tide, water comes into the studio.” Sign up for the fun stuff with our rundown of must-reads, pop culture and tips for the weekend, every Saturday morning Sign up to receive Guardian Australia’s weekend culture and lifestyle email What does he hope to pass on to his four daughters, who range in age from four to 13? “It’s about giving them the tools to deal with how they move through time and space,” he says. “Hopefully give them the confidence to deal with adversity and instil in them the idea that they are their own selves, that they are unique, that they don’t have to belong to a particular narrative of a group of people or a way of being. That they take advantage of the opportunities that my parents didn’t have. I hope that they have a more equitable future.” Treasure Island opens at the Art Gallery of New South Wales on 4 June and runs to January 2023.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/dec/18/vaclav-havel

World news

2011-12-18T12:51:29.000Z

WL Webb

Václav Havel obituary

When, to the surprise of western chancelleries, central Europe changed utterly in the autumn and winter of 1989, it was a stocky Czech dramatist lately released from prison who produced the abiding metaphor for what had happened. In 1947, after Yalta and Potsdam, said Václav Havel, who has died aged 75 after a long illness, the clock of history had been stopped in his half of Europe – and now it had started again. Havel's own career might resemble the very incarnation of that metaphor – of the notion it encapsulates of communism as no more than a bracket in history, a long deviation from the onward march of capitalism's permanent revolution. The son and grandson of wealthy architect-entrepreneurs, and on his mother's side, grandson of a writer who was an ambassador, then a government minister, the young Havel and his family suffered the discomforts of sequestration and class discrimination when the communists took power in 1948. For a time, his father was imprisoned and the family banished from Prague. Václav had to leave school at 15 and was refused higher education. After five years as a laboratory assistant and a spell of national service in the engineer corps (following Soviet practice, sons of the politically unreliable classes were often trained as sappers, readily expendable in mine-sweeping), he nevertheless made his way into the theatre and the world of literary politics, and wrote clever, politically risky plays in the absurdist manner that won him an international reputation. After the Soviet invasion that turned the Prague spring of 1968 to long winter, he became a leading dissident, a founder of Charter 77 and Vons (the Czech acronym of Committee for the Defence of the Unjustly Prosecuted), and spent much of his 40s in and out of prison. Finally, he emerged as the effective voice of the crowds that, after 20 years of sullen resentment, at last exploded in Wenceslas Square in the winter of 1989 and, having postered all of freezing Prague with the slogan Havel na Hrad! (Havel to the Castle!), did indeed send him across the river and up the hill to the castle as president of the reborn republic. A kind of restoration, then? In fact, it was more complicated and more interesting than that, just as Havel's tenancy of the Hradcany Hradcany castle, as well as being a happy ending – triumph after long struggle – was also the beginning of a period when politics became far more complicated. Like his Polish comrade in arms, Adam Michnik, Havel soon registered a mood of unease with the former dissidents turned politicians acting for a public that had mostly not been particularly brave or oppositional, and wanted to forget about "all that" and get on with getting and spending. Now, struggling with the constraints of a weak form of presidency, Havel found himself at odds with many of the political and economic views of the abrasive, new haute bourgeoisie represented by Václav Klaus and his monetarist government party which had emerged as successor to the decayed regime. At first it had seemed that the dominant voice emerging in the post-communist era would be a kind of social democracy. Many of Havel's allies in the Civic Forum, the umbrella organisation of opposition, were social democrats who had been among what he used to call the anti-dogmatic wing of the Czech Communist party before the events of August 1968. He himself had never joined the party, and while closer to social democracy than any other form of organised politics, his beliefs drew on a mixture of the political liberalism of Czechoslovakia's prewar philosopher-president Thomas Masaryk and a homespun though long-pondered philosophy of his own, derived from his reading of Edmund Husserl and concerns about the dangers that late 20th-century materialism posed. But enrichissez-vous was more the European tradition preoccupying his Thatcherite opponents. Havel, they implied, was a foggy-minded, impractical idealist. What he really wanted to do with the clock of history was to put it back – to the early, optimistic days of Masaryk's new Czech democracy. It was not long into Havel's presidency before it became clear that history was not resuming itself in any simple way in the new circumstances in which Czechoslovakia found itself. A division had grown between the free-marketry of Klaus's party and the Slovak emphasis on devolution and more interventionist economic policies. On 1 January 1993, the people of what became the Czech Republic were divorced from their brethren in Slovakia (to Havel's real distress, though there was nothing more he could have done to stop the secession). What was striking about Havel's life and career is that its contradictions seemed to be the very means by which his life and work hung together with great consistency. Some were more apparent than real, such as the contrasting (as if a falsity was being shrewdly detected) of the deep seriousness of his public, political utterances with the informal gaiety, even glamour, of his refurbishing of the castle above the Vltava. Within months of his arrival, he had it spectacularly lit at night by Jan Svoboda, Prague's great set designer, and new costumes for the guard were commissioned from the costume designer of Miloš Forman's film Amadeus. The young president scuttled along the endless corridors, zooming on a child's scooter from meeting to meeting, surrounded by vibrant young collaborators from artistic and intellectual life, under walls newly hung with modern paintings. (An early profile described his secretary as "a busty hippy in a skintight, purple mini-dress, with filigreed white stockings, lace-up boots and funkily mismatched earrings". But this, after all, was Bara Stepanova, one of the heroines of the Society for a Merrier Present, a Dadaish troupe given to posing as riot police in the November demonstrations, and threatening the crowd with cucumbers and salamis. When she produced the scooter, Havel, then still secretary-less, hired her on the spot.) Havel, of course, was staging a different kind of play. He felt instinctively the need to shake the place out of its long gloom and cheer up his depressed compatriots by celebrating with some show and style the overthrow of the dour and philistine satrapy that had preserved their isolation. And it would have been naive to suppose that the author of plays such as The Garden Party and The Memorandum, with their devastating assault on alienated thought and language, would not have something urgent to say about the dangers facing post-industrial societies, in a mode of discourse by then familiar to any reader of the samizdat essays or the Letters to Olga, his reflective writings from prison cast in the form of letters to his wife (the only kind of writing allowed him, once a week). A more significant contradiction was the effect of a privileged childhood on the way he understood life. When one of the few wartime bombs dropped on Prague damaged their apartment, his family had retreated to Moravia, where "a fat little model child" taken to a village school with village children by his governess first experienced the shame of privileged difference. Twenty years later, he still recalled the burden of those early "advantages" which produced feelings of inferiority, not superiority. "I longed for equality with others, not because I was some kind of infant social revolutionary, but because I felt separate and excluded ... alone, inferior, ridiculed." And in one of the prison letters, he described how he felt "never quite sure that my inclusion in the world won't turn out to be illusory, fraudulent and temporary". This left him with the gnawing, Kafkaesque -like question: had he perhaps "a fatal flaw that prevents me from merg ing wholly with the order of things"? The reality of these feelings is evident, and they were regularly reinforced and played upon in the world of work – he had to leave school in the grim year of the show trial and execution of Rudolf Slánský, the purged deputy leader of the first postwar government – and during his national service. He once recalled how at the successful first night of one of his plays in the Vienna Volkstheater in 1968, taking bows on stage to the audience shouting "Havel! Havel!" he had suddenly "an intense feeling that somewhere in the wings ... there was this corporal who had given me a really hard time, and that he was about to shout 'Havel! Havel! Hit the floor! Let's have no more shit from you.'" This habit of looking at the world "from below", from "outside", was a key to his plays and his acute feeling for the absurd. He acknowledged his love for and debt to Samuel Beckett and Eugène Ionesco – even more to his countryman Kafka, who, he would remind you sternly, was a comic writer, an inspirer of laughter in the dark. But he felt that his own writing was driven primarily by the experience he had described, in an attempt to grapple with that old sense of not being at home in the world. It developed as he learned about the theatre. When he left the army, he had the good fortune to be taken on as a stagehand at the ABC – a relic of the Liberated Theatre of the 1930s, presided over by his father's friend Jan Werich – and then at the new Theatre on the Balustrade, which was a seedbed of the wave of experiment and innovation that was to flourish in all the arts in Prague in the 1960s. But the real understanding of what he had to do came as he began to take in, in a way that brought its own liberation, the extent to which the painful absurdities of life provided an objective correlative for this personal sense of alienation. Looking at the plays and the life, it is not always easy to see the difference between imagined fiction and unimaginable fact, art often having a hard time keeping up with "nature" in that time and place. The Memorandum (1965), with its bursts of ptydepe, a pseudo-speech mocking the opaque cant of contemporary officialese, also quotes the notorious instruction of the party boss Antonín Novotný about "not falling on our knees before facts". And what is one to make of the counsel for a co-defendant in his 1979 trial – after Havel set up the Committee for the Defence of the Unjustly Prosecuted – who, quite without irony, congratulated the state prosecutor on his case and apologised for having to advance a plea of not guilty? Havel got four and a half years. "Shyness and courage, both very extreme – that's Havel," his friend Forman once said, though Havel would only admit to having been "a non-coward" in circumstances where he could not avoid choosing between cowardice and what he called non-cowardice. Those disturbing but educative early experiences did not inhibit Havel in his direct encounters with authority. His politics too were formed by "the view from outside". He left his mark on the sensibilities of the cultural commissars from the moment of his literary debut in 1956, when, on the strength of one article published in a new magazine, Kveten, he was invited to take part in a conference held to introduce – and keep an eye on – young authors at the Writers' Union's grand country quarters in the baroque palace of Dobris. Writing poems in the margins of his laboratory work, Havel had found his way to the table of the banned poet Jiri Kola at the Cafe Slavia, and through him and Jaroslav Seifert had met the reclusive Vladimír Holan, the other great, and rarely published, Czech modernist. In his Kveten article, Havel had asked why the magazine and its young writers were not going to school with the older poets of Group 42 (which had been set up in 1942), why they did not even know their work. Now, blushing but highly articulate (and just as Soviet tanks were rolling through Budapest), the 19-year-old took advantage of this uncensored forum to lambast the assembled literary establishment for its conformity in a speech that dominated the weekend's proceedings. The establishment duly noted him, long before his success as a playwright. He might even have shamed or encouraged some of that part of it that began to form the "antidogmatic" wing among the party's writers, with whom Havel would have more interesting encounters in the 1960s and which made much of the running during the Prague Spring as advisers and propagandists for Alexander Dubcek, the then party leader, and Josef Smrkovsky, chairman of the national assembly. Younger than most of them, having missed the immediate postwar moment of naive but genuine enthusiasm for communism, Havel seemed always at a slightly sceptical tangent to that enterprise. His defining time had been 1956, the clarifying moment of what he once called "the pseudo-dialectical tension between dictatorship and the thaw". But after the collapse of all their hopes, in the grey years when, as one of his fellow writers put it, "there was a silence like a swamp" across the land, it was Havel who proved best able to rally them, to judge when the moment had come to go public with a petition or a project such as Charter 77 – and also when to go to prison and not into exile, as he was offered the choice of doing. And when the evident disintegration of the Soviet empire – in Poland, in East Germany, in Moscow itself – made Czechs and Slovaks bold enough to come out en masse into the streets at last, it was Havel, and not the former reform communists, whom they chose to lead them back to democracy. Installed in the castle, the man who had succeeded Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn in the minds of western intellectuals as the very type and pattern of literary dissident, became now the most admired of leaders of the newly democratising states. There were times when there was some truth in the jibe that he was a president more popular abroad than at home, but his international standing helped him to lay the foundations of a rapprochement between the Czechs and Germany which would eventually overcome the scars of Munich, the Nazi protectorate and the harshly responsive expulsion of the Sudeten Germans in 1945-46. It also helped to establish his country's place at the head of the queue for entry to Nato and the EU, and to give weight to his wider advocacy of central Europe's special place at the heart, not the edge of Europe, and the Czech lands, once "the spiritual crossroads of Europe", as the place where that heart beat strongest. More important to him even than this was the attempt to carry the moral clarity and authenticity of the politics of dissidence into the hurly burly of late 20th-century market democracy politics. Nor was this effort directed only at a domestic audience. "Experience of a totalitarian system of the communist type," he once said, "makes emphatically clear one thing which I hope has universal validity: that the prerequisite for everything political is moral. Politics really should be ethics put into practice ... This means taking a moral stand not for practical purposes, in the hope that it will bring political results, but as a matter of principle." The Masarykian note was struck in his very first address as president, on New Year's Day, 1990: "Let us teach ourselves that politics can be not just the art of the possible, especially if that means the art of speculation, calculation, intrigue, secret deals and pragmatic manoeuvring, but that it can even be the art of the impossible, namely the art of improving ourselves and the world." Increasingly, he brought together his aspirations for a more humane politics – capitalism with a human face, at least – with hopes for what Europe might be. With the desperately polluted wastelands of industrial north Bohemia to hand and at heart, he challenged the dangerous – and further west, then politically unchallengeable – myth of eternal growth, reminding the west of the dangers of a Europe that continued to be divided, not now by the iron curtain, but between a closed camp jealously guarding its vulnerable prosperity and a group of poor, disunited and less stable countries outside the gates: "One half of a room cannot remain forever warm while the other half is cold." So far as domestic politics was concerned, the ideological and personal competition between the two Václavs, Havel and Klaus, the prime minister, was not without its comic side. Klaus, who like the vast majority of his compatriots had not been prominent in the opposition until just before the end, was more than a little jealous of Havel's international standing, and both personally and ideologically resentful of the thrust of his "moral politics". They competed keenly to establish their own descriptions of the new reality. When Havel re-established Masaryk's radio fireside chats with the nation in his weekly Conversations at Lány (the presidential country residence), Klaus quickly arranging a slot for his views of how things were in weekly interviews in the newspaper Lidové Noviny. One occasion on which their differences surfaced clearly was during the 1994 visit of Chile's former president, and still army chief General Augusto Pinochet to Prague to negotiate an arms deal. Havel recalled in unambiguous terms the bloody record of the general's men after the 1973 coup against Salvador Allende's government, while Klaus and his ministers stuck angrily to the line that this was a private commercial visit by a valuable customer for what (to Havel's continuing regret) was still one of the country's most important export industries. Another was an exchange in broadcasts each of them gave on the fifth anniversary of the "velvet revolution" in November 1994. Havel, talking to students invited to Hradcany as "a gesture of recognition" of their part in restoring the nation to freedom, told them that while progress had been made in building the political and economic system, too many people thought that "freedom means the right to do anything, or that the market and ethics are mutually exclusive". He was strongly against laissez-faire in this moral dimension of society, he said, being convinced "that to rely on the self-correcting activity of a stabilising and political and economic system is not enough", that it was possible and necessary to do more. Just two hours after Havel's speech, Klaus put out his counter-blast on the state news agency. The only people, he said, who were disappointed with what had happened since the downfall of communism, were "those ... who have not understood the bases of social phenomena, who have not understood what social processes are and who have not understood who is the actor in these processes". Some people, he said, "would like to take advantage of the end of communism to create something more than a free society. They would like to have not only free men and women here, but better men and women as well. They have the ambition to know how to do it, how to 'better' us, they know what is wrong with all of us and why. Well," he concluded, with a shrewd, low blow, "we have our own experience of this sort of thing." This heralded a more general and predictable reaction, in the unheroic latter years of the century, against this unfashionably demanding president. It crystallised around his remarriage in January 1997 – less than a year after the death from cancer of Olga, his first wife and mainstay of the prison years – to Dagmar Veškrnová, an attractive and assertive actor almost 20 years his junior. Faced with the evident unpopularity of this move, Havel explained himself simply enough to the nation in another of his Masarykian fireside talks. Olga had been his companion for almost 45 years, he said. "She is, and always will be, an irreplaceable part of my soul. I married Dasa [Dagmar] not to replace Olga but simply because we love each other and want to live together." But much of the popular press, and a virulent independent television station owned by a political enemy, had a field day. "There is a kind of Havel hunt going on," said a member of the unhappy coalition government that, in 1998, had succeeded Klaus's long parliamentary reign. "He's almost being turned into a dissident again." The attempt to convert Havel from impossible saint to everyday sinner coincided more or less with the onset of a long series of near fatal illnesses and hospitalisations, involving lung cancer, blood poisoning, pneumonia, spells on a respirator, and abdominal operations which left him for a time with a colostomy bag. "Mr Havel's body reads like a medical textbook," said one of his doctors, describing how, after the president's fifth near-death experience in three years, they were running out of ways of performing tracheotomies on him. But he survived then, as he survived, just, politically in 1998 when, in spite of his unpopularity with parts of the managerial elite, enough Czechs seemed to feel they still needed the element of reassurance his presence in the president's lodgings provided; there he remained until 2003 when he stepped down. A year later the Czech republic joined the European Union. His memoir of his years as president, To the Castle and Back, was published in 2007. As to Havel's "idealism" – if that is what one must call serious ecological concern, an abjuring of narrow nationalism and materialism, and an eye on what the market's "hidden hand" is actually up to or capable of – he left us with some reason, in these dangerous early years of the new millennium, to think that the "realist" critique of such preoccupations was itself anachronistic. Who, after all, were the realists of 1989? Not the clever advisers and the experienced, well-intentioned politicians in Bonn, for instance, who were telling me a few months before its fall, that "for the foreseeable future" – that comforting old formulation – the Berlin Wall and other essential structures of the cold war settlement would be remaining in place. It is hard to think of a better provisional epitaph than that supplied in the midst of his later troubles by Martin Palouš, one of the first signatories of Charter 77: "Havel was the man who was able to stage this miracle play. The sacrifice was to cast himself in the main role." He is survived by his wife. Václav Havel, statesman and playwright, born 5 October 1936; died 18 December 2011

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https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/feb/23/zuckerberg-facebook-barcelona-mobile-world-congress

Technology

2014-02-23T10:00:00.000Z

Samuel Gibbs

Mark Zuckerberg goes to Barcelona to make mobile friends

If confirmation was needed that we live in the age of the mobile phone, then the presence of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg at the Mobile World Congress gathering next week should underline the ascendancy of the handset. Zuckerberg will deliver the keynote address on Monday, fresh from announcing a $19bn (£11.4bn) deal to buy WhatsApp, the hottest mobile texting app in town. The presence of this social media superstar at one of the less glamorous trade shows is proof that mobile is now the priority for technology giants such as Facebook and Google. Facebook has shifted its focus from laptops and PCs as it strives to catch up with consumers' changing technological tastes. As a result its mobile site, also accessible via tablets, is now used by 945 million of its 1.23 billion monthly active users. Facebook will attend the MWC event with every big name in technology, including every global mobile operator and handset maker. In all, 75,000 delegates descend on Barcelona to showcase the next wave of smartphones and gadgets. Facebook has obviously seen mobile as the key to its future for a while. Its purchase of WhatsApp last week, which added another 450 million monthly active users, is the biggest in a long line of acquisitions that includes Instagram, the mobile-based photosharing site. Facebook has its own home-grown mobile applications too. The standard Facebook app has become one of the primary ways of accessing the social network for millions, while its Facebook Messenger application has joined WhatsApp in the ranks of text message replacement services. The strategic shift to mobile has been driven partly by Facebook users' embrace of mobile technology, but also by the subsequent impact on Facebook's primary revenue source, advertising. As more people migrate to using Facebook on tablets or phones, the number of eyeballs using the desktop version of Facebook shrinks. Facebook, and its advertisers, have to go where the users are. Beyond existing users in developed countries such as the UK and the US, Facebook also sees mobile as a way of engaging with people in the developing world. Already, around 81% of Facebook's 757 million daily active users are based outside the US and Canada. In the markets where Facebook is not already reaching saturation point, it is the mobile phone that is often the primary computing device – especially in developing nations, where mobile phone coverage far outstrips traditional landline and broadband infrastructure. The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) estimates that there are at least 6.8 billion mobile subscribers globally, while data from Portio Research suggests that that figure will rise to 8.5 billion by the end of 2016. Of those mobile subscribers, 5.2 billion are based in the developing world, with mobile data available to 1.2 billion of those users, according to data from ITU. By contrast only 357m fixed broadband connections exist in the developing world. The path to increasing Facebook's user base in these developing nations is therefore through mobile, something that is obviously on Zuckerberg's mind as he prepares to take the stage in Barcelona. But MWC is not just about Facebook, of course. Several major mobile manufacturers are expected to unveil their new smartphones, tablets and a plethora of accessories. New Smart watches will appear, but glitzy phone launches will still dominate. Samsung's highly anticipated Galaxy S5 is a follow-up to last year's top-of-the-range Galaxy S4, which has dominated sales of smartphones that use Google's Android operating system in the UK. The S5 is expected to feature a bigger screen and more processing power, but the biggest improvement is anticipated to be in the software department, where Samsung stands accused of falling behind competitors. Sony, too, is expected to launch at least one new high-end device in Barcelona, with the follow up to the waterproof Xperia Z1 expected to be unveiled. A replacement for the thinnest and lightest full-sized Android tablet, the Xperia Tablet Z, is also expected, which could see an Android device worthy of rivalling Apple's iPad Air. A new device from Nokia is also expected: the Nokia X. It is anticipated to be an Android smartphone, but one that is very different from Google's Android, looking more like Microsoft's Windows Phone and running Microsoft and Nokia's applications instead of Google's Maps, Gmail and search. One of Zuckerberg's reasons for buying WhatsApp at such vaulting expense was to prevent it from falling into the hands of Google. But thanks to the popularity of Android, the search giant's presence will be felt strongly in Barcelona.

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https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2014/jun/23/tips-links-and-suggestions-what-are-you-reading-this-week

Books

2014-06-23T14:16:58.000Z

Guardian readers

Tips, links and suggestions: What are you reading this week?

Welcome to this week's blog. Here's a roundup of your comments and photos from last week. edinflo has been enjoying My Life in Middlemarch, New Yorker writer Rebecca Mead's account of her love for George Eliot's novel: I read Rebecca Mead's My Life in Middlemarch in two days flat. It's something of a hybrid: a potted biography of George Eliot; an account of how Middlemarch was written; and an extended essay on how the book has affected Mead personally at different stages in her life and, more generally, how books affect us and how our experiences can change our reading of them. Despite the title, there is more about George Eliot than Rebecca Mead in the book, which I think is a good thing. Mead is our way in, but Eliot keeps us there – what an interesting person! I'm now on the hunt for a good biography of her. This opened up a great question: what are your favourite books about books? edinflo picked up the theme: I do like these books about books. I've read two recently - Laura Miller's The Magician's Book (about The Chronicles of Narnia) and Careless People by Sarah Churchwell (about The Great Gatsby). When they are done well they can be insightful and illuminating, not just about the book/author in question, but about that strange relationship between author-book-reader and the transformative power of reading. furryroadster recommended checking out a startling story from science: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. What an eye opener. Made me realise how little I know about medicine and history. Everyone should read the tale of the HeLa cells and what they have done for mankind and where these cells came from. While Henrietta Lacks was remarkable for her afterlife, MsCarey picked the biography of a woman who was remarkable for the way she lived: I’m reading Daughter Of The Desert: The Remarkable Life Of Gertrude Bell by Georgina Howell. It’s proving to be a suprisingly easy read about an interesting subject. Born in 1868, Bell was a phenomenally gifted person who became all of the following: a mountaineer of note, archaeologist, cartographer, scholar, photographer and a respected authority on the Arabic lands in the Middle East. She was fluent in six languages, travelled around the world a couple of times and was a notable horsewoman. The legacy she will be most remembered for is her involvement in the carving up of the Ottoman Empire at the end of the first world war and specifically the establishment of Iraq as a separate country. cfwaters had lined up an impressive selection of books on football (or soccer), "naturally": Books on soccer Reading books on soccer, naturally... Sent viaguardianwitness Bycfwaters 16 Jun 2014 IanCann turned to crime and thrillers: Holiday meant I read less than planned, but travel did enable me to get through 2 books in a few days, firstly there was Three Graves Full by Jamie Mason, an intelligent quirkily plotted crime novel, about a man who discovers bodies in his back yard that aren't the one he put there, and his attempts to hide his burial. Secondly though was Blackbirds by Chuck Wendig a fantastic urban fantasy/horror/thriller novel, that is the first in his Miriam Black series of novels, funny exciting, violent and speedily placed, possibluy my read of the year thus far. sanda1scuptorNYC shared her frustration with the Manhattan heat and humidity – and she offered an insight into how the heat affects her reading: I had started the first Maisie Dobbs and it's OK. For hot weather, I had started reading the ebooks mystery series (all with Witness in the title) by Rebecca Forster. These books are great for hot weather when you really can't think. I'm on #6, which I was saving for hot weather. A woman detective gets in and out of trouble, but they are colorful. When it was cooler, I had just begun Wretched of the Earth for a short while before or after I did art before breakfast. Then I'd switch over to Maisie Dobbs. Finally, we were delighted by a heartfelt comment from tinsleycollins about Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee, whose centenary is being celebrated this year: I originally read Cider with Rosie a about a squillion years ago and I can remember endlessly reading passages from it to my first wife under the influence of a glass or two, or more often a bottle or two, too many. Now I can see why. I recently picked up a copy from my usual source, the book stall in the Wells market, and from the first line onwards it was obvious why it is such a classic that has gone into so many editions. What a joy of a book and what an absolute landmine of language. Every paragraph is a perfect gem, so much so that it’s impossible to choose any one over another. His descriptions of the locals, Cabbage Stump-Charlie, Tusker Tom, Albert the Devil and Harelip Harry had me weeping with laughter and his sketches of his siblings and of course his wonderful and chaotic mother had me in tears. It’s been said of Elvis Presley that after him there was no point in any other pop singer. That’s also true of this book. Until I read it I thought I could write. Now I know how far down the literary food chain I really am. Do not dare to die without having read it. If you would like to share a photo of the book you are reading, or film your own book review, please do. Click the blue button on this page to share your video or image. I'll include some of your posts in next week's blog. And, as always, if you have any suggestions for topics you'd like to see us covering beyond TLS, do let us know.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2012/apr/04/arvo-part-passio-review

Music

2012-04-04T17:29:45.000Z

Guy Dammann

Arvo Pärt: Passio – review

Arvo Pärt's 1982 setting of the St John Passion is performed relatively rarely, perhaps because it doesn't translate so well to the secular environment in which most art and music is appreciated nowadays. Unlike most sacred works of the 18th and 19th centuries, Pärt's liturgical settings convey little sense of an unfolding drama or of identifiable emotions being explored. The emphasis is instead on creating a sense of time and awareness, within which the ancient mysteries of the text can be contemplated. Beyond a slight harmonic contrast between brief opening and closing choruses and the hour or so of hypnotic musical undulations (or tintinnabuli) that separate them, nothing much happens in musical terms. In religious terms, however, the piece steadily unfolds the familiar tapestry of ancient suffering at the heart of Christian identity. Even for an atheist, it can be profoundly moving, unsettling and humbling. Performing at the head of the Abbey's shallow nave, the choir and their accompanists – the excellent new-music ensemble Chroma – also lent an unexpected intimacy to the proceedings. In recordings, Pärt's vocal music of this period often sounds like a wash of voices and instruments, but listening live I was struck by the suspended intensity of the play between individual instruments and singers, and by the challenge – well met by all – of preserving the all-important flow of Pärt's undulations. The Evangelist quintet and soloists were all drawn from the ranks of the choir, lending an appropriate evenness of tone and manner and showing the strength and depth of a choir that, under James O'Donnell's direction, is now among the UK's very finest. Jonathan Brown's rich, steady bass was well suited to the role of Jesus, as was William Balkwill's plangent but less sure-footed tenor to the character of Pilate.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/jan/07/dvd-reviews-world-of-tomorrow-episode-two-good-time-detroit-una

Film

2018-01-07T07:00:04.000Z

Guy Lodge

DVD and download reviews: World of Tomorrow Episode Two; Good Time; Detroit; Una

January for UK cinemagoers is prestige season, when our cinemas are finally flooded with all the acclaimed, awards-baiting titles our American friends have been yammering on about for months. For breadth, beauty and brain food, however, few of these films can compete with a 22-minute marvel newly uploaded to Vimeo for streaming. Iconoclastic animator Don Hertzfeldt’s World of Tomorrow Episode Two: The Burden of Other People’s Thoughts is a major work in minor form, a wry and wrenching requiem for innocence and memory that you’d be tempted to call one of a kind – if it weren’t a sequel to Hertzfeldt’s similarly luminous, Oscar-nominated World of Tomorrow. As in that film, a wealth of intellectual and psychological questioning is filtered through the guileless perspective of preschooler Emily (voiced once more, with disarming naturalism, by Hertzfeldt’s niece Winona Mae) visited at play by her future-generation adult clone – a technically malfunctioning backup copy seeking to trawl young Emily’s consciousness for missing memories. In Hertzfeldt’s blend of plain speech and poetic logic, the outlandish premise makes soulful sense, as the girl and her own disintegrating replicant skitter through time in pursuit of knowledge that one can’t remember and the other can’t yet understand, getting waylaid in the uncanny comforts of nostalgia without recollection. It’s dense, heady material, but a purity of feeling – of sorrow for what adulthood corrupts or subtracts from the human brain – underpins its mental gymnastics, just as the naive simplicity of Hertzfeldt’s animated stick figures grounds the swirling, coruscating digital mindscapes behind them. Bring on Episode Three, once we’ve wrapped our heads around this one. Watch a trailer for Good Time. Over to the DVD shelf, where fraternal auteurs Benny and Josh Safdie’s ticking, febrile heist thriller Good Time (Curzon Artificial Eye, 15) makes a second play for the audience it didn’t quite find on its criminally tiny cinema release. This one, I think, may expand over time as some kind of classic. Led by a rivetingly itchy, agitated Robert Pattinson, hitting a career high as a rash bank robber unravelling even faster than his own botched job, it’s tightly wound, siren-stark and would dazzle as a simple genre piece even if it didn’t have such a complex, throbbing human undertow. The film situates itself entirely in the lesser-lit, socially disenfranchised fringes of New York City, populated with the racially, economically and mentally oppressed, in which Pattinson’s running-scared trajectory is just one thread of the frayed fabric. I wish Kathryn Bigelow’s Detroit (eOne, 15) ran quite as deep. Poundingly vivid in the moment, and assembled with her consummately kinetic visual and sonic flair, this revisiting of Detroit’s 1967 12th Street riot recreates that tinderbox racial conflict with tactile, punishing impact, ensuring the timely Black Lives Matter parallels can’t go unfelt. Yet the film lacks human dimension beneath its strong historical conscience. Particularly on a repeat viewing, I missed a more searching, interior view of black identity amid the blazing crisis. Watch a trailer for Una. Seethingly internalised trauma, meanwhile, is the flammable fuel on which Benedict Andrews’ Una (Thunderbird, 15) runs. A surprisingly tingly, resourceful redesign of David Harrower’s play Blackbird, the film is sparked by brilliant, knotted work from Rooney Mara as a young woman sifting through the ashes of a sexual affair from her early teens, and Ben Mendelsohn as her raddled adult exploiter. It’s an anxious, undervalued work, the sting of which lands a little more sharply in the discomfiting midst of the #MeToo movement.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2012/dec/23/young-actor-tom-holland-16

Culture

2012-12-23T00:04:01.000Z

Megan Conner

Why we're watching… Tom Holland

Tom Hardy, Tom Hiddleston, Tom Hollander... Hollywood loves a Tom H. And here we have it, another leading man breaking into Tinseltown from the UK. A man? He looks about 12! Holland is 16 but filmed what will be his breakthrough role – in The Impossible, a tense thriller about a real-life family caught up in the Boxing Day tsunami – aged 13. So you'll see him as a wee thing on the big screen, but with a more One Directional haircut on the red carpet. How harrowing is the film? Very. Holland says it felt so real he forgot he was acting. It's an Oscar contender, with Naomi Watts marked out for a best actress gong and Holland (who plays her son) predicted to be up for his support role. How do I know he's not going to go the usual way child stars do? Holland already has a hit under his belt – playing Billy Elliot on stage (Stephen Daldry cast him after telling Holland he reminded him of Jamie Bell). There's also a part to come in Kevin MacDonald's adaptation of Meg Rosoff's award-winning novel How I Live Now. He says: "When I'm acting it's like I am the character – no one can talk to me. But I'm not so method I'd sell my house and live on the street to play a tramp." We say: So cute you want to squish his nose. And he has good taste. His idol is Tom Hanks (the ultimate Tom H). The Impossible is released on New Year's Day

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/oct/19/angela-eagle-abusive-homophobic-messages-labour-members

Politics

2016-10-19T08:57:28.000Z

Rowena Mason

Angela Eagle received hundreds of homophobic messages from Labour members

A Labour internal investigation has found that Angela Eagle received hundreds of “abusive, homophobic and frightening” messages from party members. It also concluded that it was “highly likely” that a window vandalised at her office building – with a brick, according to the report – was related to her short-lived leadership challenge to Jeremy Corbyn. The investigation was conducted following complaints and counter-complaints about events in her local constituency party in Wallasey. It was carried out by officials and upheld by a subcommittee of the party’s ruling body. Eagle said she was grateful that Corbyn had attended the meeting and expressed sympathy for her and staff over the abuse they had received. The report found there had been a “high level of inter-member abuse in Wallasey” and that it was not possible for the local party to meet safely at the moment. Officials recommended a suspension of the party pending a review in the spring, because the culture had become so toxic and divided in the extreme. It will receive support from the party’s regional office to move forward with a code of conduct and training. Benn and Cooper elected to chair Brexit and home affairs committees respectively - Politics live Read more The investigation also looked at abuse suffered by Eagle, both before and after she launched a challenge to Corbyn’s leadership. “It’s highly likely that the brick thrown through the window of Angela Eagle’s office was related to her leadership challenge,” the report found. “The position of the window made it very unlikely that this was a random passerby. The window was directly between two Labour offices. “Untrue rumours were subsequently spread that the building was occupied by many companies and the window was in an unrelated stairwell. This was based on a Companies House search which found that the landlord had a number of companies registered there; in fact the only other occupant is the landlord on the upper floor. Once this incorrect rumour was spread, members repeated it as clear evidence that Angela Eagle was lying. This is categorically untrue.” It said Eagle’s office had endured a “significant amount of abuse”, including intimidating phone calls that led staff to unplug the phone, a death threat towards her and what appeared to be coordinated denial of service attacks on her internet. In relation to an annual meeting of Wallasey constituency Labour party, it said some members had truthfully claimed that homophobic instances occurred, while others truthfully said they were not aware of those instances. Angela Eagle said she was grateful Jeremy Corbyn, right, had expressed sincere sympathy for her and staff over the abuse. Photograph: Leon Neal/AFP/Getty Images Paul Davies, the vice-chair of the Wallasey CLP, said the suspension should be lifted as nothing had been found to prove the involvement of local members in abuse. “The abuse towards Angela from people should be dealt with by police, never mind the Labour party. There is no evidence I have seen that members of the Labour party or Wallasey Labour party have been involved. If they were they should be expelled and prosecuted.” He said it was “rather strange” that the report could conclude that both those who heard and did not hear homophobic abuse in Wallasey’s annual general meeting were telling the truth. On the issue of the vandalism of Eagle’s office building, he said: “Whoever broke the window should be dealt with by police, whether they are a member of Labour or not. There is no proof it was a member of the Labour party. What I can’t understand in all of the accusations is there is nothing to suggest the Labour party in Wallasey can’t meet. “My view is Angela had every right to stand as leader but we’ve also got the right to meet. That’s democracy. Both democratic principles should apply and I can’t see why we can’t meet with the regional Labour party overseeing the meetings … There is no toxicity. There is a number of people who lost their positions at the annual meeting and those people who lost have put in the complaints, simple as that.” The investigation, which anonymised all complaints and took about 100 statements, said some members were angry about the action taken in Wallasey, and about the leadership election. “This has resulted in genuine fear and intimidation of a small number of other members,” it said. “This creates an environment in which some members are fearful to take part in the party or raise their voice about any issue, as they see that meetings have become hostile and sometimes aggressive.” The report said one member in particular had endured a significant level of personal abuse and a hashtag was created to encourage people to “shame” him publicly and his home address and personal details were published online. Angela Eagle accuses Jeremy Corbyn of allowing abuse to flourish Read more The report said it could not substantiate a claim that one member had breached data protection by using a membership list to promote a public meeting to discuss concerns about the suspension of Wallasey CLP. Davies, who helped organise the public meeting, said it had been proved that no data protection laws had been breached and other people who made the complaint had lied about him. In response to the report, Eagle said she was “proud to have been the MP for Wallasey for 24 years and to have had a good relationship with most local Labour activists for all of that time”. “I am grateful that Jeremy took the unusual step of both attending and speaking in the meeting and that he expressed sincere sympathy for both me and for my staff,” she said. “It is now clear and accepted by the NEC [national executive committee] that homophobic abuse was perpetrated by some members of the local party; I will simply not tolerate it, and I know I have the backing of both Jeremy and union leaders when I say that there is no place for it in the Labour movement either. “As regards the vandalism of my office, I am grateful to both the internal investigators and the NEC for making clear both the facts of the matter and for the support of members up and down the country, including the leader of the Labour party, that such abuse both happened and is intolerable.” Separately, the Liverpool Echo reported that a 45-year-old man, Stephen King, of Mirin Wynd, Paisley, Scotland, had pleaded guilty to sending a grossly offensive, indecent, obscene or menacing message by a public communications network to Eagle. According to the report, he told police he had been venting his anger about Eagle’s challenge to Corbyn and never intended to act upon it. King told Eagle to leave the UK, said she would “never be safe” and threatened an “IRA sniper or bomb on you the day you steal the leadership of the Labour party.” A spokesman for Eagle said: “The death threat received by Angela’s office was credible and frightening. It led staff to fear for their and Angela’s safety, especially coming weeks after our friend and colleague Jo Cox’s murder. “Despite all this having been upsetting, Angela has always remained upbeat and focused on the important work of holding this rotten Tory government to account, most importantly on their chaotic approach to Britain leaving the European Union and investment into the Wirral.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2024/feb/05/brazil-first-all-women-samba-school-dance-rio-carnival

Global development

2024-02-05T11:00:11.000Z

Constance Malleret

‘Enough of being bossed around by men’: Brazil’s first all-women samba school dances to its own beat

Preparations for Brazil’s carnival are in full swing in Madureira, a neighbourhood in Rio de Janeiro famed for its strong samba tradition. In a courtyard strewn with colourful paper and fabric scraps, a handful of women are working on costumes. The mostly middle-aged black women snipping, gluing and painting belong to one of Rio’s newest samba schools: Turma da Paz de Madureira (TPM), or the Madureira Group of Peace. All of its members, from the directors down to the percussionists and dancers, are women. “We are the only all-female samba school in Brazil,” says Barbara Rigaud, TPM’s president and founder. Women have always been closely involved in Rio’s samba schools, not just as tailors and sparkly samba muses but also as musicians and participants in the creative process. Yet rarely have they occupied positions of power, or had their contributions to these community based musical organisations recognised. The pioneer sambista Dona Ivone Lara famously had to let male relatives sign her compositions for years before she became, in 1965, the first woman to be accepted as a composer in a samba school, the Madureira-based Império Serrano. Barbara Rigaud (centre), the president of the TPM, with other samba school members at last year’s street parade in Rio de Janeiro. Photograph: TPM “There was a constant presence of women in these spaces, they participated actively, and not just as hypersexualised [dancers],” says the historian Alessandra Tavares, highlighting the objectification of (usually black) women that has long dominated stereotypes of Rio’s carnival. “History never gave women the visibility they were due.” Rigaud is striving to change that. “Enough of being bossed around by men,” says the 55-year-old, who runs a beauty salon when she isn’t putting her heart and soul into carnival productions. We face a lot of prejudice and mockery because we’re being innovative Barbara Rigaud, TPM president and founder A survivor of sexual violence in a country where a woman or girl was raped every eight minutes in the first six months of 2023, Rigaud feels that bringing women together in this way can help transform lives. “I think women join TPM because they have freedom here, they can see their worth and how important they are,” she says during a conversation in the courtyard that serves as the school’s headquarters and rehearsal ground. Gisele Rosires, a security professional whose life has been marked by hardship and loss, agrees. “I always say that TPM saved me,” says Rosires, 47, who plays the surdo drum, a bulky instrument long considered the preserve of men. “Lots of girls are struggling. And when you see one succeeding, that incentivises another. I think that’s what makes TPM different, it empowers people.” ‘This year’s performance will be better than last’: conductor Paloma Bento leads band rehearsals TPM was born in 2013 as a women-only bloco, a musical group that leads carnival street parties. Its debut performance as Rio’s first all-female samba school was last year, with about 320 members parading in the lowest-tier samba league in the city’s northern suburbs (only the schools in the top leagues perform in the purpose-built Sambadrome, 20km away in the city centre). It came third and this year will compete in the bronze league with a 600-strong procession featuring 100 percussionists and an eight metre-long float. The samba-enredo song they have chosen for 17 February’s parade is a re-edition of a composition first performed by Império Serrano, aptly named Lugar de Mulher É Onde Ela Quiser! (A woman’s place is wherever she wants). Samba dancers rehearse their steps. This year’s parade will be the groups second time performing at Rio’s carnival Rigaud, who acts as creative director, has envisioned a dozen sections of dancers and musicians in costumes paying tribute to pioneering female figures, such as the indigenous warrior Clara Camarão, and celebrate everyday empowered women, such as an entrepreneur, a police officer and a university graduate. Meeting that vision is no easy task, however, and Rigaud has had to get creative, recycling costumes used in last year’s parade and picking up donated or discarded materials wherever possible. “This was rubbish, but not any more. It’s being turned into gold,” she says, pointing to scraps of velvet. Sign up to Her Stage Free monthly newsletter Hear directly from incredible women from around the world on the issues that matter most to them – from the climate crisis to the arts to sport Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. ‘TPM saved me’: Gisele Rosires plays the large surdo bass drum, usually played by men According to the rules that govern Rio’s samba parades, TPM’s procession will not be 100% female as it is obliged to feature two men as masters of ceremony. “It’s a privilege [to be involved],” says one of these dancers, 37-year-old Henrique Seixas. “What these women are doing … I think it’s incredible.” Preparing for carnival is a logistical and financial challenge for any samba school, but the smaller ones cannot rely on their fame for sponsorship and depend on local government funding, which is often delayed. TPM members also feel they face more obstacles than most due to persistent sexism and patriarchal norms – starting with the sniggers that sometimes meet their name, as TPM in Portuguese is also the acronym for premenstrual syndrome. This was an accidental coincidence which Rigaud and her co-founders have embraced as a funny joke. Jaciara Maciel, a seamstress, works on a costume Margareth Oliveira, a director of one of TPM’s dance groups, or ‘alas’, decorates a costume “We face a lot of prejudice and mockery because we’re being innovative, you see? Getting such a large number of women together, it’s different,” she says. Percussion conductor Paloma Bento laments that rehearsals this year have been sparsely attended. “We recently lost a percussionist because her 90-year-old mother became bed-bound and depends on her for everything. There’s this other woman who often has to look after her grandchildren. I don’t think this would be happening if they were men,” says Bento, 34. Women are the main breadwinner in more than half of Brazilian households (15% are headed by single mothers), yet on average they spend nearly twice as much time as men on domestic chores and care work. ‘Joy and resistance’: South America’s female football fans on their love of the game – in pictures Read more But these challenges will be forgotten as TPM members begin their 400-metre procession this month. “On the day of the parade, everything will work out, like it did last year,” says Bento. “This year’s performance will be better than last year’s, and next year it will be better still.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/mar/12/swapping-streams-subscription-services-are-supposed-to-be-a-shared-commodity

Technology

2020-03-11T16:30:07.000Z

Meg Watson

Swapping streams: 'Subscription services are supposed to be a shared commodity'

The cheapest subscriptions to Netflix, Stan and Spotify are about $10 a month. But people are paying much, much less than that. Many share the services with partners or friends. Some share with friends of friends. And others share with their housemate’s ex-partner’s family – who they have never actually met. “We just never logged out,” says Kate. Her housemate’s ex signed in once with his family account on the sharehouse TV and that was it: free Netflix for the foreseeable future, all for the price of some dud movie recommendations. “He was really into action and really blokey content – not my cuppa at all. Luckily, no Adam Sandler recommendations ever came up,” she says. Jane had a similar experience. She and her sister used her boyfriend’s friend’s girlfriend’s Netflix login for months – before word got around. “She was extremely pissed about it,” Jane says. “She felt betrayed and used.” From Riverdale to The Social Network: what's streaming in Australia in March Read more Jane didn’t mean any harm. She didn’t think it would matter at all. “I truly think that subscription services are supposed to be a shared commodity,” she says. “I use my sister’s Netflix, she uses my Stan, two friends use my Hayu, and I use my friend’s Disney+. “I’ve handed out my Stan to so many people that my friend said to me, ‘Hey, we got our own Stan, thanks for letting us use yours for the past two years’, and I was like, ‘You use it?’” If Seinfeld was still running in 2020, it would have an episode about subscription sharing. Everyone’s doing it, but no one can quite agree on the social norms. Do you need to be close with someone to share an account? Can that person pass the login on? Does it matter how big or profitable the service is? Can an ex keep using an account after a breakup? When do you add a new partner’s profile? Jordan told me he still shares his Netflix and Stan accounts with his ex’s mum “because, as she puts it, ‘it’s not my fault you broke up. I should still get to use them.’ I couldn’t argue with that logic,” he says. One woman told me she used her ex’s Foxtel account for 18 months after breaking up, before he stopped paying his bill: “He was always terrible with money. Ruining my life once again.” Another says she still shares Netflix with her ex-husband: “He uses it more than he sees his kids, whom we also ‘share’.” It’s no mystery why this is happening: getting people to pay for online content has never been easy, especially younger generations who have grown up with either unprecedented access to free streaming and/or mass file-sharing. A 2018 survey from media research firm Magid found that 42% of Gen Z and 35% of millennials share passwords for streaming services, compared to 19% of Gen X and 13% of baby boomers. One millennial told me she thinks of it in the same way “as when one person used to buy a magazine and then pass it on to like four other people to read”. But, for Kate, it’s always a considered decision. “I don’t feel as bad about companies like Netflix who pay barely any tax in Australia, but Stan (under Nine) is a bit different as it supports local content … I [also] don’t share my news subscription logins as journalism needs as much support as it can get.” Jack shares Netflix, Spotify and Stan accounts with his girlfriend and her family, and Optus Sport with his girlfriend’s football coach. “I’m annoyed at the chopping off of content onto so many platforms, forcing you to get increasingly specific subs,” he says. “I don’t want to pay for a sub just for football.” So, is this actually allowed? And are companies planning to do anything about it? Those are two very different questions. Subscribers to multiple streaming services more likely to also be online pirates: survey Read more Stan says that “you must keep your account details private and must not share these details”. Under its premium plan, you can watch on four screens at the same time. Netflix says that accounts “may not be shared with individuals beyond your household”. It maintains the right to “terminate or restrict your use” if you violate these terms of use. Both companies were approached for comment, but did not respond. Netflix, historically, hasn’t been too worried about policing this rule. The company is large enough that subscription sharing hasn’t stopped their profits soaring, and they’ve even acknowledged its potential as a tool to build more subscribers in the long term. But recently, that tune has changed. In October 2019, the chief product officer, Greg Peters, said Netflix is monitoring the situation and looking for “consumer-friendly ways to push on the edges of [it]”. This was around the same time that Spotify announced a crackdown on family plan users, to ensure they shared a home address. It was also a few weeks before the launch of rival streaming giant Disney+. With increased competition, some media commentators think it’s just a matter of time before investors pressure companies to chase this “missing revenue”. But there’s no guarantee it would result in more cash. “I probably wouldn’t pay for Optus myself, if I got kicked off,” Jack says. “I’d just watch a lot less football highlights.” All names have been changed

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/jun/20/the-grounded-backpackers-filling-their-gap-years-with-volunteering

Society

2021-06-20T05:30:14.000Z

Miranda Bryant

The grounded backpackers filling their gap years with volunteering

Djembe Askins had planned to be very far from home this summer, travelling around south-east Asia, Australia and New Zealand. Then the pandemic hit. But rather than completely abandon his gap year-style trip, the 24-year-old decided to transplant it to the UK. Askins, who left his job at a bank in London, has spent the past nine months volunteering at farms, mostly in Wales, through World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms (Wwoof), a network where people volunteer for four to six hours a day in return for food and accommodation. Although the weather was “a bit wetter and not as sunny” as his original destinations, he found the experience of living in a different part of the UK and learning how to be “self-sustaining” a revelation. “It does make me think about what else there is across the UK that I’ve never even been to.” With foreign travel prospects still uncertain and lockdown easing postponed, UK-based “volunteercations” are on the rise. Experts are predicting a summer of volunteering – especially among students and young people seeking experience and alternative gap years. Wwoof reports a surge of interest from its UK-based membership this year – which has risen by about 50% – as people seek alternatives to foreign holidays and reassess their lives following the pandemic. Although the “double whammy” of Brexit and coronavirus travel restrictions have caused the number of international members to drop, it expects the number of UK-based members to grow further as summer holidays approach and more people are vaccinated. Djembe Askins, 24, who has been volunteering on farms, or ‘wwooffing’, for the past nine months. Meanwhile, the Marine Conservation Society has seen a rise in volunteers for its beach cleaning programme and the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust (WWT) has noticed an increase in young people applying for volunteering roles. “Compared to most people I’ve had an absolutely class year,” said Askins, who spent the first lockdown in a flat in London. Since he started volunteering he has “kept busy” but without much stress and has enjoyed having so much outdoor space at his disposal. He has learned to build a chicken coop, look after animals and grow vegetables. It has also given him an opportunity to learn more about the UK. As well as gap-year students, Scarlett Penn, chief executive of Wwoof UK, said it tends to appeal to people who are at “some sort of crossroads in their life” such as a career break, divorce, retirement or parents whose children have just left home. But, she warned, it’s not a wise choice for the sedentary traveller. “It’s really good for people who’ve got a lot of energy. People who just couldn’t dream of lying by a pool and reading a book.” Penn believes that people taking stock of their lives over the pandemic and empty supermarket shelves during lockdown have contributed to the rise in volunteers. She hosts people at her smallholding in Ludlow, Shropshire, and said the influence of climate activist Greta Thunberg is also a factor for young people. Without my work and family, volunteering helped me through lockdown Read more Pembrokeshire Llamas, which has 60 animals and puts on llama treks for the public, said it has been inundated with inquiries about its residential volunteering programme, largely from UK-based school leavers and students. Matt Yorke, the farm’s director, said: “We’ve had a hell of a lot of interest. At one point I was getting a request every day … we filled up for the year very quickly back in April.” But international visitors have faced problems reaching the farm – with one volunteer getting turned away at the border. “There are two main factors working in tandem: the Brexit side of things making it harder for people outside the UK to volunteer and people in the UK who just want to get out and do something different and are limited to where they can go this year,” he said. Lizzie Jolley, 21, who is nine months into a WWT volunteering placement at Slimbridge Wetland Centre in Gloucestershire as part of her university course, said many of her friends are planning to volunteer this summer instead of going straight into work. “It’s such an accessible route and it’s more of a learn-on-the-job scenario to gain that experience to help you when applying for jobs.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/03/kids-break-catch-up-year-disruption-play

Opinion

2021-03-03T10:00:14.000Z

John McMullen

Giving kids a break is the best way for them to 'catch up' after a year of disruption | John McMullen

Across the UK schools are again preparing for a phased or full return of pupils to the classroom. Most weary parents, compassionate teachers and lonely kids will be delighted to see this day come, but concerns remain about the effect that protracted school closures have had on our children and young people. Much of the debate has focused on how to help pupils “catch up” on their “lost learning”. This narrative is profoundly unhelpful and potentially damaging, due to the psychological pressure it places on children and young people. It’s our national obsession with summative assessment that makes children feel that they have “fallen behind” if they haven’t learned certain things at certain times. But in every year group, pupils are at various stages of cognitive, physical and emotional development. There is no such thing as “behind”, there is only where children are at. Besides, if we truly believe that everyone can be a lifelong learner, then a few months of parents struggling to teach phonics is a brief bump on their educational journey. When I read recently of measures being planned to help children make up for lost school time through extended school days, tutoring and summer schools, my first instinct was that we should do the exact opposite. Pre-Covid research from the US has been referenced in support of extending school days, but studies have not provided evidence of positive impact on attainment. Research by the Education Endowment Foundation has highlighted limited evidence of small group tutoring benefiting learners who are “falling behind” and some small benefits of summer schools. Whether the small gains seen in these studies could be replicated on a larger scale post-pandemic is as yet untested, and open to debate. Given limited time and resources, rather than hoping for a slight boost in standardised attainment scores, educators and government should focus instead on addressing the immediate impact of the crisis, with an eye to what interventions will help children most in the long term. Emotional wellbeing is fundamental and foundational for academic attainment. A stressed, anxious child will have difficulty learning anything. On the flip side, promoting wellbeing can boost academic outcomes. A meta-analysis of 213 school-based, social and emotional learning programmes demonstrated an 11% boost in results in standardised achievement tests. The impact of lockdown on child and adolescent mental health and wellbeing is clear from research on previous school closures, within the health service, and in our own experiences as parents. Social isolation has exacerbated disadvantage and pre-existing vulnerability. It’s vital that long-term planning includes improving the availability and accessibility of therapeutic support for those who need it. Right now, we need to emotionally regulate before we educate. However, while there is clearly cause for concern, a fatalistic discourse can be counter-productive, and prevent schools and the government from fully committing to supporting young people. Our children are so much more than the pandemic they have lived through. They shouldn’t be pathologised for displaying normal reactions to abnormal events. It’s important to remain hopeful for our young people and to help them to hope. Put simply, if our kids keep being told that they are the “Covid generation”, helpless victims in a “tsunami” of mental illness, at some point they are going to believe it. Alternatively, if we reassure them that “it’s really hard, but it will pass, it’s going to be OK”, maybe they will believe that instead. The majority of pupils won’t need counselling post-lockdown. They will benefit from getting back to the structure, stability, predictable routine and clear expectations of school. And then they will need space to play. At every age and stage, play is essential. My daughter needs pretend play with other three-year-olds, and the teenagers need their sports clubs, societies and parties. There is growing evidence of long-term negative impacts of play deprivation. That’s because the experience of play enhances children’s social, emotional, physical, and creative skills, while also supporting the development of early literacy and numeracy ability in an integrated manner. If we really want to boost long-term academic attainment, then we need to let the kids reconnect and play together again. A summer of play should be part of that process. The psychiatrist Bruce Perry writes that, because humans are inescapably social beings, the worst catastrophes that we can experience are those that involve relational loss. Therefore, recovery must involve re-establishing human connections. Perry suggests that the most important healing experiences often occur outside therapy and inside homes, communities and schools. A “recovery curriculum” may help in this regard by supporting a relationships-based approach to teaching and learning post-lockdown. Ultimately we need to trust and respect school leaders and staff to support our children as they return to class, as well as provide adequate resources. Many teachers are close to burnout and need support for their own wellbeing. They are best placed to identify and close any gaps in knowledge. But before “catching up” on learning let’s allow pupils to catch up with each other and with staff. Resilience resides in these relationships. Dr John McMullen is an educational psychologist, and a senior lecturer at Stranmillis University College and Queen’s University Belfast

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2024/feb/22/sheryl-crow-ai-is-so-real-it-feels-like-an-assault-on-my-spirit

Music

2024-02-22T14:00:19.000Z

Dave Simpson

Sheryl Crow: ‘AI is so real. It feels like an assault on my spirit’

What inspired you to make a new album, Evolution, after calling 2019’s Threads your “final” album? Jade99 I’m raising two teenage boys who ask a lot of hard questions, and after we started talking about AI I found myself writing a lot in the mornings after they go to school. I wound up with seven songs that were halfway between a diary and venting. I called my producer friend Mike Elizondo and said, “I have these songs. I don’t want to produce myself. Can I send them?” He was blown away and excited, so we wrote two more and then we had an album. It’s my response to what’s happening in my country, in my little world, and I guess in humanity at large. In Mike’s studio this young songwriter said she couldn’t get any traction from male singers unless she had a guy singing on the demo, so she paid $5 to have John Mayer’s voice singing on it, using AI. When she played it for us I almost started crying. It was so real, it felt like an assault on my spirit. We have to protect ourselves. So the album’s full of all this light and fluffy stuff [laughter]. Sheryl Crow and Johnny Cash in Los Angeles, 1995. Photograph: Steve Granitz/WireImage Your recent single Alarm Clock documents the moment a vivid dream is rudely interrupted. Do you typically remember dreams after waking up? VerulamiumParkRanger It depends on the dream. I have stress dreams more than I used to. Alarm Clock is a metaphor for life, too. Once you get jerked into the reality of how disturbing things are, it sort of robs you of the joy of fantasy, although life can still be beautiful. My cellphone is my alarm clock, so I wake up with the fear that my brain is being deteriorated by radioactive material. Was your mention of “Bud” beer in All I Wanna Do a paid product placement? redgreg I wish! If it was, I’d have made a ton of money. But no, that shit was really frowned upon back then. It was in Wyn Cooper’s poem, Fun, which inspired the song, although funnily enough I’m from Missouri where Budweiser is made, so it was my beer of choice. “I like a good beer buzz early in the morning” wasn’t factually correct very often, although I can’t lie and say I’ve never done it. Sheryl Crow with Bob Dylan backstage at the Grammys in 1998. Photograph: KMazur/WireImage Is it true that for some time you didn’t enjoy playing All I Wanna Do on tour, and that it was initially a throwaway track that nearly didn’t make it on to your first album? NotDericeBannock It was my least-favourite song on the record and I didn’t think it should go on there. It felt throwaway, but my little brother who was in college at the time said, “No, that’s the song all of us kids like. That’s going to be your biggest song.” I was like, “Dude, that’s never coming out,” but then of course after it was massive I said: “I should hire you as my A&R guy.” There was a time when I hated playing it, but I realised that that song took me all over the world, places a kid from a tiny town never dreamed of seeing. How did you go from “All I wanna do is have some fun” to duetting with the man in black [Johnny Cash] on Redemption Day? atribecalledvest Well, in response to those travels you end up writing songs that are deep and meaningful. I wrote that song in 1996 after going to Bosnia and thinking: “Why are we [the US] in Bosnia?” There was all this genocide going on but we weren’t doing anything about it in Rwanda. In my frustration the song spilled out. Many years later, Johnny was making a record; his brother-in-law gave him that song and he asked me if he could record it. After he passed we did another [duet] recording of it with his family’s blessing. What was it like singing with Emmylou Harris at Johnny Cash’s funeral? tomcasagranda Three months before Johnny passed he had asked me to sing at his wife June’s funeral, where I saw this larger-than-life man become diminished by the loss of this woman he loved so passionately. Then he called me to say: “I’m not done yet. I’m going to record your song.” When he passed soon afterwards his family asked me to sing with Emmy. I’d known Johnny for maybe two years, but seeing her with all her years of history with him felt powerful and transformative. The funeral was very emotional. We sang Every Grain of Sand, Johnny’s favourite Bob Dylan song. The lyrics were perfect for that moment and I’m very grateful that Dylan walked the earth. Every time I made a record, I would read his lyrics to get myself into a higher place. How did you come to hear Mississippi by Bob Dylan and did he ever express an opinion of your version on The Globe Sessions? Whovian79 I didn’t think my record was finished, and my manager was good friends with Dylan’s publisher and asked: “Uh, does Bob have any [unreleased] songs lying around?” So his manager came over. They won’t let you have a copy of the song: they play it for you, then they leave. So I had to learn it. Then I got the lyrics and recorded it. Years later he said: “Hey, I heard your version of Mississippi.” I asked him if he liked it and he went: “Did you like mine?!” He was not going to give it up. He’s a very witty, funny person. When I was running round with Eric Clapton, Bob asked me if Eric had shown me any licks. He’s such a trouble-causer! Sheryl Crow with Courteney Cox in Cougar Town. Photograph: Mitch Haddad/Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images Your song Woman in the White House longs for the day the US elects its first female president. Do you believe “we could use a little female common sense down on Pennsylvania Avenue” more than ever? VerulamiumParkRanger It depends on the person, female or male, but yes I do. I think of some of the predicaments we’ve been involved in in my lifetime – if we’d had a woman at the helm and a feminine energy to work things out, instead of sticks and guns. It’s ridiculous that the US has never had a female president, but I’ve almost given up on our politicians. They won’t do anything about getting the money out of government because that’s where they get rich. They don’t represent us. It’s a shitshow. Would you do another Bond theme? writeronthestorm In a second! I love the legacy and history of it, and you have carte blanche to be dramatic. Roger Moore is my favourite Bond, but my kids like Daniel Craig, because if anything was made before 2010 they won’t go near it [laughter]. I loved your role in Cougar Town. Are you considering more acting? UpperCasey I was – or am – very good friends with Courteney Cox, so it was really fun to do. But I wouldn’t do it now. I don’t live in LA any more, so it’s not like driving round the corner to the studio, and my kids are in school, so I want to spend my time with them. Sheryl Crow duets with Mick Jagger at a Rolling Stones concert in Chicago, 2013. Photograph: Paul Natkin/WireImage You’ve collaborated with Mick Jagger solo on Old Habits Die Hard from the Alfie soundtrack and on numerous guest appearances with the Rolling Stones. Is he different with the Stones and solo? tomcasagranda With the Stones I’ve only ever done live collaborations, but I’ve had Keith come into the studio and I’ve collaborated with Mick, but never in the same room. On the telephone or hanging out he’s always the same. Mick is Mick and Keith is Keith, and when they’re together they’re Mick and Keith! They’re both very intelligent, wickedly funny, fantastic human beings and they’re out there in their 80s, which gives me great hope for another 20 years. You’ve been releasing music for more than 30 years. How has your creative process evolved in that time? Joanna72Thomas In the early days we’d say we’d start at two, end up starting at 10pm and still be writing and drinking at five in the morning. It’s not like that any more. You get to a certain age where you almost age-out of being able to have the success younger artists have, but in some ways there’s liberation in that. I get to sit down and write a song that might piss off the masses. I don’t give a crap, because who’s going to hear it, right? I also feel like I’ve earned the right to piss off whoever I want. Sheryl Crow’s 20 greatest songs – ranked! Read more What female singers influenced you growing up? jfried Linda Rondstadt and Stevie Nicks were huge influences. Then Emmylou in college and Joni Mitchell, but more for her lyric writing. Bonnie Raitt was the first woman I saw play guitar in front of a band. I thought: “Oh, so we can do that.” What’s the best value you feel you can teach your boys? kjnpdx I think empathy is a natural instinct that we’re born with; when we see something that’s hurting, we feel sad. At a certain point you learn how to desensitise yourself to that, so I guess teaching them or helping them to re-sensitise themselves is very valuable. What makes you happy these days? Dreaminman My weekends and mornings playing with my boys, just blasting music in the house and tinkering around. That’s a total joy. Sheryl Crow’s album Evolution is released on 29 March. She tours the UK in June. Details at sherylcrow.com

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/21/actor-playing-gay-role-in-musical-sacked-for-homophobic-comments

Stage

2019-03-21T20:04:21.000Z

Kevin Rawlinson

Actor playing gay role in musical sacked for homophobic comments

An actor playing a gay character in a stage production of The Color Purple has been sacked over homophobic comments she made five years ago. Oluwaseyi Omooba, who was due to play the lead role of Celie, claimed the Bible made clear homosexuality was wrong in the eyes of God and that people cannot be born gay. A row was sparked when her Facebook post was unearthed and shared online by a fellow actor last week. On Thursday, the producers confirmed she would no longer be appearing in the show, saying Omooba’s comments had caused “significant and widely expressed concerns”. Chris Stafford and Nikolai Foster, representing the Curve theatre in Leicester and the Birmingham Hippodrome, where the musical was due to be staged, said: “Following careful reflection, it has been decided that Seyi will no longer be involved with the production. “The audition process, as ever, was conducted professionally and rigorously, led by an exceptional casting director with actors who are evaluated on what they present in the audition room. We do not operate a social media screening process in the casting of actors.” Being a gay Christian can be hurtful and gruelling. But I refuse to lose faith Lucy Knight Read more Posting a screenshot of the Facebook post online last week, Aaron Lee Lambert – who is appearing in the London production of Hamilton – accused Omooba of hypocrisy. “Seeing as you’ve now been announced to be playing an LGBTQ character, I think you owe your LGBTQ peers an explanation. Immediately,” he wrote. Other actors criticised Omooba, including the performer Charlotte Yorke, who said Omooba’s “antiquated views are wrong, not my sexuality. She doesn’t get to ‘believe’ in me ... I exist, I’m gay, and I feel and am more right than ever.” The post on Omooba’s Facebook page read: “I do not believe you can be born gay and I do not believe homosexuality is right, though the law of this land has made it legal doesn’t mean it’s right.” The musical production of The Color Purple, an adaptation of the Pulitzer prize-winning novel that was later turned into film starring Whoopi Goldberg, is due to be staged at the two theatres in July. It follows the life of its “tormented heroine”, Celie, over the course of 40 years. A representative of Omooba has not responded to a request for comment.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2024/feb/27/jurgen-klopp-says-defeat-by-liverpool-does-not-make-chelsea-bottlers

Football

2024-02-27T22:30:19.000Z

Andy Hunter

Jürgen Klopp says defeat by Liverpool does not make Chelsea ‘bottlers’

Jürgen Klopp has said it is unfair to label Chelsea “bottlers” for their ­Carabao Cup final display and that he felt sorry for Mauricio Pochettino’s team after their defeat by an inexperienced Liverpool. Chelsea were described as “blue billion‑pound bottle jobs” at Wembley by Gary Neville for a woeful extra‑time performance against an injury‑ravaged Liverpool side featuring four young substitutes. Klopp continues to savour “an immense” victory for his club but believes the accusations aimed at Chelsea were harsh and inaccurate, albeit part of the fallout from a cup final defeat. The Liverpool manager, who may have to rely on the same young squad for the FA Cup tie at home against Southampton on Wednesday, said: “I understand that people have to talk about it but I was in the other seat as well, losing a final, and people say a lot of things about you that you don’t like to hear. In my case some of them were true, some were not true, just ­guessing what might have happened. Jürgen Klopp’s Liverpool showed Chelsea how to win with young players Read more “I’m the one who knows what it’s like to lose five or six finals in a row. I can imagine how it was for Chelsea. Everybody tells you: ‘By the way, you lost the last five and that’s a new record.’ It’s not nice and I really felt for them. “They didn’t deserve to get all the blame. They played a really good football game, in a final where nobody plays their absolute best football. You just have to beat the opponent, and that’s what we did. That’s why this ‘bottling’ thing is really not mine. I really don’t understand it. They wanted it badly and didn’t get it, and I saw in the faces of the players and Poch after the game that it felt horrible. I don’t think anybody deserves these kind of feelings but in finals it is like that, that one feels like that and the other one is happier. It’s tricky, but it is the world we are living in.” Ryan Gravenberch will miss at least the fifth-round tie and the Premier League game at Nottingham Forest on Saturday with an ankle ligament injury sustained at Wembley. Wataru Endo is also an injury doubt and Mohamed Salah, Darwin Núñez and Dominik Szoboszlai will again have fitness tests before Klopp finalises his lineup for Southampton. Klopp remains astonished by the manner of the triumph on Sunday. “It was really touching the way they played and the way they contributed,” Klopp said of the young players. “The situation before we scored, when we got the corner, I don’t think I will ever forget it. ­Caoimhín [­Kelleher] passes the ball out to Wataru, the ball goes left to [Jarell] Quansah, passes it down the line then Dannsy [Jayden Danns] chips the ball, James [McConnell] passes the ball to Bobby Clark, who is waiting between the lines. That is wonderful because these details in football are incredibly important – the positions you are in – and these boys are doing it. It shows it’s possible. I didn’t know it was possible. Sign up to Football Daily Free daily newsletter Kick off your evenings with the Guardian's take on the world of football Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. “If you’d asked me before this lineup: ‘Can you win a game in extra time against Chelsea?’ No. Impossible. But seeing it and being part of it is super special. I know we won bigger trophies, it just didn’t feel like that in that moment.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/aug/20/jodi-picoult-white-male-literary-darlings

Books

2010-08-20T14:44:02.000Z

Alison Flood

Jodi Picoult attacks favouritism towards 'white male literary darlings'

Bestselling author Jodi Picoult has criticised the New York Times for focusing on "white male literary darlings" in its book coverage, following Michiko Kakutani's rave review of Jonathan Franzen's new novel Freedom. Earlier this week Kakutani's review of the novel – Franzen's first since his 2001 hit The Corrections – praised its "visceral and lapidary" prose, calling the author "as adept at adolescent comedy ... as he is at grown-up tragedy" and applauding "his ability to throw open a big, Updikean picture window on American middle-class life". "[He's] completed his own transformation from a sharp-elbowed, apocalyptic satirist focused on sending up the socio-economic-political plight of this country into a kind of 19th-century realist concerned with the public and private lives of his characters," wrote the influential reviewer about the novel, in a huge change of heart from her dissection of Franzen's memoir The Discomfort Zone in 2006, which she called "an odious self-portrait of the artist as a young jackass: petulant, pompous, obsessive, selfish and overwhelmingly self-absorbed". Picoult, whose popular novels of everyday people facing awful dilemmas have sold more than 12m copies worldwide but are largely overlooked by the literary establishment, was quick to respond. "NYT raved about Franzen's new book. Is anyone shocked?" she wrote on Twitter. "Would love to see the NYT rave about authors who aren't white male literary darlings." For every review of authors such as Haitian-American writer Edwidge Danticat or the Dominican-American Pulitzer winner Junot Díaz, "there are 10 Lethems and Franzens," she added later. Picoult also criticised Kakutani's use of the word "lapidary". "Did you know what [it] meant when you read it in Kakutani's review? I think reviewers just like to look smart," she tweeted. As well as Kakutani's Franzen piece, the most recent fiction reviews in the New York Times range from a piece on Gorky Park author Martin Cruz Smith's latest novel Three Stations to critiques of Norwegian novelist Per Petterson's I Curse the River of Time and Suzanne Rivecca's debut story collection Death Is Not an Option, along with shorter pieces on Ann Weisgarber's Orange-longlisted The Personal History of Rachel DuPree and Helen Grant's debut novel The Vanishing of Katharina Linden. Chick lit fails to make an appearance. Contacted by blog the NYT Picker, Picoult reaffirmed her view that "the Times favours white male authors. That isn't to say someone else might get a good review – only that if you are white and male and living in Brooklyn you have better odds, or so it seems". "The NYT has long made it clear that they value literary fiction and disdain commercial fiction – and they disparage it regardless of race or gender of the author," said the author. "I'm not commenting on one specific critic or even on my own reviews (which are few and far between because I write commercial fiction). How else can the Times explain the fact that white male authors are ROUTINELY assigned reviews in both the Sunday review section AND the daily book review section (often both raves) while so many other writers go unnoticed by their critics?" But she rejected the blog's claim that her disgruntlement stemmed from poor reviews of her own work in the paper: in 2008 a reviewer said she had written her novel Change of Heart "on authorial autopilot". Posting her email response to the blog online "in the effort of truth in journalism", Picoult insisted that "nowhere in here do I criticise Ms Kakutani, rant, or suggest that my comment (which really was just that - a COMMENT) was precipitated by the fact that I don't get rave reviews from the NYT. Just stating an opinion, as I see it, about those to whom the NYT chooses to devote inches of print". Her feelings were backed up by bestselling chick-lit writer Jennifer Weiner, author of In Her Shoes. "Carl Hiaasen doesn't have to chose between getting a Times review and being a bestseller. Why should I? Oh, right. #girlparts," she wrote on Twitter. "Books read by men – mysteries, thrillers, horror – at least maybe they'll be noticed, whether author male or female. Books read by women – romance, chick lit, commercial fic, whatever – rarely get noticed. When they do, reviews often ignorant." Later, she added: "NYT loves its literary darlings, who tend to be dudes w/MFAs ... In summation: NYT sexist, unfair, loves Gary Shteyngart, hates chick lit, ignores romance. And now, to go weep into my royalty statement." Over the last year Twitter has become a popular spot for authors to respond to critics. Last June, novelist Alice Hoffman tweeted that "Roberta Silman in the Boston Globe is a moron" following a poor review in the paper, going on to publish the reviewer's phone number and email address. "We writers don't have to say nothing when someone tries to destroy us," she added. "I love that writers have a way to talk back now."

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/nov/27/indefinite-immigration-detention-high-court-ruling-45-more-people-released

Australia news

2023-11-27T08:22:34.000Z

Paul Karp

Another 45 people released due to high court ruling on indefinite detention as Coalition plays hard ball on ‘patch-up’ bill

Peter Dutton has accused Labor of a “patch-up” job on its response to the high court decision on indefinite detention, as the Coalition plays hardball by demanding the government create a regime to redetain non-citizens. The immigration minister, Andrew Giles, has introduced new legislation to make “strict laws stricter”, amending the earlier emergency legislation passed with the Coalition’s support to make it more “durable” and help “get ahead of potential future challenges”. On Monday, the government tried to get on the front foot on immigration detention, announcing a $255m package to respond to releases and the new legislation to criminalise breach of conditions including approaching schools, childcare or daycare centres, working with minors or contacting victims or their families. The new bill rewrites one of the key safeguards of the initial response, changing the test for an exception to mandatory electronic monitoring and curfews from the minister being satisfied a “non-citizen does not pose a risk to the community” to satisfaction that the conditions “are not reasonably necessary for the protection of any part of the Australian community”. On Monday afternoon, Dutton told the House of Representatives the government “stands condemned” for designing a bill “on the run”, labelling it a “patch-up of laws designed by the Labor party at the 11th hour”. Dutton revealed he had met the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, three times on Monday to reiterate that “the resolve of the Coalition is to make sure that whatever can be done needs to be done to take these people back into detention”. In the NZYQ decision, reasons for which will be published on Tuesday, the high court found that indefinite immigration detention was unlawful where it is not possible to deport the non-citizen. But Dutton said the government should legislate a “preventative detention regime as part of this bill”. The opposition voted with the Greens against the government bill. A government spokesperson said the Coalition had opposed “urgent laws which would criminalise released detainees going near schools or contacting their victims – the very laws Peter Dutton says he supports”. The government, which has given “in-principle support” for a preventative detention regimes, will now “need to consider” the court’s reasons “to finalise rigorous and robust legislation”, the spokesperson said. Australian housing wealth is meaningless, destructive and fundamentally changing our society Read more Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup Guardian Australia revealed on Wednesday that the first package had been challenged on the basis they were “punitive” by a Chinese refugee known as S151. Earlier, Giles told reporters in Canberra the government would “vigorously defend” the case. “Fundamentally talking tough doesn’t keep Australians safe. Strong laws keep Australians safe.” On Monday the Australian Border Force confirmed that 141 people have been released as a result of the high court’s landmark NZYQ decision. The ABF commissioner, Michael Outram, said that of the 138 people released who require electronic monitoring some 132 have already had electronic monitoring ankle bracelets applied. Of the remaining six, Outram said four “have been referred to the federal police, that means there’s been non-compliance in those four cases”. Three have been contacted. In one case the ABF and the AFP are still “making attempts” to contact them, he said. Sign up to Afternoon Update Free daily newsletter Our Australian afternoon update breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what’s happening and why it matters Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. “The remaining two … are difficult, complex cases,” he said. “For example, involving some health issues and those two cases are being worked through today.” The home affairs minister, Clare O’Neil, said said the effect of the high court’s decision was that the government must release people for whom it was not “reasonably possible for us to move them to another country and someone who is in immigration detention under the same sort of circumstances as NZYQ”. O’Neil said the reason a “second cohort” had been released in addition to the initial 93 was that “we have received advice that this all needs to apply to people who have some kind of legal matter on foot with the commonwealth”. “So for people, for example, who might be appealing an aspect of Minister Giles’ decision-making – those people, we have been advised, we are also required to release.” O’Neil claimed “this is it” for expected releases – despite the fact the government was facing action in the federal court to release others, such as Iranian asylum seeker Ned Kelly Emeralds. “The entire detention cohort has been assessed against the criteria,” she said. “What now awaits us is a period where the reasons for the decisions will be released by the high court.” After the reasons are released, O’Neil conceded it was “possible that other cohorts will be brought in” – meaning further releases. Greens senator Nick McKim said Labor had “let Dutton pressure them into trampling refugee rights with hasty and xenophobic legislation”. “Here they go again,” he said in a statement. “This isn’t leadership – it’s a betrayal of principles in the face of political pressure.” Alison Battisson, the director of Human Rights For All, and David Manne, the executive director of Refugee Legal, have both warned the changes may amount to “extrajudicial” punishment. The Law Council has warned the government’s new laws lack sufficient safeguards and may not be proportionate.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2024/jan/24/how-to-spot-a-liar-10-essential-tells-from-random-laughter-to-copycat-gestures

Science

2024-01-24T10:00:04.000Z

Zoe Williams

How to spot a liar: 10 essential tells – from random laughter to copycat gestures

Twenty-two people in a castle, Claudia Winkleman hamming it up like crazy, a number of silly challenges, a chunk of money sitting at the centre, almost glowing, and human nature laid bare. To try to pick apart exactly what makes The Traitors so compelling would be to miss the point, like trying to analyse the ingredients in a Krispy Kreme doughnut. As enjoyable as it is, though, the show gets more infuriating with each episode. I don’t want to point fingers, still less give spoilers, so let’s keep this broad: why are they (the Faithful) all so stupid? Why can’t they tell when they are being lied to? It’s so obvious! I asked three experts how to spot a lie – and why most people can’t. First, Dr Linda Papadopoulos, a psychologist, author and broadcaster, whom people of a certain vintage may remember as the standout discovery of the first season of Big Brother. Reality TV was in its infancy, so watching ordinary people interact under a microscope was fascinating in itself, but Papadopoulos, the show’s resident psychologist, added an almost superhuman level of insight into the contestants’ feelings; she was like a mind-reader. Second, Joe Navarro is the author of What Every Body Is Saying, insights into non-verbal cues and tells gleaned from his career as an FBI agent. Gabrielle Stewart, the third, is a retired insurance investigator who works as a fraud consultant for the industry. This trio don’t always agree but, seriously, you wouldn’t want to lie to any of them. Here are their 10 tips for spotting a liar. Watch for self-soothing gestures Under pressure … Ash, a Traitor, feels the heat. Photograph: BBC “The problem with the myth of detecting deception is that since the groundbreaking work of Paul Ekman [a psychologist whose visual test, Pictures of Facial Affect, was published in 1976] and all the researchers that came after him, we know that humans are no better than chance at detecting deception,” says Navarro. But that doesn’t mean you can’t read anything into people’s expressions and behaviours. “What the human body does – and it does it exquisitely – is display psychological discomfort in real time,” he says. “King Charles – he’s always playing with his cufflinks. This is how he deals with social anxiety. Prince Harry – he’s always buttoning the button that’s already buttoned – another comforting behaviour.” Facial touching is known as a pacifier – a way to soothe yourself under stress. “Right now, you are covering your suprasternal notch,” says Navarro as our video call starts. Protecting my neck, in other words, “which is because there’s a man right in front of you”. That makes me chortle, because I love men. But he is right in the sense that I have always keenly felt the jeopardy of the first few seconds of an interview – if you make a mess of that, the whole thing is ruined. So, there is the first principle: everything someone does with their hands and their face says something. Now, you have to figure out what. Probe areas where you detect psychological discomfort Navarro recalls a search for a fugitive during his FBI days. Interviewing the man’s mother, he asked if she had seen her son. She said no and was plainly nervous, but there was no way to connect the anxiety to the answer; she could have been telling the truth and simply been unsettled by the appearance of two FBI agents on her doorstep. He changed tack and asked if it was possible that her son was sneaking in to the house while she was at work. “She said: ‘No, that’s not possible at all,’” displaying a nervous tell – covering her neck, in this instance. “But there was no reason for that, right? All she had to say was: ‘I don’t know.’” So the non-verbal show of nerves combined with the illogical answer hinted at deception. Sure enough, the man was in the house. Don’t take obvious gestures at face value Covering your mouth in horror, like Jaz, doesn’t prove your motives. Photograph: BBC Some striking non-verbal tells are rooted in archaic human self‑preservation. We cover our mouths when we see something shocking or horrible, because “it prevents the casting of our scent, which predators can pick up on,” Navarro says. The problem is that the more obvious the gesture, the easier it is to plan for and mimic. So, every time they vote out an innocent player on The Traitors, all the Faithful cover their mouths in horror, but so do the Traitors. Big, set-piece events, where everyone is making the same face or gesture, probably won’t tell you very much. Look for mismatch Papadopoulos picks up on the space between the non-verbal and the verbal – the incongruity between words and gestures: “You’re nodding, but saying no.” Stewart listens for acoustic variance in speech, where pitch and tone change. Lying people will pad a story with elements of truth, which is probably smart, except that, when they come to the falsehoods, “they speed up and speak at a higher pitch”, says Stewart. “The voice is saying: ‘I’m in cognitive overload.’” Learn to receive, not transmit All ears … Diane listens intently as Brian and Jonny hash it out. Photograph: Studio Lambert/BBC “The ability to actively listen, which is what psychologists do, is surprisingly rare. A lot of people are thinking of what they’re going to say next, rather than listening,” Papadopoulos says. We also forget how much of ourselves we bring to the interaction; if we are stressed or anxious, it’s harder to detect or decode stress in others. Papadopoulos describes falling for a scam when she was in the middle of a family crisis: “I write about these things – I know my stuff – but, in that moment, I was duped. If I was on my game, that would have been much less likely. That’s the whole basis of psychology: we think through our emotions and that moderates the quality of our thinking.” Don’t ignore the impact your tone is having on the conversation (memo to The Traitors’ Diane): “If you come across as accusatory, that affects how people react,” Navarro says. “I never did that, as it puts people on the defence and it begins to mask behaviours that I need to observe.” Don’t jump to conclusions, either. Classic ways to spot a liar – such as vagueness, or buying time, Papadopoulos says – might mean something completely different. “It might just mean they weren’t really listening,” she says. If you decide too quickly that you have uncovered deception, it gates off other possible explanations. Get them to tell their side of the story Friends or foes? (From left) Anthony, Kyra, Sonja, Miles, Jaz and Charlotte. Photograph: Llara Plaza/BBC/Studio Lambert Stewart, who did her insurance investigation work by phone, says: “The structure of the account is key. You wouldn’t necessarily do this in person when you’re speaking to somebody, but any story will have a beginning, a middle and an end. It’s normally 30% buildup, 40% content, 30% afterthoughts and reflections. An untruthful account won’t stick to that structure, because they don’t really want to tell you that 40%. The most common structure of a lie will be 80% buildup, then they’ll tell you what happened really, really quickly, then they’ll want to get it over with. “I would record an event using timelines and bullet points on landscape paper, then draw a line where I believe I’ve gone from beginning to middle to end. Almost every fraudulent account will have a very long beginning, bugger-all middle and bugger-all end.” Memory-blamers are a flag: when something significant happens, it’s very unusual to forget it. Even if it has been misremembered or misperceived, there won’t be a big hole in the memory where that detail should be. Listen for tenses and dissociation “We use completely different language when we’re telling lies,” says Stewart. “A really famous example is President Nixon. He was asked straight out: ‘Did you know about Watergate?’ and his answer was: ‘The president would do no such thing.’ “First, he’s got disociation, which is very common. In an untruthful account, there’s a lack of ‘I’ and ‘my’, because we want to push the lie away from ourselves. Then, he’s slipped tenses.” A truthful person whose car has been stolen, for example, will say: “I left it here, came back an hour later and it was gone.” An untruthful account might slip into the present continuous: “I’m walking down the path and I’m looking for my car, thinking …” Be alive to odd noises or random words Stewart talks about “emotional leakage”. A liar might randomly start laughing, but it won’t sound like mirth. Time-filling sounds are common. “It’s an additional cognitive load, saying untruthful things,” she says. “It’s like patting your head and rubbing your stomach at the same time. So, they’ll be on high alert and they can’t bear silence. You’ll hear coughing, or strings of words that don’t need to be said.” Allied to this is non-committal language, or “linguistic hedging” – words such as “probably” and “possibly”. “They’re like disclaimers: ‘I don’t want to commit myself with this language.’” Ask character questions Denying that Zack (right) is annoying would be classic liar behaviour. Photograph: Llara Plaza/BBC/Studio Lambert In the 80s, my dad, who was a prison psychologist, devised some recruitment tests for the police that were designed to establish whether candidates were honest. One of the progressions was: “Are you married? Have you ever had an affair? Have you ever thought about having an affair?” If you answered yes to the first, it didn’t matter what you said to the second, as long as you didn’t answer no to the third, because everyone’s thought about it. To apply this to The Traitors, a player could ask of another: “Do you find Zack annoying?” If they say no, it doesn’t prove that they are a Traitor, but they are certainly the kind of person who lies. Ask yourself: are you looking through the right end of the telescope? Unlike Jasmine, not everyone will feel discomfited by mendacity. Photograph: BBC Every one of these clues – verbal, non-verbal and in between – relies on something: the liar’s discomfort. Not everyone will feel discomfited by mendacity; some people will enjoy it. “We know that 1% of any given population – here in America it may be way more – are psychopaths,” says Navarro. “These people can lie all day long. There are structures in their prefrontal cortex that just don’t function.” Added to that, “4% of the population is antisocial; these are people who live by criminal activity”, he says. Even if they weren’t born to deceive, they will be habituated to it. Many people have to lie for their jobs. Navarro mentions spies and doctors, but makes the broader point that we all use lying “as a tool of social survival”. Inevitably, some of us will end up quite good at it. But what are we trying to survive? We want to remain members of the group and we fear expulsion. In a culture where lying is prized – politics, The Traitors – the act of lying might make you come across as more confident, rather than less. So, if you cross-referenced the verbal and non-verbal cues, then reverse-engineered the tests to become reasonably good at identifying an honest nervous person, you could figure out who was lying by a process of elimination; even if they were psychopathically good at it, that wouldn’t matter. In The Traitors – and in life – what will undo you is letting yourself become certain on the basis of too little information or ambiguous evidence. “I looked at 261 DNA exonerations in the US,” Navarro says. “All the police officers thought that they could detect deception, but not one of them could detect the truth. In fact, none of the men were guilty.” Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2019/jun/19/everton-andre-gomes-barcelona-burnley-tom-heaton-rejects-new-contract

Football

2019-06-19T16:27:09.000Z

Andy Hunter

Everton set to land £22m Gomes but Burnley hit by Heaton contract blow

Everton are close to the permanent signing of André Gomes after agreeing a fee of £22m plus add-ons for the Barcelona midfielder. Gomes enjoyed a successful loan last season at Goodison Park, where regular first-team football and a healthy relationship with the manager, Marco Silva, helped to rejuvenate a career that had stalled. Transfer window summer 2019 – every deal from Europe's top five leagues Read more Everton did not have an option to buy the Portugal international, a situation that invited West Ham to make several bids for the 25-year-old, but Gomes made clear to the Spanish champions that he wanted to stay at Goodison. That helped Everton to secure a deal that is expected to rise to around £25m with bonus payments. Gomes’s arrival will coincide with Nikola Vlasic turning his loan at CSKA Moscow into a £14m transfer. The Croatia international was the last of many ill-fated signings under Ronald Koeman, costing £10m in 2017, and started only 11 games for Everton. Leighton Baines has signed a 12-month contract extension to stay at the club next season. Burnley could be forced into seeking buyers for Tom Heaton after the England goalkeeper turned down a new contract. The 33-year-old, who made a positive impact on regaining his place in the lineup after a lengthy spell out with injury, will enter the final year of his deal next month. Heaton made his 200th appearance for Burnley on the final day of last season and was in effect England’s No 2 behind Jordan Pickford at this month’s Nations League finals. Yet the Burnley captain faces stiff competition to remain first-choice in Sean Dyche’s side, with Nick Pope – another England international – having signed a new long-term deal in May and Joe Hart also on the books. The latter also has one year to run on his contract and Burnley are unlikely to risk both experienced goalkeepers departing on frees next summer. Clubs including Bournemouth and Aston Villa have been credited with interest in Heaton.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/jun/07/albanese-government-knew-sustainable-darwin-harbour-project-would-be-used-for-gas-export-documents-show

Australia news

2023-06-08T01:53:28.000Z

Lisa Cox

Albanese government knew ‘sustainable’ Darwin harbour project would be used for gas export, documents show

The federal government knew wharves at the proposed “sustainable” Middle Arm development on Darwin harbour would be used for gas export, documents released under freedom of information show. Briefing materials from the Northern Territory government released to the Environment Centre of the NT have prompted fresh questions about the Albanese government’s $1.5bn stake in the project, which both governments have labelled a sustainable development precinct. Darwin’s ‘sustainable’ Middle Arm development is key to huge fossil fuel projects, documents show Read more The federal minister for infrastructure, Catherine King, has previously said the federal government’s investment in Middle Arm is “not a subsidy for fossil fuels” but rather “an important way of setting up our economy for a sustainable future”. But a conceptual drawing by the NT government that formed part of an incoming minister briefing prepared by the federal infrastructure department before last year’s election shows the gas industry would benefit from the proposed federally funded marine infrastructure. In the drawing, four of five proposed wharves are labelled for shipping of products including LNG (liquefied natural gas), methanol, ethylene, ammonia and “clean petroleum”. The remaining wharf is labelled “hydrogen”. The drawing was for what the NT government described as a “balanced scenario” it was pursuing at Middle Arm, which would feature gas, petrochemicals, blue and green hydrogen, critical minerals and carbon capture and storage. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup Two other possible scenarios were prepared, a “future fuels” scenario focused on gas and hydrogen and a “downstream” scenario focused on petrochemicals. A separate video describes the project as a “globally unique green energy hub” and illustrates plans to link Middle Arm with Sun Cable’s proposed solar farm and the Beetaloo gas basin south of Katherine. It includes a list of companies that could feature at the Middle Arm site including Tamboran Resources (one of the main companies operating in the Beetaloo), Fortescue Future Industries (Fortescue Metals Group’s clean energy arm), Sun Cable and the critical minerals company TNG, which has since rebranded as Tivan. Critics argue the Middle Arm precinct project amounts to ‘fracking infrastructure’. Photograph: Mike Bowers/The Guardian The video is undated, but a version was published by the NT government in late 2022 without the list of possible proponents. The Australian Financial Review reported Wednesday afternoon that Tamboran, FFI and Tivan would feature in an imminent announcement by the NT government about the precinct. Guardian Australia revealed last month that a briefing to the environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, said the precinct was seen as a “key enabler” for the export of gas from the Beetaloo basin. Kirsty Howey, the ECNT’s executive director, said the new documents put “beyond doubt” that “everyday Australians are funding a massive fracking export hub in the middle of Darwin harbour to the tune of $1.5bn”. “By directly subsidising fracking infrastructure at Middle Arm, it’s clear the Albanese government is not merely a passive bystander in new gas projects – it’s a partner in them,” she said. “Our governments should be acting urgently to cut emissions, not funding carbon bombs that will speed us towards climate collapse.” A spokeswoman for King said the Middle Arm precinct was “not targeted at one industry over another”. Sign up to Afternoon Update Free daily newsletter Our Australian afternoon update breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what’s happening and why it matters Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. “It offers opportunities for a range of industries including gas, green hydrogen and renewable storage, as well as advanced manufacturing, carbon capture and storage, minerals processing and other land uses,” she said. “This investment into common-use enabling infrastructure will give all potential users, in the market the opportunity to grow and thrive rather than a particular company or industry.” Grant Wilson is the executive chair of Tivan, which has publicly stated it will use the Middle Arm precinct for processing of vanadium for products such as batteries. Wilson said Tivan would make use of the existing infrastructure at Darwin harbour and renewable power to limit its own footprint. He has raised his concerns about the gas focus of the $1.5bn in federal funding and urged the Albanese government to consider redirecting the money to more sustainable uses at the site. How is Australia trying to sell a major gas expansion? By badging it ‘sustainable’ Read more “I think more of the so-called subsidy should be devoted to land-based infrastructure and to facilitating common use renewables and common use water infrastructure,” Wilson said. “We are concerned that the social and community reaction to what is effectively subsidising gas infrastructure will be negative for the precinct.” On Wednesday the NT government outlined plans for a feasibility study for a “clean hydrogen hub” at Middle Arm. The study, which has federal funding, would be conducted by the gas companies Inpex and Santos, the national science agency CSIRO and the energy consultancy Xodus. The NT’s chief minister, Natasha Fyles, said Middle Arm “will be a sustainable development precinct for both jobs here in the territory for manufacturing” but also for new technologies to supply energy locally and globally. She dismissed suggestions Middle Arm was gas-focused. “There’s a lot of excitement because people can see that this precinct is an opportunity not only for the Northern Territory but an opportunity for Australia and around the world,” she said.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/food/2023/dec/04/poached-chicken-five-trimmings-sauces-recipe-rachel-roddy

Food

2023-12-04T11:00:41.000Z

Rachel Roddy

Rachel Roddy’s recipe for poached chicken with five sauces | A kitchen in Rome

Before she moved, Ginia lived in a fifth-floor flat in a 1920s block near Piazza Vittorio. And before she gave up cooking, she used to make a bollito every other Sunday. Once upon a time, that meant an almost full bollito misto alla Piemontese, as her father taught her to make it: beef (muscle, tail and tongue), also a whole chicken and cotechino sausage boiled separately, then served together, sliced and steaming hot, with a selection of sauces. But as the years went on and the house emptied – of children, also of her husband (she threw him out) – her bollito streamlined. By the time I met Ginia, the bollito was half a chicken, or maybe a boneless beef rib known as scaramella. Not that there was any talk of food when we first met in the international bookshop near Termini station. Browsing side by side, she asked me what I thought of Iris Murdoch, looked appalled when I said I hadn’t read her, then walked over to the desk and ordered me a copy of The Sea, The Sea. Two weeks later she sent me a message in capital letters – “LIBRO ARRIVES, BOOKSHOP WED 10” – and, after picking it up, we went for coffee, the first of many. She also seemed appalled when I told her I wrote about food. “Of all the subjects”. But then later we did talk about food – if the story involved something sinister or salacious, or a pub. Which is how we arrived at the bollito, and her ex-husband’s insistence that for it to be true bollito, the raw meat must be put into boiling water, but how she used to start from cold and he never noticed the difference. And somehow we arrived at Fergus Henderson’s way of poaching a chicken, which she was quite delighted by, and in return she gave me suggestions for the sauces for boiled meat, whether for a bollito or a single poached bird, which is one of my favourite meals. Ginia suggested two or three condiments, plus mustard, with a poached bird, the sauces, and all ideally served in a compartmentalised dish. Leftover sauces are a gift for future meals and the saviour of leftovers. Ginia now lives in Berlin near her daughter, reads avidly and never cooks. Poached chicken with five sauces Northern Italian bollito – that is, poached meats served with various sauces – meets a Fergus Henderson chicken recipe. I think the boiled bird, while pale, looks beautiful sitting whole, maybe with a leaf of parsley dipped in broth as an almost tattoo-like decoration, but it can, of course, also be sliced and arranged on a pretty plate. Either way, the chicken is surrounded by the various sauces, including jewel-like mustard fruits, and a bowl of boiled potatoes, too, if you like. Prep 10 min Cook 45 min, plus cooling time Serves 6 For the poached chicken 1 large chicken (approx. 2kg), with the skin slit between leg and breast 1 carrot, peeled and halved 1 leek, trimmed and halved 1 onion, peeled and halved 2 bay leaves 34 parsley stalks Salt Put all the ingredients in a large pot, cover with cold water and slowly bring to a boil. As soon as it boils, take off the heat, cover and leave to cool completely. Lift the chicken and all the vegetables out of the pot and set aside. Strain the broth, return it to the pan and bring to a gentle simmer. Return the chicken to the pot and simmer gently for 30 minutes, to heat it through thoroughly – by the end, it will be cooked through, warm and very tender. If you like, heat through some whole boiled potatoes, too. There are now two options: one is to lift the bird on to a plate and carve it at the table, passing around a jug of the broth, and the other is to carve it first, arrange on a serving dish and serve with a little broth spooned over the top to keep it moist, with more broth in a jug alongside. Either way, serve with four or five of the sauces below in small bowls, and encourage everyone to help themselves. Mustard fruits The most important of the sauces –especially when this is being served as a festive meal – is mustard fruits, or mostarda di frutta, a glossy bling of a condiment from Cremona in northern Italy consisting of candied fruit poached in a mustard-flavoured syrup. You can get it from any good Italian delicatessen. Horseradish sauce Blend 100g horseradish (either fresh or puree from a jar) with 100g soft white breadcrumbs, 50g white-wine vinegar, 40ml olive oil and a teaspoon of sugar until it forms a soft cream, then season with salt to taste. Bagnetto rosso (red sauce) Dice 300g tomatoes, 300g red pepper, 200g onion, a stick of celery, a small red chilli and two cloves, then put in a pan. Cook, stirring often, over a very low heat for about 45 minutes, or until the vegetables are extremely soft. Lift out and discard the cloves, then pass through a food mill or blend smooth. Add two tablespoons of red-wine vinegar, 20g sugar and salt to taste. Salsa verde (green sauce) Put 120g parsley, three anchovy fillets, two hard-boiled egg yolks, a peeled clove of garlic, a teaspoon of drained capers, 150ml olive oil and two teaspoons of red-wine vinegar in a blender and whiz to a thick, consistent sauce. Mayonnaise Blend two egg yolks, a teaspoon of dijon mustard and, adding it slowly and whisking constantly, 250ml oil – I use half-and-half vegetable oil/olive oil – until emulsified. Add salt and lemon juice to taste. Fiona Beckett’s drink pairing Although the sauces are quite punchy, Italians would tend to drink a lightish red such as a langhe nebbiolo with a dish such as this. The Wine Society has one in its Exhibition range (£14.50, 14.5%) that would be spot on.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/sep/14/edith-grossman-obituary

Books

2023-09-14T15:44:06.000Z

Nick Caistor

Edith Grossman obituary

“I thought to stay home and translate was more fun than playing with monkeys. I didn’t have to get dressed to go to work. I could smoke all I wanted.” This was the typically tongue-in-cheek way that Edith Grossman, the pre-eminent translator of Latin American and Spanish literature, described how she started out on her career in translation. Grossman, who has died aged 87 of pancreatic cancer, became a professional translator soon after she had completed her doctorate on the work of the Chilean poet Nicanor Parra in 1972, and was considering what she should do next. This was at a time when US publishers were beginning to bring out translations of the contemporary Latin American authors of the “boom” generation, and it was not long before “Edie”, as she was known, became the translator of choice for Gabriel García Márquez, completing her version of his 1985 novel Love in the Time of Cholera in 1988. She and the Colombian author became close friends, and she once described him as “an utterly delicious man. He was very funny, with a straight-faced wit. I never knew what the expression ‘a twinkle in the eye’ meant really; I couldn’t visualise it until I met him, because his eyes did twinkle. He was very witty, very smart, very underplayed.” Grossman went on to translate all his subsequent novels, as well as those of another Latin American Nobel laureate, the Peruvian Mario Vargas Llosa, beginning with Death in the Andes in 1996. He has said of her work: “It doesn’t seem to be a translation of a novel, but something that gives the impression that it has been written originally in English.” As well as many other Latin American writers, including Mayra Montero, Ariel Dorfman, and Álvaro Mutis, Grossman tackled some of the classic Spanish authors, most notably Cervantes and his Don Quixote, producing a memorable version in English for the fourth centenary of its original publication in 2003. The critic Harold Bloom praised her as being “the [pianist] Glenn Gould of translators, because she, too, articulates every note”. For her part, she insisted that translation was an aural/oral practice, first capturing the tonalities of the original work, and then finding a way of being able to speak something as close as possible to it in English. She was born Edith Dorph in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (which she once called “the most boring city in the United States”) to Sarah (nee Stern), a secretary, and Alexander Dorph, a shoe salesman who later owned his own shoe store. She studied Spanish language and literature at the University of Pennsylvania, spent a year in Spain as a Fulbright scholar, and gained her doctorate from New York University (NYU). She had married Norman Grossman, a musician, in 1965; the couple had two sons before their divorce in 1984. The author whose work Grossman said she most enjoyed translating was, however, not a novelist, but the obscure 17th-century Spanish poet Luis de Góngora, whose work was notoriously difficult to understand, let alone translate. She produced a version of his Solitudes (published in 2011) of which she said: “I thought, oh my God, if I can do this I can leap tall buildings in a single bound – there’s nothing I can’t do.” Although she gave up an academic career to be a full-time translator, over the years Grossman was an inspiring teacher of Spanish and Latin American literature as well as translation at NYU and Columbia University. In 2010 she published a book of essays with her thoughts on her craft, Why Translation Matters. In it, she reflects on the importance of bringing works from another language and culture into English, stressing how this process “expands and deepens our world, our consciousness, in countless, indescribable ways”. She was also insistent that the translator’s name be included on the front cover of publications, together with that of the author. In a 2019 interview for the translation website Asymptote, Grossman considered it was time that translators were no longer seen as the poor relation but as an equal partner in the production of a work in a different language: “Reviewers used to write as though translation had appeared through kind of a divine miracle. An immaculate conception!” Her work was recognised by many awards over the years. These included: the PEN/Ralph Manheim medal for translation in 2006, the Arts and Letters award in literature in 2008, and the Queen Sofía Spanish Institute translation prize in 2010 for her translation of Antonio Muñoz Molina’s A Manuscript of Ashes. In 2016, she received the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Civil Merit from the king of Spain, Felipe VI, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters awarded her its Thornton Wilder prize for translation in 2022. She is survived by her sons, Kory and Matthew, and a sister, Judith. Edith Marion Grossman, translator and lecturer, born 22 March 1936; died 4 September 2023

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/jul/02/christian-bale-batman-gives-up-role

Film

2013-07-02T11:40:01.000Z

Ben Child

Christian Bale gives up Batman role

Christian Bale will not be returning to the role of Batman – in a Justice League movie or any other film. Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, the British actor confirmed his trilogy of films as the caped crusader for Christopher Nolan between 2005's Batman Begins and last year's The Dark Knight Rises had sated his interest in playing the superhero. "We were incredibly fortunate to get to make three. That's enough. Let's not get greedy," he said. "Chris always said he wanted to make it one film at a time. And we ended up sitting there looking at each other, saying 'We're about to make the third.' We never really knew if we were going to get to be there, but if that was how it was going to be, this was where it should end as well." Bale said the time was now right for another man to play Batman on the big screen. "It's a torch that should be handed from one actor to another," he said. "So I enjoy looking forward to what somebody else will come up with." A Justice League movie, which would see Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman uniting on the big screen, is in the works at studio Warner Bros following the $520m (£340m) box-office success of Superman reboot Man of Steel. It is expected, however, that a sequel to Man of Steel will move into production first. US blog Latino Review set tongues wagging in the fanboy community in March by suggesting that Bale would return as Batman in Justice League, with Nolan overseeing the project in the same way he produced Man of Steel. Warners also produced the British director's Batman movies and owns screen rights to all DC comics superheroes. However, Bale said he was not aware of more than the most basic details regarding Justice League. "I have no information, no knowledge about anything," he said. "I've literally not had a conversation with a living soul. I understand that they may be making a Justice League movie, that's it."

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2024/feb/20/ato-eyeing-ramp-up-of-controversial-robotax-scheme-in-bid-to-recoup-15bn-in-on-hold-debts

Australia news

2024-02-19T14:00:14.000Z

Jonathan Barrett

ATO eyeing ramp-up of controversial robotax scheme in bid to recoup $15bn in ‘on-hold’ debts

The Australian Taxation Office is preparing to expand a controversial scheme that resurrects decades-old debts in its pursuit of more than $15bn, despite rising numbers of complaints, transparency concerns and at least one systems error resulting in miscalculations. Internal ATO documents released to Guardian Australia show the program is designed to ramp up this year to eventually capture up to 1.8m entities, largely consisting of individuals. The documents, released under freedom of information laws, show the ATO had decided against seeking a reprieve for older Australians and those on lower incomes as part of the plan to recoup historical debts. But it said in a statement it was “currently assessing next steps” for the scheme. Dubbed robotax, the initiative has drawn comparison to the flawed robodebt compliance program that relied on automated processes, and has been described as “brutal” by taxpayers, including those who say they do not know how the debts were incurred and no longer have documents required to challenge them. The old debts are described as “on-hold”, marked to be scraped from tax refunds. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup The surge in ATO activity stems from a policy change to adjust parameters on its automated systems that had previously ignored old debts deemed uneconomical to pursue, some of which are more than two decades old. The amounts are often linked to old business activity statements, GST payments, PAYG instalments and non-lodgment fines applied to those living overseas, with many of the debts unknowingly accrued and invisible to taxpayers for years. Correspondence between the ATO and government officials, obtained under freedom of information The tax department started removing exemptions on its systems in 2022 that had previously filtered out the old debts. An ATO spokesperson said on Monday night the tax office had “paused all communications and offsetting for those who had their debt placed on hold before 2017”. Offsetting refers to the initiative to extract the older debts from tax refunds. “We are currently assessing next steps and no decision has been made yet as an outcome of this review,” the spokesperson said. The ATO has consistently said it had no option under the law to cancel the debts, following advice that found an apparent flaw in its policies. “The ATO has no discretion under the law to write these amounts off even though some of them might be quite aged, and must offset any future refund against these amounts no matter how small except in limited circumstances,” the spokesperson said. “We are legally required to offset debts that were placed ‘on hold’ against any tax credits or refunds the taxpayer may become entitled to.” The ATO plans to remove the last-remaining exemption, related to the age of the debt, before the end of this financial year, according to the documents, in an expansion of the program. Robotax: why thousands of Australians are receiving tax debt notices dating back up to 15 years Read more The exemptions had previously filtered out debts if they were very old, small, or the taxpayer was aged over 70 years or earning a taxable income of less than $50,000. ATO correspondence shared with the federal government said: “When all exclusions are removed, all clients may have credits offset against their debts.” The ATO’s approach to remove the exemptions had been discussed with Treasury officials as far back as mid 2022, according to the documents. There have also been periodic updates provided by the ATO to the office of the assistant treasurer, Stephen Jones. Pre-empting questions about the program, the ATO also shared its “media holding lines” with government officials. A spokesperson for Jones said it was a matter for the ATO but the government was deeply concerned about the way the initiative had been communicated with taxpayers, and the stress caused. “The ATO should ensure they communicate with compassion and understanding to impacted individuals,” the spokesperson said. Last year the ATO paused a letter campaign alerting taxpayers to historical debts after conceding its communications caused “unnecessary distress”, although the debts still remain. No reprieve While tens of thousands of Australians have started having their old debts paid from their tax refunds, the number of people affected is set to escalate. Up to 1.8 million ATO “clients”, which mainly refers to individuals but also includes small businesses and other entities, collectively owe more than $15bn of on-hold debts, the documents show. Correspondence between the ATO and government officials The internal documents show the ATO decided against asking the finance minister to seek a waiver for some people, such as lower-income earners and older Australians. It defended the blanket approach in correspondence with government officials by arguing it would be unfair to other taxpayers to let some off, and that it might set a bad precedent. As a result, some taxpayers have been pushed further into hardship by having their anticipated tax refunds scraped for old debts, a scenario that has drawn criticism from the tax ombudsman. The ATO began extracting debts from tax refunds before providing records to affected taxpayers that would have allowed them to see how the debts were accrued. The lack of transparency has been a common complaint given some of the debts are so old they are almost impossible to challenge, far exceeding the five-year retention period most taxpayers are required to keep records. Robotax: retiree pursued by ATO for five-year-old tax on deceased father’s estate Read more “We are giving visibility to clients of their existing debts ‘on hold’ in two stages, prioritising those who we believe are more active in the system,” correspondence from the ATO to the assistant treasurer’s office said in August 2023. “By 30 June 2025, we will provide visibility to all remaining clients.” In separate correspondence with Treasury officials the same month, the ATO acknowledges a “small number of clients” had been impacted by a systems error that resulted in the amount to be offset being miscalculated. After debts were extracted from a batch of 29,015 individuals and small businesses, the ATO disclosed it received 167 complaints from those affected. The ATO commissioner, Chris Jordan, is due to give a major public address at the National Press Club on Wednesday shortly before stepping down from his role at the end of the month. Do you know more? Email jonathan.barrett@theguardian.com

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2022/aug/02/worst-house-on-the-street-review-youll-be-screaming-at-the-tv-who-are-these-people

Television & radio

2022-08-02T20:00:07.000Z

Chitra Ramaswamy

Worst House on the Street review – you’ll be screaming at the TV ‘WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE?’

Such is the total state of this country that when I first saw the title of this series I assumed it was a euphemism for Britain. As in: here’s Worst House on the Street, a hard-hitting Channel 4 documentary about the UK housing crisis. Next, set the tape – as my mum would say – for Sick Man of Europe, an unflinching look at our shrinking economy, how countries closed their borders one by one to UK air travel during the pandemic, and … you get my drift. How grim. But, also, nice one, Channel 4. What else should a public broadcaster be doing while the ideological – sorry, formal – process of selling it off continues? You get the TV programming you deserve. Then I Googled Worst House on the Street (Channel 4). Oh. It’s another property programme. The Place in the Sun of 2022, if you like. The logical outcome of a situation, where, even if you have a place in the sun – which, obviously, you don’t – you can’t get to it because all the flights are cancelled. And a place in the sun is deeply concerning because Europe is on fire. What does a nation primed over generations to be infatuated with home ownership need in such end times? A classic Channel 4 property programme about how whacking a £4,750 porch on to the front of your “ultimate doer-upper” could add 2% to the value. What the Worst Country in Europe needs, in short, is Worst House on the Street. This warped mirror held up to our broken society is presented by a chipper brother and sister duo, Stuart and Scarlette Douglas. They have been renovating properties for 15 years and were on George Clarke’s Flipping Fast, in which six novice teams fought it out over a year to make the biggest profit on their properties. Which sounds about as fun as finding asbestos in your ceiling. The Douglas duo seem lovely even if it’s all a bit gendered: he’s the haggler when it comes to natural stone worktops; she does the sensitive chat about whether to go for flatpack or bespoke built-in wardrobes blah, blah, blah. There are some half-hearted attempts at sibling rivalry, but my cynicism levels are so high now that I found myself wondering if they are even related in real life. They are, and run an aspirational property design and development agency called Kindred Elite. Of course they do. WHOTS is based on the adage that says you buy the worst house on the best street if you want to maximise profit. Or, find a property show loophole at a time of rising rents, house prices, pay freezes and a dearth of affordable homes. In this case, the worst house is a 1930s three-bed terrace in Purley, Croydon, that costs … £415k. Which, for anyone outside the sick man of Europe, is a perfect example not of picking up a bargain, but the eyewatering extent of our housing crisis. And our mauvaise foi. Harry, a public affairs consultant, and Yimika, a marketing manager, are in their late 20s. They recently married, and have scraped every penny together to buy the house, paid £15k over the asking price, and have been living with Yimika’s family for a year to save for renovations. One can only assume they must have cancelled their Netflix subscription and put the kibosh on takeaway flat whites, too. Anyway, they’ve got “just” £40k to do up the wreck and plan to move in in six weeks. Cue, leaping off the sofa to scream at the TV: “WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE?!’” The rest is like bad graffiti printed on the peeling wallpaper of your mouldy British soul. There’s the near-disaster relating to the removal of a chimney breast. The discovery of, yup, asbestos in the ceiling. The incessant talk of maximising budget, profit, and light. The happy ending, in which three valuations are done and, in direct opposition to reality, they have made a £32k profit. And the increasing pressure on our young couple, as the weeks drag on, the budget dwindles and the momentum of the build wanes. My favourite unintentional-exposition-of-the-patriarchy moment (most property programmes have them lurking in the walls) comes when Harry waxes lyrical about the spreadsheet they created “automatically” calculating their spend. “No, it doesn’t do it automatically,” says Yimika. “I put the figures in.” “Oh,” says Harry. “Ok. Cool. Sorry.” Look, I’m not being sniffy about property programmes or escapism. I understand that it’s part of the British psyche to watch endless episodes of 24 Hours in A&E, while the NHS is being dismantled. I’ve put in my fair share of Grand Designs hours over the centuries. I had a crush on Sarah Beeny in the 00s, like everyone else. But when you can picture the hand-rubbing execs around the table blue-sky-thinking-up-outside-the-box a property series for an age in which frontline workers are priced out of owning their own home in 98% of the country, you wonder if it has gone too far. This article was amended on 3 August 2022. The UK is not part of mainland Europe as an earlier version suggested.

Full

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/aug/10/toby-room-pat-barker-review

Books

2012-08-10T21:55:00.000Z

Hermione Lee

Toby's Room by Pat Barker – review

The title of Pat Barker's new novel echoes Virginia Woolf's Jacob's Room, her 1922 novel in memory of her brother Thoby, who died young, written in the aftermath of the war in which so many millions of young men were killed. Toby's Room is also about the death of a beloved brother, and also deals with what art can, or should, do with the horrors of war. Its central female character is a woman painter, a pacifist who is trying to remain outside the war: "As a woman, it didn't concern me." Woolf appears as an offstage character to support her view, saying that "women are outside the political process and therefore the war's got nothing to do with them". (Actually this sounds more like the Woolf of 20 years later, in Three Guineas – "As a woman I have no country" – though she did formulate those views in the first world war, and most of her friends were artists and non-combatants.) But, as Woolf also knew, art cannot be immune. Toby's Room, written partly in tribute to Woolf – though Barker is not at all like her as a novelist – shows how unsparing and rigorous war art can be. Barker's admirable 1990s trilogy, Regeneration, The Eye in the Door and The Ghost Road, was set in the Craiglockhart hospital for the treatment of traumatised soldiers, at the front and in wartime London, and had the war poets Sassoon, Owen, Graves and the neurologist Dr Rivers as its central "fictional" characters. Fact and fiction, as Barker has said, were very closely interwoven in the trilogy's anguished debate over their involvement in the war and its psychological after-effects. The regeneration of "nerves" and minds is the focus, but we are also made to see and think about the appalling things done to bodies in war: the body parts that have to be shovelled up into a sack, splintered bones and flesh and blood mixed up with mud; the soldier blown down on to a German corpse whose gas-filled belly ruptures on impact and fills his nose and mouth with "decomposing human flesh". These are the things that don't get into the official reports and which haunt Barker's shell-shocked veterans' waking and sleeping lives. Twelve years after the last volume of the trilogy, Barker, still haunted herself, went back to the subject of art's responsibility to war in Life Class (2007). This time, instead of having historical figures as named characters, she took a group of well-known artists studying at the Slade under the formidable Henry Tonks in the pre-war years – Mark Gertler, Christopher Nevinson, Paul Nash, Dora Carrington, Barbara Hiles, Stanley Spencer – and fictionalised them. The aggressive, sardonic, womanising Kit Neville, a Marinetti-like futurist, has a touch of Nevinson and a touch of Gertler. The less confident, northern working-class landscape painter Paul Tarrant is Paul Nash mixed with Spencer. The independent, androgynous, crop-haired Elinor Brooke is like Carrington without the eccentricity. Tonks, though, remains Tonks, an acerbic and critical mentor, and there are walk-on parts for Augustus John and Ottoline Morrell. In the second half of the novel, the group's emotional entanglements are swept under by the war, and all must decide what an artist should do. Ambitious, ruthless Kit, who goes out as a stretcher-bearer, thinks of war as "a painting opportunity". Paul, who works in Belgium as a hospital orderly and ambulance driver, sketches his patients and argues with Elinor – who wants, on principle, to "ignore" the war – about his need to draw what he sees: "Though I don't know what the point of it is. Nobody's going to hang that sort of thing in a gallery." "Why would you want them to?" "Because … they're there … And it's not right their suffering should just be swept out of sight." Now, five years later, in Toby's Room, Barker comes back to these characters and these arguments. In the interim, an excellent historical account of these artists' wartime experiences, A Crisis of Brilliance: Five Young British Artists and the Great War (2009), by David Boyd Haycock, has been published, which may partly have inspired her to continue their story. Toby's Room is not treated as a sequel, and the connection between the two novels is a bit awkward, with earlier relationships and events having to be clumsily back-filled ("and there was that mad weekend in Ypres"). Barker has never been a thrilling stylist, and can often sound ordinary: "thoughts floated to the surface of her mind and burst like bubbles"; "the ache of his absence was like nothing she'd ever experienced before". But you don't go to her for fine language, you go to her for plain truths, a driving storyline and a clear eye, steadily facing the history of our world. In these respects, Toby's Room doesn't disappoint. There are three interlocking subjects: what has happened at the front to Elinor's brother, Toby Brooke; how a woman artist responds to the war; and – the strongest part of the book – how to treat, and look at, and not turn away from, the ruined faces of terribly injured veterans. Elinor's resentment of her conventional family, her intense sexual feeling for her brother and her obsessive mourning for him, the ambiguous, unresolved relationships between her, Paul, Kit and her women friends, and her determination to stay free of the war, are interesting enough. What's most compelling, though, is her experience of dissection, in the anatomy lessons she attends to improve her drawing. Laying bare what's been covered up is what Paul also has to do, having been asked by Elinor to find out what really happened to Toby. He learns the truth in a climactic scene with Kit Neville during a violent storm in a Suffolk village, whose marshy landscape reminds him of Ypres (a replay of a very similar scene in Regeneration). These personal stories, which also involve the victimisation in wartime of Germans in England, and of pacifists and homosexuals, give the book a strong and intense plot-line. But its tour de force, a counterpart to the Craiglockhart scenes in the trilogy, is the account of the treatment of facial wounds at the Queen Mary hospital in Sidcup. Henry Tonks, a surgeon as well as an artist, is making medical drawings of the men's "hideously disfigured" faces before and after their operations. The viewer of such "portraits" is moved to ask not, who is this person, but "how can any human being endure this?" Barker makes us see, with steadiness and without sensationalism, the men with no eyes, the men with no mouths, the men with no jaws, men whose tongues stick out through holes in their cheeks, men who are being patched up and operated on "and sent on their way with whatever the surgeons had managed to supply by way of a face". Tonks's drawings are medical illustrations, and also artworks (which can now be viewed online, as Barker notes at the end of the book). Kit Neville, whose nose has been blown off, is one of the patients at the hospital, and a subject for what Tonks calls his Rogues Gallery. The treatment given is to fit a "nose pedicle" – flesh taken off the man's chest, rolled into a tube and sewn on to the face – and to wait to see if it takes. Often, it doesn't: one man in the hospital has had 23 operations. Some patients choose to wear a mask when they go out of the hospital – the Rupert Brooke mask is especially popular, says Kit, whose savage rage and cynicism are put to great use in these scenes. When he gets back to working, Kit paints futuristic, mutilated machinery. Paul, as a commissioned war artist, paints landscapes (like Paul Nash's paintings of Ypres), but "the landscapes are bodies". Barker's interest in anthropology and primitive myths as means for understanding the destructive forces of "civilisation" (central to The Ghost Road) lends Paul a fascination with the myth of the Fisher King, the wounded ruler of a perpetual waste and in need of redemption. "The point is," Paul tells Kit, "the wound and the wasteland are the same thing. They aren't metaphors for each other, it's closer than that." For Barker, the wounded faces of the soldier-victims are realities, and also emblems of what must never be forgotten or evaded about war, and must continue – in her plain, steady, compelling voice – to be turned into art. Hermione Lee's Edith Wharton is published by Vintage. Pat Barker will be appearing at the Edinburgh International Book Festival on 26 August.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/10/covid-shown-flexible-working-a-benefit-only-for-privileged-few

Opinion

2022-04-10T06:30:13.000Z

Sonia Sodha

Covid has shown flexible working is a benefit only for the privileged few | Sonia Sodha

It feels strange now to recall that two years ago we had just entered a three-month stretch of government-enforced hermithood after the first wave of Covid struck. Living alone, forbidden from spending time with anyone else, my social life consisted of Saturday nights in front of my laptop doing a virtual pub quiz. It quickly became the new normal, but now I wonder how I ever adjusted. One of the aspects of lockdown living I would like to reintroduce, though, is working less. As someone who is freelance for part of the week, for a while there was just less work available. And so, having written about the theory of the four-day week, I found myself living it in practice. Lucky enough to afford to take the hit, I discovered I loved having more time to myself – even though there wasn’t actually that much to do. It has made me a more enthusiastic proponent of shorter working hours. So I will watch with interest the results of the world’s largest four-day week pilot launched last week. The trial will involve 3,000 workers across 60 British companies, who will be paid the same salary for a shorter working week. The case for a four-day week starts with the insight that human progress should not just be measured by the accumulation of “stuff”, but rather of time. One hundred and fifty years ago, Britons worked on average a 62-hour week, an appalling thought. Who’s to say our current conception of full-time work, the five-day week, is right? As technology from the wheel to the widget means societies can produce more and more with the same human input, it seems a no-brainer to think that we should bank some of the gains by enriching our lives with more time spent with people we love on the things we enjoy, rather than more consumer goods. There are other benefits. Substituting more time over increases in collective wealth will also be better for the environment. And by embedding a more flexible working culture for both men and women, a shorter work week would help reduce the gender-based pay gap (much of which is accounted for by part-time work holding mothers back from progressing in workplaces where working full time is the norm). The concern, however, is that only some will get to benefit from these changes. Our labour market is riven not just by inequalities of pay but in working conditions, such as the amount of flexibility and autonomy employees are permitted. This was notable during the pandemic. While some of us got to work more flexibly from home, sometimes, admittedly, in less-than-ideal conditions, many others, especially those in lower-paid work, experienced little change in how they worked, having to put their health at risk to continue the daily grind. And now, as many white-collar companies embrace hybrid working, allowing their workers to cut down on commuting, others are stuck paying more for less frequent public transport or having to contend with the rising cost of petrol to get to and from work. While 80% of us would like to reduce our working week, few are in a position to negotiate this without losing pay The experience of technology has been different, too. Zoom may not be quite the same as sitting in a room with colleagues, but for me it has reduced time spent in unnecessary meetings. In contrast, some workers report they have experienced greater use of surveillance technology since the pandemic, which was already being deployed by companies such as Amazon, which uses it to track worker movements around the warehouse. Tools such as keystroke and phone call monitoring erode autonomy, privacy and trust between employer and employee. While 80% of us say we would like to reduce our working week, few are actually in a position to negotiate this with their employers without losing pay. Mass historical reductions in working time have been achieved as a result of collective union bargaining. But today, a fraction of employees are covered by collective bargaining agreements and the typical union member is a middle-income, professional public sector employee, with low-paid private sector workers out in the cold. It is also easy to see how the productivity argument, the idea that people working shorter weeks are more efficient and so can get almost as much done in less time, appeals more to white-collar employers than those in service sectors that depend on intensive human interaction, such as childcare and social care. So the danger is that better-off workers in a position to demand more from their employees will benefit from innovations in working time, while less affluent workers feel little benefit. That has happened in France, where, despite higher levels of unionisation, managers have disproportionately benefited from measures to reduce working time. The government, too, seems to be retreating from its manifesto commitment to make flexible working the default. It has picked cheap fights on flexible working as tabloid fodder, with ministers accusing civil servants working from home of laziness and seeming to back an it’s-not-work-if-you’re-not-at-your-desk culture. The difficulty is that working time improvements are no different to those in pay. They cost employers money and involve a redistribution of profits from owners to workers. The share of GDP that goes to workers in the form of wages is lower than it was at its peak in the 1970s and average working time hasn’t changed much since either. So the risk of this new trial is that it demonstrates that a move to a shorter working week isn’t cost-free and consequently gets ignored by most employers, save those who see this as a way of making themselves more competitive when it comes to recruitment and retention. The economic reality is that a shorter working week will never be delivered through the goodwill of employers. Just as it took the union movement to negotiate the significant reductions in working time that meant people were no longer expected to work on Saturdays, it will only happen in an economy where workers have more power to negotiate what’s good for them. Sonia Sodha is an Observer columnist

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/may/12/north-korea-admits-to-covid-outbreak-for-first-time

World news

2022-05-12T02:35:11.000Z

Justin McCurry

North Korea admits to Covid outbreak for first time and declares ‘severe national emergency’

North Korea has declared a “severe national emergency” after confirming its first outbreak of Covid-19, prompting its leader, Kim Jong-un, to vow to quickly eliminate the virus. State media reported on Thursday that a sub-variant of the highly transmissible Omicron virus, known as BA.2, had been detected in the capital, Pyongyang. “There has been the biggest emergency incident in the country, with a hole in our emergency quarantine front, that has been kept safely over the past two years and three months since February 2020,” the official KCNA news agency said. North Korea faces economic ruin amid food and medicine shortages Read more The report said people in Pyongyang had contracted the Omicron variant, without providing details on case numbers or possible sources of infection. North Korea had claimed it had not recorded a single case of Covid-19 since it closed its borders at the start of the pandemic more than two years ago. The discovery of the Omicron variant presents a potentially serious risk to North Korea, which has not vaccinated any of its 25 million people, according to experts, and its poorly resourced healthcare system would also struggle to cope with a major outbreak. The country so far has shunned vaccines offered by the UN-backed Covax distribution programme, possibly because administering the jabs would require international monitoring. A health official sprays disinfectant as part of preventative measures against Covid-19, in the Daesong Department Store in Pyongyang) Photograph: Kim Won Jin/AFP/Getty Images The Seoul-based NK News reported that areas of Pyongyang had been in lockdown for two days. “Multiple sources have also heard reports of panic buying due to uncertainty of when the lockdown might end,” it said, citing sources in the city. The KCNA report said samples taken from patients in Pyongyang who had developed fevers were “consistent with” the Omicron variant. The discovery prompted Kim to call a crisis meeting of the Workers’ party politburo, where officials said they would implement “maximum” emergency measures. They reportedly include tighter border controls and lockdown measures, with Kim telling citizens “to completely block the spread of the malicious virus by thoroughly blocking their areas in all cities and counties across the country”. Dire situation in North Korea drives 'collective exit' of diplomats Read more All business and production activities will be organised so each work unit is “isolated” to prevent the spread of disease, KCNA said. Kim told the meeting that “the goal was to eliminate the root within the shortest period of time”, it added. Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul, said the regime’s public acknowledgment of coronavirus cases meant “the public health situation must be serious”. “This does not mean North Korea is suddenly going to be open to humanitarian assistance and take a more conciliatory line toward Washington and Seoul,” he said. Easley said the presence of the virus could affect any plans the leadership has for missile or nuclear tests. “The Kim regime’s domestic audience may be less interested in nuclear or missile tests when the urgent threat involves coronavirus rather than a foreign military,” he said. “The Kim regime would be well advised to swallow its pride and quickly seek donations of vaccines and therapeutics.” North Korea closed its borders to nearly all trade and visitors at the start of the pandemic, inflicting more pain on an economy already damaged by decades of mismanagement and international sanctions over its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programmes. It tentatively reopened railroad freight traffic with China in January, but Chinese authorities halted trade last month after a Covid-19 outbreak in Dandong, a city close to the border with North Korea.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/feb/21/ndis-over-65s-age-exclusions-national-disability-insurance-scheme-class-action

Australia news

2023-02-20T14:00:39.000Z

Paul Karp

‘We have to fight’: the over-65s challenging NDIS age exclusions

Six weeks, or 16km – that’s how far Helen Bonynge fell short of qualifying for the national disability insurance scheme. The retired counsellor was 63 when she became paralysed from the hip downwards due to radiation treatment for uterine cancer. If Bonynge, a mother of two and grandmother of four, developed the same disability at the same age today, she would qualify for the NDIS, despite the controversial age bar banning people aged 65 and over from applying. But Bonynge was diagnosed with paraplegia in 2015, two years before the NDIS was rolled out in her area – a twist of fate that would have major consequences for funding her care. Australian government faces biggest class action ‘since robodebt’ over NDIS age exclusions Read more “I got a letter back to say I was ineligible because I was going to be six weeks too old when it rolled out in [Sydney’s] inner west,” Bonynge says. “Even the social workers [preparing the NDIS] plan for me were shocked – they hadn’t heard [of] that before. “I burst into tears. I was devastated. I couldn’t believe it. “[If] I lived on the other side of the Harbour Bridge, in the northern beaches, it was rolled out in 2016, the year before. So if I lived there, I would have got it … I was astounded.” Bonynge is the prospective lead plaintiff in a class action being assembled by Mitry Lawyers against the alleged unlawful exclusion to the NDIS of people aged 65 and over, for which 640 senior Australians have registered so far. The case, to be launched within weeks, seeks compensation for a decade of lower-quality disability support and, if successful, could add hundreds of millions of dollars to the annual cost of the NDIS. Paraplegia “turns your life upside down”, Bonynge says. Her husband became her main carer – a decision that would impact her ability to get disability support funded under the My Aged Care system, the NDIS alternative for over-65s. “They basically just looked at my husband and they put the gardening, cooking, shopping, caring hat on him and said, ‘Right, well you can do all that stuff, so we don’t need to give you money for that.’ “The difference between the NDIS and My Aged Care is NDIS looks at you as an individual. “They assess that you need help … you need this, and they’re going to give you the money to do those things and they want you to be as independent as possible and not a burden on your family. [And] you’re not means tested.” Helen Bonynge: ‘We’ve all got a disability, we all have the same issues and the same needs.’ Photograph: Carly Earl/The Guardian Bonynge was assessed as level two in the My Aged Care system, which can be worth up to $15,000 a year. But after the means test and provider fees, she was eligible for just $30.48 a week of government support – which “wasn’t even enough money for me to pay for a cleaner”, she says. She declined, opting to pay for the costs of supports – including a $19,000 wheelchair – out of her own pocket. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup “There shouldn’t really be a discrepancy between what someone on disability gets and what someone in aged care gets … We’ve all got a disability, we all have the same issues and the same needs.” For some, the difference between the NDIS and My Aged Care is starker still. “There are people who are in bed 24/7 because they don’t have enough money for carers to get them out of bed,” Bonynge says. ‘Embarrassing’ exclusions Peter Freckleton, a member of the Post Polio Victoria board, tells Guardian Australia he applied for the NDIS two years ago, citing lifelong paralysis in both legs as a result of having contracted polio as an infant in the 1950s pandemic. “I couldn’t walk unaided, I had to wear leg braces and crutches. There was no doubt about the disability … The only thing they [NDIS] objected to was my age.” There is a challenge for disability care for over 65 … That will be a matter for the whole of the government. Bill Shorten, NDIS minister Freckleton says aged care payments were not “designed to deal with disability” – which can require big lump-sum costs for assistive technologies – forcing him to save payments over months to buy a wheelchair. “If I had been on the NDIS, [the supplier] would’ve signed up on the spot … [Instead] I arranged to accumulate aged care payments … I had to wait to save enough.” The proposed court case has two main arguments. First, that the age bar was inconsistent with the convention on the rights of people with disabilities, which could render it invalid because the commonwealth relied on its external affairs power to legislate the NDIS. Sign up to Afternoon Update Free daily newsletter Our Australian afternoon update breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what’s happening and why it matters Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Second, that the staggered rollout of the NDIS by state and by area could have breached the constitution’s ban on discrimination based on state of residency. Rick Mitry of Mitry Lawyers says it was a “really odd situation” that people were excluded based on different rollout dates. “I think it’s embarrassing … that the government would be discriminating against a certain sector of the Australian community which cannot help itself.” Prospective plaintiffs are going without new equipment or supports, he says – for example, being forced to sleep on a 20-year-old mattress. Roger Beale (seated front in this 2008 image) says the case ‘could be the biggest and most morally embarrassing class action the commonwealth has faced since robodebt’. Photograph: Alan Porritt/AAP Case could be biggest since robodebt Another proponent of the case is a former senior public servant, Roger Beale, who had childhood polio. He says the case “has significant budgetary implications and impacts thousands of disabled people and their families”. “It could be the biggest and most morally embarrassing class action the commonwealth has faced since robodebt,” he says. The robodebt case, brought on behalf of welfare recipients who received computer-generated debt notices using unlawful income averaging, cost the commonwealth $1.8bn. Beale estimates the cost of the NDIS exclusion at $800m a year, due to NDIS recipients receiving tens of thousands more in support on average than My Aged Care recipients. That figure is based on an assumption that a “significant proportion” of the 140,000 people on the highest level of aged-care package are “seriously and permanently disabled and would have been eligible for NDIS support but for the age exclusion in the act”, he says. When Guardian Australia revealed the proposed class action in September, the NDIS minister, Bill Shorten, blamed the Coalition for the fact aged care had “fallen in a rut” since the NDIS was set up in 2013. “There are people in the community who say that the quality of disability care after the age of 65 is inferior to the quality of disability care before 65,” Shorten told reporters in Canberra. “I think they have a point.” “[The] NDIS, despite all of its challenges, is still a scheme that looks better for people in aged care than what they have.” Shorten said he would not comment specifically on the case but said: “There is a challenge for disability care for over 65, whether or not the solution’s an NDIS – which is very expensive – or an improvement in the quality of disability care and aged care. That will be a matter for the whole of the government.” In November the minister said: “We want to make sure that people with disability who are over 65 get proper care.” The NDIS has transformed my life – and the last thing we need is media hysteria about its cost Elly Desmarchelier Read more But he said it was parliament’s “explicit intent” for the NDIS to cover only those under 65. “So in short … I get the class action and we’ll see where that goes,” he said. “But for the substance of the issue, NDIS is for people under 65, aged care for people over 65.” A government spokesperson said: “People who acquire a disability before the age of 65 who are NDIS participants can continue to access the NDIS after the age of 65.” A total of 2,156 older Australians who received state-based disability services “were able to continue with equivalent services” through the continuity of support program. “People who acquire a disability over the age of 65 are not eligible for the NDIS or [continuity of support],” the spokesperson said. “The government is focused on implementing reforms to the aged care system to better support this group of people.” Mitry said government suggestions that disability support in aged care could be improved were “fairly vague”. “I don’t know that we’re going to be able to help the members of the class through the generosity of the government. We have to fight for it, unfortunately.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/may/31/paul-newman-joanne-woodward-auction-sothhebys

Film

2023-05-31T17:30:10.000Z

Lauren Mechling

Inside a revealing Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward auction

You, too, can have a piece of Newman’s own … everything. Nearly 400 items from the personal holdings of the legendary actor Paul Newman and his wife and former co-star Joanne Woodward are on offer at Sotheby’s latest celebrity estate sale. James Dean auction offers unseen items showing new side to star Read more The movie stars and enduring lovebirds met on the Broadway set of Picnic in 1953, and lived in what sounds like marital bliss for some 50 years. The pair collected Americana and held on to the Hollywood memorabilia and bits and bobs of a life that managed to be unpretentious yet high-flying. In addition to Woodward’s wedding dress, an Academy award plaque, and mementoes from The Color of Money, the auction includes the thrift store find that was the centerpiece of what Woodward referred to as their “fuck hut” – a room of their own, if you will. Overseeing the event is Mari-Claudia Jiménez, Sotheby’s managing director and worldwide head of business development, Global Fine Arts. She logged on to a video call with the Guardian US having just learned that she was on the hook to bring an assortment of rare objects to the Today Show set the following day, as Hoda Kotb’s people were intrigued by Newman’s cabinet of curiosities. Newman and Woodward, who primarily resided in Westport, Connecticut, but also had a home in New York City and, briefly, in Los Angeles, personified “shabby chic” before shabby chic was even a thing, said Jiménez. Their affinity for high-low extended to their collection of yard sale finds, as well as Newman’s small but much drooled-over stash of Rolex watches. Inside Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward’s barn in Westport, Connecticut. Photograph: Sotheby’s The enthusiasm surrounding the sale has already been more than the auction house accounted for. When the Memorial Day Classic, a race car event at the Connecticut track that racing enthusiast Newman considered his home base, led to a flood of online clicks, the auction house decided to open the sale earlier than planned. “It’s already had tons of bids, which is unusual,” said Jiménez. In the world of celebrity auctions, she went on to explain, people “normally jump in at the last minute because nobody wants to bid it up in advance”. But it’s a different story with the personal effects of Newman and Woodward, whose glamorous and passionate union is more or less unrivaled. Among the items on offer are the shackles from Cool Hand Luke, a pocketwatch and a selection of baseball hats, which were the actor’s staple accessory. “They are already at many multiples of their estimated price,” said Jiménez. “They started at $100 or $200 and now we’re looking at $900 per lot.” Jiménez said that Sotheby’s has been working with Newman’s five daughters (his only son, Scott, died in 1978) on the event for many years. Newman died in 2008 and Woodward has been ill with Alzheimer’s for several years. The proceeds will be split among the children, two of whom are daughters to Newman and his first wife, Jackie Witte. “They’ve been thinking about their parents’ legacy and how to do it justice, and what to do physically with all of the objects that they acquired,” said Jiménez. “And so they just felt that this was a good moment.” The many sides of the hodgepodge on offer is evidence of the multifaceted aspect of Newman and Woodward’s lives. “We know them as movie stars and actors,” Jiménez said. “They were also hugely philanthropic and they were activists.” And, she pointed out, they were homebodies, content to nurse a martini at night among their ephemera salvaged from yard sales and the old film scripts they quartered with a paper cutter and recycled into notation paper. Photocopy of Nixon’s enemy list with his notes on Paul Newman’s ‘Radic-Lib causes’ ($150–250). Photograph: Sotheby’s Other items on sale include the jumpsuits Newman wore while tuning up his race cars; Richard Nixon’s enemy list, which featured Newman, who was friends with Martin Luther King Jr; as well as Rolex watches he wore as a hobbyist race-car driver. Newman won the 24 Hours of Daytona race at the age of 70. She and her team expect to be swarmed by Hollywood memorabilia fanatics, as well as general collectors of cool ephemera. Newman and Woodward, she pointed out, weren’t pretentious in the least. “He lived his life the way he wanted to live it, without a need to be posing as a movie star. He just was very low key. And I think people really appreciate that about him, which is why it’s not just all glitz and glamour. He actually had high-low taste. That extended to the things he surrounded himself with.” The greatest exception to the low-key tenor is the handful of luxury watches (Newman was a horological icon). The Daytona Rolex that he purchased for himself, and that would go on to inspire many more such purchases, is on sale, as are a few valuable paintings. Most of the items, though, feel warm to the touch. Jiménez wasn’t a Paul Newman expert at the outset of this project, but she read his much-lauded posthumous memoir and came to understand how uncomfortable he felt with the movie-star mantle and his disarmingly good looks, which he described as an aberration to the flawed whole of his being. Her understanding deepened when she watched the six-part documentary made by Ethan Hawke, another thespian who knows what it’s like to be married to a fellow actor who has her own dreams to contend with. “When you watch the documentary, and you hear [Newman] speak to his family members, you see that there’s so much more to him than just the persona.” The Infamous Bed from the memoir Paul Newman, The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man, early 20th century ($500-$1,000). Photograph: Sotheby’s He and his wife made about 15 movies together, but Woodward, who was a movie star before he was, threw herself into the raising of their children and the keeping of their homes. “They weren’t the Architectural Digest type,” said Jiménez. “They cultivated homes that somebody wanted to live in and they were surrounding themselves with the objects they wanted to see every day.” The pair frequented flea markets and antique shows, and were constantly loading up on new treasures. “They were thrifty and thoughtful,” said Jiménez. “It wasn’t like, I went to Sotheby’s and spent $10m on a painting. It was: I found this great find and I loved it.” They were also totally, completely enamored of each other. In his memoir, Newman revealed that Woodward trussed up their Beverly Hills home with a modest brass frame bed that she found at a yard sale “for probably $20”, Jiménez estimated, and designated as the centerpiece of their “fuck hut”, the room they repaired to for intimate encounters. “It’s interesting, we think of [Newman] as this really handsome stud with these gorgeous blue eyes, somebody who people must have been fawning all over, but he doesn’t think about himself that way,” said Jiménez. “He always thought of himself as being kind of awkward and uncomfortable with his physicality. Joanne is the one who he says turned him into this sex symbol. Even into their 70s, people who knew them said that they couldn’t keep their hands off each other.” The “fuck hut” bed, listed for an estimated $500-$1,000, is still accepting bids.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/oct/09/jacinta-allan-commonwealth-games-2026-budget-extra-cost-knew

Australia news

2023-10-09T01:49:44.000Z

Benita Kolovos

$7bn cost estimate used to axe Commonwealth Games based on worst-case scenario, inquiry reveals

The controversial $7bn cost estimate used by Daniel Andrews to justify axing the 2026 Commonwealth Games was based on a worst-case scenario modelled by the event’s organising committee and a government department, it has been revealed. The government cancelled the event on 18 July, with the former premier blaming cost estimates tripling from $2.6bn to up to $7bn. Commonwealth Games Australia has previously described the $7bn figure as a “gross exaggeration” and the source of the cost estimate has not previously been known. The first day of an upper house inquiry into the event’s cancellation heard on Monday that Andrews’ successor as premier, Jacinta Allan, was briefed by the Department of Jobs, Skills, Industry and Regions in March that costs could reach $4.5bn. Allan – then the deputy premier and minister for the Commonwealth Games - told the department to try to reduce the costs but it again warned in June that it would need $4.2bn to deliver the 12-day sporting event. Commonwealth Games could be delayed a year as officials scramble to find replacement hosts Read more Jeremi Moule, the secretary of the Department of Premier and Cabinet (DPC), told the inquiry the Department of Jobs estimates did not include the costs for transport or policing, or factor in possible risks. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup Moule said the DPC later received further analysis from the Victoria 2026 organising committee and the office of the Commonwealth Games (OCG), which was within the Department of Jobs, that included “cost implications if risks materialised”. “Essentially, if the risks were weighted at 50% the costs would likely reach or exceed $6bn. If they were weighted at 100% the cost would be closer to $7bn,” he said. He was not asked to reveal what those risks were. “Both DPC and the Department of Treasury and Finance (DTF) formed the view that there was a very high probability that the risks would be realised. In fact, DTF formed the view that it was prudent to rate them all at 100%.” On 13 June, Moule said he flagged the costings with Andrews. Law firm Arnold Bloch Leibler was engaged on 14 June. At the same time, the OCG and Victoria 2026 were tasked with examining other possible options for the games, such as a “hybrid regional-Melbourne games, or hosting the Games in Melbourne”, Moule said. On 30 June, he arranged a meeting with the chief executive and president of the Commonwealth Games Federation in London. “At that time, no decisions had been made, but it was clear that the government would need to make a significant decision regarding the games to either materially reshape it in a way that would require renegotiation of the host contract, or to cancel the commitment. The meeting was set for 17 July,” he said. In his evidence to the inquiry, Tim Ada, the secretary of the Department of Jobs, said the original business case – put together by Ernst & Young in March 2022 and peer reviewed by KPMG – greatly underestimated the cost of the event. Ada said their projected cost of $2.6bn “largely relied on top-down estimates and benchmarking against known amounts from the 2018 Gold Coast Games”. “It is clear now, with the benefit of hindsight, that the business case prepared in early 2022 did not reflect the true cost of delivering a sporting program spread across five cities, nor anticipate the significant cost escalation that’s been experienced in the construction sector,” he told the inquiry. Sign up to Morning Mail Free daily newsletter Our Australian morning briefing breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what’s happening and why it matters Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Victorian government hired lawyers weeks before Commonwealth Games cancellation Read more Former chief executive of the OCG, Allen Garner, said it was clear “sometime in 2023” that there would be a “significant shortfall” in funds, largely due to rising building costs and challenges at the sites of proposed athlete villages. Garner said he was only notified of the decision to scrap the games the night before the public announcement. Asked whether he was effectively “kept in the dark”, Garner replied: “Yes. We were very focused on delivering [the event].” The organising committee – headed by chief executive, Jeroen Weimar, and chaired by the former Richmond Football Club president Peggy O’Neal – were also told on 17 July. “We were confident that we could deliver a successful games but the costs of delivering those games would far have exceeded the estimates made during the bid, so we understand the government’s decision and we respect it,” O’Neal told the inquiry. After cancelling the event, the government went on to pay $380m in compensation to Commonwealth Games bodies for terminating their contract. The inquiry on Monday formally invited Allan to appear as a witness. As a member of the lower house, Allan cannot be compelled to give evidence to the upper house inquiry and she has previously indicated she will not appear before it. Opposition spokesperson for sports, tourism and major events, Sam Groth, urged the premier to front the inquiry. “Despite being aware of multi-billion dollar cost blowouts and the total inadequacy of the initial business case, Jacinta Allan kept the Victorian community in the dark for months on end,” he said. “Premier Jacinta Allan needs to take responsibility for this debacle, and commit to fronting this inquiry to explain how this all went so wrong.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2016/jul/09/don-reid-and-alfie-hewitt-win-wimbledon-wheelchair-mens-doubles

Sport

2016-07-09T13:44:55.000Z

Simon Cambers

Gordon Reid and Alfie Hewett win Wimbledon wheelchair men’s doubles

Scotland’s Gordon Reid warmed up for his singles final here on Sunday by clinching his first Wimbledon wheelchair doubles title on Saturday, teaming up with the Englishman Alfie Hewett in a dramatic 4-6, 6-1, 7-6 victory against Stéphane Houdet and Nicolas Peifer of France. Reid, the runner-up last year, and his 18-year-old playing partner let slip a 5-2 lead in the third set but recovered well to win a deciding tie-break 8-6 for victory on a packed Court 18 in a match which was also broadcast live on BBC2. Serena Williams beats Kerber in Wimbledon women's final – as it happened Read more “It’s an amazing feeling,” Reid, 24, said. “I was trying to keep focused at the end and play smart and we managed to nick it there in the tie-break. We both stepped up well and played good tennis when we needed to. It’s not a bad way to start our grand slam doubles career together – we’ve put a lot of hard work in over the last few years and it’s paid off big time.” Reid, who won his first grand slam doubles title at the US Open last year in partnership with Houdet, served for the match at 5-2 in the third but was broken and Houdet and Peifer then broke Hewett to level at 5-5 before holding serve to nudge ahead. But the British pair held firm to force a tie-break and, after missing two match points at 6-4, they snatched it 8-6. Hewett said: “It’s incredible to win my first grand slam title, I can’t even remember match point, I don’t know whether I hit the ball or Gordon did, it’s all a blur if I’m honest. “The support from the crowd today was amazing and really helped us out after going to that tie-break in the third set having led 5-2. It’s not sunk in yet and I think it will take a while to realise that I’m a Wimbledon champion.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/17/tasmanian-devil-analysis-challenges-study-suggesting-facial-tumour-disease-decline

World news

2024-04-17T15:00:08.000Z

Sharlotte Thou

Tasmanian devil facial tumour research challenged: disease may not be declining after all

Cambridge researchers have challenged a previous study which had concluded that a facial cancer that devastated the Tasmanian devil population was on the decline. Devil facial tumour disease, a fatal cancer spread through biting and sharing of food, emerged in the 1980s. The spread of DFTD led to the species being listed as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature in 2008. The original study, published in the journal Science in 2020, found that the rate of transmission had slowed, so that an affected animal would only infect one other animal – previously an infected devil would affect another 3.5. The researchers in 2020 were “cautiously optimistic” that the devils had developed a natural immune response to the cancer and concluded the disease was no longer a threat to the species’ survival. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup Cambridge scientists replicated the study, and concluded the key findings of the original study could not be reproduced, leaving the future of Tasmanian devils uncertain, in a critique published in Royal Society Open Science. Elizabeth Murchison, a professor of comparative oncology and genetics at the University of Cambridge and one of the critique’s senior authors, said the original researchers sequenced DNA half the recommended number of times. Tasmanian devils rapidly evolving to resist contagious cancer, study finds Read more She said it was recommended that scientists sequence DNA at least 30 times when analysing tumours to have confidence that a variant is actually a mutation. Her reanalysis found the researchers in the original study sequenced DNA an average of 15 times. Murchinson said the mutation rate recorded by the original researchers was “implausibly high” and suggested that the mutations recorded were likely non-meaningful. The authors of the initial study disagreed, and said they stood by their research. They said they had published papers in the years since that “support the basic conclusion that continued survival of Tasmanian devils in the wild is likely and that there has been rapid evolution of devils in response to the disease”. In a joint statement, they said the Cambridge researchers had previously approached the journal Science to publish a critique of the first study, but the publication rejected it. They said Murchison and her fellow authors had now published “an almost identical” critique in the Royal Society Open Science and not afforded them the right to respond before publication, contrary to “usual procedure”. The Cambridge researchers said they reproduced the initial study after noticing that the tree mapping out how the tumour evolved over time generated by the original researchers “looked nothing” like their own tree. Sign up to Afternoon Update Free daily newsletter Our Australian afternoon update breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what’s happening and why it matters Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Carolyn Hogg, a population biologist at the University of Sydney who was not involved in either study, commended the depth of sequencing analysis the Cambridge researchers took. She said they were “by far the global experts” in the field. She disagreed with the conclusions the authors drew in their initial paper and did not see how their conclusions were supported by their data. “I don’t know if the [initial] researchers did anything wrong,” she said. “They probably weren’t aware [of sequencing depths] … because they’re not cancer researchers. “It’s a cautionary tale for scientists to be cautious of the conclusions they draw if they’re not an expert.” Hogg said the “best bet” for Tasmanian devils was a vaccine being developed by the Menzies Institute for Medical Research.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/jun/15/tamara-ecclestone-wedding-extravanganza

Opinion

2013-06-15T18:00:06.000Z

Bertie Brandes

Let's draw a veil over Tamara Ecclestone's wedding bash | Bertie Brandes

So, congratulations to Tamara Ecclestone and her new husband, Jay Rutland, who succeeded in throwing a three-day wedding party so extravagant there may well have been a nationwide hush as we all scrolled in wide-eyed amazement through the endless "reportage". Well, I say we, but perhaps you had better things to do than try to live vicariously through Tamara's wedding photos; dancing on stage in front of Mark Ronson on a private beach on the French Riviera, a chicken-nugget-size diamond pressing firmly into her finger and enough champagne to fill a swimming pool. Maybe you find the whole thing completely vulgar and excessive, and you think what a waste of £12m when it only manages to secure Mark, Elton John, Calvin Harris and Lionel Richie as the entertainment. Well, you're right. Not only was it an immense overspend, but to laud wealth so crassly feels pretty inappropriate at the moment. Furthermore, despite the impossibly big budget, it all felt a bit like a package deal, like one of those huge "invitation only" parties where the food is a bit soggy and you'd be lucky to taste any real vodka in your cocktail. Theme-wise, people need to realise that unless Leonardo DiCaprio is actually present, the "all white" dress code has been totally unacceptable since about 2004. 2006 absolute tops. Oh, and did I mention Calvin Harris? Yeah, I thought so. In stark contrast, Keira Knightley's tiny, understated wedding last month, to which she wore a "re-cycled" wedding dress by Rodarte, was infinitely more glamorous. Praised by Karl Lagerfeld as the "least pretentious" wedding ever, hers was a far cry from these 72-hour, diamante-studded nuptials. Knightley's was the kind of celebrity wedding we deem acceptable when the prospects of our own largely revolve around eBay and wholesale cava. But then again, what's the use of bemoaning the daughter of a man who purchased a £52m house for his 23-year old for throwing a lavish wedding? I watched every episode of Tamara Ecclestone's (amazing) reality TV show Billion $$ Girl and if you haven't managed to grasp as much from the title, they spend a lot of money. Still, despite missing several important meetings to have a pimple zapped by a laser in one episode, Tamara seems like a genuinely sweet, incredibly vulnerable person. If she wants to throw her dream wedding with her own – that is, her father's – money, who are we to criticise? Ultimately, no matter how many millions of pounds you might drop on your big day, it's always going to devolve into the same beautiful ritual. The bride, cigarette in one hand and something fizzy in the other, dancing on a table, as the groom, slightly upstaged by his new, gloriously drunk wife, rampages in the background. By that point, you may well have spent £12m but you're still going to want to alternate making out like teenagers and sharing a huge plate of chips. These things don't change. Sigh. I can't wait.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/mar/02/us-uk-trade-deal-pm-eyes-three-course-meal-but-may-end-up-with-packet-of-crisps

Politics

2020-03-02T15:53:18.000Z

Richard Partington

US-UK trade deal: PM eyes three-course meal, but may end up with packet of crisps

It was supposed to be one of the biggest Brexit dividends. According to Liz Truss, an “ambitious and comprehensive” trade agreement with Donald Trump would reflect Britain’s unique relationship with the US, cutting red tape and tariffs to help British businesses and the economy grow. The value to the nation: at most, an economy 0.16% bigger after 15 years. In the cold language of economic benefits, such a small number is almost a rounding error. The gains in cash terms are roughly £3.4bn under the best-case scenario, an amount worth less than the current annual contribution of Brentwood or Bury. Set in the context of the potential costs from erecting tough trade barriers with the EU, or leaving the bloc on World Trade Organization terms (an Australia-style trade agreement, in the language of government), the numbers are even more stark. Compared with the plan to add a small town’s worth of economic output to Britain over 15 years, failure to strike an EU trade deal would result in an economy 7.6% smaller than under current arrangements, over the same timeframe. That’s according to the most recent official economic impact assessment published by the government, late in 2018, when Theresa May was forced to reveal official forecasts. At the time, the report also suggested that a Canada-style deal – of the type sought by Boris Johnson – would still leave the UK about 4.9% worse off. To repurpose a comment made two years ago by Sir Martin Donnelly, once the most senior civil servant at the department under Liam Fox, as he assessed the prospects for British trade outside the EU: such a plan is akin to swapping a three-course meal for a packet of crisps. Allow Scribd content? This article includes content provided by Scribd. We ask for your permission before anything is loaded, as they may be using cookies and other technologies. To view this content, click 'Allow and continue'. Allow and continue Of course this is not the government’s stated intention. Free trade deals are wanted with the US, the EU and other nations – keep the three-course meal, crisps, and eat the lot. But carrying out negotiations in parallel may eventually force Johnson’s hand towards making tough choices. Any deal with the US could influence any deal with the EU. It will be imperative for both to know what Britain wants, putting Johnson in a bind, even should he aim to play one off against the other. One perhaps surprising point about the latest government analysis is the seemingly frank assessment of the limited benefits. This suggests the trade department was either not leant on, or refused to be cajoled into producing trumped-up estimates, according to Dr Peter Holmes, an academic at the UK Trade Policy Observatory at Sussex University. “They are in line with the standard results,” he says, adding that such small gains probably reflect the relatively low tariff barriers between the US and the UK at present. The trade department estimates US tariffs on UK exports are worth about £493m, out of a relationship worth a total £220.9bn. It could also reflect that non-tariff barriers – the red tape that Truss says she would like ripped apart – can be particularly tough to get rid off, especially should Britain refuse to bend to every demand made by Trump, and vice versa. Truss warns that any deal must protect the NHS (the health service is firmly “not on the table” in Monday’s document) and also uphold the UK’s “very high standards on food safety and animal welfare”. The clock though is ticking. Johnson has set a deadline of the end of 2020 for an agreement with the EU, do or die. Trump will undoubtedly want to show progress before the US elections in the autumn. Tougher and more detailed decisions over Britain’s post-Brexit trade priorities will soon need to be made.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2021/aug/09/alistair-green-internet-comedian-satirising-middle-england

Stage

2021-08-09T07:00:44.000Z

Hannah J Davies

Comic Alistair Green on his middle England satire: ‘I don’t want to be really mean’

Even if he wanted to, Alistair Green can’t redecorate his living room. The plain white walls that backdrop the comic’s sketches – and our Zoom call – are as much a trademark of his material as the range of deluded middle Englanders and disquieting eccentrics he portrays in front of them. His home is, for his legions of fans, a Mr Benn-style portal to an amped-up reality where Covid deniers believe that hand sanitiser causes the virus and anti-Meghan Markle sentiment is “nothing to do with race – she’s half and half”. He knows his audience would freak out “if I suddenly had purple walls”. It would definitely be unsettling, given the amount of virtual time total strangers have spent in Green’s home in Deptford, London, during the pandemic. On Twitter and Instagram, he has gained a reputation for sharp satire and general oddities, with Ricky Gervais and Judd Apatow among the thousands to have retweeted his sketches. So-called front-facing camera comics have been having a moment since Covid hit, among them Michael Spicer, with his politically minded Room Next Door skits, and Munya Chawawa, who spoofs government restrictions at lightning speed. While Green has prodded Boris Johnson and co during the pandemic, his iPhone-filmed material is more focused on society at large and the people we all encounter there, often in single-take monologues. “It starts from maybe something I’ve overheard,” he says. “It’s normally one line. I did one about a woman in a back garden. I thought about that weird English thing where you’re with your family, and someone does that baby voice where they go, ‘Where’s the sun gone?’” There’s a universality in the end product, which is a Frankenstein’s monster mix of Alan Bennett and Scottish comic Limmy complete with climate denial, illness and the looming spectre of death. Ahead of the curve … Green and Diane Morgan as Teddy and Mookie in The Wankers. Green was well ahead of the front-facing curve, having regularly posted his videos since 2018. Before then, he had garnered praise for his and Diane Morgan’s Wankers series on YouTube (a parody of the amorous Kooples clothing adverts) and a series of videos with his grandmother in which he narrated Fifty Shades of Grey to her, among other scabrous things. While he had been ploughing his standup furrow for the previous decade, and has popped up in some of the funniest shows on TV, including Stath Lets Flats, it’s clear that the internet is where Green belongs. We speak about Julie, AKA Jules, one of his many memorable characters. On a trip to an Indian restaurant to pick up her takeaway, draped in a shawl, she is overbearing with the staff, assumes Solihull is in Asia, and offers advice on the menu to diners. “Aloo gobi – it’s cauliflower. I saw you looking confused.” Jules is horrendous, but also something of a tragic figure. “I don’t ever want to really be mean,” Green says of his creations. “She’s quite lonely. She wants people to know about her. And there’s a hint that the marriage isn’t great, ‘I’ll sit on the floor and eat with my hands, he’ll have a knife and fork.’ There’s a hint that they diverged at some point and she got into spirituality – crystals and stuff. I don’t think she’s a bad person. She’s just trying to do the right thing. She’d be very keen on pronouns but she’d still vote Conservative, and not make that connection.” sari pic.twitter.com/xBZutGX8p6 — alistair green (@mralistairgreen) February 17, 2020 Not all his characters are treated with pathos, though. “Sometimes,” he says, “I’ve got no sympathy for them at all.” Take the sketch where a man poses questions about what a woman could have done differently to avoid sexual assault, ultimately concluding that she must be escorted by a man at all times. “There are no jokes,” he says. “You’re following his logic. And he ends up saying that women should be accompanied because he doesn’t want to acknowledge the problem.” It is, he says, “probably one of the darkest, if not the darkest” of his videos. “Really, what that character is saying is, ‘I’m sort of OK with sexual assault. I don’t want to make any changes. It’s not our fault.’” ‘It’s democratising and exciting’: has lockdown changed comedy for ever? Read more Despite the attention he’s garnered online, Green also takes pleasure in showing his comedy in a cinema setting, something he is about to do again at London’s Blue Tick festival. The screenings are, he says, “really chaotic. I always do something weird to make it an occasion. I’ll dress up weirdly, like I think I’m a film director, and I’ll talk at the beginning for way too long.” Take a look at his Twitter mentions and you’ll find fans and fellow comics insisting Green must get a TV show. Does he find this offensive, people assuming TV must be his next step, it being the be-all and end-all of comedy? “No, because it means I could get away with doing something really shit and they wouldn’t mind.” He laughs. “No, I’m kidding. It means they’ll like what I do. I’m grateful.” Alistair Green appears as part of the Blue Tick festival at the Rio Cinema, London, on 10 and 19 August.

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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/nov/15/ethnic-women-sacked-sarkozy-cabinet

World news

2010-11-15T14:19:40.000Z

Kim Willsher

Ethnic minority women sacked from cabinet as Sarkozy moves to right

The French government has become more white and more rightwing in a reshuffle that has included the sacking of two ministers handpicked by Nicolas Sarkozy to bring ethnic diversity to the cabinet. Senegalese-born Rama Yade, the sports minister, and Fadéla Amara, the minister for urban policies, lost their jobs in the shake-up that also signalled an end to the French president's policy of "openness" to his political opponents and to racial minorities. Less than two years ago, Sarkozy declared: "The diversity at the bottom of the country must be illustrated by diversity at the head of the country. This is not a choice, this is an obligation." That obligation went by the board in Sunday's long expected reshuffle – it was announced almost five months ago. The prime minister, François Fillon, was reappointed, and the French administration moved further to the right. Yade, 33, was one of the so-called Sarkozettes, seven women given ministerial posts after Sarkozy's presidential victory in 2007. Their appointment was to fulfil his election vow to introduce "positive discrimination French-style" and to reflect the diversity of modern France. Yade, while hugely popular with the public, fell out of favour with the president for not toeing the official line on several occasions, including the time she criticised Sarkozy's decision to invite the Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi, to Paris on a state visit. She also refused his offer of a European parliament job. Amara, 46, a once outspoken French feminist and former president of the organisation Ni Putes Ni Soumises (Neither Whores Nor Doormats), is a Muslim born to Algerian parents. She was appointed junior minister for urban policies in 2007. Her main job was to devise a "Marshall plan" for France's troubled city suburbs, but she found herself rapidly sidelined. The third symbolic appointment, Rachida Dati, who was made justice minister, the first Frenchwoman of Algerian and Moroccan roots to hold a top post in government, also fell out of favour with Sarkozy and was packed off to the European parliament in June last year. In Sunday's reshuffle French diversity was represented far down the political pecking order by Jeannette Bougrab, of Algerian parentage and a former president of the country's anti-discrimination and equality authority, who is the newly appointed junior minister for youth, and by Nora Berra, 47, who has north African roots, and was appointed junior minister for sport. Patrick Lozés, president of the Representative Council for Black Associations, wrote in his blog on the Nouvel Observateur site: "This is a sad day for diversity. I particularly regret the departure of Rama Yade from the government. Her leaving is a heavy symbol for all French from visible minorities." He said the appointment of Bougrab was a blow to his organisation. "It's not a matter for celebration," he wrote. Female politicians fared slightly better: six of the 15 cabinet posts are now held by women, one fewer than in Sarkozy's first government in 2007. The recruits include Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet, 37, who is made minister for ecology, development, transport and housing. This article was amended on 16 November 2010. The original named an organisation as Ni Putes Ni Soumis. This has been corrected.

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https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/may/04/inorganic-arsenic-rice-cakes-babies-queens-university-belfast

Food

2017-05-04T18:02:27.000Z

Denis Campbell

Dangerous levels of arsenic found in rice cakes for babies

Almost three-quarters of rice cakes and other rice-based foods aimed at babies and young children contain dangerously high levels of arsenic, which has been linked to health problems including cancer. The findings raise doubts about the effectiveness of EU rules brought in only last year to reduce the amount of the toxic chemical, which can impair a baby’s physical and mental development. MPs back fresh curbs on 'misleading' formula milk marketing claims Read more Dangerous levels of inorganic arsenic are also often found in babies who have been reared on formula milks, especially non-dairy versions, according to the research by experts at Queen’s University Belfast. “This research has shown direct evidence that babies are exposed to illegal levels of arsenic despite the EU regulation to specifically address the health challenge,” said Andy Meharg, a professor of plant and soil sciences at Queen’s, who led the research. “Babies are particularly vulnerable to the damaging effects of arsenic, which can prevent healthy development of a baby’s growth, IQ and immune system, to name but a few. “Products such as rice cakes and rice cereals are common in babies’ diets. This study found that almost three-quarters of baby crackers specifically marketed for children exceeded the maximum amount of arsenic.” The European commission introduced new rules in January 2016 setting out the legal maximum amount of inorganic arsenic that food manufacturers can put in rice and other rice products consumed by many children. However, Meharg and his co-authors have found out that the composition of rice-based snack foods has not become healthier despite that move. “Little has changed since this law was passed, and 50% of baby rice products still contain an illegal level of inorganic arsenic,” according to the study, which has been published in the journal Plos One. Arsenic gets into rice because it occurs naturally, including in the water surrounding rice when it is growing, though levels of it vary around the world. “It’s impossible to eliminate from our food. However, having too much arsenic in our diet could be harmful to health,” the Food Standards Agency says. Rice usually contains 10 times more inorganic arsenic than other foods and overconsumption has been linked to developmental problems, diabetes, heart problems and nervous system damage. The authors said there was an urgent need for food manufacturers to do more to cut the amount of arsenic in their products aimed at babies and children. Parents should seek out the rice products with the lowest arsenic content “in order to protect this vulnerable group”. Meharg and his colleagues based their findings on urine samples taken from 79 infants tested before and after they had been weaned and on analysis of unnamed branded products. Food producers could reduce arsenic levels by as much as 85% by percolating the rice before using it, said Meharg. “Simple measures can be taken to dramatically reduce the arsenic in these products, so there is no excuse for manufacturers to be selling baby food products with such harmful levels of this carcinogenic substance,” he said. Prof Mary Fewtrell, the nutrition lead at the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, said: “As a precaution, rice drinks for infants and young children should be avoided and they should have a balanced diet with variety of different grains as a source of carbohydrate. Inorganic arsenic intake is likely to affect long-term health and, as this study shows, high concentrations are found in some rice-based foods and drinks widely used for infants and young children.” The inorganic arsenic content of foods should be declared to help consumers, she added. The Food Standards Agency said: “We recommend that consumers eat a balanced, varied and healthy diet. Rice and rice products can be part of that, including for young children. However, we do advise that toddlers and young children – ages one to four-and-a-half – should not be given rice drinks as a substitute for breast milk, infant formula or cow’s milk. This is because of their proportionally higher milk consumption and lower bodyweight compared to other consumers.” The British Specialist Nutrition Association, which represents manufacturers of complementary foods designed for children under three, insisted that if its members’ products were tested now, they would be compliant with the EU arsenic levels. The ones in the study were bought in February 2016, a month after the new policy took effect. A spokesman said: “The safety of products is the top priority for BSNA members. Manufacturers carefully select and rigorously check all their raw materials to ensure they are safe and strictly compliant with current food safety regulations. Industry has been working proactively to reduce the levels of arsenic in food and it has been a focus of ongoing, long-term research. BSNA works across industry and with regulators in the UK and Europe to further increase our shared understanding of arsenic in foods.”

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https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2023/mar/18/match-of-the-day-review-linekers-return-restores-charm-and-calm

Television & radio

2023-03-18T20:24:47.000Z

Jack Seale

Match of the Day review: Lineker’s return restores charm and calm

“A h,” tweeted Gary Lineker from the Etihad Stadium, an hour before coverage began on BBC One of Manchester City v Burnley in the FA Cup quarter-final. “The joys of being allowed to stick to football.” The speed of the modern news cycle means it seems like months since Lineker was suspended by the BBC for criticising government immigration policy, but in fact it was only last weekend when Match of the Day aired as a 20-minute shell of a programme, with no presenters or commentators having been willing to work on it in Lineker’s absence. In an extraordinary show of solidarity from BBC staff and freelancers, other football shows on television and radio were forced off-air. By Monday morning, the Beeb had climbed down, sheepishly promising to review its rules on social media impartiality. Lineker’s brief ensuing Twitter thread included a fresh plea for sympathy with refugees; his avatar on the app was quietly changed to a picture of him in front of the George Orwell quote on the wall outside Broadcasting House, the one about liberty being “the right to tell people what they do not want to hear”. After that comfortable 1-0 win, Lineker enjoyed a normal week online – commenting on Champions League goals, retweeting funny viral clips and recommending podcasts that turned out to be made by his production company – before heading back to work. Cup weekend meant Lineker’s comeback began early, presenting a live game in the late afternoon. But that didn’t change the first question viewers wanted answered: what would Gary’s opening line be? Surely it wouldn’t just be the usual fare, a basic but well-timed gag about Alan Shearer’s baldness or Micah Richards’s vanity? Gary Lineker with Alan Shearer (centre) and Micah Richards on FA Cup Match of the Day between Manchester City v Burnley. Photograph: BBC Perhaps being back in the presenter’s seat was enough, because Lineker solved the problem of what to say to camera by not saying anything. Instead the opening shot was of a young Burnley fan as Lineker, audibly struggling with a cold, voiced a video package about the Burnley manager, Vincent Kompany. When we finally cut to the presenters, Lineker contented himself with turning to Shearer and cueing him up: “Alan, it’s great to be here.” Shearer, glancing nervily at a sheet of paper, duly gave a short, slightly po-faced speech about the previous week’s farrago: “I just wanted to say how upset we were that audiences missed out last weekend … some really great people in TV and in radio were put in an impossible situation, and that wasn’t fair. So it’s good to get back to some sort of normality and be talking about football again.” Lineker agreed, and that was that. The show went on, with Lineker barely noticeable in the way a good host should be, unobtrusively lending professional insight to a discussion of Kompany’s qualities and pulling the trademark move of self-deprecatingly referencing his own football career by saying of City striker Erling Haaland: “He scores proper goals … all in the six-yard box.” The Haaland chat continued at half-time, the Norwegian having put City ahead with two goals. Despite sounding more and more croaky, Lineker hit his stride as he drew on his former occupation as an England striker and explained how the secret to centre-forward play is constantly attacking space in the knowledge that the right pass will come eventually: “It’s not intuition. It’s the law of probability.” Lineker’s job now, apart from casually being better at links, trails and VT intros than people who have spent their whole careers presenting television, is to oversee studio conversations reliably offering lightly worn expertise and hearty banter, the last of those flowing easily with Shearer and Richards. One of the trio’s go-to joke formats – Richards teeing up Shearer to boast that one of his career statistics was better than Lineker’s – gave the host the opportunity to slyly reference the controversy of a week ago, when Richards had been quick to publicly back him up: “At least you were on my side for a week!” Later, after Manchester City had completed a 6-0 victory, all that was still required of Lineker was to lead a swift summary of the action and rib Shearer about potentially losing his scoring records to Haaland before wrapping up bang on time, ready for Michael McIntyre’s The Wheel. Another easy win was in the bag.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jul/14/labour-power-keir-starmer-politics-crises

Opinion

2023-07-14T05:00:01.000Z

Andy Beckett

If Labour wins power, will Starmer’s safe strategy become a huge risk? | Andy Beckett

The bigger Britain’s problems get, the more Labour seems to shrink. As almost every economic, social and public sector indicator flashes red, Labour politicians explain that regretfully they will only be able to do a limited amount in government about the worst set of interlocking crises in our modern history. The more disenchantment with politics grows, the more narrowly Labour defines the kind of politicians and party members it wants. It excludes or marginalises Corbynistas, leftwingers in general, respected local government radicals such as Jamie Driscoll, and even the mild centre-left organiser Neal Lawson. The few clearly left-leaning figures who remain – for now – in the shadow cabinet, such as Ed Miliband, are briefed against by anonymous Labour sources in the Tory press. Meanwhile, Keir Starmer has increasingly regular chats with Rupert Murdoch. There is a logic to all this purging and repositioning, lowering of expectations and policy trimming. It is the logic that has underpinned successful election campaigns by both main parties since 1997. From New Labour’s pledge cards, with their concrete but modest promises, to the Tory strategist Lynton Crosby’s advice to David Cameron to “get the barnacles off the boat” before his 2015 victory, electioneering in Britain has often been about discipline, repetition and minimising dissent and unnecessary commitments. It may not be inspiring or innovative, but it works, the advocates of this method argue. Look at Labour’s lead in the polls. By telling us so little about its policy plans, Labour tells us all we need to know Frances Ryan Read more Yet poll leads and election victories take a party only so far. Once in office, especially at a time of national crisis – as Starmer is likely to be – the gap between wary campaign politics and the more risk-taking and imaginative mode that crises often require can create great tensions in a government. Sometimes premierships are destroyed by them. If Labour wins power, will Starmer’s supposedly safe strategy become a huge risk? Despite the Tories’ claim to be the nation’s natural custodians, Labour usually takes office when Britain is in a mess. Unfortunately, such situations are the only time when many voters are prepared to give the party a try. One example of a cautious Labour government being overwhelmed in such a scenario is still infamous in the history of the party, even though it occurred almost a century ago. In 1929, Labour won power with unemployment rising and industrial relations tense, just as they are now. Within months, the Wall Street Crash and Great Depression made economic and social conditions much worse. Yet the chancellor, Philip Snowden, like today’s shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves, believed that Labour governments needed to prove their credibility by strictly controlling how much money they borrowed. He resisted calls to increase public spending, then supported cuts. The government disintegrated into pro- and anti-austerity factions. An early general election followed, in 1931, and Labour lost spectacularly, shrinking to 52 MPs. The Conservatives got 470. Given the deep problems of the current Tory party, it’s hard to see it making such a dramatic recovery. But a Starmer government struggling with all the problems left by its Tory predecessors, as well as with inevitable fresh crises, while being blamed for everything by the rightwing press, and also attacked by some of the leftwing Britons he has alienated, is only too easy to envisage. Yet a Starmer premiership doesn’t have to play out that way. Governments can rule cautiously, even in a period of crisis, if they are trusted. For the first two years of Tony Blair’s administration, Labour kept to the Conservatives’ existing spending plans, despite the rundown state of public services, and voters did not desert Labour in a disillusioned fury – probably because they believed, correctly, that better funding from the government would eventually be forthcoming. A prime minister can also persuade enough of the electorate to be patient if they have a clear project. Margaret Thatcher’s long, divisive premiership was partly sustained by the belief of a decisive minority of voters in her vision of a more competitive society. Occasionally, Starmer tries to give a Labour government a similar grand purpose. In January, he promised “a fairer, greener, more dynamic country with an economy that works for everyone, not just those at the top”, and “a politics which trusts communities with the power to control their destiny”. So used are we to seeing him as Mr Cautious, these expansive moments do not get the consideration they deserve. Labour urged again to vow to scrap Tories’ two-child benefit limit Read more He lacks Thatcher’s and Blair’s communication skills, which enabled them to embed their main message even in everyday announcements. He also lacks their consistent quality: the sense that they had an ideology, whether you liked it or not. In three years as leader, he has already shifted from the continuity Corbynism of his initial pledges to the jittery patriotic centrism of his pandemic period to the more confident critic of Conservative Britain that is his current incarnation. In office, he could easily change again. Optimists on the British left – there are still some – hope that he will be more radical in government than opposition, because circumstances give him no option. If public services are in even deeper crisis than now, after possibly another 18 months of Tory rule, then he will need new sources of revenue. With Labour’s ambition for Britain to have “the highest sustained growth in the G7” unlikely to be achieved quickly, if ever, and more borrowing ruled out, then this revenue will need to come from higher taxes. And with most taxpayers struggling financially, raiding the bloated stashes of the economic winners of recent decades is going to be very tempting – whatever reassuring things Starmer and Reeves say to the rich now. Such a sequence of events could be wishful thinking. But it’s too early to say for sure how Starmer might govern. Next week, Labour’s national policy forum meets to help decide what goes into its manifesto. Further policy announcements are likely at this autumn’s party conference, and during the election run-up, which could include another Labour conference in 2024, if Rishi Sunak delays the election as long as possible. If Starmer treats this whole period as an exercise in risk avoidance, and does the same in Downing Street, then he may join the list of failed British premiers. Helpfully, he has supplied future historians with a phrase of his own for governments that lack boldness: “sticking-plaster politics”. Let’s hope he has some stronger remedies hidden somewhere in his medicine cabinet. Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/dec/20/bristol-man-who-murdered-ex-partner-jailed-for-at-least-20-years

UK news

2023-12-20T14:49:47.000Z

Steven Morris

Bristol man who murdered ex-partner jailed for at least 20 years

A former chef who was brought to justice for the murder of his ex-partner after an extraordinary covert policing operation has been jailed for life and told he will serve at least 20 years before being considered for parole. Darren Osment was put on trial for killing Claire Holland after making a series of admissions to an undercover officer who for 18 months posed as a gangster to win the murderer’s trust. How an undercover police officer won trust – and confession – of a murderer Read more Holland’s family are calling for Osment to admit how he killed the mother-of-four, who was 32 when she vanished from Bristol in 2012, and where he hid her body. They hope that “Helen’s law”, which makes it very difficult for killers who have not revealed the locations of their victims’ remains to be freed, will persuade him. It is believed Osment, 41, may have strangled Holland after arranging to meet her at a pub where he worked and could have used his knife skills to dismember her body before disposing of her remains, possibly in the Severn estuary. Claire Holland, who went missing in 2012. Photograph: Avon and Somerset Police/PA Holland’s younger sister, Sarah Holland, 41, a student nurse, told the Guardian: “We haven’t had that chance to say goodbye. We don’t have anywhere to go to remember her. We’ve got nothing. That’s been taken away from us. If he has one ounce of compassion, just one measly ounce, let us know. I’m not sure that will ever happen.” During his trial, the undercover officer, who used the pseudonym Paddy O’Hara, described how police designed pieces of “theatre” to convince Osment that the officer was a criminal. O’Hara got Osment to act as a lookout while he pretended to hide cash and silver in woods. He took him on a run to pick up a gun and even pretended that he too had killed someone in the past. Gradually, Osment began to open up to the officer about the killing of Holland. 1:12 Darren Osment filmed speaking to undercover police officer on body cam – video Before the trial began, Osment’s defence tried to get O’Hara’s evidence excluded, claiming the confessions were obtained through “oppression”, that the police set out to groom and exploit a vulnerable man. Mrs Justice Cutts accepted that Osment, from Patchway, near Bristol, was a functioning alcoholic and had depression and anxiety. She said: “I accept that Paddy became central as a friend to Darren’s life. They spent a great deal of time together.” But she said it had been a “properly authorised and lawful investigation which was regularly reviewed”. The judge decided that it was for a jury to assess O’Hara’s role and the confessions he elicited. It found Osment guilty of murder by a majority of 10-2.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2024/mar/23/red-bull-claim-pole-for-australian-gp-but-off-track-issues-continue-to-fuel-more-f1-drama

Sport

2024-03-23T08:13:25.000Z

Jack Snape

Red Bull claim pole for Australian GP but off-track issues continue to fuel F1 drama | Jack Snape

Two victories and three pole positions into season 2024 and the experts have all but handed the title to defending champion Max Verstappen. Meanwhile, the lawyers have descended on Formula One like never before. But to the swathes of motorsport fans squeezed into the leafy Albert Park track in Melbourne, these intercontinental ructions meant little. Instead, on this mild Saturday, tens of thousands of them streamed, bobbed and weaved towards the main stage adjacent to the lake. Max Verstappen blitzes to Australian GP pole as Lewis Hamilton slumps Read more “Who wants to see Daniel win?” the MC asked, eliciting a mostly underwhelming response for Australian idol Daniel Ricciardo. “Who wants to see Oscar win?” she tried again. A roar for Melbourne local Oscar Piastri erupted from the crowd – sprinkled with more orange than anywhere outside Zandvoort – as if anointing a new national hero. Fans are still looking where in the 2024 grid a contender might emerge behind the dominant Red Bulls, but off the track there have been more surprises than a Mercedes wind tunnel. A Red Bull employee’s complaint over inappropriate behaviour against the team principal, Christian Horner, was rejected in February. The employee has appealed and the matter remains afoot. The complaint, and the handling of it, fuelled speculation in recent weeks of a power struggle in the world’s fastest garage. Formula One champion Verstappen – whose parents divorced in 2008 – said on Thursday that Red Bull was a “second family”, offering little to allay paddock gossip. McLaren’s Melbourne-born driver Oscar Piastri signs autographs for fans at Albert Park ahead of the Australian Grand Prix. Photograph: William West/AFP/Getty Images Much of the motoring media has focused on what this saga means for the defending champion’s future, and his role in the great driver merry-go-round that is set to define much of this season. However, the complaint is just one of a series of integrity scandals testing the institution of Formula One. The sport has leveraged its Netflix success and soap opera-like character to build an increasingly diverse following, including in Australia. Two in five of Albert Park’s record crowd last year were women, up from fewer than one in four in 2019, and with Formula One’s growing status comes new expectations. When asked about the integrity issues consuming the sport, McLaren chief executive Zak Brown said pointedly on Friday, “we’re living in 2024, not 1984”. But look around, and it’s not immediately obvious. The drivers are all men. The vast majority of the paddock is male. The press box, similarly gendered. Governing body the FIA is largely devoid of women in leadership and governance roles, although Natalie Robyn was brought in as chief executive in 2022. At the end of last season, the FIA president, Mohammed Ben Sulayem, had to defend historical sexist remarks uncovered from an archive on his personal website. The head of the all-female F1 Academy series, Susie Wolff, has filed a criminal complaint in a French court against the FIA for statements made about her in December, that she claimed were rooted “in intimidatory and misogynistic behaviour”. Lewis Hamilton, whose boss at Mercedes is Wolff’s husband, Toto, offered his support on Thursday to Susie and highlighted the sport’s ongoing challenges with gender and inclusion. Susie Wolff, head of the F1 Academy and wife of the Mercedes principal Toto Wolff, is one of the few women in a leadership role in a Formula One world still dominated by men. Photograph: Qian Jun/MB Media/Getty Images The FIA’s problems don’t end there. On Wednesday, Ben Sulayem was cleared of allegations that he had interfered in race results after an investigation by his own organisation’s ethics committee. But it offered little to justify the finding. Two days later, Brown called for a swift resolution to the sport’s multitude of issues as well as “total transparency”. The episode has prompted Ben Sulayem to issue a defence of his leadership in a letter to FIA members, Associated Press reported on Friday. Complaints against him, Ben Sulayem alleged, were meant to “destabilise me as president of the FIA, but also of questioning the integrity of our respected organisation”. Sign up to Australia Sport Free newsletter Get a daily roundup of the latest sports news, features and comment from our Australian sports desk Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. The drama away from the track has made up for an absence of drama on it. Red Bull has gone one-two in the first two races and Verstappen has now won nine grands prix in a row, and a scarcely believable 19 of the past 20. Saturday’s qualifying gave the field little reason for optimism. The Red Bull driver’s quickest trip around the lake was more than a quarter of a second better than the Ferrari of Carlos Sainz, who was returning two weeks after having his appendix removed. ‘Messes with the mind’: Hamilton hits 14-year low in Australian GP qualifying Read more Eight-time Albert Park pole sitter Lewis Hamilton failed to reach Q3, and will start from eleventh. Even further back was Ricciardo, whose best lap in the first qualification session was rubbed out by stewards for exceeding track limits. It’s the first time the 34-year-old has been eliminated in Q1 in Melbourne, and Ricciardo will start close to the back on Sunday. Piastri’s performance met, but did not exceed, expectations, after his lap was narrowly bested by McLaren teammate Lando Norris late in the session. The Australian will start sixth, alongside Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc on the third row. Speaking to the press afterwards, Verstappen said he was pleased with another pole, given Ferrari appeared to have narrowed the gap. The turmoil at Red Bull and the challenges at the FIA avoided discussion. But the words of Sainz, after securing a spot on the front row, echoed into the Melbourne evening. Asked about his still-healing stomach, the Spaniard replied: “Everything feels a bit weird.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2012/dec/06/george-osborne-credit-rating-lost-cause

Politics

2012-12-06T20:05:25.000Z

Patrick Wintour

George Osborne warned: protecting AAA credit rating is lost cause

Cabinet colleagues have warned George Osborne not to try to protect Britain's AAA credit rating because its loss is now inevitable and voters should be told it is unlikely to lead to higher borrowing costs. Osborne insisted he wanted to defend the UK's prestigious credit rating. He said: "The credit rating's important and the market is important, and the reason why this matters to people is because if you don't have credibility, if you're not able to show the world that you can pay your way, then interest rates go up for the government." In the wake of the autumn statement, the credit rating agency Fitch warned the UK was at greater risk of losing its status. This was because of breaking its supplementary rule to ensure debt was falling as a proportion of GDP by the end of the parliament. Fitch put the UK on "negative outlook" in March 2012 – meaning the rating was under threat – but said on Wednesday: "Missing the target weakens the credibility of the UK's fiscal framework, which is one of the factors supporting the [AAA] rating." Danny Alexander, chief secretary to the Treasury, said in the summer that losing the rating would not be "the be all and end all", but was criticised within the Treasury for his remarks. But economic ministers are now telling colleagues that the credit rating agency's own standing is much reduced due to its performance in the financial crisis. It is also being pointed out that the borrowing costs for France and the US have not increased despite those countries losing the AAA rating. Ministers are suggesting that, in the US election, Mitt Romney, the Republican challenger, made few efforts to attack Barack Obama over the loss of the US's AAA status in a lengthy campaign, and if Republican aides did mount such an attack, they gained no traction. They add the UK has its own currency. Interviewed on BBC2's Newsnight, Robert Chote, chair of the Office for Budget Responsibility, the government's fiscal watchdog, said: "Other countries have seen downgradings and have been in a similar sort of position and it's not made an enormous amount of difference to the reactions the markets have to them. "Often credit ratings agencies are looking at the same information that everybody else does and it's not clear what additional information a would-be investor in British government debt learns from that that they couldn't have learned from looking at our forecasts and other forecasts." But Osborne has said protecting the AAA status was one of his objectives along with reducing borrowing and cutting the deficit. Osborne warned that losing the support of the credit ratings agencies might mean taxpayers "have to pay more to fund the debt; but also, interest rates in the economy go up, mortgage rates go up, small business rates go up". He added: "And one of the things we've been able to do as a government is keep those rates very, very low because the world has confidence in us." Michael Hewson, senior market analyst at CMC Markets, said: "The ink had barely dried on the latest autumn statement before ratings agency Fitch warned in no uncertain terms that the UK government's failure to hit its debt targets 'weakens the credibility of the UK's fiscal framework'. "This statement suggests that it's fairly certain that the rating will be cut next year; however credit ratings aren't what they once were three years ago when 10-year gilt yields were above 4%. "The world has become a much changed place since then and it seems quite likely that a cut in the rating wouldn't be the disaster it might have been then, as the recent US and French experience has shown."

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/food/2021/dec/13/ex-fat-duck-pastry-chef-sues-for-200k-over-rsi-claims

Food

2021-12-13T18:06:44.000Z

Caroline Davies

Ex-Fat Duck pastry chef sues for £200k over RSI claims

A former pastry chef at Heston Blumenthal’s Fat Duck restaurant has claimed she was left with crippling repetitive strain injury from placing sweets into bags using tweezers and hand-making chocolate playing cards and about 550 whisky wine gums a day, court documents show. Sharon Anderson, 30, who worked at the three Michelin-starred restaurant in Bray, Berks, between 2014 and 2015, claims she is now plagued by constant wrist pain, and is suing for £200,000 damages. Her work included putting 400 sweets a day into small bags using tweezers, racing against time to make chocolate playing cards before the chocolate set too hard, and administering hundreds of tiny fingertip pinches to mushroom logs, court documents state. Heston Blumenthal. Photograph: Ander Gillenea/AFP/Getty Last week her lawyers told a high court judge that the “fast, arduous and repetitive” tasks meant she was effectively working on a factory floor as she made the concoctions dreamt up for the celebrity chef’s kitchen. “She was essentially on what was effectively a production line,” her barrister, Joel Kendall, said. The company denies liability, claiming the work she did was routine for a pastry chef in a “fine dining restaurant” and that she was given sufficient breaks. Lawyers acting on behalf of the restaurant claim there was a stark lack of medical evidence provided by Anderson. Anderson, of County Donegal, Ireland, claims her injury was caused by being made to perform work that was “too fast, arduous and repetitive for her.” In court documents, she states that her role included wrapping and packing about 400 individual sweets into cellophane bags from 7-11am, before she switched to creating chocolate playing cards from 11.30am to around 4pm. The chocolate playing cards were made in moulds of metal and plastic, while each mould could create 12 cards and weighed over a kilogram. The completed mould weighed about 2kg, it is claimed, and Anderson aimed to produce around 180 cards a day. “The process had to be carried out under time pressure as it had to be completed before the chocolate set in each mould,” her lawyers claim in court papers. Anderson went with the restaurant when it moved to Melbourne, Australia, in January 2015, while the Bray premises were renovated. From February 2015, her work followed a similar pattern to life in Bray, she claims, although she was under pressure to handle even more moulds, due to wastage caused by cards melting faster in the warmer climate. Her kitchen shift then switched to making whisky wine gums between 4pm and 6pm, she says, and she would produce around 550 by hand. She now suffers “significant wrist pain” even after carrying out normal manual tasks, court documents state. The injury means she has recurring problems with daily tasks such as heavy lifting, driving and – crucially – cooking, her lawyers said. They claim the restaurant failed to allow sufficient rest periods or support, and “required her to work under time pressure throughout the day”. After a brief court hearing, Judge Victoria McCloud adjourned the dispute, directing a case management conference for May 2022 ahead of a trial of her compensation claim.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/11/britains-pavement-hell-how-messy-broken-streets-ruin-peoples-lives

World news

2024-01-11T10:00:38.000Z

Emine Saner

Britain’s pavement hell: how messy, broken streets ruin people’s lives

Three years ago, Simon Daws and his guide dog, Lemar, were hit by a car on a street in Suffolk. Lemar had spotted an obstacle on the pavement and navigated his owner around it, but Daws, who is visually impaired, didn’t realise how narrow the pavement was. He slipped off the kerb and into traffic. Lemar was injured and took several weeks to recover. “Fortunately, my injury was very minor, but it could have been a lot worse,” says Daws. “The dog wasn’t at fault – he did his job. If the obstacle wasn’t there, whatever it was, then I wouldn’t have been put into that position.” Britain’s pavements can be hard to navigate even if you are not visually impaired. The clutter, barriers and trip hazards are everywhere. The wheelie bin your neighbour keeps on the street despite having space to store it. The coffee table someone has placed outside with a note offering it to passersby (a practice that has been described as “middle-class fly-tipping”). Charging cables for electric cars that snake across the pavement. Loose manhole covers. Advertising signage and cafe tables that annex more and more space. A tangle of ebikes and other “micromobility” vehicles. Then there is the problem of poorly maintained pavements, resulting in cracks, holes and uneven slabs. This is without the despicable scourge of dog mess and general litter. “It’s a bit of a jungle these days,” says Daws. “It’s not just people with sight loss that this is affecting – it’s wheelchair users, it’s parents with pushchairs, it’s mobility scooter users.” A familiar but infuriating sight at this time of year … Photograph: Amer Ghazzal/Alamy At this time of year, there is another obstruction – desiccating Christmas trees. The charity Guide Dogs has asked householders to be considerate when putting their trees out for collection and not to block pavements. “It’s just another issue for people with sight loss to face while trying to go about their day,” says Hannah Trussler, the organisation’s policy and campaigns manager. The other day, she walked past three on one road. Daws, a spokesperson for the charity, whose sight started deteriorating when he was in his 40s as a result of retinitis pigmentosa, says: “People might prop them up for collection, but when the weather has been bad they get blown over and fall across the paths.” Since Lemar died last year, Daws now uses a cane to navigate: “You don’t find something until you’ve tapped it or tripped over it. It’s a great problem.” Tom Shakespeare, a university researcher, social scientist and writer, says he has noticed the state of pavements getting worse in recent years. In London, where he lives, he says the quality of pavements differs from borough to borough and “how much funding has been put into maintaining them”. Shakespeare uses a wheelchair; he has come out of it “multiple times” after hitting a rough area. It is painful, although so far he hasn’t been seriously injured. “But it’s certainly embarrassing, awkward and difficult, because I have to drag myself out of the chair and put it the right way up and get back in,” he says. “Obviously, everybody thinks, rightly, that they should rush and help, but they’re really not very helpful; I can do it.” It might be OK for other people to pick their way through; it’s not OK if you rely on a wheelchair Tom Shakespeare It means he has to concentrate hard on the path ahead, as opposed to chatting to whomever he is with, or enjoying his surroundings. He has lost confidence. “I’m realising that I could, any time, hit something and come out, and that’s a nasty way of going about the world,” he says. “It should be smooth, easy; you get from A to B without any mishap. But because of the uneven pavements, I’m going much slower, I’m looking much more carefully.” Even then, he says, it still happens: “The other day, I hit something. I didn’t come out of my chair, but it was a real jolt.” He says the state of pavements has “definitely got worse. I can understand why – local authorities are strapped for money, budgets are tight and they neglect it, because as long as they’re passable, it’s OK. But it might be OK for other people to pick their way through; it’s not OK if you rely on a wheelchair.” Research by Living Streets, a charity that promotes walking and campaigns for a better environment, last year said trips and falls on pavements in England cost health and social care budgets as much as £500m a year and resulted in about 30,000 people being admitted to hospital. “Our streets not being up to the standard they should be is costing a lot,” says Kathryn Shaw, a spokesperson for Living Streets. “A lot of the funding to fix potholes is for roads. We want some of that funding to be ringfenced for footway improvements.” A report on “street clutter” released in October by the thinktank Centre for London focused on three streets in the capital, but one of the authors, Millie Mitchell, says: “We’re very aware it is a problem that’s faced by the rest of the country as well. We found more than 120 items of clutter and we quantified approximately half of those items as having moderate to severe negative impacts on pedestrians and other pavement users.” Examples of “clutter” included planters, bollards, phone boxes and redundant signs, but Mitchell found that it was impermanent objects that were most prevalent. The biggest was sandwich, or A-board, advertising outside shops and restaurants. “They tend to cluster – when one shop or cafe puts out an A-board, the others tend to follow suit, so you can end up with one street that quickly becomes cluttered in that way. Also, as these are transient objects, they cause particular challenges for people with visual impairment, because their locations can be unpredictable.” Ebikes dumped on the pavement outside Waterloo station in London. Photograph: Peter Dazeley/Getty Images The second-biggest problem was dockless hire ebikes, which some users abandon wherever they finish their journey. Micromobility companies can issue fines for reckless parking, but these tend to be small and not much of a deterrent, although repeat offenders can be banned. “Sustainable travel is really important, but part of sustainable and active travel is walking. If the walking environment is let down by poorly located ebikes, that is a concern,” says Mitchell. The next-biggest problem was bags of rubbish placed on the pavement for collection. This is partly a problem of infrastructure, she says – businesses don’t have anywhere else to put their waste – and partly because there are different collection days for different types of waste. “It can mean that rubbish ends up on the street for way longer than it should be,” says Mitchell. Simon, who doesn’t want to use his last name, set up the social media account Dockless Obstructions about a year ago, appalled at the way hire bikes and scooters were being left on streets. As a regular traveller to King’s Cross in central London, where the head office of the Royal National Institute of Blind People is situated, he started to notice visually impaired people “getting off the trains and having to navigate through all these banks of dockless bikes”. Then an elderly neighbour told him she was reluctant to leave her house because there were so many bikes parked on the pavement; she was worried one would fall on her, or that they would be blocking pedestrian crossings. He and others started posting pictures of wayward bikes on X, formerly Twitter. “It means there’s a record, because when we tried to get in touch with the companies themselves, we got a generic message saying that they were sending somebody to sort it out, but there was no record of the complaint as such,” he says. One recent photograph, taken on New Year’s Eve, shows at least 30 hire bikes parked on the pavement at a busy intersection. A-boards protrude into the street on Whitehall in central London. Photograph: Alamy “Dockless hire bikes are a good example of where technology is rapidly advancing, but legislation is lagging hopelessly behind,” says Will Norman, London’s walking and cycling commissioner. “The problem with this is that cities across the UK, not just London, lack the power to regulate this. We have independently and collectively been saying to the government for years that they need to give cities the power to better manage dockless rental bikes.” He had hoped they were getting somewhere: “It was massively disappointing that in the king’s speech there was no mention of any of this. The government not addressing this is a massive missed opportunity. It will continue to create pavement clutter, inconvenience and safety issues for everyone.” A temporary fix is “working with all the London councils to try to explore a coordinated scheme, but it’s not yet clear if that is possible with the legal powers that we have got”, Norman says. “There are informal agreements between companies and councils, but there’s no real teeth. Unless the government gives cities the power to regulate this, we’re not going to solve the problem. It risks damaging the whole concept of ebikes, which are an inherently good thing for people’s health and for cities.” In a survey done by Living Streets, which runs an annual “cut the clutter” campaign, the top concern for pedestrians was cars parking on the pavement, followed by badly located bins, lamp-posts and signs. “If we want people to walk more and we want to reduce congestion and air pollution, then there has to be a nicer and better alternative to jumping in the car,” says Shaw. “For people who don’t have access to a car, it’s really problematic. It means that they maybe won’t leave the house, they won’t get out, they won’t socialise, so there’s a mental health aspect.” Living Streets’ survey found that one in three adults over 65 did not walk more, or at all, on the streets around their home because of the poor state of them. “Parents have said they’d be more likely to walk their child to school if there was a better walking environment, so that’s a huge amount of children that could be benefiting from walking if our streets were clearer,” says Shaw. Motorists in Edinburgh can be fined £100 for parking on the pavement. Photograph: newsandmore/Alamy Edinburgh began enforcing Scotland’s ban on pavement parking at the end of last year, but it remains legal in most of the UK, with the notable exception of Greater London. This can force pedestrians into the road. “That can be a daunting and scary experience if you don’t know what’s coming,” says Trussler. “Some people don’t leave the house because of it.” For wheelchair users, pavement parking can be impossible to navigate. One of the problems with street clutter, says Mitchell, “is that there is quite a complex governance and ownership landscape”, which means responsibility can be hard to ascertain. Benches, planters or signs might be owned by the council or a transport authority, but phone and utility boxes are owned by companies. Mitchell says: “One of the things we hear a lot [from local authorities] is that they know this is a problem that they ought to be dealing with, but they are struggling from a power perspective to be able to do that.” A lack of funding is an even bigger problem. Huge cuts to central government funding since 2010 means surveying and maintaining pavements has slipped down the priority list for many councils. “While dealing with one individual item may seem relatively cheap, if you scale that up to the number of streets that they’re responsible for, it can quickly get expensive,” says Mitchell. “One of the things we’re calling for is better resourcing for local authorities. It could also mean granting them greater power to levy charges against privately owned objects on their pavements. Perhaps that could help subsidise other decluttering activities.” Broken roads and broken necks: life in pothole Britain Read more Potholes on roads get a lot of media attention and motorists are vocal about their supposed rights and interests. It seems a harder fight for pedestrians, even if the government’s ambition is for 50% of journeys in towns and cities to be walked or cycled by 2030. One of the problems highlighted by the Living Streets report into pedestrian falls last year was that, because there is no systematic collection of data, the scale and impact of the problem is unknown. In the absence of political will, it falls to communities to put pressure on councils and the government. In Edinburgh, Living Streets was one of several organisations that campaigned successfully for pavement A‑boards to be banned; the prohibition came into force in 2018. “We really want to encourage members of the public to put the pressure on and to highlight where these bad spots are,” says Shaw. Daws would like people to be a bit more thoughtful. “Losing my sight has taught me how much stuff is out there that I never really understood when I was a sighted person,” he says. “When I was a driver, I’d bump up on to the kerb and leave the wheels on. I didn’t understand, but now I do. “I urge everybody to have a little bit more thought about where they leave items such as bins. People don’t like cutting things back any more on their bushes and trees. I’ve regularly had branches in my face while walking; I have had cuts.” And watch where you put that Christmas tree. Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Full

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/dec/04/best-politics-books-2015-review-helen-lewis-labour-corbyn-cameron-conservative

Books

2015-12-04T08:00:11.000Z

Helen Lewis

The best politics books of 2015

Goodbye 2015, and goodbye to big beasts like Ed Balls, Vince Cable and the Alexanders (Douglas and Danny), all ushered off the political stage in an election that saw Scotland turn SNP yellow, Ukip reduced to a single MP and Ed Miliband replaced as Labour leader with lifelong backbencher Jeremy Corbyn. The unexpected Tory majority gave writers plenty to chew over in their election postmortems. How did Labour, which claimed to have won the “ground war” on the eve of the election, get it so wrong? The BBC’s Iain Watson attempts to find out in Five Million Conversations (Luath), written in an accessible diary style. His conclusion is not a happy one: the party has serious political and organisational challenges to overcome if it wants to take power again (and it needs to capture seats it hasn’t held since Tony Blair’s landslide in 1997). A large portion of Labour’s current misery is down to the nationalist landslide in Scotland. The background to that thumping defeat is spelled out in Joe Pike’s fast-paced, well-sourced Project Fear (Biteback), which covers Scottish politics from the start of the independence referendum campaign through to election night. It’s essential reading for anyone who follows Westminster politics but has a sketchier idea of the earthquake north of the border, not least because Corbyn’s continued leadership could rest on the outcome of next summer’s Holyrood election. Labour insiders fear another wipeout, which would prompt the question: wasn’t Corbyn supposed to win back Labour voters who swung to the SNP as “the only true anti-austerity party”? The big disappointment for Ukip on 7 May was that, despite racking up more than four million votes, the party held just one of its two seats (Douglas Carswell’s Clacton constituency) and failed to gain any. Most humbling of all, party leader Nigel Farage was defeated in Thanet South. Farage resigned, then unresigned, and the Huffington Post’s Owen Bennett was there to see it all. There was fretting in Ukip circles when his book Following Farage (Biteback) came out, as many party staffers had gleefully slagged off their former leader after his resignation, only to discover 48 hours later that he was back in charge. They needn’t have worried. Bennett’s book is full of the utterly barmy stuff we’ve come to associate with Ukip footsoldiers (Godfrey Bloom of women are fridge-sluts fame makes a cameo), but most of their voters clearly don’t care. Following the Conservative victory, this autumn marked David Cameron’s 10th year as party leader. The anniversary was commemorated with two flavours of biography. For serious types there is Cameron at 10 (William Collins) by former Wellington school headmaster Anthony Seldon and Peter Snowdon. This “inside story” starts in 2010, and the early chapters will prompt wonkish nostalgia. Remember the Big Society? The economic Plan A? Andy Coulson? The Tories would rather you didn’t. For the more frivolous, there is Call Me Dave (Biteback), a book-length version of the tearful voicemail one might leave an ex-lover, implying that he’s nothing without you and, anyway, you’ve told all his friends he’s rubbish in bed. Michael Ashcroft and Cameron’s breakup was prompted by the former’s belief that his contributions to the Conservative party should have been rewarded with a seat in the cabinet. The PM declined to oblige. During the election, Ashcroft made his detailed polling available to the public, and followed up with this biography co-authored with the former Sunday Times political editor Isabel Oakeshott. It’s undeniably readable, thanks to several eye-catching claims that no one but a billionaire could have got past the libel lawyers. This autumn we also got the second volume of Charles Moore’s epic, if occasionally exhausting, Margaret Thatcher biography (Allen Lane), tragically not called “Thatch 2: Thatch Harder”. Filed alongside it in the “Leftie Hate Figures” section of all good bookshops will be Niall Ferguson’s Kissinger, 1923-1968: The Idealist (Allen Lane). Finally, 31 years after it was written, Robert Caro’s The Power Broker (Bodley Head) got a UK release following the success of his endless biographies of Lyndon B Johnson. The story of New York’s unofficial emperor Robert Moses reveals how to get things done in local government (top tip: being a minor-league tyrant running a shadow government helps). Looking at politics more broadly, several titles stand out. Juliet Jacques’s Trans (Verso) provides a lyrical exploration of her own gender journey against the background of increasing media interest in transgender issues. Thoughtful and intimate, it’s a fine successor to books such as Jan Morris’s Conundrum. Meanwhile, Katrine Marçal’s Who Cooked Adam Smith’s Dinner? (Portobello), translated by Saskia Vogel, asks hard questions about homo economicus, who is very definitely a man. Our economy depends on huge amounts of unpaid and often unacknowledged labour, the majority of it done by women. What if policymakers took that into account? But the year in feminism is not all depressing: Anita Anand’s Sophia: Princess, Suffragette, Revolutionary (Bloomsbury) unearths the extraordinary story of a forgotten British-Indian suffragette who went from Queen Victoria’s goddaughter to militant activist. As Russia grandstands over Syria, understanding what Vladimir Putin wants is crucial. Peter Pomerantsev, a British journalist born to Russian parents, spent a decade working in Moscow immediately following the energy boom that created the oligarch class. The vignettes in his account of modern Russia, Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible (Faber), transport the reader to a world of glittering decadence and Kafkaesque corruption. For those interested in American politics, Ta-Nehisi Coates’s short, brutal meditation on the black body and masculinity, Between the World and Me (Text), and Claudia Rankine’s prose-poem Citizen (Penguin) are essential reading. Finally, if you want to understand how things work – or, as is more often the case, how they don’t – there are two good options. Gillian Tett’s The Silo Effect (Little, Brown) asks why organisations fall into an institutional version of tunnel vision; while David Halpern’s Inside the Nudge Unit (WH Allen) explains how to change people’s behaviour in subtle but profound ways. Politicians of all parties, whether winners or losers this year, could learn from them. Save at least 30% Browse all the critics’ choices at bookshop.theguardian.com or call 0330 333 6846. From now until Christmas, 20p from each title you order will go to the Guardian and Observer charity appeal 2015. Best books of 2015 Fiction of the year Crime and thrillers of the year Science fiction and fantasy of the year Biographies and memoirs of the year Sports books of the year Children’s books of the year Nature books of the year Politics books of the year History books of the year Paperbacks of the year Music books of the year Food books of the year Drink books of the year Stocking-filler books of the year Best art books of the year Best architecture books of the year Best graphic novels of the year Best photography books of the year Vote now: what was your favourite book of the year?

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https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/aug/19/tigers-red-weather-klaussmann-review

Books

2012-08-18T23:05:10.000Z

Anna Baddeley

Tigers in Red Weather by Liza Klaussmann – review

Liza Klaussmann's first novel opens on a balmy evening in New England just after the second world war. Glamorous twentysomething Nick Derringer, excited about the imminent return from the navy of her husband, Hughes, is having a last drink with newlywed cousin Helena before she jets off for a new life in Hollywood. Both women are looking foward to lazy summers at the family mansion in Martha's Vineyard. "Houses, husbands and midnight gin parties … Nothing's going to change." Sadly for them, the book's title comes from Wallace Stevens's poem, "Disillusionment of Ten O'Clock", a proto-Seussian lament about the monotony of a life starved of imagination ("The houses are haunted / By white night-gowns / None are green / Or purple with green rings"). Before long, Nick is standing in a night-gown at 10 o'clock in the morning, the kitchen stinking of the shrimp she's forced to cook every supper, feeling disillusioned with her marriage to the beautiful but passionless Hughes: "They were supposed to be different, different from all the people who didn't want things and didn't do things and weren't special. They were supposed to be the kind of people who said to hell with it, who threw their wine glasses into the fireplace, who jumped off cliffs. They were not supposed to be careful people." For a while, we're firmly in Revolutionary Road territory. But just as we resign ourselves to a familiar tale of domestic discord, we fast forward to 1959, and a grisly discovery by Nick and Helena's children behind a tennis court. What follows is a heady mix of murder mystery, coming-of-age story and glimpse into two dysfunctional marriages, set to a soundtrack of Count Basie and country club chatter. Despite a scattering of literary allusions – Klaussmann is a big fan of F Scott Fitzgerald – Tigers in Red Weather is not an especially literary novel. But then perhaps Klaussmann did not set out to write anything too weighty. In an interview she said: "Martha's Vineyard is so idyllic. White picket fences, American flags; everyone goes to the club together, everyone wears the same thing, everyone does that same stuff. The flipside is that it can be really homogeneous and stifling. It makes for a good place to turn on its head." The result does occasionally read like Desperate Housewives transported to East Egg, with a bit of Mad Men chucked in for good measure. Two things, however, set this enjoyably creepy book apart from your average beach read. The plot and pacing are expertly managed: though the story darts back and forth over two decades, hops between east coast, west coast and wartime London, and is told from the point of view of five people, the reader never feels lost. But the real selling point is the writing, which is minimalist and evocative at the same time. Klaussmann, who used to work for the New York Times and studied creative writing with Andrew Motion at Royal Holloway, has a journalist's economy with words and a perfect sense of when to up the lyrical ante. Just when a tide of gin and jazz threatens to sweep you away, a startling image – a woman's pubic hair compared to "a flat vine growing up a trellis", a child describing a mutilated corpse looking "as if someone had taken a cookie-cutter and stamped out her skin" – will throw you back on to the shore.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/oct/07/imperial-war-museum-holocaust-memorial-london

UK news

2017-10-07T20:30:31.000Z

Harriet Sherwood

Imperial War Museum in clash over planned Holocaust memorial

Plans to erect a national Holocaust memorial next to parliament have become embroiled in controversy, only weeks before the winning design is due to be announced. The £50m memorial and education centre, initiated in 2013 by David Cameron when he was prime minister, has attracted some of the biggest names in art and architecture, including Norman Foster, Daniel Libeskind, Anish Kapoor and Rachel Whiteread. A jury to select the winning entry has met and an announcement from the UK Holocaust Memorial Foundation is expected this month. But in an extraordinary intervention, the Imperial War Museum (IWM) is calling for the plan for an educational complex below the memorial to be reconsidered because it will compete with its own new Holocaust centre, opening in 2020, less than a mile away. Meanwhile, people who live near the memorial’s site – Victoria Tower Gardens, next to the houses of parliament and on the banks of the Thames – are stepping up objections to the proposal. They say it would mean the loss of much-valued green space, increase pollution and traffic, and require a heavy security presence. IWM, which has been the national museum for the Holocaust since 2000, has welcomed the memorial, but has raised concerns about the inclusion of an education centre. It says it is likely to replicate its own advanced plans for a £33.5m “digitally enabled learning and events suite”, and the public should be offered one facility, rather than competing educational resources.Last month Prince William visited the museum to discuss its plans for new galleries and meet Holocaust survivors in his role as president of the War Museum Foundation. According to IWM, more than 600,000 people visit its Holocaust exhibition each year, including 25,000 schoolchildren and teachers. Its new and expanded galleries will include new survivor testimonies, objects and original material and will present the Holocaust narrative within the wider context of the second world war. Diane Lees, the museum’s director-general, said: “Our ground-breaking new galleries and digitally enabled learning suite will allow us to transform the way we present the second world war and the Holocaust and, through our new narrative, enable visitors to engage with events that may be less well understood and known to them.” She added: “We urge the reconsideration of the creation of the UK Holocaust Memorial Foundation’s learning centre at Victoria Tower Gardens, [which is] less than a mile away from us, as it will very much divide the public offer on learning about the Holocaust.” Sir Trevor Pears of the Pears Foundation, which supports Holocaust education in the UK, also welcomed the memorial plan. “It is bold in its vision, and addresses some real concerns expressed by survivors, educators and heritage professionals,” he said. But, he added, the UK Holocaust Memorial Foundation “must not miss the opportunity to work in partnership with existing provision ... if it is to succeed in its mission”. Duplication of effort and resources should be avoided. The memorial foundation said its centre would be complementary to the war museum’s offering. Sir Peter Bazalgette, chair of the memorial foundation, said: “Standing in the shadow of our parliament, the new Holocaust memorial and learning centre will become an internationally recognised symbol against hatred. Its learning centre will use the stories of the Holocaust to explore antisemitism, extremism, Islamophobia, homophobia and other forms of hatred and prejudice in society today.” Holocaust memorial Day is commemorated at the Imperial War Museum, which is objecting to a new learning centre at the memorial. Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo He added: “As IWM has previously agreed, the learning centre and the war museum galleries have different remits, with distinct yet complementary objectives. We see no reason why the two cannot continue to work together.” His view that the two educational centres were complementary was echoed by Sajid Javid, the communities and local government secretary. However, local residents have also raised concerns about the new centre. Barbara Weiss, an architect whose company is based near the gardens, said the proposal was “completely contrary” to London’s ambition to protect its green spaces. “The designs are deceptive. They show a very idealistic and abstract view that doesn’t correspond to reality,” she said. Emergency staircases, service access and signage were absent from the drawings and models.The memorial’s backers “seem determined not to listen” to the local objections, she added. “There is a worry this will become a ‘Disneyworld’ Holocaust event, in a superficial, bling way. It seems it has to have a ‘wow’ factor, it has to be a ‘new attraction’. As someone who is half-Jewish and married to a Jew, I find that distasteful.” Another local campaigner, Lucy Peck, said Victoria Tower Gardens was heavily used by residents and office workers, “who sit peacefully and watch activity on the river. It’s a surprisingly tranquil little London park that we don’t want to lose. And people might not feel comfortable taking their sandwiches into the park and sitting on top of a Holocaust memorial.” People were concerned that security, already heavy around parliament, may need to be stepped up to protect a vulnerable site. “If locals were to be searched every time they enter the park, it would become unusable,” said Peck. The memorial fund said its plan would be developed in consultation with the local community, and the park would remain accessible to the public. “The competition design brief was clear that the memorial should be visible and prominent but preserve as much as possible of the park’s open space,” said a spokesperson. A full planning application would allow the views of local residents and other interested parties to be considered.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/tvandradioblog/2011/jul/14/the-joy-of-box-sets

Television & radio

2011-07-14T09:56:13.000Z

Vicky Frost

The joy of box sets

Most of us have shelves filled with box sets: well-watched discs of our favourite programmes, shows we somehow missed first time round and have come to love, that unlikely impulse-buy yet to make it out of the cellophane and on to the screens. Our DVD shelves, bursting with brilliant shows, are our TV safety blankets – the things we raid when the schedules are bare but the sofa still calls. Of course, we could just watch shows as they are broadcast. Lots of us still do. But there is something about viewing several episodes in one sitting that quickly becomes addictive – once you've started gobbling down storylines in three-episode chunks, you want to watch everything in concentrated bursts. The bingeing is part of the appeal. But so is talking about the show afterwards. So we thought it was time to launch our new Box Set Club – in which we will discuss a different DVD every week. On Tuesday afternoons we'll kick off a conversation on a show, and then throw things over to you. We'll also let you know what we'll be watching for next week, so you can dig out the title from that pile under the television. We won't be focusing on releases of new shows – given that they've only just been on TV, chances are they've already been reviewed and picked apart – but on those box sets that we still return to, or discover, sometimes many years after the programme first broadcast. When I review my box set purchases, for every recent show that ends up in my basket, an old favourite – or, more likely, something I missed entirely the first time round – also finds its way in there. Our first DVD, next Tuesday, will be Our Friends in the North. Join us to discuss the drama then – and for now help us out with some of the finer details of Box Set Club. How should we sensibly approach box sets of multiple series, for instance – one at a time? A handful at a time? The whole thing as one body of work? Do we need to give you more than a week's notice of a DVD? What about spoilers? We look forward to your thoughts – and seeing you for discussion next Tuesday.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/sep/27/us-murder-rate-increase-2020

US news

2021-09-28T00:15:55.000Z

Lois Beckett

US records largest annual increase in murders in six decades

The US has experienced its largest-ever recorded annual increase in murders, according to new statistics from the FBI, with the national murder rate rising nearly 30% in 2020 – the biggest jump in six decades. Nearly 5,000 more Americans were murdered across the country last year than the year before, even as rape, robbery, and other property crimes fell, according to FBI figures. Murder increased in every geographic region, and in small towns and suburban areas as well as large cities. At least 77% of the murders were committed with firearms, according to the new government estimates. The sharp one-year increase, to a total of at least 21,570 murders, does not erase the nation’s safety gains since the early 1990s. The US murder rate had dropped more than 50% since 1991. Even after last year’s increase, it is still 34% lower. But the single-year jump in murders, the largest since current record keeping began in 1960, has fueled debate about the broader social effects of the coronavirus pandemic. National statistics show that no other crime category surged to the same extent that murder did: the nation’s overall violent crime rate increased just 5%, according to the data. While homicides have continued to rise in big cities through the first half of 2021, the rate of increase has slowed, according to the criminologist Richard Rosenfeld, who has been tracking changes in crime throughout the pandemic. A study looking at a subset of 29 US cities through the end of June showed homicide up 16% this year, he said. Experts who study violence point to multiple factors that might have played a role in the murder increase, from the emotional trauma and economic instability of the pandemic, which fell hardest on communities that were already struggling, to an increase in gun-carrying in public. Conversations about American crime and violence often focus on victims of color in big cities, but “the FBI data is showing an increase everywhere”, said Shani Buggs, an assistant professor at the University of California, Davis, who studies community violence prevention. “It’s urban. It’s rural. It’s Democratic. It’s Republican.” Law enforcement agencies have reported increases in illegal firearm possession, and there have been anecdotal reports from cities across the country of more guns on the streets, Buggs said. “What I’m hearing on the ground, from folks in New York, Chicago, Oakland, Louisville, St Louis, is that you have mundane issues that are turning lethal because there is so much anger, and rage, and guns available,” she said. While handguns remained the most common murder weapon in the US, much about the surge in gun violence in 2020 remains unclear. The circumstances for most of the nation’s more than 21,000 murders are not recorded in the national data released on Monday. More than 4,000 were attributed to arguments, at least 900 to gang killings, and more than 1,900 were committed in the context of other crimes, including robberies and drug crimes. But the largest category is simply “unknown”. Republicans have responded to the increase in gun violence by leaning into “soft on crime” rhetoric and pushing for more punitive responses, while Joe Biden and other Democrats have focused on Americans’ widespread and easy access to guns. Biden has also proposed a $5bn investment over eight years in scaling up community gun violence prevention strategies, including funding outreach workers and other programs that focus on the small number of people most likely to shoot or be shot, strategies that have shown a strong track record of reducing killings. They lost loved ones to gun violence. Then their grief was politicized Read more The murder increase has also become a key data point in debates over the role of police departments in preventing community violence, particularly after last year’s protests against police killings of Black Americans. Some advocates said it was important to focus on the fact that 2020’s murder spike was building on a level of violence across the country that was already far from normal. “It took one pandemic to unveil another pandemic, a more silent pandemic,” said Malik Russell, the director of communications for the Health Alliance for Violence Intervention. “It’s important that the nation as a whole doesn’t miss the forest for the trees, the fact that every year, thousands and thousands of people, disproportionately Black and brown, are being killed on the streets.” Stark racial disparities in who is most at risk of being murdered continued into 2020: Black Americans, who make up about 14% of the population, represented more than half of the 2020 victims whose race was known. But the number of murders also increased sharply across racial groups. Compared with 2019, the number of white males murdered rose 27%, while the number of Black males murdered rose 31%, according to data on the victims whose race was recorded. Of the nearly 5,000 additional murder victims in 2020, at least 1,200 were white, while at least 2,400 were Black. Rosenfeld, the criminologist, said that while murder was the most serious crime, it was also the rarest, which made the continuing decline in US property crimes last year an “important story” that should not be overlooked. The number of people victimized by property crimes had been on a downward trend for at least two decades, and the pandemic had not changed that, he said, even as homicides spiked. “We want to address the increase in homicide with remedies that are specific to homicide,” Rosenfeld said. “These broad-based remedies, like ratcheting up years in prison for the commission of a felony – we not only don’t need them, they may do more harm than good.” In conversations with people working on the front lines of the murder crisis across the country, Buggs said, she consistently heard “people talking about how much trauma exists in the community, and the need for healing and peacemaking”. “As a country, as a society, we don’t have a great answer to that, but we need to be trying, and innovating, and we need to be taking it seriously,” she said.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2023/may/07/nikola-jokic-mat-ishbia-suns-owner-nuggets-shove-nba-playoffs

Sport

2023-05-08T01:48:36.000Z

Guardian sport

Nikola Jokic scores 53 and tussles with Suns owner during Nuggets’ playoff loss

Denver star Nikola Jokic was given a technical foul on Sunday evening after a clash with Phoenix owner Mat Ishbia during the Suns’ 129-124 playoff victory over the Nuggets. In the second quarter Suns guard Josh Okogie stumbled into the seats while chasing the ball. Ishbia grabbed the ball and Jokic tried to retrieve it. Shortly after the ball flew back into the seats, Jokic and Ishbia made contact. Predictably the 6ft 11in, 285lb Jokic got the better of the tussle and Ishbia was knocked backwards into his seat. It was unclear if Jokic saw Ishbia clearly or was even aware of who he was. Jokic and the Suns owner. 😳 pic.twitter.com/Cvd2D4ADHA — Hoop Central (@TheHoopCentral) May 8, 2023 Officials consulted with each other for a few minutes before assessing Jokic a technical. Crew chief Tony Brothers told reporters after the game that Jokic was allowed to remain in the game because he “didn’t just run over and hit a fan”. Jokic was asked by reporters if he expected to be suspended or fined over the incident. “But his hands [were] on me,” Jokic said. “So [the NBA] is not going to protect me? They’re going to protect the fan? Not me as a person, I’m talking about as a player.” Jokic was also asked if he knew who Ishbia was. “He’s a fan, isn’t he?” Jokic said. “He cannot influence the game by holding the ball.” Ishbia, who bought the Suns and the WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury for $4bn from Robert Sarver in February, said he did not want to see Jokic punished. “Great win for the Suns last night in an amazing series so far!” Ishbia wrote on Twitter on Monday. “That should be and is the only story. Suspending or fining anyone over last nights incident would not be right. I have alot of respect for Jokic and don’t want to see anything like that. Excited for game 5! Go Suns!” Jokic is a two-time NBA MVP and at 28 is already considered one of the league’s greatest European players of all time. The incident did little to cool Jokic’s performance – he scored 53 points and made 11 assists. Kevin Durant and Devin Booker scored 36 points each for Phoenix. The Suns’ victory tied the series at 2-2. Game 5 is on Tuesday night in Denver. In Sunday’s other game, James Harden scored a go-ahead three-pointer in overtime as the Philadelphia 76ers tied their playoff series at 2-2 with the Boston Celtics. “I just want to win,” Harden said. “Today was do-or-die for us.” Bigger than basketball 🙏 James Harden gives John Hao his shoes after hitting the game-winner in Game 4 💙❤️ pic.twitter.com/LODiFtII11 — ESPN (@espn) May 7, 2023 Harden said he was inspired by John Hao, who was paralyzed in a shooting at Michigan State University earlier this year. The two have struck up a friendship, and Harden invited Hao to the game as his guest. “He’s strong, he’s bouncing back, he’s recovering very well,” Harden said after the game. “I feel like it’s my job to give him that light, that smile that he deserves. Hopefully today was one of those days where he can smile.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2019/jul/06/seaside-cottages-walks-kayak-sea-beach-england-wales-scotland-northern-ireland

Travel

2019-07-06T06:00:22.000Z

Clare Gogerty

Coast through summer: 10 itineraries for the UK seaside

Contents1 Llŷn peninsula, Gwynedd 2 Ardnamurchan, Highlands 3 Morecambe Bay, Cumbria/Lancashire 4 Saltburn-by-the-sea, North Yorkshire 5 Orford, Suffolk 6 Lynton and Lynmouth, Exmoor coast, Devon 7 Winchelsea Beach, East Sussex 8 Isle of Portland, Weymouth and Chesil Beach, Dorset 9 Helford estuary, Cornwall 10 Ards peninsula, County Down Llŷn peninsula, Gwynedd Parts of the Llŷn peninsula still feel wild and remote – head to its tip along single-track roads for some splendid isolation and a glimpse into its mythical and holy past. The south coast is more popular with holidaymakers: it’s all about surfing, sailing and sandcastles on its long, sandy beaches. Day one Shop for fruit and veg and all manner of worldly goods at the popular Wednesday market in Pwllheli – handy if you arrive by train, as it’s right by the station. Alternatively, wait until Sunday when the market stalls sell more local produce. Stop for fish and chips at Allports, where the chips come double-fried to order. Pwllheli boasts sandy beaches, Plas Heli – the Welsh National Sailing Academy – and the Hafan Pwllheli Marina, so there are plenty of sailing and yacht-ogling options. Day two See the work of Welsh artists, sculptors and ceramicists at Plas Glyn-y-Weddw in Llanbedrog, a historic arts centre in a fine Victorian Gothic building overlooking Cardigan Bay. Wander around the exhibitions or buy jewellery, textiles and ceramics made by local craftspeople in its shop. Stop for coffee and cake in the glass-roofed tearoom, then walk its network of woodland paths that join the Wales Coast Path on the cliffs above Llanbedrog beach, with its colourful beach huts, shallow water and bucket-and-spade-friendly sand. Day three Surf the waves rolling in from the Irish Sea at one of the long bays on the peninsula’s south coast. Hell’s Mouth (Porth Neigwl), between the headlands of Mynydd Penarfynydd and Mynydd Cilan, has the most reliable surf breaks. Its long, gentle, shelving beach suits swimmers, body boarders and kayakers, too. At the sheltered beach at Porthor, on the north coast, body boarders may even come nose-to-nose with a seal. Porthor has “whistling sands” – slide bare feet along the beach and listen to it squeak. Plas Glyn-y-Wedd arts centre, Llanbedrog. Photograph: lan King/Alamy Day four Be a pilgrim and walk part of the 135-mile-long North Wales Pilgrim’s Way (Taith Pererin Gogledd Cymru) to the end of the peninsula. Pick it up at the last leg, from Porthor to Aberdaron (about three miles). Then catch a ferry to Ynys Enlli (Bardsey Island) from Porth Meudwy (£32.50 adult, £20 child, book in advance on bardseyboattrips.com), where, according to legend, 20,000 saints are buried. Be warned: the strong tides and currents mean that the crossing can be choppy and infrequent. Day five Walk to the Tŷ Coch Inn (no cars allowed, park in the National Trust car park a 20-minute walk away), which is right on the beach at the tiny hamlet of Porthdinllaen. One of a string of buildings protected by a headland, with the sea a few feet away, the pub is a perfect lunch stop. Refuel with sandwiches and pasties, then go for a stand-up paddleboarding lesson, running every Thursday and Saturday throughout the summer holidays. Learn about Porthdinllaen’s surprising shipbuilding and fishing past at Caban Griff, the National Trust centre in the village. Stay Bert’s Kitchen Garden (three-nights from £133 to £145 per pitch based on four sharing, pre-pitched tents also available) in Trefor is an eco-campsite with 15 pitches, communal campfires, a private shingle beach and a cafe in a converted campervan. Ardnamurchan, Highlands Bay of plenty … silver sands, rockpools and wildlife abound at Sanna, Ardnamurchan. Photograph: Derek Croucher/Alamy A solitary road alongside Loch Sunart runs through this remote peninsula in the north-west Highlands. Wild, sparsely inhabited and unspoilt, it is the westernmost point of the UK mainland and the place to go for unhurried exploration of beaches, mountains, forest and moorland, taking in wildlife along the way. Day one Gen up on local wildlife at the Ardnamurchan natural history visitor centre. The area is rich in wildlife, including otters, pine martens, golden eagles and wild cats. Some – pine martens, field voles and swallows – make their way to the Living Building, built to encourage a variety of creatures to make it their home. Visitors can walk through this turf-roofed timber building to experience simulations of various habitats, including a wild cat den and a wood at night. Its Lochview Tearoom serves full Scottish breakfasts and light lunches, or buy sandwiches and cake to take away. Day two Hire a bike from Sunart Cycles (£20 a day) and either pedal independently or ask for a pre-planned tour. Bikes can be dropped off for no extra charge in the towns of Acharacle and Salen. Cycling on the peninsula itself is restricted mostly to the main road, which can get busy in summer. There are cycle paths on the other side of Loch Sunart in Morvern, however, which include routes through nature reserves and the ancient forest of Ariundle Oakwood. Suitable for hybrid and mountain bikes, there are several challenging off-road tracks. Day three Climb Ben Hiant to get 360-degree views of the peninsula. Not as forbidding as it might sound, this extinct volcano is easy to scale – it’s a mere 528 metres high and there is a clear path to the top. As you ascend, look out for signs of pine martens and red deer. If visibility is good, you can see the islands of Muck, Eigg and Rum, Mull, Coll and Tiree from the top, as well as the rest of Ardnamurchan spilling out before you. Ben Hiant is loosely translated as Holy or Blessed Mountain, which may be a nod to the ancient burial ground nearby, at the bay of Camas nan Gaell. Loch Sunart is a base for canoe and kayak outings. Photograph: Andy Sutton/Alamy Day four Otter Adventures can guide you on a variety of kayak and canoe outings on Loch Sunart, including a Sea Kayak and a Family Canoe Adventure. With a guide (and other canoeists), you get to stop off at otherwise inaccessible islands and forests, or light a fire and brew a cup of tea. There may also be seals. Journeys take up most of the day and cost £80 adult, £50 child. Day five Pack provisions and head to Sanna Bay, at the tip of the peninsula, as there is nothing to buy when you arrive. A remote and lovely spot with soft white sand beaches, turquoise seas and flower-rich machair in spring and summer, it is easy to spend hours here doing nothing very much apart from a spot of rockpooling or beachcombing. There are plenty of wildlife-spotting opportunities, too: sand martens nest in the dune cliffs; otters forage along the shore; butterflies feed on wildflowers; you may even spot a white-tailed eagle. Stay Keeper’s West cottage (sleeps four, from £428 to £676 a week) sits beneath the Ardnamurchan Lighthouse at the edge of the peninsula. Tir Nan Og (sleeps six, from £340 to £640 a week) is a simple whitewashed stone cottage, minutes away from the white sand beach of Sanna Bay. Morecambe Bay, Cumbria/Lancashire Royal male … Piel Island has its own ‘king’ – also the pub landlord. Photograph: robertharding/Alamy The vast, shimmering sands of Morecambe Bay may look beguiling but the quicksand and mudflats are notoriously dangerous. Best to admire these from the shore and explore its estuaries, islands and resorts instead. Day one Stop for coffee at the Ravilious Rotunda Bar at the Midland Hotel – non-residents are welcome. This art deco smasher, with its curvilinear white facade, has become a destination in its own right. Sit by a window and look out over Morecambe Bay’s seemingly never-ending expanse. On 31 August–1 September, Hemingway Designs is holding its annual Vintage By The Sea Festival (free entry) at the hotel. Expect many moustachioed and red-lipsticked retro enthusiasts enjoying the vintage fairground, live music, market and classic cars. Day two Walk south on Morecambe’s promenade to the very end – about three miles, depending on where you start. This flat and undemanding route, also ideal for cycling, skirts Morecambe Bay. You might see wading birds such as oystercatchers and turnstone digging around in the mudflats for food – especially at low tide when they are driven closer to the promenade. You’ll definitely see the wonderful statue of Eric Morecambe in one of his characteristic poses with a pair of binoculars around his neck (he was a keen ornithologist). At the prom’s end, walk up to Heysham Head and the ruined eighth-century St Patrick’s Chapel (rumoured to be where St Patrick came ashore following a shipwreck), which has great views of the bay. And look out for the body-shaped pre-Norman graves, carved out of rock and facing towards the ocean. Day three Fortify yourself with breakfast at View Café, decorated with vinyl and music memorabilia. A designated Spam Menu includes Spam fritters, but there are other, more contemporary – and more appealing – options. Hire a bike at Morecambe station from Bike and Go (£10 for an annual subscription, then £3.80 a day), then join the Bay Cycle Way and pedal part of the route out of Morecambe, heading north along the coast. (Its entire length, from Walney Island in Barrow-in-Furness to Glasson Dock in Lancaster, is 81 miles.) Plotted by Sustrans, it takes cyclists on traffic-free paths and quiet lanes wherever possible (get a map, which includes several day rides at sustrans.org.uk, £13). Pedalling the Bay Cycle Way. Photograph: Keith Douglas/Alamy Day four Catch the train from Lancaster to Grange-over-Sands (or from Morecambe and change) and travel over the 505-metre-long viaduct that snakes across the estuary of the River Kent. On arrival, check out the station, with its elegant red-and-green wrought iron pillars supporting glass platform canopies. Grange-over-Sands was a popular resort during the Victorian sea-bathing craze and still has a rarefied air. Its sheltered position means it also has many subtropical plants along the promenade and in the Ornamental Gardens. It’s not the place to swim, however: at extreme low tides, the sea can be around 10 miles away. Day five Have an audience with the King of Piel Island. This 50-acre kingdom off the tip of Furness peninsula, Barrow-in-Furness, comprises a ruined 14th-century castle, a row of houses and the Ship Inn. The landlord, Steve Chattaway, is also the king – a title he inherited with ownership of the pub. You can camp here (£5 per tent, must be pre-booked) and the pub also serves food, but most visitors come for the day. In high season (April-Sept), catch the ferry from Roa Island, which is connected to the mainland by an isthmus (daily 11am-4.30pm, weather permitting, adult £5 return, child £3). Piel Island is also accessible on foot at low tide from Walney Point, but be warned: it’s risky as swift tides can leave you stranded. Stay Gibraltar Farm campsite (from £14 per tent) in Silverdale is a working farm in the Arnside & Silverdale AONB, with views of Morecambe Bay and its own ancient woodland. For groups, camping in a designated area in the woods is £160 a night for up to 10 tents. Wolf House Cottages are two self-catering properties near the village of Silverdale: the Coach House sleeps six, from £575 to £795 a week; the Old Cottage sleeps four adults and two children, from £495 to £580 a week. Saltburn-by-the-sea, North Yorkshire Twilight zone … Saltburn-by-the-sea has the only surviving pier in Yorkshire. Photograph: meldayus/Getty Images Often overlooked in favour of its neighbour, the quainter fishing village of Staithes, or the mighty harbour that is Whitby, Saltburn-by-the-Sea is a Victorian seaside resort that remains steadfastly unchanged. It still has its original pier and lift, a funicular railway that takes passengers from the clifftop town down to the massive, sandy beach. Day one Step into the imagination of Henry Pease, a Victorian Quaker and industrialist, who literally dreamt up Saltburn in 1858: a celestial vision prompted him to create a town on the edge of a cliff and turn its glen into pleasure grounds. The result is a dignified town with substantial houses overlooking the beach, streets named after jewels (Pearl Street, Ruby Street, Emerald Street) and a very long pier (see below). It also has a variety of independent shops – check out Chocolini’s for handmade chocolates, and Lillian Daph for Scandi-style homeware. Then promenade through the Valley Gardens, whose winding paths cross a stream, go through woodland, and pass formal gardens and a colonnaded gazebo. Day two Plummet to the beach from the town in the Victorian, water-powered lift. The cliff lift deposits passengers at the entrance of the 200-metre-long pier, which extends across the wind-blown sand at low tide and over rolling waves at high. It has absolutely nothing on it except dog walkers and the occasional seabird – a place to go to clear the head and gulp salty air. The beach is a well-regarded surf spot, and although the sea can get lively, there are good beginner’s waves on either side of the pier. Saltburn Surf School has been teaching folk to surf here for over 30 years and offers private lessons (£50 an hour for one person, £60 for two). Day three Hunt for fossils among the rocks and shingle on the beach. The entire coast between Saltburn and Scarborough is the stuff of geography field trips, and packed with Jurassic geological interest. Saltburn beach is backed by the sheer rock of Huntcliff, whose erosion has revealed ammonites, crinoids and belemnites, and fossilised wood. Staithes, Robin Hood’s Bay and Runswick Bay are all good fossil-hunting grounds. The venerable Saltburn Cliff Lift. Photograph: stevegeer/Getty Images Day four Spend a few hours in the village of Sandsend, a 30-minute drive along the coast. There is not a whole heap to do here except enjoy its massive (four mile) sandy beach and look around its well-scrubbed village: stone cottages with red roofs, some of which are holiday accommodation, sit in front of immaculate lawns beside a stream that rushes towards the sea. A sprinkle of shops includes a good general store and cafe. Eat well for a reasonable price at the Bridge Cottage Bistro, which serves an imaginative menu including many dishes involving locally caught fish. Alternatively, plump for a Whitby crab sandwich on the deck of the Sandside Cafe, inches from the beach. Day five Visit Staithes to see why it has inspired so many artists, past and present. Park at the top of the town and walk down its steep main street to the harbour, wandering into intriguing-looking alleys along the way. Call in at Dotty’s Vintage Tearoom for a buttered tea cake and a pot of tea among vintage collectibles. The Cod and Lobster Inn on the harbour wall is as close as you could get to the sea: waves lash against its front door at high tide. At low tide, the rocky shoreline platform outside is exposed – good rockpooling territory. Stay Coastguard Cottage (sleeps four, from £320 to £650 a week) is one of a row of houses perched above Saltburn beach on the Cleveland Way. The Spa Hotel (doubles from £109 a night B&B) sits above the beach, has views of the sea and cliffs, and offers Surf and Stay packages which include lessons. Orford, Suffolk Radio station … former military facility the Black Beacon can be climbed for great views of Orford Ness. Photograph: Susie Kearley/Alamy Traces of Orford’s past can be detected in its ex-fishermen’s cottages, busy quayside and hulks of old boats sinking into the mud. This pretty village is a mixture of the delightful and the beguilingly sinister: the former military testing site and shingle bank, Orford Ness, stretch out alongside. Day one Pick up breakfast from Pump Street Bakery in Market Square: all of its naturally leavened bread and pastries are made in the village, and it makes its own small-batch chocolate. Nip into Pinney’s for picnic supplies – the shop beside its smokehouse sells its own smoked fish, and wet fish caught daily on its boats. Orford General Store is an excellent village shop selling local cheese, fruit and veg, and just about everything else you may need, including maps. Day two Catch the little ferry from Orford quay to Orford Ness, a strange and rare shingle spit running parallel to the coast. The fragile, shifting bar of pebbles, dunes, reeds, saltmarsh and brackish lagoons is populated by avocets, redshank, oystercatchers, brown hares and Chinese water deer among many other species. Barn owls also nest in several of the buildings built from 1913-1987, when Orford Ness was used as a military test site. Follow waymarked trails to see these and the wildlife. Day three Motor south along the coast towards the estuary of the River Deben, stopping at Shingle Street – a lonely row of ex-fishermen’s cottages (now holiday accommodation) evacuated in 1940 under mysterious circumstances. Sit on the beach, soak up the atmosphere, or go for a swim. Stop for lunch at The Ramsholt Arms (the lunch menu includes handmade faggots, local ham steak and veggie options), and watch yachts sail by from its deck overlooking the estuary. Pump Street Bakery, Orford. Photograph: Kumar Sriskandan/Alamy Day four Tune into your animal spirit with a goat yoga session – the goats wander among you – at Skylark Farm (£15, book in advance) in Bawdsey, held on Sunday mornings and Tuesday evenings. Goat petting/milking sessions can also be arranged as a child-friendly option. Drive on to Felixstowe, and either marvel at the Tetris-like dexterity of the crane drivers at the container port, stroll through the recently restored Seafront Gardens, or swim in the sea (rated “excellent” water quality by the Environment Agency). The beach is a mixture of shingle and sand. Day five Climb aboard the Lady Florence, a lovely wooden second world war supply ship, for a lunch or supper cruise. Departing from Orford Quay, the three-hour trip along the rivers Alde and Ore goes past Orford Ness to Shingle Street and the North Sea, before returning. It also circumnavigates Havergate Island bird sanctuary. Alternatively, a breakfast cruise will take you upstream to Aldeburgh and back, as you eat hot muffins on deck. Twelve passengers per cruise, £22.50pp, meal extra, rivercruiserestaurants.co.uk. Stay Daphne Cottage (sleeps two, from £485 to £795 a week) is a Grade II-listed Victorian cottage with a small garden at the front and a patio at the back. Lynton and Lynmouth, Exmoor coast, Devon Devon sent … Lynmouth. Photograph: Manfred Gottschalk/Getty Images The twin towns of Lynton and Lynmouth peer over the sea from the precipitous cliffs of the north Devon coast. Exmoor is close by, to the south, and the cliffs and gorges are threaded with numerous walking trails, rocky coves and hidden beaches. Day one Ascend from the Esplanade at Lynmouth to its sister town of Lynton on the Cliff Railway. There’s no better way to get up a cliff than sitting in a bottle-green carriage of a Victorian funicular railway as it steadily makes its way to the top. Two carriages work in tandem – one goes up as the other goes down – propelled by the gravity pull of water discharged from tanks fitted to each. At the top, a giant scone awaits in the cafe as part of a Devon cream tea, plus views of the coast curling out of sight. Day two Walk to the Valley of Rocks. A 20-minute walk from the Cliff Railway along clearly marked paths will take you to a U-shaped dry valley that runs parallel to the coast. A spectacular smattering of shattered rocks populated by feral goats (and, in high season, coachloads of tourists), it has inspired Romantic artists (Samuel Palmer), poets (Coleridge, Wordsworth) and novelist RD Blackmore, who set parts of Lorna Doone here. Free guided walks to Hollerday Hill and the Valley of Rocks leave Lynton Town Hall throughout the summer. Day three Breakfast on shakshuka or eggs benedict at in Lynton. Then head for Lynmouth car park and follow the East Lyn River to Watersmeet (click on the link for downloadable circular walk). A pleasant two-mile stroll will take you along the river, through a thickly wooded gorge lush with ferns and over bridges to the fairytale-like Watersmeet House. Now a cafe, this ex-fishing lodge sits at the confluence of the East Lyn River and Hoar Oak Water. It is still possible to fish here for salmon, sea trout and brown trout (permits available from Watersmeet House), but most choose to drink tea on the lawn and listen to the river rushing past. The Valley of the Rocks meets the Bristol Channel west of Lynton. Photograph: Craig Joiner/Alamy Day four Discover a secret(ish) cove. Pack lunch and a book, and scramble down to Wringcliff Bay, following a path from the roundabout in the Valley of Rocks. It takes a bit of effort to reach it – it is accessible only by a steep footpath, so children should probably avoid it – but the peacefulness of the place is worth it. The small sandy beach is sheltered by steep cliffs all around and is often deserted. Strong currents mean it is not advisable to swim far out but paddling is highly recommended, as is sitting on a rock and watching the waves. Dogs are allowed. Day five Explore Combe Martin, a seaside resort that runs ribbon-like along the bottom of a valley with a sheltered (and popular) sandy beach. Pick up some homemade pork pies and pasties from the Combe Martin Farm Shop, then spend the day rockpooling, or hire a kayak or two from Surfside Kayak Hire and go looking for hidden coves and dolphins. Alternatively, take the South West Coast Path out of town and walk to the vertiginous Hangman Hills, the highest sea cliffs in England. (Combe Martin is also where the Hunting of the Earl of Rone – a custom involving villagers dressing up and chasing the Earl of Rone through the town – takes place every May.) Stay Bayview Tower in Lynton (sleeps four, from £560 to £2,129 a week,) is a rather grand apartment (with four-poster bed) looking over Lynmouth Bay. Countisbury Hill Cottage (sleeps four, from £309 to £819 for two nights/£559 to £1,479 a week, dogs welcome) is a stone cottage with an enclosed garden in a remote hamlet near Lynton. Foreland Bothy (sleeps four, from £21 to £27 a night) is a simple, windowless room with wooden platforms for beds (no mattresses or other amenities), right on the South West Coast Path near Lynton. Winchelsea Beach, East Sussex Big beach … Camber Sands (a few miles east of Winchelsea and Rye) is expansive enough to accommodate the thousands who head there on hot days. Photograph: Zuma Press/Alamy Tucked behind a shingle ridge, a stroll from the soft sands of Camber and three miles from the cobbled lanes of Rye, the village of Winchelsea Beach still feels undiscovered. Pre-war railway-carriage homes sit beside wooden beach huts, bungalows and smart, contemporary dwellings, giving the area an appealingly ramshackle and curious air. Day one Stock up on supplies for the week at Salts Farm Shop just north-west of Rye, which sells Kentish Mayde pies, free-range eggs from a farm in Battle, and beer from Romney Marsh Brewery. Head up the hill to the Winchelsea Farm Kitchen for good quality meat, wine and other deli delights. On the way back, drop in at The Clam, a new Camber cafe serving all-day brunch – tasty sourdough toast toppings include tahini, blood orange, pistachio and honey – and steak tacos. Day two Stay local and make the most of Camber Sands on your doorstep. This four-mile stretch lined with dunes is one of the few sandy beaches along this coastline, and the place to head with a picnic and a beach towel. Even at busy times it’s possible to find a quiet spot to put up a windbreak (advised – it can get very blowy). The Kitesurf Centre and Rye Water Sports offer kitesurfing and paddleboarding lessons. Day three Head out to Romney Marsh and explore its 14 medieval churches, rising in splendid isolation from the flat land. Built by lords of the manor to serve now-vanished communities, and also as a display of wealth, most are open to visitors. Don’t miss St Thomas à Becket at Fairfield, which has appeared in various TV programmes, including Great Expectations. End the day in an open-sided carriage of a one-third size steam locomotive on the Romney, Hythe & Dymchurch Railway. Buy a return ticket and hop on at nearby Dungeness for a sweet little chug along the coast to Hythe and back (rover ticket £18.60 adult, £9.30 child, less for shorter journeys). A steam train at Dungeness on the Romney, Hythe & Dymchurch Railway. Photograph: Steven Town/Alamy Day four Walk to Rye Harbour Nature Reserve – a land of gravel pits, lagoons, marsh and shingle. An important conservation site, you could spot avocets nesting in the saltmarsh or marsh harriers hunting in the reedbeds. Walk to a bird hide along wooden boardwalks (look out for yellow horned-poppies, sea kale and sea campion in the shingle along the way) and wait. The Avocet Gallery in Rye Harbour village serves tea and cake (Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays) and showcases (and sells) the work of top-quality local artists, designers and makers. Day five Go for a beachcomber’s lunch at The Gallivant and tuck into local specialities like saltmarsh lamb and fish from the Hastings fleet (but don’t bring young children – this hotel/restaurant next to Camber Sands welcomes over-10s only). Head up the hill and enter Winchelsea through one of its medieval gates. Now a quietly delightful town perched high on a ridge a mile inland, it was once an important port and the centre of the wine trade. Book a guided tour around its vaulted cellars – a great rainy-day option – to get a taste of the town’s medieval past. Stay Seashells (sleeps five, from £1,150 to £1,400 a week) is a new, light and airy beach house on Camber Sands with a large gated garden. The same owner rents out Pebbles Beach House (sleeps five, £1,299 a week high season, £165 a night low season – two-night minimum), an airy, shabby-chic wooden bolthole on the shingle at Winchelsea Beach. Isle of Portland, Weymouth and Chesil Beach, Dorset Rock the boat … Jurassic Coast trips leave from Weymouth harbour. Photograph: fotoVoyager/Getty Images The Isle of Portland isn’t actually an island – it’s a chunk of limestone tethered to the mainland by the shingle tombolo that is Chesil Beach – but it still feels apart from the mainland, and the rest of the Jurassic Coast. Day one Take a look around the scattered settlements of Portland, keeping an eye open for buildings built from Portland stone. Drop by Tout Quarry nature reserve and sculpture park, where much of the stone was quarried (and ended up in Buckingham Palace and St Paul’s Cathedral, among other places) and which now has 60 hidden sculptures to discover along meandering paths. The Portland Museum, a community project founded by birth-control pioneer Marie Stopes and housed in two thatched cottages, is a good place to learn more. It was also the inspiration for the heroine’s cottage in Thomas Hardy’s The Well-Beloved. Day two Continue explorations by venturing to Portland Bill, which overlooks the roiling waves of Portland Race. This whirl of tides and currents, combined with the Shambles sandbank, is why this rocky promontory has three lighthouses. Climb up the automated candy-striped one to understand the nature of the ship-wrecking waters that surround it. Drop in at the visitor centre, once the home of the lighthouse keepers, and learn more with the help of interactive displays, then feast on crab sandwiches at The Lobster Pot next door. Day three Head along Chesil Beach to Abbotsbury. Chesil Beach runs beyond the pretty, thatched village of Abbotsbury, parallel to the coast to West Bay, framing Fleet Lagoon. This brackish lake is home to the 600 mute swans at the Swannery at Abbotsbury. Help to feed them at noon and 4pm daily, then sample Abbotsbury mackerel and other sustainably sourced fish at the Taste Café in the Chesil Beach visitor centre, which has views over the lagoon and beach. Neck it down … feeding time at Abbotsbury’s swan sanctuary. Photograph: Paul Springett/Alamy Day four Get out on to the water at Weymouth and Portland National Sailing Academy in Portland Harbour, which hosted the sailing events at the 2012 Olympics and is now a centre of sailing excellence. The RYA-accredited Andrew Simpson Centre offers sailing taster sessions for £20 an hour. There are also plenty of other opportunities locally to snorkel, canoe, swim, scuba dive to shipwrecks, and fish. Head into Weymouth and refuel with fish and chips at The Old Harbour restaurant, followed by a game of whack-a-mole in the amusement arcade on the beach for the full-on seaside experience. Day five Visit the labyrinthine Northe Fort at the mouth of Weymouth harbour, which was built in 1872 to defend the Portland naval base from Napoleon III. Now a visitor attraction, it also has a reputation as a haunted site. Alternatively, hop aboard a wooden second world war naval boat and let a bewhiskered skipper take you on a 1½-hour trip along the Jurassic Coast. Boats leave from Weymouth harbour (£14). On the way back to base, stop for a drink at the Cove House Inn – sit outside and enjoy the sight of Chesil Beach stretching out before you. Stay The Old Higher Lighthouse cottages (each sleeps four, from £450 to £1,000 a week) on Portland Bill, have the sea views you’d expect from a lighthouse plus shared use of a pool and hot tub. Alternatively, 50 Ocean Views (sleeps four, from £490 to £1,154 a week) is a smart contemporary apartment with a private terrace and sea views. Helford estuary, Cornwall Up chic creek … the life aquatic in full swing on the River Helford. Photograph: James Osmond/Getty Images The cool, wooded creeks and tucked-away coves of the River Helford are a welcome escape from the busy beaches and bustle of nearby Falmouth. It’s all about the life aquatic here, whether it’s watching small boats and yachts from the footpath or the terrace of an agreeable pub, or taking to the water in a kayak. Day one Sink a pint on the terrace outside The Ferryboat Inn at Helford Passage. This popular pub sits beside the river above a beach, and is a good viewpoint for gazing over the estuary and watching small boats bob about. The menu changes daily and includes pub food classics and inventive fish dishes (mackerel tacos, seabass linguine). It’s a prime position for watching the Helford Passage Regatta (10 August) and is also the place to catch the ferry across the river to Helford, see below, and to pick up the South West Coast Path. Day two The lush vegetation and the cherry laurel maze at the National Trust’s Glendurgan Garden near the village of Durgan is a wonderful place to get lost in. Extending over both sides of a steep valley, the garden is planted with exotic species like Mexican cypress, Japanese loquat and mimosa. Giant gunnera erupt jungle-like in the lower valley. The maze is waist high, so it’s possible to signal for help from others caught in its coils. A stroll to the bottom of the valley leads to Durgan on the water’s edge, where the sandy beach is a good place to sit and eat a sandwich as others go rockpooling. Day three Paddle through the creeks and coves of the River Helford. Slipping quietly through the water in a small boat is the best way to get to know the river and its forested valleys, witness its wildlife close up, explore the inlets that probe inland, and pull up at one of its quieter beaches and go for a dip. St Anthony Sailaway on Gillan Creek at the entrance of the river hires out single and double kayaks and rowing boats for £13-15 an hour. Koru Kayaking runs guided two-hour kayaking adventures for £40, setting off from the private beach at Budock Vean Hotel. Visitors can rent kayaks at Helford. Photograph: Ian Woolcock/Alamy Day four Visit convalescing seals in Gweek. Started when Ken Jones rescued a baby seal washed up on the beach in 1958, the Cornish Seal Sanctuary now has five pools and a hospital where it cares for orphaned, sick or injured animals – not just seals: otters, goats, ponies and penguins are all looked after here. Once recovered, most seals are returned to the sea: those that wouldn’t survive, stay on as “guests”. Day five The shortish (three-mile) circular walk from Helford village and taking in Frenchman’s Creek is idyllic. Walkers will see the little ferry sailing to Helford Passage on the other side of the river with its cargo of hikers and holidaymakers (no cars). The path then passes the Shipwright’s Arms (where children can crab off the slip, and which holds an annual regatta), to the tiny chapel of St Francis at Pengwedhen, past Kestle Barton, the new Rural Centre for Contemporary Arts in a restored ancient farmstead, and along the wooded and fern-lined Frenchman’s Creek, made famous by Daphne du Maurier’s classic book, before returning to Helford. It’s worth tarrying to wander around the village’s thatched cottages and boathouses. Stay Kestle Cottage (sleeps four, from £395 to £1,295 a week), near Frenchman’s Creek, is one of several holiday homes in recently converted farm buildings. Creek View (sleeps four, £317 to £939 a week) is an apartment above Helford Village Stores with a gorgeous view over the estuary. Bosvathick House B&B (doubles £110 a night, singles £70)is a grand private home in Constantine, a short drive from the estuary, with stately rooms, a laurel maze and rolling grounds (gardens open in peak season). Ards peninsula, County Down Down town … Portaferry’s marina at the entrance to Strangford Lough. Photograph: David Lyons/Alamy The Ards peninsula wraps around Strangford Lough enclosing it from the Irish Sea. The shoreline is never far away, be it the sandy beaches of the east coast, or the shingle banks surrounding the Lough. Day one Stock up on locally produced food and craft at the monthly market, held in Portaferry’s restored market house (first Saturday of the month, 10am-1.30pm). Portaferry sits at the southern end of the peninsula near the Narrows – the turbulent channel linking Strangford Lough to the Irish Sea – and is where to catch the ferry to the other side of the Lough. Sit outside the Portaferry Hotel with a coffee and wait for the ferry to arrive, or duck inside to eat seafood dishes, including bouillabaisse and lobster. Day two Make your way three miles up the road from Portaferry to Kearney, a former fishing village restored in vernacular style by the National Trust. Now fully occupied, the simple whitewashed cottages tucked between drumlins (hillocks) and the sea, present a sanitised but appealing impression of what life was like in a 19th-century fishing village. In one cottage lived Mary Ann Doonan, captain of the so-called “she-cruiser”, a ship crewed entirely by women, and something of a local legend. The sandy beach of Knockinelder is close by and is a lovely spot for a dip. Day three Hire a canoe and explore one of Strangford Lough’s 100-plus islands, many of them rich in seabirds and other wildlife; you may even spot seals and otters as you go. Outdoor Recreation NI, which manages and promotes outdoor activities in Northern Ireland, has devised a series of canoe trails, which can be found, along with a list of canoe providers, at canoeni.com. One canoe trail leads to Salt Island, where you can stay overnight in a bothy – it has a woodburner and a flushing toilet but no cooker (sleeps 10, £10pp sharing, £80 for exclusive use). The view from restaurant Daft Eddy’s. Photograph: Carrie Davenport Day four Drive around to the other side of Strangford Lough to the Castle Epsie Wetland Centre (which is just 12 miles south-east of Belfast). Blending with the shoreline of the Lough, its 25 hectares of tidal lagoons, salt marsh, woodland and reed beds are home to countless birds, bats and insects, and a stopping-off point for migrating brent geese. Watch the avian comings and goings from one of the hides, or walk among ducks, ducklings and geese in the duckery. On the way back, stop off at Daft Eddy’s, a smart modern restaurant by the side of the Lough, for Portavogie scampi and a pint of Guinness. Day five Visit Grey Abbey House and Gardens in Newtownards to inspect a fine example of a big old Irish Georgian house. Located on the side of the Lough, the grounds have a walled and vegetable gardens, and two orchards of Victorian fruit trees and Irish apple trees. The expansive estate includes a lake and ancient woodland inhabited by red squirrels. Close by are the ruins of a Norman Cistercian priory, dissolved by Henry VIII. Up the road is Harrisons of Grey Abbey, a nursery, farm shop and popular restaurant. Stay Cowey Cottage (sleeps four, from £395 to £550 a week) in Newtownards is a stone cottage with a woodburner, comfortable leather sofas and a flagstone floor, deep in rolling farmland but a short drive to the Lough. Castle Ward Caravan Park, in the grounds of the Castle Ward estate on the shores of Strangford Lough, has 10 pitches for tents (from £18.50), plus wooden camping pods (sleep two to five, from £42 to £67), and 25 hard stands for caravans/motor homes (from £22). For caravans and tents, add £2 per additional adult, £1 per child and £2 per additional car. Looking for a holiday with a difference? Browse Guardian Holidays to see a range of fantastic trips

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/jan/16/the-night-of-the-hunter-review

Film

2014-01-16T22:31:01.000Z

Peter Bradshaw

The Night of the Hunter – review

"I come not with peace, but with a sword," says Robert Mitchum's psychopathic bogus preacher, brandishing a switchblade that at moments of extreme sexual excitement and disgust will poke out of his trouser-pocket, tearing the material. His performance in Charles Laughton's The Night of the Hunter (1955) – now on re-release – is startlingly stiff-necked and straight backed, with a mannered theatrical baritone, a change from Mitchum's usual rangy coolness. Perhaps it was this unfamiliarity that contributed to the film's failure on first release, a bruising experience that helped make it Charles Laughton's sole directorial credit. In fact, this suspense thriller is a stunning piece of work, with the shadows of German expressionism and a compositional sense comparable to the work of George Stevens: it trumps its own noir cynicism with a thrilling and plausible idealism in the final moments. Critic James Agee adapted the 1953 bestseller by Davis Grubb, inspired by the real-life "Bluebeard" serial killer Harry Powers who in depression-era America killed widows and their children for the family savings. Mitchum plays "Reverend" Harry Powell, a predatory killer, grifter, car-thief and horse-thief who believes his own god-fearing rhetoric. In the poverty-stricken south, a world of broken families and economic despair, this paterfamilias from hell finds credulous victims. He is the ancestor of many a modern televangelist and snake-oil scripturalist. While in jail, Powell hears that a fellow prisoner on death row for robbery and murder has hidden the $10,000 loot with his kids: once free, Powell sets out to find the man's frightened widow (Shelley Winters), seduce her and terrify the children into giving him the cash. Every frame of this film is brilliantly contrived, particularly the underwater nightmare at the end. A gripping, complex chiller.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jun/21/waterloo-dispatch-reenactment-victory-200-years-on

Culture

2015-06-21T16:22:39.000Z

Robert Booth

Re-enactment celebrates Waterloo victory 200 years on

It began with a clatter of hooves on the cobbles of Greenwich’s Old Naval College and the proud declaration: “Victory, sir. Victory!” Sunday’s re-enactment of the arrival in London exactly 200 years ago of news from Waterloo that Napoleon’s army had been defeated stirred the embers of English jingoism or the spirit of European unity, depending on who you asked. Descending from a replica of the carriage that carried the Duke of Wellington’s dispatch about the historic battle to the prince regent, Julian Farrance, a 47-year-old historian acting the part of Wellington’s messenger Major Henry Percy, bombastically roused a small crowd of locals and tourists. “We have met the Corsican ogre in the field and have dealt him the most shattering defeat,” he said, to patriotic cheers. It was the start of a day-long procession that took in the Tower of London and Horseguards Parade and would culminate in Princess Anne taking on the role of prince regent to receive Wellington’s dispatch. She awaited the messengers at St James’ Square, on the site where the prince regent was attending a ball on a sultry evening two centuries ago when the news finally came. The re-enactment was the climax of a week of events marking the Iron Duke’s Waterloo campaign. On Saturday there was a re-enactment of the battle in Belgium. A re-enactment of the battle of Waterloo in Braine-l’Alleud, Belgium. Photograph: Geert Vanden Wijngaert/AP After dressing up for events in Brussels, Bruges, Ostend, Broadstairs, Canterbury and London, Farrance and another historian, Michael Bradley, playing the sloop captain who carried the dispatch across the Channel, said they had observed markedly different perspectives on this week’s Waterloo commemorations. “In Europe, the battle is viewed as a great coming together in Europe, as the beginning of the idea of coalition,” said Farrance, who works at the National Army Museum. “But in Britain we have found it is a celebration of victory over the old enemy. There is a more emotional response here. The English need little encouragement to cheer beating the French.” The organiser of the restaging of Wellington’s dispatch preferred the idea about European unity. “Waterloo was a defining moment in European history,” said Peter Warwick, chairman of the event, dubbed the New Waterloo Dispatch. “It created 100 years of peace. So this is a great celebration of the idea of Europe and European co-operation. That resounds today because when you look at the geopolitical situation the job is not finished and we still need to create peace in Europe.” Among those celebrating in central London were ambassadors from across Europe as well as the great-great-great grandson of Miguel de Alava, a Spanish general who was with Wellington at Waterloo. “This is the European brotherhood paying homage to all heroes,” said Gonzalo Urrecha, a management consultant from San Sebastián, who admitted that for all its pivotal strategic significance, for most people in Spain Waterloo means little more than the 1974 Eurovision-winning Abba song. The competing perspectives – English triumphalism versus European unity – might explain why some of the historical details of the re-enactment were subtly and diplomatically changed. The replicas of two French flags, topped with Napoleon’s golden imperial eagles, that Percy had seized from the battlefield as trophies to lay at the feet of the prince regent, were pristine in Sunday’s re-enactment, rather than stained with the blood of battle casualties. “The originals were bloody and holey,” said Richard James, who was playing the part of an ostler looking after the horses. “We nicked them. We won them on the battlefield.” Julian Farrance, playing Major Henry Percy, holding a French flag. Photograph: Nils Jorgensen/Rex Shutterstock As Percy’s carriage rattled through London’s tourist-filled streets on Sunday, other choice details of the story of Wellington’s dispatch were lost too, such as how for one Mrs Boehm, a merchant’s wife hosting the prince regent at the ball on St James’s Square, the military victory meant social disaster. According to her description of events, recounted by Bernard Cornwall in his just-published history of Waterloo, the first dance was about to begin and the prince was set to take his seat on the dias when Mrs Boehm’s guests scrambled towards the open windows. The music stopped and everyone focused on a mob around Percy’s carriage, “out of whose windows were hanging three nasty French eagles”. Percy, “such a dusty figure”, Mrs Boehm complained, rushed into the ball to deliver the news, but all the hostess could think of was the untouched supper laid out in the dining room. “All our trouble, anxiety and expense were utterly thrown away in consequence of, what shall I say?” she told the Rev Julian Young later. “Well, I must say it. The unseasonable declaration of the Waterloo victory! Of course one was very glad to think one had beaten those horrid French, and all that sort of thing; but still, I always shall think it would have been far better if Henry Percy had waited quietly till the morning, instead of bursting in upon us, as he did, in such indecent haste.” The news was also a shock to the prince regent. Cornwall reported another guest saying he fell into “a sort of womanish hysteric” at the news, and first water and then wine was thrown in his face to revive him before he “drowned his feelings in an ocean of claret”.

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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/21/hurricane-us-coronavirus-covid-19-floods

World news

2020-05-21T09:00:52.000Z

Oliver Milman

Unusually active hurricane season could threaten US effort to fight Covid-19

As the US continues to be pummeled by the coronavirus pandemic, a fresh looming threat is set to complicate efforts to contain the outbreak – an unusually fierce hurricane season. The official season for Atlantic hurricanes doesn’t start until 1 June, but for the sixth year in a row there’s been a named storm occur before this date, with tropical storm Arthur brushing the Outer Banks of North Carolina on Monday. Florida nurse who struggled with coronavirus trauma found dead Read more Arthur is set to be just the opening salvo in an active period of hurricanes, according to forecasters, with Penn State’s Earth System Science Center estimating there will be between 13 and 24 named storms – a category reached when the National Hurricane Center deems a storm to have wind speeds of at least 39mph. Penn State researchers’ best guess is there will be 20 named storms, eight more than the 30-year average, which would make 2020 one of the most active years for hurricanes on record. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) will release its own projection on Thursday. While it’s uncertain how many of these storms will hit the US, researchers at Colorado State University have calculated that there is a nearly 70% chance this year that at least one major hurricane – a category three event or greater with winds exceeding 111mph – will make landfall on American soil. “As far as we can tell it’s going to be an extremely active hurricane season,” said Jhordanne Jones, a researcher at Colorado State University’s department of atmospheric science. Jones said a La Niña climate event is expected to cool waters in the Pacific, causing a sort of seesawing effect where waters in the Atlantic will warm up and strong winds will form – ideal conditions for a hurricane. The prospect of a disastrous hurricane making landfall is causing growing angst in coastal US states, such as Florida and Louisiana, that are already in the process of restarting economic activity during the coronavirus pandemic. The normal strategy of cramming displaced people into temporary shelters to escape flooding risks spurring a fresh wave of infections, forcing authorities to tear up their standard hurricane plans. “In our first meeting about this, we were like, ‘Oh my God, we will have to have shelters with Covid,’” said Steven Davis, president of All Hands Consulting, a disaster preparation firm. “This year is different because you can’t put a bunch of people in an elementary school with a disease spreading. It’s going to be challenging. We are having to redo all of our plans.” Emergency planners are trying to engineer social distancing by recruiting a greater number of shelters, allowing displaced people to spread out and observe mask wearing and regular hand-washing. Hotel rooms may be commandeered before a storm hits to house people. Bus services to escape routes may be replaced by contracts with individual ride hailing services such as Uber and Lyft. The pandemic has thrown up a range of potential problems in a disaster situation. Volunteers who usually help with relief efforts may be sick or unwilling to be in close contact with people potentially infected, while it may be difficult to transfer medical expertise and supplies between states. The economic downturn triggered by the pandemic means many people may not even have the means to flee a storm before it hits. Hurricane Dorian in Cape Hatteras in North Carolina last year. Photograph: José Luis Magaña/AFP via Getty Images The Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema), previously heavily criticized over its faltering response to 2017’s Hurricane Maria, which devastated much of Puerto Rico, has been attempting to map out a very different sort of scenario for 2020. The agency has been working with various partners on drawing up guidelines that include advising people to bring hand sanitizer, cleaning materials and two cloth face coverings per person if they are forced into a shelter. “We are now well past the question of what to do, we have to deal with it because we do not have a vaccine for this hurricane season and probably not for the next one either,” said Craig Fugate, the administrator of Fema during Barack Obama’s presidency. “People are the vector, so we run the risk of increasing the spread the more we move them.” Fugate said that it will be important for people to not move unless they are within an evacuation zone, and even then only travel short distances to family. A shelter run by the Red Cross or other organization should be the last resort, he said. Even in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, scientists have been at pains to point out that the impact of the climate crisis will be longer and deeper. A recent study found that global heating has increased the likelihood of a hurricane developing into a major storm with winds greater than 110mph since 1979, by around 8% a decade. This trend is only set to intensify. “The priority to get people out of storm surge zones and coastal wind zones and then worry about Covid,” said Davis. “If you get Covid there’s a good chance you won’t die. If you get 20ft of water in your house, you’ll probably die.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/jul/19/fraudulent-certification-of-unsafe-building-products-going-unchecked-inquiry-told

Australia news

2017-07-19T05:47:17.000Z

Christopher Knaus

Flammable cladding found on Brisbane hospital, minister confirms

Cladding on Brisbane’s Princess Alexandra hospital is combustible, the Queensland government has confirmed. The health minister, Cameron Dick, said the government would speak to experts about how to deal with the problem. But he was confident the hospital was safe, saying it was well built and fitted with sprinklers and fire alarms throughout. “Every building in Queensland has combustible material in it,” Dick said. “We have to determine what is the risk and what is the response to that risk.” It comes on the same day that a Senate inquiry heard evidence that widespread fraud was being used to certify unsafe building products across the country. The same inquiry heard only three of the 71 buildings used to house G20 leaders in Brisbane in 2014 complied with safety standards. The Senate inquiry has been given new urgency by the Grenfell Tower fire tragedy in London, an inferno caused largely by the use of unsafe, flammable external cladding. Flammable cladding is considered “the canary in the mine”, the inquiry heard, and almost all states and territories had instigated audits or taskforces to assess the extent of its use in buildings across the country. Thousands of Australian buildings could be at risk of fire tragedy, inquiry told Read more The Senate inquiry is exploring the impact of deregulation, privatisation and globalisation on the proliferation of unsafe building products since the 1990s. It has heard evidence that the changes have reduced mandatory inspections, weakened the certification regime, allowed for non-compliant products to be imported and caused Australia’s building standards, which can take up to four years to update, to lag badly behind changes in the industry. Many witnesses have advocated for the re-regulation of the industry and almost all have called for a nationally consistent approach to overcome regulatory gaps and loopholes that exist state-by-state. On Wednesday, the inquiry heard a disturbing example from the G20 meeting in Brisbane three years ago. An audit of the buildings used to house world leaders including the then US president, Barack Obama, revealed just three of 71 hotels used complied with Australia’s safety standards. “Sixty-eight buildings failed,” Rob Llewellyn, from the Australasian Fire and Emergency Service Authorities Council, said. “They included from pumps, where the batteries were flat and would never start, diesel tanks that had no diesel ... contractors punching holes through fire walls without the necessary collars or seals. “I could go on and on and on.” Earlier, the Building Products Innovation Council executive officer, Rodger Hills, gave evidence that the use of fraudulent documents to certify unsafe building products was rife. Hills said one of his members, the Australian Windows Association, had thousands of pages of evidence of fraud in the industry. He said he had provided repeated warnings of the scale of fraud to state and federal governments, without any real response. London fire: flammable cladding on Australian buildings 'is like the asbestos problem' Read more “Fraudulent documentation is a massive problem in the industry,” he said. “Since at least when I started with the building products innovation council, which was three years ago or so, but even before that, I’ve been saying it’s a massive issue.” Hills said he was not aware of a single prosecution involving fraudulent building certification in Australia. Subsequent witnesses said they were similarly unaware of any prosecution having ever taken place. The inquiry heard such fraud was outside the jurisdiction of both police and the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission. A simple change to include building products in the definition “consumer good” would put such fraud in the ACCC’s remit, the inquiry heard. “If someone comes across a fraudulent document, who do they report it to?” Hill said. “The police will turn around and say, ‘Well, that’s not our jurisdiction’. “If they take it to the ACCC, they say ‘it’s not our jurisdiction’.” “So at the moment there’s nowhere to report these instances because simply there’s nothing there.” The shadow industry minister, Kim Carr, told Guardian Australia reforms were needed as a matter of urgency. Carr, who sits on the Senate inquiry, said the government response was marred by buck-passing and blame-shifting. He said privatisation and deregulation had left the industry ripe for fraud and unsafe practices. “There is evidence of a litany of failures, where every level of government points to someone else being responsible,” Carr said. The Owners Corporation Network’s chairman, Stephen Goddard, made a powerful plea to the committee for action, warning that 75% of new buildings were being constructed with defects. “You have seen in the Lacrosse building how it can happen here and to what extent,” he said. “You have seen in the United Kingdom the level of loss of life you are facing. “Your failure to act has dire consequence. The act we ask you to take is to cause the building sector to become truly accountable, not regulated in the way that we’ve seen regulation fail to deliver life safety for the whole of this century so far.” South Australia to audit Adelaide buildings for flammable cladding Read more Goddard said consumer protections and home warranty insurance had been “whittled away” as governments sought to encourage building companies to build. His group wants to see the creation of a statutory duty of care extending from builders to end users. That would seek to overcome a 2014 high court decision, involving builder Multiplex and an owners corporation, which found the company owed no duty of care to owners. “If this situation is to be remediated, it falls upon the parliaments of this commonwealth to create a statutory duty of care,” Goddard said. “The solution that the Owners Corporation Network would put before you is to consider a statutory duty of care extended to the end user, the victim. “The person who buys into a strata building, unable to see the invisible absence of fire dampeners, the absence of fire collars and now the existence of flammable cladding.” The inquiry continues.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/oct/04/great-pacific-garbage-patch-ocean-plastic-trash

Environment

2016-10-04T17:02:28.000Z

Oliver Milman

Great Pacific garbage patch' far bigger than imagined, aerial survey shows

The vast patch of garbage floating in the Pacific Ocean is far worse than previously thought, with an aerial survey finding a much larger mass of fishing nets, plastic containers and other discarded items than imagined. A reconnaissance flight taken in a modified C-130 Hercules aircraft found a vast clump of mainly plastic waste at the northern edge of what is known as the “great Pacific garbage patch”, located between Hawaii and California. The density of rubbish was several times higher than the Ocean Cleanup, a foundation part-funded by the Dutch government to rid the oceans of plastics, expected to find even at the heart of the patch, where most of the waste is concentrated. “Normally when you do an aerial survey of dolphins or whales, you make a sighting and record it,” said Boyan Slat, the founder of the Ocean Cleanup. “That was the plan for this survey. But then we opened the door and we saw the debris everywhere. Every half second you see something. So we had to take snapshots – it was impossible to record everything. It was bizarre to see that much garbage in what should be pristine ocean.” Boyan Slat, founder of the Ocean Cleanup. Photograph: The Ocean Cleanup The heart of the garbage patch is thought to be around 1m sq km (386,000 sq miles), with the periphery spanning a further 3.5m sq km (1,351,000 sq miles). The dimensions of this morass of waste are continually morphing, caught in one of the ocean’s huge rotating currents. The north Pacific gyre has accumulated a soup of plastic waste, including large items and smaller broken-down micro plastics that can be eaten by fish and enter the food chain. According to the UN environmental programme, the great Pacific garbage patch is growing so fast that it, like the Great Wall of China, is becoming visible from space. Last year, the Ocean Cleanup sent 30 vessels to cross the patch to scoop up micro plastics in fine nets to estimate the extent of the problem. However, the new reconnaissance flights from California have found that large items of more than half a meter in size have been “heavily underestimated”. Slat said: “Most of the debris was large stuff. It’s a ticking time bomb because the big stuff will crumble down to micro plastics over the next few decades if we don’t act.” Following a further aerial survey through the heart of the patch on Sunday, the Ocean Cleanup aims to tackle the problem through a gigantic V-shaped boom, which would use sea currents to funnel floating rubbish into a cone. A prototype of the vulcanized rubber barrier will be tested next year, with a full-sized 100km (62-mile) barrier deployed by 2020 if trials go well. The boom will not be able to suck up all of the strewn rubbish, however, with Slat warning that plastic is “quite persistent. We need to clean it up, but we also need to prevent so much entering the oceans. Better recycling, better product design and some legislation is all part of that. We need a combination of things.” The full scale of plastic pollution was revealed in 2014, when a study found there were more than 5tn pieces of plastic floating in our oceans. In 2014, 311m tonnes of plastic were produced around the world, a 20-fold increase since 1964. It is expected to quadruple again by mid-century. A report by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation earlier this year predicted there would be more plastic than fish in the oceans by 2050 unless urgent action was taken.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2017/jun/23/1-best-things-this-week-love-supreme-rotterdam-okja

Culture

2017-06-23T08:00:19.000Z

The Guide

The 10 best things to do this week: Love Supreme, Rotterdam and Okja

TheatreCommittee … (A New Musical) This play at London’s Donmar Warehouse is sure to cause a stir: it takes the form of a trial exploring Whitehall’s handling of ill-fated charity Kids Company, in order to “consider how civic life in the UK is really governed”. At Donmar Warehouse, WC2, 24 June to 12 August Rotterdam Jon Brittain, the playwright who wrote the critically acclaimed Margaret Thatcher Queen of Soho, is behind this Olivier award-winning play, which follows a lesbian couple living in Rotterdam, one of whom hasn’t come out to her family yet, and one who comes out as transgender. At the Arts theatre, WC2, to 15 July Festivals Manchester international festival Curator ... Mary Anne Hobbs. Photograph: The Mancorialist One of the world’s best arts festivals is back for another 18 days of world premieres, musical one-offs, exhibitions and performances, again pairing people from art and pop culture. Those include Jane Horrocks’s “industrial music drama” Cotton Panic!, about Lancashire’s 1860s cotton famine; a show about contemporary fatherhood featuring Underworld’s Karl Hyde; and Dark Matter, eight shows curated by Mary Anne Hobbs with music from rap crew Levelz, alt-saxist Colin Stetson and more. At various venues, 29 June to 16 July RebusFest Celebrate 30 years of Ian Rankin’s detective from Friday at this noirish weekender, from whisky workshops to spoken word, live music to crime-writing classes. At various venues, 30 June to 2 July Love Supreme jazz festival Virtuoso ... Kamasi Washington. A truly impressive lineup at this Lewes jazz bash, covering all areas of the genre: in the pop-soul corner, there’s Corinne Bailey Rae, Laura Mvula and the Jacksons; plus veterans George Benson, Gregory Benson and Herbie Hancock; and new wavers from BadBadNotGood to virtuoso sax star, Kamasi Washington. At Glynde Place, nr Lewes, East Sussex, 30 June to 2 July Reveal festival The V&A opens a new area, the Exhibition Road Quarter, on 30 June with a week’s worth of achingly cool programming. Running to 7 July, Reveal will bring fashion (British designer Molly Goddard showcasing her cult designs); dance, with a new site-specific piece from Julie Cunningham and company; plus Mira Calix live-streaming music, spoken word and more. At V&A Museum, SW7, 30 June to 7 July East Neuk festival Fife’s leisurely festival prides itself on offering music in such varied venues as village churches, aircraft shelters, gardens, caves and barns. The 2017 lineup includes Spanish oboist Cristina Gómez Godoy playing Schubert and Mozart; a special 60-strong show led by trumpeter John Wallace; and Bach played on acoustic guitar by Sean Shibe, among many other concerts. At various venues, Fife, 28 June to 2 July Exhibitions The New Observatory This bold new show at Liverpool’s FACT takes the idea of an observatory but flips it for, as they say, our “technology-mediated world” where data is turning us into “observatories of ourselves”. Works on show include artist Stanza’s lurid piece The Reader, which questions the future of wearable tech, alongside other installations. Charlie Brooker would approve. At FACT, Liverpool, to 1 October Dreamers Awake Surrealism has long been dominated by men, from Dalí to David Lynch, but a new show at Bermondsey’s White Cube aims to reverse all that, exhibiting rarely seen paintings from key women of the period and showing its influence to the present day through over 100 female-led works. At White Cube Bermondsey, SE1, 28 June to 17 September Film Okja 2:15 Watch the trailer for Netflix's Okja - video Here comes another wild and wonderful film from the director they call the Korean Spielberg, Bong Joon-ho. His first Netflix-backed effort is an eco-fable with a dizzyingly odd premise, as a South Korean girl fights to keep her giant, genetically modified pig, Okja, out of the hands of an evil multinational corporation, bossed by Tilda Swinton’s magnificently mendacious CEO. Bong’s eye for a grandiose set-piece is on full display while the Jon Ronson-penned script is full of droll humour, and Swinton delivers a performance as hammy as the film’s porcine star. On limited cinema release; available on Netflix from 28 June

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/business/marketforceslive/2013/feb/27/ftse-100-recovers-italy-enrc

Business

2013-02-27T17:17:47.000Z

Nick Fletcher

FTSE 100 shrugs off Italy woes but ENRC drops after asset write-off

Leading shares recovered some ground following the post-Italian election slump on Tuesday. But a few shares remained in the doldrums, notably Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation. The Kazakh miner fell 9.2p to 347p after saying it would take a "significant" impairment charge from writing down the value of its alumina, copper and platinum businesses. Production troubles and falling prices are behind the valuation cut. ENRC has been on the slide for a number of days, having previously been energised by talk of possible corporate action from 26% shareholder Kazakhmys. Also heading lower was Petrofac. The oil services firm - recently by a warning from rival Saipem - lost 100p to £14.97, making it the biggest faller in the leading index. The decline came despite a better than expected 17% annual profit increase as the company issued what was deemed to be a cautious outlook statement. ITV lost initial gains after its results, ending 1.2p lower at 119p. The broadcaster reported a 6% rise in full year pretax profit to £348m and a £156m special dividend. The payout was less than the more optimistic analysts had been hoping for, and comments from chief executive Adam Crozier dismissing talk of takeover approaches also did some damage. Intu Properties, formerly Capital Shopping Centres, unveiled the world's worst kept secret with a £280m placing at 325p a share. The proceeds will be used to fund the purchase of the Midsummer Place shopping centre in Milton Keynes, but with a flat dividend announcement, its shares fell 9p to 333.9p. Overall though the FTSE 100 finished 55.44 points higher at 6325.88. Angus Campbell, head of market analysis at Capital Spreads, said: The equity markets have by no means forgotten yesterday's sell off but they have found some solace today as an Italian bond auction saw the country's borrowing costs decline from Tuesday's spike. Some strong demand for Italy's debt has shown that investors have not given up on the chances of normalisation even in the aftermath of a disastrous election. If there's one thing that investors have learnt in the past couple of years it's that there's very strong political will to see the eurozone succeed and the central bank is always on hand to step in if things start to wobble. Investors are also enjoying the resilience shown by US markets that have been boosted once again by strong economic data from across the pond. The sell off so far this week looks like it could be over as soon as it started. Vodafone added 3.2p to 165.1p on talk it may curtail its European acquisition plans. The company has reportedly been considering a £6bn or so offer for Kabel Deutschland but Bloomberg reported Vodafone had suspended the idea. However it went on to say an offer could still be made at some point. Meanwhile JP Morgan issued a note this week saying that a merger spree would not necessarily be the only way for the mobile phone group to expand. It said: The emerging theme of fixed-mobile convergence has highlighted a potential structural disadvantage of being mobile-only, raising concerns Vodafone will now embark on a pan-European fixed-line M&A spree. This assessment is overly simplistic in our view. A potential Kabel Deutschland deal is not primarily driven by convergence, but reflects growth attractions and a significant synergy opportunity. Across the rest of Europe, we see many (superior) alternatives to M&A as Vodafone seeks to expand its fixed-line capabilities. [This is] our preferred strategy by markets: Spain: A fibre joint venture with Orange or a joint venture/wholesale deal with ONO. Italy: A joint venture with Fastweb. UK: Organic strategy leveraging the Cable & Wireless Worldwide acquisition. Netherlands: Fibre wholesale. Among a host of companies reporting results, Weir rose158p to £23.22 after the engineering group reported a 12% rise in full year profits, boosted by strong demand for its pumps from mining companies but a weaker performance in oil and gas. Analyst Thomas Rands at Investec said: Lower than expected revenues, mainly due to lower oil and gas, were offset by good operating margin progression due to a higher percentage of aftermarket revenues. The outlook for 2013 is cautious with guidance for low single digit revenue growth and stable margins. As such we are likely to trim our operational forecasts by 2%-3%. We put our 2,250p target price and buy recommendation under review. In our opinion, the stock has done enough for the time being until clear direction is seen. The significant short position could cause further volatility. British Gas-owner Centrica closed 1.3p lower at 347.8p despite a 9% rise in profits, but its former associate BG added 16.5p to 1163.5p on hopes for its Brazilian business after Royal Dutch Shell paid $4.4bn for assets in the area. Andrew Whittock at Liberum Capital said: The market may look for a read through to the value of BG's LNG business. The characteristics of the assets acquired are not obviously a good comparator but (very rough and ready) Shell appears to have paid around 10 times 2012 estimated earnings before interest and tax – we value BG's LNG business on around 6 times so [this] could be positive. Among the mid-caps, the prospect of breaking into the New Jersey online gaming market sent shares in Bwin.partydigital soaring. The state governor has just signed a bill legalising online betting after the local assembly and senate both voted in favour. The law will permit existing casinos to offer licensed games on the internet, including casino games, poker and bingo, and will require renewal in parliament after 10 years. Analysts at Daniel Stewart estimate the New Jersey market could be worth at least $450m, and Bwin already has a agreement which could give it access. Bwin closed 12.2p higher at 150p while rival 888 - which could also benefit - added 6.5p to 156.75p. Homeserve, the insurer and boiler repair group, is still awaiting the outcome of an FSA investigation into misselling allegations, which led to the company cutting its UK operations while trying to grow overseas. It said in early February that the regulatory probe was likely to continue for a number of months yet, but in the meantime it had been re-contacting customers who "may have suffered detriment as a result of the way in which they were sold their policy." Now its new strategy has been called into question by analysts at Espirito Santo who have moved their recommendation from buy to sell. Espirito's David Brockton said: It has become increasingly clear to us that Homeserve's new marketing is much less effective than we had hoped. We change our UK forecasts to reflect lower policy sales. We also reduce our international forecasts to reflect greater marketing spend in the US and weaker growth in France. Together these changes dent our confidence in the investment case, contributing to earnings per share downgrades of 4% and 12% for 2014 and 2015 respectively. As a result, even with a favourable conclusion to the current FSA investigation, we now expect the shares to underperform. We reduce our fair value from 288p to 210p and downgrade from to sell. The news helped send Homeserve 3.9p lower to 237.8p. Finally Dixons Retail has added 0.21p to 26.58p after closing its struggling Pixmania stores in Europe. Espirito Santo said the move came sooner than forecast: Given a sooner-than-expected resolution in Western Europe and the bearish "worst-case" numbers management has highlighted as the potential cash cost of closing other businesses, news flow from the company should become incrementally positive now.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/feb/12/baftas-2016-more-diverse-than-oscars

Film

2016-02-12T17:44:16.000Z

Catherine Shoard

Baftas more diverse than Oscars but change may still be on way

As it prepares to roll out the red carpet on Sunday night, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts is already celebrating its own victory: dodging the controversy that has dogged its US counterpart. Not only are Bafta nominees more diverse – Oscar-snubbed Idris Elba and Benicio Del Toro are both up for best supporting actor – the spotlight has failed to fall on the organisation’s own internal diversity. Baftas 2016: Peter Bradshaw predicts the winners Read more In Hollywood, the Academy’s president Cheryl Boone Isaacs has sought to mitigate fallout from the #OscarsSoWhite debacle by expressing herself heartbroken by any possible prejudice. She also introduced a raft of measures intended to double the number of minority background voters by 2020, in part by withdrawing voting privileges for members who have not worked for 10 years. Such action has been welcomed by many across the industry, including the Bafta CEO, Amanda Berry. “I admire them for the stance they have taken and respect them for the decisions they have made,” she said. “In doing what they have done change will happen more quickly, and that can only be a good thing.” Suggestions that Bafta may seek to introduce similar measures first circulated after a diversity survey was sent out to members two days after the Oscar nominations. The survey, which closed earlier this week, was anonymous and voluntary and asked for details of age, gender, ethnicity, religion, disability and sexual orientation. Berry says this was not “a knee-jerk reaction”. Instead it had been announced last summer, its release delayed to coincide with maximum digital engagement from members as they vote on annual awards. Results will not be known publicly until later this year, but Berry predicts they will reveal a demographic about a decade younger than the Academy equivalent. Idris Elba is up for a best supporting actor Bafta. Photograph: David M Benett/Getty Images A study by the Los Angeles Times in 2012 found that the median age of Oscar voters was 62, of whom 94% were white and 77% male. Research by the Guardian suggests a substantially healthier picture for the Baftas in two respects: some 32% of members are over 62, about 92% are white and 66% are male. The first two were judged on sample size assessment; the third by looking at the gender of all 7,656 members. Bafta has long been conscious its ethnic makeup likely lags behind its mix of age and gender. “We have been working away in the background, probably too quietly,” says Berry. “We recognised a number of years ago our industry is not very diverse and therefore the pool of people we can call upon to give lectures or be our nominees or winners is not very diverse. So what we have done is set up 15 new talent initiatives and mentoring schemes and scholarships and made diversity an absolute priority.” Measures are already in place to further improve the voter mix, with prospective members, as well as committees and juries, all vetted for diversity. A drive to increase the games division has meant certain experience requirements have been waived for applicants, further lowering the average age. Yet as with the Academy Awards before Isaacs’s new initiative, the number who can vote on the film awards is capped – at 6,500 – and space only becomes available after the departure or death of a voter. Berry confirmed that diversity is one of the elements the board is to consider when filling the vacancies. “It is one of the measures we will be looking at,” she said, also stressing that rules require a minimum number of specialists in each chapter, such as cinematography and editing. “We want an informed membership who are casting their votes.” But the first full poll of members has led some to suspect this is the first step in more dramatic action. Berry is not ruling out wider measures, but said they need to be “evidence-based” and “not reactionary”. “Once we see the results, we can talk about them, we can understand our membership within the context of the industry as a whole. We can’t change what has happened in the past but we can very much hope we can change what happens in the future,” she said. Baftas 2016: full list of nominations Read more A recent survey by Taking Part found 5% of people involved in the creative industries in the UK is black and minority ethnic, a statistic Bafta is likely to beat. A report by Bafta in 2012 found 80,000 Britons were involved in film and TV production, which means their membership represents a far higher industry ratio than that of Oscar voters, which number around the same but derive from a far larger workforce. However, some Bafta members the Guardian spoke to said they would be “outraged” at any US-style action against veteran voters. One echoed the sentiment of Steven Spielberg in questioning whether “members who have paid their dues and maybe are retired now” should be penalised. Cheryl Boone Isaacs and Steven Spielberg at the nominees’ luncheon in Los Angeles on Monday. Photograph: Rob Latour/REX/Shutterstock “Maybe they’ve not won a nomination,” said Spielberg on Thursday, “which would have given them immunity to the new rules, but they have served proudly and this is their industry, too. To strip their votes? I’m not 100% behind that.” “Age is a proxy,” said one Bafta voter. “It’s the attitudes they associate with age which are under attack – values which don’t conform to contemporary fashion and which can look at the wider context.” Another Bafta member, who also wished to remain anonymous, expressed his relief the diversity survey had not asked members for information about how long it had been since their last industry employment. But they were uncomfortable with developments in the US, and the idea they might translate to change in the UK. “Hollywood is attempting to corrupt the process of rewarding films on the basis of merit,” they said. “They want to subvert the process for temporary political gain. The Oscars are implicitly introducing a quota – they just don’t want to say so. But although bottom-up change is to be encouraged, it is not the job of film awards to transform society.” Additional reporting by Jennifer Guay and Benjamin Lee

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/feb/22/hydeia-broadbent-dead-hiv-aids-activist

Society

2024-02-22T19:50:26.000Z

Maanvi Singh

HIV/Aids activist Hydeia Broadbent dies aged 39

Hydeia Broadbent, an HIV/Aids activist who from a young age campaigned to reduce stigma around the virus, died on Tuesday in her home in Las Vegas. She was 39. Her father, Loren Broadbent, announced her death in a Facebook post. He did not share a cause of death. “Despite facing numerous challenges throughout her life, Hydeia remained determined to spread hope and positivity through education around HIV/AIDS,” he wrote. Hydeia Broadbent was adopted by Patricia and Loren Broadbent as a baby, and was diagnosed as positive with HIV, the virus that causes Aids, at age three. By the time she was six years old, Broadbent was sharing her story on television – with the aim of educating the public and reducing stigma surrounding the virus. When she was seven, she starred in a Nickelodeon special with the basketball star Magic Johnson, who by then had revealed his HIV-positive status. Broadbent at a church in Los Angeles to talk about being 16 and growing up with Aids, on 10 March 2001. Photograph: Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images Johnson posted a clip from the segment on social media following the news of Broadbent’s death. “By speaking out at such a young age, she helped so many people, young and old, because she wasn’t afraid to share her story and allowed everyone to see that those living with HIV and AIDS were everyday people and should be treated with respect,” he wrote. “Thanks to Hydeia, millions were educated, stigmas were broken, and attitudes about HIV/AIDs were changed.” I’m devastated to hear about the passing of an incredible young woman, activist and hero Hydeia Broadbent. In 1992, I did a Nickelodeon special called “A Conversation with Magic”, and 7-year-old Hydeia and I made an incredible impact. Hydeia changed the world with her bravery,… pic.twitter.com/cwiohZTwbF — Earvin Magic Johnson (@MagicJohnson) February 21, 2024 At age 11, Broadbent appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show, and at 12, she spoke at the Republican national convention, where she told the crowd: “I am the future, and I have Aids.” She continued to speak about HIV/Aids as an adult, seeking to fight misinformation and increase awareness about available treatments and ways to stop transmission of the virus. She worked with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on the Let’s Stop HIV Together campaign and launched the Hydeia L Broadbent Foundation.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/feb/29/student-immigration-restrictions-will-damage-uk-economy-universities-say

Education

2024-02-29T08:36:29.000Z

Richard Adams

Warnings of economic damage to UK as international student numbers fall by a third

Immigration restrictions imposed on international students threaten to damage the UK economy, according to university leaders, with the number enrolling from overseas falling by a third. Universities UK (UUK), which represents mainstream universities and colleges, said the government’s new curbs, coupled with steep visa fee increases and threats to cut back on graduate work entitlements, are having a negative impact on the UK as a study destination. Data from more than 60 UK universities shows that the number of study visas issued has fallen by 33% this year compared with the same time last year. A separate survey of 70 universities by UUK found that enrolments in postgraduate taught courses were down by more than 40% since January’s immigration changes. Vivienne Stern, UUK’s chief executive, said: “I regret the fact the government appears to want to diminish our success in this area. Our new data shows that if they wanted to see a reduction in numbers, they have already achieved that through policy changes introduced earlier this year. British students not being ‘squeezed out’ by overseas applicants, say universities Read more “If they go further, they will damage the economies of towns and cities throughout the UK, as well as many universities. Given we should be doing everything we can to promote economic growth, this seems to be getting the priorities wrong.” The rules that came into force in January barred international students on taught courses such as master’s degrees from bringing family members with them. But UUK said students were also being put off by uncertainty over the UK’s post-study work offer, after the government asked the Migration Advisory Committee to review whether international students should be entitled to stay in the UK for at least two years after successfully completing a course. “We call on all political parties in the run-up to a general election to reassure prospective international students that the UK remains open, and the graduate visa is here to stay,” Stern said. “Any further kneejerk reforms could have serious consequences for jobs across the country, economic growth, and UK higher education institutions.” The data from the Enroly admissions management service shows that international students’ deposits and visas are lower than in 2023 and 2022, with their figures showing postgraduate acceptances down by 37% so far this year. Sign up to First Edition Free daily newsletter Our morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what’s happening and why it matters Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Jeff Williams, Enroly’s chief executive, said: “The downturn in January 2024 signals the impact of UK policy on recruitment volumes, underscoring the industry’s sensitivity to political and economic factors.” More than 320,000 international students account for nearly half of enrolments on taught courses at UK universities, paying tuition fees averaging about £17,000 a year. A sudden fall in enrolments would make a wide range of courses uneconomic and cause severe financial dislocation at many institutions. A new study commissioned by UUK found that the growth in international students since 2019 has delivered a £60bn boost to the entire UK’s economy. The Department for Education said: “We are fully focused on striking the right balance between acting decisively to tackle net migration, which we are clear is far too high, and attracting the brightest students to study at our universities.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/nov/18/implacable-immutable-irreplaceable-why-malcolm-young-was-a-rocknroll-great

Music

2017-11-18T19:34:06.000Z

Michael Hann

Implacable, immutable, irreplaceable: why Malcolm Young was a rock’n’roll great

‘N ot only is he a great guitarist and songwriter, but also a person with vision – he is the planner in AC/DC. He is also the quiet one, deep and intensely aware.” That’s how Malcolm Young was described in an early Atlantic Records press release about the band he founded and led for more than 40 years, those words ringing true right until dementia forced him to retire from the band in 2014. Now, just weeks after the passing of his elder brother George – a rock hero in his own right, and an important part of the AC/DC story, too – he has died, aged just 64. Malcolm Young obituary Read more The presence of George – a star in the 1960s with the Easybeats – meant rock’n’roll was not an unattainable dream in the Young household in Sydney. And so Malcolm pursued it, forming AC/DC in 1973. Greatness wasn’t immediate, but it came. The first three Australian AC/DC albums were patchy, and whittled down to two much better records for international release. Let There Be Rock, from 1977, was a huge step in the right direction, and the following three years saw AC/DC release three of the greatest hard rock records ever – Powerage (1978), Highway to Hell (1979) and Back in Black (1980). They never reached those heights again, but every single AC/DC album thereafter – nine of them – contained at least one song, often more, that slotted as comfortably into the setlist as anything from the older, greater albums. Malcolm Young. Photograph: Bob King/Getty Images And Malcolm Young was the heart of it all. The great producer and engineer Terry Manning – whose career consisted largely of working with the greatest soul groups and rock bands – once said that as a rhythm guitarist, Malcolm was the equal of Steve Cropper, of Booker T & the MG’s, and that does not oversell him. Malcolm, on a Gretsch Jet Firebird that always looked giant on his tiny frame, was not just the business brain of AC/DC but their musical heart, too – everything AC/DC did stemmed from his playing. And what he played, he insisted, was rock’n’roll, not rock. One puzzled interviewer once asked him the difference between the two. “Well, rock bands don’t really swing,” he said, as if explaining how the Earth was in fact spherical rather than flat. “Rock’n’roll has the swing.” He proceeded to demonstrate precisely what he meant by hissing out the respective hi-hat patterns, while beating his thigh to mime the kick drum. “They don’t understand the feel, the movement.” You can hear that feel best, perhaps, on the version of Live Wire that opened the 1977 promo album Live From the Atlantic Studios, a performance so taut and dynamic it ought to be mandatory listening for every aspiring rock band. Crucial to it all is space: no matter how raw Malcolm’s rhythm playing is, he never gives in to the temptation to fill in the gaps. Power chords are allowed to fade, not be chopped off prematurely. AC/DC – 10 of the best Read more That’s also a tribute to Malcolm’s songwriting. Think of it: his name appears on the credits of so many classics: Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap, Let There Be Rock, Whole Lotta Rosie, Highway to Hell, Back In Black, You Shook Me All Night Long, For Those About to Rock (We Salute You), and countless more almost as well known. That combination of songwriting and playing made AC/DC something unique. Even in the 1970s, it was hard to juggle rock’n’roll’s constituent parts to come up with something that sounded like no one else. By Powerage, when they shed the blues shuffle once and for all, AC/DC had managed that. From then on, anyone trying to incorporate AC/DC’s influence just ended up sounding like copyists, without the same finesse – try the Cult’s Electric album, or anything by Airbourne and you’ll see what I mean. That’s because AC/DC’s greatest songs aren’t just riffs and choruses, they’re full of tricks and variations: the pauses after three crashing chords of each part of Highway to Hell’s riff, the stutter in Back in Black, the way Riff Raff spends 30 seconds building up to its monstrous central riff, then a further minute allowing the whole riff cycle to unspool before allowing the vocals to come in. For people who simply refuse to countenance the idea that a band who spent almost all their career playing riffs with largely puerile lyrics on top could be revolutionary, the following statement will sound ridiculous, but I believe it to be true: Malcolm Young was hard rock’s Ralf Hütter, someone who saw the possibilities of focusing on one thing and pursuing it to its end. He was implacable, immutable, irreplaceable. He was one of the greatest rock’n’roll musicians ever.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2011/jan/10/tom-lubbock-obituary

Art and design

2011-01-10T18:34:36.000Z

Kevin Jackson

Tom Lubbock obituary

Until the last months of 2010, Tom Lubbock, who has died aged 53, was mainly known for his work as the chief art critic of the Independent. Two events changed and broadened that public profile. The first was the publication, in the Observer, of When Words Failed Me, his long, painful but at times strangely beautiful memoir of two years' suffering from the brain tumour that was slowly killing him, and which eventually robbed him of the power to write or speak. But it was more than just a fine writer's eloquent lament for the tragic loss of eloquence: it was a prose poem about language and mortality. Just a few weeks after this, the Victoria Miro Gallery, London, mounted an exhibition of the collages that Tom had made for the Saturday editions of the Independent between 1999 and 2004. It was widely and warmly reviewed, notably by the Turner prizewinner Mark Wallinger, who praised the way in which these "exquisitely crafted" pieces "addressed the world in many different registers – sardonic, caustic, erudite and celebratory, with instinct, intelligence and wit". The exhibition announced to the world something that Tom's friends had long known: Lubbock the art critic was also Lubbock the artist. When I first met him, more than 30 years ago, he was Lubbock the cartoonist. It seemed as if within days of arrival at Cambridge University – he read philosophy and English at Corpus Christi College – he was adorning the pages of student magazines with ferocious daubs and scatological caricatures. Political, 2002, a wry critique on power and geography by Tom Lubbock. Photograph: The Independent In those days, before he grew the trademark beard that gave him the air of a 19th-century Russian anarchist, his face was like that of a cherub who had done a sneaky deal with the devil. He tended to dress in odd headgear and old formal suits – part scruff, part dandy – and his fingers were perpetually stained with ink. He was charming, if a bit frightening and had the most infectious laugh I had ever heard: a kind of sustained bronchial explosion. When someone uses the word "glee", I can see the boyish Tom, grinning hugely (he had terrible teeth), blue eyes wide open as he thrilled to some fresh joke or conceit, body convulsed, almost breathless with mirth. He was a superb mimic, too. Tom was a serious student, busy laying the foundations for what became a formidable erudition, but he threw himself into all manner of other activities, including journalism (he edited an edition of Granta, in its old incarnation), student theatre, and a series of elaborate pranks that are probably best left unrecorded. It was said that whenever the Corpus porters discovered some new Dada-style atrocity, the cry would go up: "Where's Lubbock?" One college contemporary, who was in the habit of arranging his loose change in neat piles on the mantelpiece, recalls how Tom used to love knocking them over in pure relish of chaos. Another remembers going to Tom's room for the first time and finding a note pinned to the door by a hunting knife: "You will die, Lubbock", it read. He did not seem greatly perturbed. After graduation, Tom moved to London and began to scrabble around in the world of newspapers and magazines. His family was rather grand – Liberal politician Sir John Lubbock was an ancestor; so was the distinguished literary critic Percy Lubbock – and he had been to Eton. But there was no money to underwrite a life of scholarly ease, so, like most of his college peers, he learned to survive on his wits. He was theatre editor of the exceptionally short-lived magazine Bad News, and a jack of many trades for Richard Branson's Event listings magazine; and he produced lots of illustrations, often in collage form. Gradually, his reputation as a writer of uncommon talent became recognised, and his byline became more frequent. His career gathered momentum in 1985, when was taken on by the producer Tom Sutcliffe as a regular contributor to BBC Radio 3's arts programme New Premises, for which he wrote both serious essays – his debut piece was a searching appreciation of George Stubbs's equestrian paintings – and spoofs or satires. One of these was a cod-documentary about a Thatcherite agit-prop theatre company, which toured banks and wine bars and gentleman's clubs with such shows as Piss on the Fire, Jack, My Toast's Done. His collage-cartoons began to appear in the Mail on Sunday, and then the Observer, and he designed the opening credits for the Channel 4 television programme A Week in Politics. Tom also appeared on TV himself, as a contributor to BBC2's The Late Show in its early days. In collaboration with the director Roger Parsons, he also wrote an innovative six-part comedy series for BBC2, The Wolvis Family (1991). As its fans have pointed out, there were elements of this comedy that anticipated both The Royle Family (six characters confined to a single room) and The Office (a deadpan, apparently earnest approach to its characters' absurdities). Wolvis bombed in the ratings, but fared surprisingly well in Australia. Perhaps its best audience was Tom himself, who sat in the studio control room all but exploding with delight, until he had to be thrown out. Meanwhile, he worked as a radio reviewer for the Independent and then the Observer, and wrote many book reviews. Tom was exceptionally well-informed in several areas – literature, music, philosophy – and as a book reviewer, he could turn his hand to almost anything editors asked of him, but it was becoming increasingly clear that his mind was at its most forceful and innovative when he thinking about the visual arts. He wrote long essays for the journal Modern Painters between 1990 and 2002, and won the Hawthorden prize for art criticism in 1993. His full-time work as a reviewer and essayist for the Independent began in 1997. Apart from his keen eye and his wide range of reference, Tom's virtues included bracing clarity (he never used art-speak or any other kind of higher waffle), utter honesty (he was never intimidated by reputations), and originality (even if you thought you knew his tastes, he could surprise you). He could also be howlingly funny. His essay about conceptual art, based on various things you might do with a toaster, should be mounted in every modern art gallery as a contribution to public sanity. When not engaged in journalism or family life – he married the artist Marion Coutts in 2001; their son, Eugene, is three years old – Tom worked at more substantial projects. He wrote major catalogue essays on Goya and Ian Hamilton Finlay, and monographs on Thomas Bewick and Carol Rhodes. A collection of essays from his popular Independent series Great Works will be published this year, and there are three manuscripts of completed books: one on Bad Art, one on the English graphic tradition, and The Donkey's Head, on 17th-century painting. His friends also hope that the full-length version of When Words Failed Me will become a book soon. The last word should go to Tom: they are the last words of that essay. The final thing. The illiterate. The dumb. Speech? Quiet but still something? Noises? Nothing? My body. My tree. After that it becomes simply the world. Thomas Nevile Lubbock, critic and illustrator, born 28 December 1957; died 9 January 2011

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jul/21/katie-hopkins-boat-far-right-activists-sicily-migrants

Opinion

2017-07-21T13:10:52.000Z

Joe Mulhall

Why has Katie Hopkins set sail with a bunch of far-right activists? | Joe Mulhall

The most dangerous thing we can allow to happen to the far right in Europe is to let it become normal. The last decade has seen a process of mainstreaming of far-right narratives, organisations and people. Things that have long been deemed beyond the pale have begun to creep back towards the realms of the acceptable. This week could become a watershed moment in this dangerous process of normalisation. Right now, Mail Online columnist Katie Hopkins is in Catania, Sicily, spending time with a far-right group called Defend Europe, which had the original aim of harassing and block NGO search and rescue vessels operated by groups like Save the Children from picking up refugees and migrants in the Mediterranean. This is a new collaborative project launched by far-right activists across Europe drawn from a movement of young, so-called Identitarian activists, who claim they are “defending European culture” and use direct action stunts (often filmed as slick propaganda videos) to drive home their message. Sicilian mayor moves to block far-right plan to disrupt migrant rescues Read more At its core this is a network of explicitly far-right activists who hold deeply anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant views, and who talk of a need for a “reconquista” in Europe (referring to the Christian recapture of the Iberian Peninsula from the Moors) and “remigrating” those who don’t fit in. Members of this Identitarian movement have occupied mosques, blockaded roads around Calais, climbed the national theatre building in Vienna and the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, clashed with leftists and already attempted to block an NGO ship in Sicily. They have managed to raise almost £180,000 and chartered a ship, the C-Star. The far-right French Identitarian leader Clément Galant, the Berlin Identitarian leader Robert Timm, former leader of the Würzburg branch of the notorious anti-Muslim street movement Pegida and Ein Prozent reporter Simon Kaupert, Austrian Identitarian co-leader Martin Sellner, Italian Identitarian activist Gianmarco Concas and the Canadian activist and “citizen journalist” Lauren Southern all look likely to be on the ship. Put simply, this is a ship of far-right activists. The stated aim of the Defend Europe “mission” was originally to actively block search and rescue (SAR) NGO vessels. They now claim they will “monitor” the situation and intervene should they see wrongdoing by the NGOs. They say they will fulfil their duty to rescue migrants from boats in peril, yet they also claim that they will return them to Libya, a deeply troubling claim considering Libya cannot currently be considered a place of safety under the SAR convention and returning legitimate refugees could possibly contravene the non-refoulment obligation under article 33 of the 1951 convention. While of course any journalist has the right to cover this story from any angle they choose, it is deeply concerning that it appears Hopkins is supporting Defend Europe rather than reporting on them. Earlier this week, she tweeted: “Looking forward to meeting the crew of the C-Star in Catania tomorrow. Setting out to defend the Med. All this week @MailOnline”. She has also retweeted the Defend Europe Twitter account among other clearly supportive gestures, including being photographed with prominent far-right activists such as Peter Sweden, a UK-based far-right Holocaust denier who is also in Catania supporting the Defend Europe mission. He has previously tweeted: “The claim that 6 million jews were gassed seem highly unprobable. The concentration camps didnt have the facilities for that” (13 May, 2016). He also tweeted: “By the way just so you know i am not a nazi : ) I think hitler had some good points, but i dont agree with facism or socialism” (7 August 2016). [See footnote] To place Hopkins’ support in context, other vocal supporters of this project including David Duke, former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, who has helped raise funds for Defend Europe and the largest neo-Nazi website in the world the Daily Stormer. This goes beyond merely disagreeing with the opinions of Hopkins and is actually about the Mail Online, and any other media outlet that offers a positive take on Defend Europe, possibly playing a role in the normalisation and mainstreaming of explicitly far-right and extremist people, organisations and narratives. The fight to stop Mediterranean people-smuggling starts on land, not at sea Daniel Howden Read more There is no doubt that the current situation in the Mediterranean is extremely difficult, as are the wider issues around refugees in Europe, but, surely, we can all agree that a ship of far-right activists possibly disrupting the lifesaving work of NGOs is not helpful and should not be supported or condoned. The ship has currently been stopped in Port Suez, due to “a lack of documentation and papers”. And Hopkins first article from Catania in Sicily has mysteriously disappeared from the MailOnline site. Perhaps there’s hope yet. Now is a time for everyone, even those who are critical of current responses to the refugee crisis, to vocally condemn the Defend Europe project and its far-right motivations. Any hint of support from the mainstream will not only provide succour to extremists but will become remembered as a landmark moment in the normalisation of the far right in Europe. This article was amended on 25 July 2017 to include the precise dates of Peter Sweden’s previous tweets in 2016. Sweden tweeted a statement on 19 July 2017 to say that he no longer holds these views.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/oct/09/get-into-the-groove-writers-go-head-to-head-to-declare-madonnas-best-album

Music

2023-10-09T14:00:15.000Z

Ben Beaumont-Thomas

Get into the groove! Writers go head-to-head to declare Madonna’s best album

Madonna (1983) Madonna: Lucky Star – video This punchy, scrappy and fantastically frothy record announced Madonna to the world – and the world was never the same. She had made a name for herself through sheer charisma, hustling her way around New York’s post-disco club scene, and she mixes this plucky resolve with simple but effective songwriting. To modern ears, the oingy-boingy synths sound dated and the simple songs feel porous, but it’s a swirling cocktail of enduring sounds and ideas, adjusting the trajectory of pop and laying the groundwork for Madonna’s next 40 years. Take Borderline, with all its new-romantic melodrama and vocals that swoop from chipmunk-adjacent to breathy desperation, underpinned by straightforward piano chords and a restless, almost vacant cymbal tap: each part of it has a thinness to it but there is an ineffable magic to the sum of those parts. Lucky Star’s twinkling synth arpeggios show up in pop music time and time again (notably referenced by Robyn and Carly Rae Jepsen) – and who but Madonna could take a nursery rhyme and turn it into a whirling dancefloor filler that reverberates through the ages? The punky vocal of I Know It, the sheer commitment to the bit on Holiday, the sultry purr amid Everybody’s playground call to “dance and sing”: Madonna’s charisma holds it all together. Everything she was to become can be found here. Kate Solomon Like a Virgin (1984) Madonna: Into the Groove – video Like a Virgin was the album that made Madonna the biggest female star in the world. It was sharp, it was provocative, it was fun, it was witty – the cynicism of Material Girl offering a pretty effective skewering of the era’s increasingly blatant aspiration/greed (the word “yuppie” had entered the lexicon between the release of her debut album and Like a Virgin). It was also packed with fantastic songs: four huge hit singles, five if you got the second version, hastily rereleased with the peerless Into the Groove tacked on. And it was the last album on which Madonna sounded like a product of the environment that birthed her: in its skilful cocktail of post-disco dance music, with a dash of hip-hop (listen to the rhythm of Pretender) and a surprisingly large shot of choppy, angular new wave rock, you could catch the faint scent of the Mudd Club and the Paradise Garage, the bohemian New York milieu that also spawned everyone from Jean-Michel Basquiat to the Beastie Boys to Sonic Youth. By the time of its follow-up, True Blue, everything had changed. She still made fantastic pop records, but everything about Madonna – her messaging, her provocations, her musical shifts – seemed more studied, more obviously calculated, not quite as much fun. Alexis Petridis True Blue (1986) Madonna: Papa Don’t Preach – video An annoying piece of accepted wisdom is that Madonna can’t actually sing very well – that she is a diamond-class pop star in spite of her voice. But while she may not have the exhilarating technical prowess of a Mariah Carey, she is fiercely expressive, and True Blue – her most commercially successful studio album – complicated and deepened that expression. Where previously she had sung girlishly (often knowingly so, as on Material Girl), here she matured, opening up lower chambers of her register and darker cellars in her psyche. Madonna: 'I wanted to be somebody – because I felt like a nobody’ Read more The beseeching, lapel-grabbing tone of Papa Don’t Preach and the trudge of Live to Tell, her first great ballad, are the starkest examples, but Madonna makes even the frothy La Isla Bonita really quite desperate, her yearning urgent and horribly unfulfilled. The doleful vocal tone that marked her out on Borderline in 1983, showing she was much more than a nightclub podium girl is shaken by vibrato, making her sound truly stricken. There are buoyant moments, such as when the choruses of Open Your Heart and Where’s the Party modulate into major keys, but coming as they do after moody verses the effect is jarring, as if Madonna is insisting she’s having a great time with a rictus grin and wild eyes. As much as I love the “sex” records that were to follow, those husky performances are more obvious than the ones on True Blue, where Madonna, her voice grave, considers the stakes of love with great seriousness. Ben Beaumont-Thomas Erotica (1992) Madonna: Erotica – video What do you do when you’ve conquered the world? On 21 October 1992, Madonna tackled this conundrum as only she would – by publishing a coffee-table book called Sex, which contained explicit photographs of her indulging in activities including toe-sucking, rimming, naked hitchhiking, BDSM, fingering herself while wearing a leather mask and participating in a threesome with two female skinheads, one of whom holds a knife to her crotch. The ensuing uproar all but drowned out her fifth album, Erotica, a bold leap away from shiny dance-pop and into the grittier realms of hip-hop, house and R&B. Over its 75 minutes, Erotica offers only brief moments of euphoria (imperishable bop Deeper and Deeper, the ballad Rain). There’s an awful lot more anger and pain, both at disappointing boyfriends (Words, Waiting, Bye Bye Baby) and the world in general (Why’s It So Hard, which despite its title isn’t actually one of the smuttier numbers). One major reason for this dark mood reveals itself in the ponderous ballad In This Life, in which Madonna laments her best friend Martin Burgoyne, taken by Aids aged 23. In 1992, Aids deaths were approaching their peak: an estimated 33,590 Americans lost their lives to the disease that year, with nearly three-quarters of them aged between 25 and 44. If Erotica evokes a world where sex and desire are shadowed by death and fear, that was a daily reality for her gay fans. But there’s also the hope of a new dawn in the two songs in which Madonna celebrates her vagina: Where Life Begins and the brilliant closer Secret Garden, in which she proves that she’ll try anything (at least) once … even jazz. Alex Needham Ray of Light (1998) Madonna: Ray of Light – video Like a Prayer might nip at its heels, but Ray of Light is Madonna’s best album because it marries pop thrills and heavy drama even more deliciously. Released just before she turned 40, its spirit of epic curiosity twitches and jitters; William Orbit’s trip-hop and trance-inspired textures bring humility and humanity to Madonna’s big pop personality. This ignites from the album’s opening track, Drowned World/Substitute for Love, full of unsettling ambient winds and a godly vocal sample (from the San Sebastian Strings’ 1969 track Why I Follow the Tigers). Fresh from vocal training for Evita, Madonna sings “I never felt so happy”, but then the beat cuts out. You hear the depth of her lie in her delivery, and this bold vulnerability bristles in the rest of the tracks. It suits her. Sign up to Sleeve Notes Free weekly newsletter Get music news, bold reviews and unexpected extras. Every genre, every era, every week Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Different emotions hit hard. The title track surges with joy; Sky Fits Heaven persuades us to follow our hearts at 140bpm; The Power of Good-bye’s metallic, sequenced synths give glorious gravity to the tale of a breakup. Mer Girl is also a wonderfully weird folk horror finale, about mortality, running away and decay. An LP of strangely epic intimacy, it distils Madonna’s magical powers. Jude Rogers Music (2000) Madonna: Don’t Tell Me – video Madonna approached the new millennium with her usual spirit of reinvention: “Hey Mr DJ, put a record on.” Ray of Light producer William Orbit was enlisted for early sessions, but his euphoric trance-pop had by then trickled down to lesser stars like Mel C. Madonna needed something new. She found it on a demo by French unknown Mirwais Ahmadzaï. Drafted in for six songs, his micro-chopped grooves (Impressive Instant) and sad robofunk (Nobody’s Perfect) could have only come from the land of Daft Punk and Air. He also had the bold idea to cut the reverb on Madonna’s vocals – central to the airiness of Ray of Light – and the resulting dryness lends Music an unusual intimacy. It all gels to perfection on Don’t Tell Me, where finger-picked guitar and compressed vocals intertwine with post-Björk strings and a hydraulic hip-hop bassline: cyber-country on the brink of a new millennium. And while Madonna’s politics have been patchy at times, Music contains one of her most enduring explorations of gender in the dreamy What It Feels Like for a Girl. Somehow she managed to follow up the best Madonna album with, perhaps, the best Madonna album. Chal Ravens American Life (2003) Madonna: Hollywood – video Madonna’s ninth album was always going to be a hard sell. A “fame sucks” concept record trailed by a lead single featuring a toe-curling rap about soy lattes and Mini Coopers, and presented with the aesthetics of a revolutionary at a time of the Iraq war, it was judged accordingly (the BBC called it “bland and weak”). Clearly in no mood to placate critics, nor fans, Madonna opens American Life with a triptych of songs dissecting the false dawn of the American Dream: that contentious title track, ironic second single Hollywood and the abrasive I’m So Stupid. While her conclusions are often banal – money doesn’t solve everything! – it’s thrilling to hear confusion reign, cogs whirr and the ultimate conclusion that she’s been “stupider than stupid” land like a thud. Every one of Madonna's 78 singles – ranked! Read more But there’s also genuine heart and soul in what follows, all wrapped up in Mirwais’ odd, minimalist fusion of percussive synth rhythms, contorted vocals and cut-up acoustics. The beatific Love Profusion acts as a healing balm to the album’s early flagellation, while the loved-up ballad Nothing Fails is buffeted by a sudden choral burst. Sparkling deep cuts Intervention and X-Static Process continue the mid-album tribute to then-husband Guy Ritchie, the former featuring one of her best choruses, while the latter strips everything back to a tender folk lament. There are introspective curios at every turn, with Madonna exploring how the death of her mother shaped her on the electro jolts of Mother and Father, upending the conventions of a Bond song on the Freud-heavy Die Another Day and ruminating on ageing on elegiac closer Easy Ride. American Life can be tough going, but it’s the closest we’ve come to seeing the “real” Madonna in all her complicated glory. Michael Cragg Confessions on a Dance Floor (2005) Madonna: Hung Up – video Confessions on a Dance Floor plays on a classic trope that has recurred throughout Madonna’s career: never assume she’s out for the count. The follow-up to the misunderstood American Life had a heavy burden on its shoulders: it was the album that would define her as either a multi-generation-defining star or a has-been. It cemented her status as the former, but it is also her last great record, a glorious, neon-hued swan song before her precipitous 2000s downslide. And what a way to go out: Confessions is Madonna’s best dance record, combining the hypnotic stoicism of 1998’s Ray of Light, the skewiff European club throb of 2000’s Music and the clarified, hard-won euphoria of her classic 80s run. In Madonna terms, Confessions was a relatively minor hit in the US – it won a Grammy and its Abba-sampling lead single, Hung Up, became the most successful dance single of the decade – but for many fans in Europe and Australia, it is the Madonna album, a gargantuan hit that compressed three decades’ worth of dance genres into one electrifying record. The album’s club throb and unashamedly lascivious promotion served as a firm riposte to the idea that a 47-year-old diva should be hanging up her Spandex and stepping into balladworld; its ahistorical approach is, undeniably, the blueprint for hit 2020s dance records such as Dua Lipa’s Future Nostalgia and Lady Gaga’s Chromatica. Those records pale in comparison, of course. Confessions saw Madonna plant Excalibur back in the stone; 20 years on, we’re still waiting for a new heir to pull it out. Shaad D’Souza

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2019/jun/24/the-rhythm-methods-favourite-duos

Television & radio

2019-06-24T10:00:09.000Z

Peter Robinson

The Rhythm Method’s favourite duos

For a snapshot of how Joey Bradbury and Rowan Martin picture the Rhythm Method’s new album blending the last few decades’ worth of popular culture, look no further than the way they’ve described themselves on Twitter. They are the Rhythm Method AKA, they’ve claimed, Facebook Status Quo, Morecambe and Dennis Wise, Paul Young Thug, Armitage Shanks & Bigfoot, ASOS Rocky, The Cardi B Gees, Sigur Ros Kemp, Stock Aitken & Dennis Waterman, and the Janet Street Preachers. While they are all this and more (and, the self-effacing pair would likely argue, significantly less), modern Britain’s greatest pop duo (under-40s category) owe everything to a more established London-based pairing. While young Rowan wrote his first melodies over his parents’ Chas & Dave records, 10-year-old Joey was putting on performances of Eminem’s My Name Is, unaware that it sampled the guitar and bass of both Chas and Dave. As for history’s other most iconic duos? Join us in a pub garden in the flightpath of a south-west London helipad as Rowan and Joey explore the notion that it does indeed take two to make a thing both go right and be out of sight. Piers Morgan and Susanna Reid Pier Morgan and Susanna Reid. Joey I’m Piers Morgan, the loud-mouthed arsehole. Rowan While I, as Susanna, am merely tolerating him. Who likes Piers Morgan? I’ve never met anyone who likes Piers Morgan. Joey The whole echo chamber thing is seen as a negative, isn’t it? But maybe echo chambers are good. Maybe I don’t need to see that shit. Holmes and Watson Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman in Sherlock. Photograph: BBC/Hartswood Films/PA Joey I really like the Cumberbatch series – I’m a Cumberbitch. I met Martin Freeman once, when I used to work in a barbershop in Soho, and shampooed his hair. Rowan How was he? Joey Miserable. It was the day of The Hobbit premiere. I shampooed his hair: no tip. Dermot O’Leary, though, is lovely. The second time he remembered my name and what we’d talked about last time. Obviously it’s a professional nice guy thing, but he does seem genuinely nice. Richard and Judy Richard and Judy. Photograph: Ian West/PA Rowan I have a morbid fascination with Madeley, particularly his novels. The first one was about a psychopathic Spitfire pilot. The second begins with a modern-day crucifixion scene IN THE COTSWOLDS! He’s a great example of the truth being stranger than fiction; much more Partridge than Partridge could ever be. A compellingly weird man. A decent guy, but petty. Absolutely hilarious. Cagney and Lacey Rowan WHAT a theme tune. Cameron and Clegg David Cameron and Nick Clegg. Photograph: Carl de Souza/AFP/Getty Images Rowan I’m Clegg, he’s Cameron. Joey Again, I’d be the arsehole. Although I was completely heartbroken when Clegg had the opportunity to make a coalition with Labour. He was like: “The Conservatives got more votes”, but fuck that! Fuck that all! Even Blair’s Labour would have been the better option; Blair might be a war criminal but even he wasn’t going out of his way to starve people in our country. Jedward Jedward. Photograph: Ernesto Di Stefano Photography/WireImage Rowan I was the bouncer at my sister’s 18th birthday. I was getting into the zone, establishing my authority and practising lines like: “You’re out of order” and, “That’s way out of line”. Then the first kids who turned up looked at me and just went: “It’s Jedward”. It destroyed me. The Twix Twix. Photograph: David Lee/Alamy Stock Photo Joey I adore a Twix. Rowan We’re a Twix band. We’d do a deal with Twix in a heartbeat. Joey We’re desperate for an endorsement. We’re very eager to sell out, and have no qualms whatsoever. I heard Fat White Family turned down £300,000 to use one of their songs on an easyJet advert. Why would you turn that down? Cos it doesn’t fit in with your image? Fuck that! DJ Jazzy Jeff and The Fresh Prince Jazzy Jeff and Will Smith. Photograph: Iris Honold/REX/Shutterstock/Iris Honold/Rex/Shutterstock Joey Did you see that trailer someone made for a dramatic retelling The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air? It was basically like The OC. The thing is, it could never compare to the drama of the original comedy, where his dad leaves. That’s pure drama. Comedies throughout history have always been good at that. Is Line of Duty exploring the human condition as well as Porridge did? No. Rowan In dramas you see actors desperate to cry, but that’s not how people cry in real life is it? People try not to cry. Joey I’ve only ever cried in my friends’ arms a couple of times, and that’s probably due to ketamine, to be frank. The Rhythm Method’s album How Would You Know I Was Lonely? is out now

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https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/apr/18/my-assistance-dog-changed-my-life-but-i-brace-myself-when-we-leave-home

Society

2019-04-17T18:00:06.000Z

Fiona Wright

My assistance dog changed my life – but I brace myself when we leave home | Fiona Wright

Almost a year ago exactly, I became the handler of an assistance dog, after a long and rigorous process involving an in-house assessment, a medical assessment and a recommendation from my psychiatrist and my GP respectively. Almost a year ago, I started working every week with a professional trainer so that both the dog and I could learn what to do. And suddenly, almost a year ago, my largely hidden disability became startlingly visible, and I’m still getting used to what this means. My instinct here is to tell you about my illness, my disability but I’m not going to do it. I’m not going to do it because the specifics don’t matter, and because one of the things that has amazed me about having an assistance dog in public is the number of people – complete strangers, people I’ve only just been introduced to – who immediately ask me, “How does she assist you?” The cost of getting well in Australia is keeping us sick Read more And while I understand where this question is coming from – aside from Guide Dogs, assistance dogs are still a fairly new phenomenon – it’s a startlingly invasive request. Because what they’re really asking is that I explain my diagnosis, and the way that it affects me in the world, and reveal some of the things that might go wrong for me in the next few hours. And though I know this isn’t their intention, it always makes me feel as though I have to prove that I’m unwell and not just bringing my dog to the cinema because I’m a deluded hipster who treats my pet like my first-born child. All you need to know, I guess, is that Virginia has made a marked difference in my life. That there are things that I am able to do now that I could not before – and that this is all that anyone can hope for in any kind of disability aid. Whenever I take Virginia with me somewhere new I always have to brace myself because our entry is so often questioned, if not outright refused. Usually, the staff are great, and the moment I point out what her vest means they apologise profusely – but then the questions start up again. Either that or it’s a customer that intervenes: the man in the greengrocer who said I was disgusting for bringing my dog into the shop and stood over me and shouted as much while the staff stood idly by; the woman on the bus who kept repeating to her friend, loudly and unsubtly, “I can’t believe they’re letting dogs on buses now.” Once, it was a cafe owner, who came over to my table to let me know that, after the last time I had been there, someone had left a zero-star review on social media because there’d been a dog inside. “A zero-star review,” he kept saying, and I knew he wanted me to say that I was sorry but that’s a thing that I refuse to do. ‘Whenever I take Virginia with me somewhere new I always have to brace myself because our entry is so often questioned’ I know that a lot of this confusion and hostility is because of unfamiliarity – because people still aren’t used to seeing assistance dogs, and especially not assistance dogs that aren’t the labradors that organisations like Guide Dogs Australia primarily use. Virginia is a small cavoodle; there’s a part of me that’s embarrassed, sometimes, that I have such a fashionable dog, but her breed is perfect for this kind of work – loyal, affectionate (even to a fault), smart without being highly strung, and with the added bonus of fur that doesn’t shed. I chose her for these reasons (and because she was undersized, the runt of her litter, which I figured we both had in common). But any kind of dog can do this kind of work – in the organisation we are working with, there are German shepherds, greyhounds, ridgebacks, terriers, even a chihuahua or two. None of these look the way people assume an assistance dog should. Strangers ask me often, who are you training her for? And I used to answer, slowly and carefully, that the system works slightly differently for these kinds of dogs, that they train with their handlers, and a trainer, from the beginning rather than being raised by volunteers like Guide Dogs are. But now I just say, “for me”, and have to stop myself from adding, “That’s right, this here is what crazy looks like.” Here are some of the things that assistance dogs can do: they can let their handler know when they’re on the edge of a panic attack or dissociative attack, because they can smell changes in the hormone content of their sweat, and then they can take their handler somewhere safe, or offer them tactile comfort. They can alert their handler if they’re about to faint or have a seizure. They can find their handler’s friends in a crowd, or wake them from the night-terror dreams that are common in people with PTSD. They can intervene in the sensory meltdowns that people on the autism spectrum often experience, or put pressure on specific parts of the body to assist with bio-feedback, with bringing the heart rate or breathing back under control. They can be an anchor, or a buffer, or just one thing at least that has your back. Unless, of course, someone distracts them. (It surprised me, and still does, how many people try to distract Virginia, clapping on their knees or making kissy noises or clicking their tongues, swooping in for a pat or trying to get her to play. It’s spectacularly unhelpful, and sometimes downright dangerous.) The problem isn’t that I’m unhappy explaining these things, even to strangers, or that I’m uncomfortable. I’m not. I speak and write often about mental illness and my own conditions because I think it is important, because I know first-hand how damaging silence and stigma can be, how the shame I felt about my illness kept me from even recognising it for what it was for years. And I know that I’m the “right” kind of crazy – unthreatening, and a little kooky, sure, but by and large adhering to social mores and saving most of my meltdowns for when I’m at home or on my own. I know it’s easier for me to speak, that is, than it is for many other people in my situation, and that almost always the people who are asking questions are genuinely curious. It’s just that it gets exhausting. And I’m sick of people talking to me about my disability aid instead of just talking to me. On 19 April 2018 this article was amended. A previous version incorrectly said the Guide Dogs organisation exclusively uses labradors.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/jun/30/australian-election-2016-turnbull-shorten-coalition-greens-labor-briefing

Australia news

2016-06-29T22:03:04.000Z

Helen Davidson

Today's campaign: national security has been ignored, says Tony Abbott

Good morning, everyone. It’s Thursday, but I think I might just have the hang of this one. All opinions are not equal. Some are a very great deal more robust, sophisticated and well supported in logic and argument than others. Or so says Douglas Adams. I’ll leave it to you to apply the wisdom where you see fit. We are two days out from the election and things are picking up speed. Head on over here to catch up on yesterday. The big picture Malcolm Turnbull will address the National Press Club at lunchtime, and call for a little more foot traffic on the higher road. After eight weeks of sometimes hostile campaign battles, the PM will make use one of his final major speeches to urge the next parliament to “offload the ideology, to end the juvenile theatrics and gotcha moments, to drop the personality politics”. As Lenore Taylor observes over here, the call for more mature politics and an end to “division for division’s sake”, is quite similar to the speech he made after taking the leadership from his predecessor, Tony Abbott. Abbott, ever helpful, has popped up and suggested this hasn’t been the campaign he would have run. The former PM told Sky News budget repair and border security had been ignored. “This has been an election campaign where a lot of big issues have been touched on without really being developed,” he told Sky News last night. “National security has played almost no part in this campaign and even border security has been just an intermittent visitor to the campaign.” This has meant “less substantial stuff” has been front and centre instead. Abbott also said people would feel “ripped off” if a marriage equality plebiscite didn’t happen now. .@TonyAbbottMHR says border security has been 'just an intermittent visitor' in this campaign #ausvotes #pmlive https://t.co/3AkcgfW8nO — Sky News Australia (@SkyNewsAust) June 29, 2016 The election was called over a construction industry watchdog but in its last days is all about marriage equality. Turnbull said a Coalition win on Saturday would deliver a clear mandate for a plebiscite and he demanded that Bill Shorten respect that and pass the legislation. “I think it would be very rash of any political party to deny the Australian people a say on this issue when it is clear a majority do want a say, and particularly when a government is returned on the very clear mandate to do it,” he told the Australian. Turnbull was very confident it would pass, very confident voters would approve it, and has previously said he was sure the free vote then granted to Coalition members would see it “sail through”. “Sailing through” may be an optimistic prediction for the future Senate. A Guardian Australia survey has found Coalition measures like the corporate tax cut and the so called “zombie cuts” would be unlikely to get through parliament. It also found a Labor government would be forced to negotiate on its negative gearing measures. Such an event is looking more unlikely though, as polls suggest Labor won’t win the 21 seats it needs for government. Leadership questions are in the air, according to News Corp papers, which are suggesting a possible challenge by Anthony Albanese after an unsuccessful election. Today the opposition leader has warned of Australia heading towards a situation where the likes of Donald Trump and Ukip gain traction because of increased inequality – which he says three more years of the Coalition would foster. “We’re not at the point of America, but cooperative economic growth where people are included, not left behind, that’s how you avoid in democracies where people are feeling marginalised and alienated,” he has told Fairfax Media. “We’re not immune from that – I don’t think we’re as far down the track.” Shorten again denied Labor was running scare campaigns on Medicare, and said Turnbull had given up some of the “centre ground”. “I think in this election he’s emerged as hollower than people thought.” On the campaign trail Bill Shorten is in Brisbane today, pushing on with education and health – specifically Medicare. If you want to make sure we have a government that looks out for working- and middle-class families, not just the big end of town, then you need to vote Labor,” a campaign spokesman said. Malcolm Turnbull is in Canberra and will address the press club at lunchtime. The campaign to watch Less a campaign to watch than one to keep an eye on and perhaps send to the naughty corner, but things have already gotten heated at pre-poll booths in one New South Wales seat. In pre-poll booths in Macarthur, a Labor volunteer allegedly pushed over an elderly Liberal party volunteer and Liberal volunteers have allegedly removed how-to-vote cards from the hands of voters and verbally harassed a young woman. Police were called but no charges laid and the matter has been referred to the electoral commission. The safe Liberal seat (3.3%) in Sydney’s outer south-west is held by Russell Matheson, who accused Labor of being “increasingly desperate and aggressive”, and demanded the party apologise for the behaviour of its volunteers. Istanbul airport attack: Turkey blames Isis as new details emerge of assault Read more And another thing … Turkey has declared a day of morning after a terrorist attack on the Ataturk airport in Istanbul killed 41 people and injured more than 250. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has blamed Islamic State for the late-night attack. Follow the day’s developments live Sign up here to receive your Campaign catchup in your inbox every afternoon

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https://www.theguardian.com/music/2011/apr/07/metronomy-the-english-riviera-review

Music

2011-04-07T22:00:01.000Z

Caroline Sullivan

Metronomy: The English Riviera – review

Metronomy leader Joe Mount rather grandly "splits his time between London and Paris" these days, but it's Totnes, Devon – his hometown – that's been on his mind lately. The album's title and its music are a homage to Mount's native south-west – but it's a sunny, west coastified version, in which cool people drink tequila sunrises and Steely Dan tunes waft out of seafront bars. The English Riviera is miles removed from the glowstick-waving indie-dance that previously characterised Metronomy – instead, it piles on ambling good vibes and darts of sweet synth, along with basslines that sculpt songs into various shapes: Latin-funky on Everything Goes My Way (a completely gorgeous duet by Mount and guest vocalist Roxanne Clifford), soft-rocky on Trouble. Their nu-rave past is revisited on The Look and Loving Arm, and sits surprisingly easily alongside the FM radio feel of the rest of the record, probably thanks to the charm that permeates every last moment of this album.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2017/nov/01/tony-slattery-return-to-live-impro-comedy

Stage

2017-11-01T09:34:10.000Z

Brian Logan

A bleary agent of chaos: Tony Slattery returns to live impro

On the way to Slattery Night Fever, the new weekend impro night featuring ex-Whose Line Is It Anyway? man Tony, I read two old interviews with its star. One was from 15 years ago, when Slattery was just emerging, it seemed, from a breakdown that derailed his career. The other was from this summer, when he ventured back to the Edinburgh fringe with the Whose Line Is It? team. In each instance, the interviewer wrote about being reduced to tears by how low Slattery fell – and by his resilience. I’d not quite registered the extent of his difficulties – with mental health, drugs, alcohol. The lurid stories Slattery has to tell – chucking his possessions into the Thames, lying naked under a car, being bitten by rats – almost beggar belief. How we made Whose Line Is It Anyway? Read more Retrospectively, that reading was unideal preparation for Slattery Night Fever, at which Tony and friends present us with vanishingly insubstantial impro-comedy about eccentric drinks parties and magic carrots. It’s on the London fringe – only a few miles from the Willesden housing estate where Slattery grew up. It’s cheap. And it’s too flimsy a construction to bear the burden of being “Tony Slattery’s comeback”, far less the thought of everything he’s been through since his TV and West End ubiquity 20 years ago. But if you can put all that out of your mind, it’s a diverting evening of unadventurous impro – more or less identical in format to Whose Line?, even if in this case the talent doesn’t seem quite so evenly distributed among a six-strong cast. Slattery both is and isn’t the star. He introduces the event, and it is instantly apparent he’s a loose cannon, marching to the beat of no one’s drum but his own. If you’re a purist, that’s a problem. Slattery is all over the place as an improviser, repeatedly misunderstanding the format of any given game (“Am I still a robot?”), trampling over realities carefully established by others, dragging scenes and stories off at unhelpful tangents. While his five colleagues are trying to create an ad hoc play about body-snatching, Slattery keeps ranting about satanism and free will. Teamwork doesn’t seem to be his strong suit. Tony Slattery in 1994. Photograph: Rex Features Which is fine, assuming the rest of the gang are happy to clean up after him. Because Slattery has the charisma to get away with it. Here he comes across as the sozzled, erudite old git, a Falstaffian lord of misrule, barely bothering with the rules, less concerned with progressing a story than engineering a snog with the other men on stage. He’s game, he’s blithely uninhibited – but it’s left to others to make any semblance of sense. Veteran impro man Alan Marriott rises highest to the challenge: his Halloween song is a highlight. Luke Sorba also impresses as a murderer obliged to guess the details of his own crime. It’s not, finally, an exciting evening’s impro – although next weekend it might be. On this occasion, the cast comprises five men and one woman (the organiser, Lesley Ann Albiston) – a too-common problem compounded here by the occasional sexism of the comedy. Albiston is frequently cast as “whore” or “adulteress”, and Slattery greets one of her entrances (in a Shakespearean scene) with: “Oh look! An unnecessary wench!” The final joke of the evening finds the long-suffering Albiston playing God, and still being talked over by the five guys. It is a bit dispiriting. That old-school atmosphere is reinforced by the supper-club setting and an audience whose idea of a funny title for a scene is Felicity Kendal’s Underwear. In the event, the title of the improvised play we’re promised after the interval is Dead Is the New Black. But this Halloween-themed cod-horror never coalesces into a coherent whole. That it stays jolly and enjoyable is due in no small part to tonight’s main man, a bleary agent of chaos who still occupies the limelight with no little rumpled panache. Slattery Night Fever is at the London Improv theatre

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/28/flight-mh370-malaysia-missing-one-year-on-jon-ronson

World news

2015-02-28T07:30:10.000Z

Jon Ronson

Nobody cares any more': the relatives looking for flight MH370

Ayear ago, on 8 March 2014, an American schoolteacher named Sarah Bajc sat in her Beijing apartment waiting for the plane carrying her boyfriend Philip to land. Her anxiety was growing; there had been sketchy news reports that a plane had vanished from radar screens, so she was hitting refresh on a flight-tracker website. Refresh. Delayed. Refresh. Delayed. Refresh. Missing. At the same time, an Australian businessman and part-time private investigator named Ethan Hunt was flying from Dubai to Paris. The first reports mistakenly said the missing plane was travelling from the Far East to Europe, so Ethan’s niece, frantic with worry, was repeatedly emailing him. When Ethan landed in Paris and saw the panicky messages, he caught a taxi to his hotel and turned on the TV. “And all I did after that was watch CNN,” he tells me. The news reports were bizarre. The plane, MH370, had taken off at 12.41am and been on its scheduled path from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, when it just disappeared. No distress signal had been sent. A Japan-bound pilot on another Boeing 777 said he had contacted MH370 at 1.30am, to ask if it had entered Vietnamese airspace, and had received “only static and mumbling in return”. In the scramble for information, the Malaysian authorities made odd, contradictory statements. On 11 March, air force chief Tan Sri Rodzali Daud reportedly said the plane had last been detected at 2.40am near Pulau Perak, an island in the Malacca Strait – a massive detour: instead of travelling north to China, it had doubled back across Malaysia. Later that day, Daud denied he had said such a thing. The next day he said the last radar signal had been received at 2.15am from a different location, 200 miles north-west of Penang. The day after that, the time of the signal was amended to 2.30am. On 15 March, the Malaysian prime minister, Najib Razak, announced that someone on board MH370 had shut down the communication systems and, after that, the plane had seemingly drifted for six hours, with all 239 passengers and crew incapacitated by oxygen starvation. Malaysian police raided the pilot’s home for clues: had he ditched the plane as some kind of political protest? He was a known supporter of the opposition leader. Meanwhile photographs had emerged of the co-pilot with his arm around young women he had allowed into the cockpit on previous flights. Could he be to blame? The theories began to stack up: MH370 had landed on a Malaysian military base called Butterworth, had been hijacked by terrorists, or destroyed in a corporate insurance scam; it had been seized by Chinese or American operatives who wanted access to the 20 employees of a US tech company on board, manufacturers of microchips for the defence industry. Millions of internet users tried to help, scouring satellite images in the hope of spotting the plane. I was one of them. But after 10 minutes of looking at grainy shots of ocean, I got bored and gave up. “I’m no expert,” wrote Courtney Love on her Facebook page, “but up close this does look like a plane and an oil slick. It’s like a mile away from Pulau Perak, where they ‘last’ tracked it 5°39’08.5”N 98°50’38.0”E but what do I know?” Investigators were urged to check out oil slicks and debris, white specks floating in the ocean off Malaysia, Vietnam, Australia. The official search widened to cover 2.24m square nautical miles, or 1.5% of the planet – impossible, unfathomable distances. During these confused and hysterical days, Sarah Bajc was frequently interviewed on television. On 10 March, a CBS news reporter spoke to her at her flat in Beijing. She cried and said, “The clothes in his closet are the worst. I open the closet and it smells like him.” She and Philip Wood, an IBM executive, had been dating for three years, having met in a pub where they’d both gone to listen to live music. They were about to move together to Kuala Lumpur. “Until there’s proof Philip is dead,” she said, “I refuse to believe it. If anybody could survive something like this, it’s him.” In his hotel room in Paris, Ethan Hunt watched Sarah crying on TV and felt a compulsion to track her down, to help. How could a plane simply vanish in the 21st century? It was impossible, but this was the only scenario the authorities had. This is the story of what happened when Ethan, Sarah and other MH370 relatives finally made contact – six very different characters, scattered across the planet – and set out with the scantest resources to solve the most startling mystery in modern aviation history. M aarten Van Sluys is the 51-year-old executive director of the fourth biggest hotel chain in Brazil, Nobile Hotels. He lives in São Paulo and is talking to me over speakerphone in his busy office, so he sounds echoey and indistinct, but also emphatic and even-tempered. Maarten had no loved ones on MH370, but his younger sister Adriana died on Air France flight 447, which crashed into the Atlantic in 2009. She was 40, on a business trip to Seoul with a stopover in Paris. There was no mystery with that disaster: wreckage and oil was spotted within a day, but it took two years to retrieve the plane. Talking to Maarten, my impression is of a man who has been through something truly terrible and has emerged from it resolute and considerate. It is comforting, in a way, to know that it’s possible to function again. After the Air France crash, Maarten set up a families’ support group and, when he heard about MH370, wanted to “share what we went through”, he tells me. It was a common instinct: in those early days, MH370 relatives heard from the families of people who had died at Lockerbie, in the 1997 SilkAir crash in Indonesia, at the World Trade Center on 9/11. Soon after the Malaysian flight went missing, Maarten was on a business trip to Beijing. Like Ethan, he had seen Sarah Bajc on TV and felt compelled to contact her. The families of the passengers were being convened for the first official briefings from the airline and government; Maarten suggested accompanying Sarah. The briefing was very different from his experiences with Air France. “There were military people there,” he says. What surprised him was that their role seemed to be to protect the authorities from the relatives. “The French had a kind of national pride about bringing the plane pieces out of the water. I was on the ship that finally found it. Those on board told me, ‘Maarten, we will find it. We know we will.’” “Pride?” I say. “Pride, exactly,” Maarten says. “But it was completely different in Malaysia. Everything was very strange. Psychological support? Nothing. They don’t have any kind of care. It’s difficult for relatives to get them on the line. They seem scared of everything. You have the impression they’re hiding things, and you feel you’re being watched.” He pauses. “They made elementary mistakes. Sending emails – ‘You should think your loved ones might never be back.’ Something like that.” He is referring to the extraordinary moment, on 24 March, 16 days after MH370 went missing, when the airline texted the relatives to tell them their loved ones were dead: “Malaysia Airlines deeply regrets that we have to assume beyond any reasonable doubt that MH370 has been lost and that none of those on board survived.” Protests at the Malaysian embassy in Beijing, the day after the airline texted relatives – 16 days on from the plane’s disappearance – to tell them all the passengers were dead. Photograph: Lintao Zhuang/Getty “Do you really want to know what it is like?” Sarah Bajc emails me from her home in Kuala Lumpur. “Close your eyes and think hard on this. Imagine that the person you love most in the world suddenly disappears among a cacophony of media mayhem, dashed hopes, false leads, incompetence and dishonesty. Now imagine that your entire life is uprooted and your privacy is destroyed. Perhaps that gets you halfway.” Over the past few months, I’ve had several email exchanges and one telephone conversation with Sarah. Her pain is right on the surface, and manifests itself in intolerance of my sporadically clunky questioning. When I express surprise that the airline sent that awful message by text, she misunderstands me, thinking I didn’t know about it at all. “Jon, that was… Huh. That was all over the news. I’m shocked.” She says she has always been a fighter: “My mom left when I was seven; my dad was an alcoholic. I’ve been independent since I was 16. I put myself through college. We had to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps.” Like many of the relatives, she has been approached by scores of opportunists: private investigators, psychics, alien-abductee theorists. There were hostile people, too, reposting Facebook photographs of her and Philip kissing with arrows all over them and captions such as: “How can he have red eye but not her? PHOTOSHOP!” and: “His head on someone else’s body. PHOTOSHOP!” and: “Arch-fraudster Sarah Bajc is nothing other than a rabid, extremist Zionist agent, hostile to the bone, bent on spreading great corruption in the land.” These conspiracy theorists are convinced Sarah and other relatives are intimately involved with the plane’s disappearance – Mossad disinformation operatives whose relationships with the passengers are fabricated. It took Ethan Hunt eight weeks to find Sarah, even though he calls himself, in his online CV, an “experienced private investigator”. He contacted her in May, after a CNN reporter included her email address in a tweet by mistake. Sarah was dubious. “At first I thought it was just another scam. There have been so many.” But Ethan seemed sincere, determined to find answers where the official investigators had none, so Sarah listened. He told her something about his background. He was born in Perth, Australia. He’d spent time in the military and had more recently managed fitness centres and run software companies; he currently owns a 3D printer business. But he had suddenly found himself – at 55, single and childless – feeling an intense desire to do something philanthropic. “I don’t have any conspiracy theory about where the plane is,” he told Sarah, “but I strongly believe that the truth is not out there.” I sat at Kuala Lumpur airport watching everything that happened on the tarmac. I can’t believe security is still so lax Ethan Hunt, photographed in Hong Kong’s business district earlier this month. Hunt helped relatives crowdfund $100,516 for a private investigator. Photograph: Gareth Brown for the Guardian Ethan looks younger than he is – cropped hair, fit, a bit like Bear Grylls. I’d assumed his was a fake name – it’s the same as Tom Cruise’s character in Mission: Impossible – but it’s just a coincidence. He’s incredibly enthusiastic and fast-talking. When I speak to him, he’s in his office in Shenzhen, a few miles down the road from where Foxconn make Apple products. He has a 10,000 sq ft office here, where he manufactures 3D printers. When business is good, 100 people work for him. Ethan told Sarah about some of the previous investigations he had carried out in China. “Like what?” I ask him. “Well, there was the time an Australian business sent $25,000 to China for some flatscreen TVs that never arrived,” he replies. “So they contacted me through a mutual friend.” Ethan tracked the missing money to a woman in an apartment building and persuaded two local policemen to “just walk in and pretend they were doing an electricity meter check. I said, ‘I want you to tell me the colour of the walls in the bedroom, any photos, where the sofa’s positioned.’ Then I telephoned her. She just laughed at me. ‘You don’t know who I am or how to find me! You’re an idiot!’ I said, ‘I can tell you right now that you’re sitting on a brown sofa and behind it is a photo of your mother and father. I know they live there with you and your two children and your husband. You’ve got 24 hours to give me back the $25,000 or there will be serious consequences.” There’s a huge smile on Ethan’s face. “She couldn’t run away. She knew I could go there at any time. With people. That’s what they do in China. They take 10 people and go and beat you or steal things. I used that mentality. I’ve done it a few times and it works perfectly.” “It sounds like this is fun for you,” I say. “Yeah, absolutely,” he says. “China is a bit like the wild west. Seriously.” Ethan proposed his idea to Sarah: he would crowdfund a $5m reward for a whistleblower who could lead them to the plane. Somebody within Malaysia Airlines or the government must know what happened, he reasoned, and it would take a huge reward to persuade that person to come forward, given the potential repercussions. Ethan told Sarah he’d already approached the crowdfunding site Indiegogo and been given the go-ahead, just as long as he co-opted some family members for credibility. He was approaching Sarah because he kept seeing her on TV. “How did you arrive at the $5m figure?” I ask. “There were 1.7 million people around the world, on Facebook, Twitter, voicing support for the families,” he says. “I believed those 1.7 million people would melt Indiegogo down. We’d get $5m in two weeks, then we could put up the reward and see what happened.” He shrugs. Sarah didn’t need much convincing. She had no faith in the official investigation and felt the relatives had been misled from day one. She was in daily contact with many of them, and now gathered together a six-strong reward committee. Besides her and Ethan, there was Maarten Van Sluys; French businessman Ghislain Wattrelos, whose wife was on the plane, with two of his teenage children and his son’s girlfriend; human resources consultant KS Narendran from Chennai, India, who lost his wife; and Pralhad Shirsath, an NGO manager from Pune in India, who also lost his wife. (They tried to co-opt some Malaysian and Chinese families, too, Ethan says, but they weren’t interested: ‘They were against it from the start, because they believed the government was doing what it could. In an initial meeting, they asked me to just give them the $5m and go away. The misconception was I was offering $5m of my own money.’) Sarah and Ethan put together a highly dramatic video, with horror movie music playing over photographs of the missing passengers, and Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak looking evasive. The pictures were intercut with captions: “Incompetence or obfuscation? The truth is out there” and, “It could happen to you!” “Sarah did the majority of the work,” Ethan says. “She edited it on iMovie. The idea was to look as solemn as possible, like we were contemplating.” The video made by MH370 passengers’ relatives, offering a reward for information In the video, the relatives hold up cards to the camera. Sarah’s reads: “My soulmate, Philip Wood, age 51, American, father of two, deserves to come home! Please donate.” “Do you know how many people donated?” Sarah asks me on the phone from Kuala Lumpur. She sounds tense, exhausted, raw. “All of those hundreds of thousands of people who had this huge outpouring of support, shock and dismay? Only 1,100 people. 1,100 people donated.” The final figure raised last August was $100,516. “Nobody cares any more,” Sarah says. “Nobody cares, Jon. Honestly. The story’s moved on. This is just one of those things that people will be shocked about, then do nothing about.” When they realised the $5m would be an impossibility, the committee quickly abandoned the reward idea and decided to use the money to hire a team of private investigators. “We put all our eggs into the PI basket instead,” Ethan says. Nobody will tell me the name of the firm they hired. Maarten says they chose the least wheeler dealer-seeming one: “People made all kinds of promises: ‘If we have the money, we can bring you anything you want.’ A lot of bullshit.” “We went with a high-quality firm that’s giving their services at cost, doing a good, old-fashioned gumshoe investigation,” is all Sarah will say. “They’re chasing down leads, talking to people.” “Are you happy with their service?” I ask her. “I’d be happier if they’d figured out where the plane was,” she replies. Maarten divulges a little more: “They’ve brought us details of devices that detect ping signals in the water, and some Malaysia Airlines maintenance reports from prior flights.” “They’re getting a lot of pushback,” Ethan says. “That tells me people know something. If there was nothing untoward, they wouldn’t get pushback.” “What do you mean by pushback?” I ask. “I mean they’re not getting anywhere,” he says. T he official search for MH370 continued. In August, the Australian government awarded the Dutch multinational Fugro $50m to search 60,000 sq km of seafloor off Western Australia. The search began in October and so far, 24,000 sq km have been combed, with no success. Ethan, meanwhile, has been doing all he can. He reads the emails from “the psychics, the ‘Allah’s going to give you the answer’ people”. He “scours forums and blogs for hidden messages. People say things on blogs.” He recently posed a question on a message board for pilots: “What would happen if a Boeing 777 on autopilot ran out of fuel? Would it spiral into the ocean or continue flying?” Straight away, he says, the moderator told him: “You are banned for life. Don’t come back.” He travelled to Phuket, Thailand, to inquire about buying a stolen passport. “That’s where the Iranians got theirs,” he says. He means the two Iranian passengers on MH370 who were travelling on stolen passports. The authorities raised the possibility of a hijack soon after the plane disappeared, then quickly called it a false alarm: the men, Pouria Nour Mohammad, 19, and Seyed Mohammed Rezar Delawar, 29, were asylum seekers with no links to terrorist groups. But Ethan isn’t so sure. “It didn’t make sense to me that they’d have that much bad luck,” he says. “How unlucky for someone to have stolen passports, then for the plane to go missing. I thought that was bizarre. So I wandered around, went to a few bars, asked a few people. And the cheapest stolen passport I could get was $20,000. These guys were claiming refugee status in Europe! Where did they get $20,000 and the money to buy an air ticket?” He pauses. “Sarah contacted one of the boy’s mothers and she backed up his story: ‘Yeah, he was absolutely coming to claim refugee status.’ But I said to Sarah, ‘That’s OK. His mother wouldn’t necessarily know if he was doing something dodgy.’ I still don’t 100% believe there’s not a connection.” He admits the men’s seats – towards the back of the plane – point to their innocence. The most plausible hijacking scenario would be passengers in row one overpowering the pilot as he went to the toilet. “But that doesn’t mean the manifest wasn’t altered and their actual seats were at the front in business class,” Ethan says. Illustration: Guardian Graphics He has also been staking out the runways at Kuala Lumpur airport. “I was in the terminal, in the viewing area,” he tells me, “where the MH370 banners with all the condolences are. For a whole day I sat and watched everything that happened on the tarmac. Catering trucks going in and out without anybody checking, as far as I could see. The next day I watched again. I can’t believe, after all that’s happened, the security is still so lax. I could easily have got down on the tarmac.” He pauses. “I have a theory. Philip had a thing where he’d always send Sarah a text message from his seat: ‘I’m on board. Sitting down. We’re about to take off. See you soon.’ She never got anything from him that day. There’s no contact phone-wise from anybody after they got on that aeroplane. Nobody tweeted. Why? Chinese people will talk on the phone as the plane’s taking off. I once sat next to a Chinese woman in business class, in the front row, facing the flight attendant, and she was on her phone at the tip of the runway as the plane was about to launch. After she was warned five times, I said to her, ‘Turn off your phone.’ She just looked at me. So I grabbed her phone, turned it off and put it down the side of my seat. The flight attendant gave me a thumbs up.” Ethan smiles at the memory. “But on MH370: nobody. Not one.” “Wait,” I say. “Are you saying that after the plane doors closed, nobody sent a single message?” “Before the doors closed!” Ethan says. “Really?” I say. “Not one message from anybody on that aircraft!” Ethan looks delighted by my astonishment. “I’ve told the PI to look at this. At Kuala Lumpur I saw how easy it would be for someone to get on to a plane and put mobile phone blockers on there.” I can tell Ethan is feeling the pressure to find something. “I’m pretty much classed as the outsider,” he says. “The Malaysians and Chinese call me that.” “You mean the authorities?” I ask. “Oh, the authorities trust me even less. I mean the families. They haven’t trusted me from day one. In fact I just got an email from Sarah saying people still look at me as the outsider. We’ve been doing this investigation for eight months and they’re still wary of me.” “Why?” I ask. “In Malaysia and China,” he says, “they don’t have a concept of charity. They say, ‘Nobody on the plane is related to you?’ It amazes me. Fifty per cent of my life is doing this work. I use my own company resources. I talk to the team members.” He says he is providing his services and time pro bono. Sarah vouches for this, telling me she and the committee have “put many controls in place regarding Ethan’s involvement. To the best of my knowledge, he has always behaved in an honest and upstanding way.” Imagine the person you love suddenly disappears among media mayhem, dashed hopes, false leads, incompetence, dishonesty Missing: Passenger Philip Wood, with partner Sarah Bajc. Photograph: Courtesy of Sarah Bajc Talking to Sarah and Ethan can feel overwhelming: a tornado of facts and suppositions, tech and geography. One moment Ethan is suggesting that the plane landed in Butterworth, before taking off in another direction (“It’s plausible”). Then he’s “thinking along the lines of the Russians”. He’s convinced there is a connection between the disappearance of MH370 and the shooting down of MH17 over Ukraine. “Putin is seriously trying to provoke the west into going to war with him,” he says. “For him a war would be fantastic.” He thinks western governments are “covering it up because they don’t want a world war three”. “Why haven’t they checked the South Pacific island chains?” Sarah says. “There are 16,000 uninhabited islands in Indonesia alone. A lot of them are small, but a good third to a half are large enough for a plane to land and be hidden under the canopy of a rainforest.” She, like Ethan, is convinced the plane is on land: “How can you believe that a ghost plane with everybody dead on board can fly for six hours and be totally silent and not show up on anybody’s radar, then gracefully land in the water and produce no debris? There has never been a plane wreck, except for Amelia Earhart, where there has been absolutely no tracking or wreckage of any kind. Never. Not least an enormous plane loaded with stuff in this day and age.” “If the plane does turn up in the ocean,” Ethan says, “it’s going to have been planted there.” Their suspicions are understandable; theories like this flourish when people in power behave in conspiratorial or mysterious ways, or simply fail to communicate. But it’s not just Ethan and Sarah who believe this stuff. They got a huge boost in October when Tim Clark, the British CEO of Emirates airline, said he felt Malaysia Airlines were withholding information, telling reporters: “Our experience tells us that in water incidents, where the aircraft has gone down, there is always something… My own view is that probably control was taken of that aeroplane.” I talk to KS Narendran in Chennai, one of the two Indian members of the committee. He calls himself Naren. Every word he says is precise and well-mannered. I realise what a mix of wildly differing temperaments there are in this breakaway group, thrown together by a shared tragedy. “Some of us are a lot more emotional,” Naren agrees. “Some are driven by reason, scepticism, a certain conservatism, if we can call it that. Some are very focused and upfront.” He sees this as a positive – that all these dispositions can balance each other out and make one clear-headed unit. Naren tells me about the last time he saw his wife, Chandrika Sharma. She was on her way to the airport. They were about to start building a house in the hills to enjoy in years to come and their final conversation “revolved around construction, payments, scheduling, stuff like that”. It’s very hard to believe anything that has been put out as fact. The first week there was so much bungling Missing: Chandrika Sharma, with husband KS Narendran and their daughter Meghna. Photograph: Courtesy of KS Narendran It took Naren a while to agree to join the group. He had doubts. “I was very new to the idea of crowdfunding. Initiatives like that aren’t known here in India. And we were so spread around geographically. How would it work? So I started with ignorance and a bit of scepticism.” I tell Naren what Ethan said – that so many of the families don’t trust him. He laughs. “It’s the general unwillingness to believe public-spirited citizens in this day and age,” he replies. “Walking around in daily life, you don’t come across an Ethan. You don’t just bump into an Ethan.” “He does seem quite eccentric,” I say. At this Naren goes quiet. It’s a wary silence. It’s telling me not to insult this man who is giving the relatives something the Malaysian authorities have failed to deliver: information. “Ethan has so many theories,” I say, “whereas you seem very measured. Which of the theories seems the most plausible to you?” “I wrestle with this question when I go for my walk,” he replies. “I walk around my apartment complex for an hour every day. My wife and I used to walk together. Now I walk with the company of my thoughts.” He pauses. “Quite honestly, it’s really hard to lean on one theory or another.” He adds that it isn’t only the theories that are troublesome. It’s the facts: “It’s very hard to believe anything that has been put out as fact. The first week there was so much bungling, or what Sarah calls misdirection. The search kept on in an area when it was quite clear that the plane had actually gone in a very different direction.” “You mean the South China Sea?” I ask. “That’s right,” Naren says. Ethan and Sarah said this, too: that the search teams had spent days hunting for an oil slick that had been spotted in the South China Sea, between Malaysia and Vietnam, even though by then they had radar data showing the plane had doubled back across the Malay peninsula and was never close. “So I know something was seriously amiss in that first week,” Naren says. “Sometimes I wonder if there’s been criminality, either by individuals or the government.” I ask Naren a stupidly hopeful question. Amid the misery, does the group ever find itself laughing together, sharing happy conversations? Naren thinks. “At the end of last year we shared our own sheer exhaustion,” he says. “We shared that, for sure. At times I’ve felt extremely alone, quite helpless. To carry on and make something of what’s left of one’s life has seemed burdensome. And we often share our deep contempt for some of the ways the government of Malaysia, and perhaps the airline, has behaved, with their issues of transparency and treating the families with dignity. But I’m not sure we’ve had a good laugh together. There has not been an occasion to do that. There has been very little to cheer about, let’s be honest.” O n 29 January this year, the Malaysian government suddenly scheduled a press conference. Family members rushed to get there. Then the government hurriedly cancelled it, on the grounds that it wasn’t “appropriate” for the loved ones to attend. A statement was released instead: “We officially declare Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 an accident… All 239 of the passengers and crew are presumed to have lost their lives.” The statement sparked a furious response. Some families demanded a retraction, saying the government had no right simply to give up. The government said it was just trying to be helpful: the families could now proceed with compensation claims. Naren told a reporter from the International Business Times: “It looks like, more than offering closure to families, the government and the airline themselves wanted closure.” I talk to another member of the group, Pralhad Shirsath, who lost his wife, Kranti, on the plane. Their last conversation had been on the phone. “She was walking towards the boarding gate. She said, ‘Everything is OK. Don’t worry about me.’ Because she was travelling alone.” He sounds utterly flat and spent. He says he thinks Ethan is “admirable” and “outstanding”, but he’s not as active in the group as he once was. “Why?” I ask him. “I have two sons,” he says. “I have to look after them. I have to make sure they go to school every day. I have to make sure that I am there to pick them up from the bus stop. I have to make sure that their lunch is ready, their dinner is ready.” But it’s not only that, he says. It’s the evasive way the authorities have dealt with the committee’s inquiries. “We started receiving the same answers from the Malaysian government, the airline, just repeating the same thing,” he says. “The way they respond to our queries is quite demotivating.” He falls silent. “You feel helpless,” he says. The way the government and airline respond to our queries is quite demotivating. You feel helpless Missing: MH370 passenger Kranti Shirsath, with husband Pralhad. Photograph: Courtesy of Pralhad Shirsath I think about everything I don’t know about Ethan. Why is he so convinced he can unpick this, where thousands of others, with far greater resources, have failed? He says things that indicate a complicated life, such as: “I won’t back away from a fight. I don’t mean a fisty-punchy fight. I’m very skilled at hitting people and I know when I hit them, they’re going to get hurt. I don’t like that.” In June 2013, Pando Daily investigated claims that Ethan was a scam artist, crowdfunding on Indiegogo for a brand new “Micro-Phone” that was actually just a cheap Chinese phone. But then the man making the accusation – one Michael Gabrill – publicly apologised for defaming him in a blogpost: “I, Michael Gabrill, officially apologize to Ethan Hunt… about my lies and harassment… Please don’t hurt me. I’m leaving you alone. I’m out of work and have children.” Ethan and I speak soon after the government last month declared the loss of MH370 an accident. “Since then, they’ve stopped the search,” he says. “The official search is finished. They may say they’re still looking, but they’re not to the degree they were.” (According to the Australian government, the search is continuing as normal: “Fugro Equator resumed underwater search operations on 5 February following a suspension due to weather conditions.” Last week, search coordinator Martin Dolan said he expected the plane would be found “between now and May”.) It is the 11-month anniversary of MH370’s disappearance on the day we speak, Ethan suddenly realises. “I must email Sarah,” he thinks out loud. “When I see Sarah cry on TV, it really breaks my heart. I sit there and think, ‘Why can’t I do more?’” “Maybe I’m over-thinking it,” I say, “but I imagine that you have to be tough to survive in business where you are. You have to roll up your sleeves. So maybe you’re doing all this MH370 work as a kind of karmic rebalancing?” “In my life I’ve had to do things…” He trails off. “I was in the military. I’ve had to roll up my sleeves, as you say. So maybe this is my redemption for all the bad things I’ve done. I’m an OK person but I’ve done a few bad things.” “I was impressed that Michael Gabrill publicly apologised to you,” I say. “How did that happen?” “He told a lot of lies about me. So I did some investigating. I was able to tell him that I knew he had a family, two children.” Ethan smiles, but it seems a sad, weary smile. “He pulled down his website and I got a public letter of apology.” “What are the bad things that haunt you?” I ask. “Everybody has regrets in life,” he says. “I’m a single guy. I’ve never been married. I’ve got no children. I’ve always just done business. So, yeah, maybe this is the redemption thing.” Then Ethan tells me something I didn’t expect. The $100,516 is all gone. It was spent months ago. “$100,000 doesn’t go very far,” he says. “Initially the investigators wanted $50,000 a month, but we brought that down and paid them a monthly payment for three months. One day in the ocean, to check out one place, costs about $500,000.” How can you believe a ghost plane with everybody dead on board can fly for six hours and not show up on anybody’s radar? There’s a little hope, he says. “A Chinese and Malaysian group has started kicking up trouble since the declaration in January. I’m trying to contact them but it is proving difficult. Perhaps they don’t trust foreigners, or maybe just me.” There’s something else, Ethan says. “Our PI has found out that the pilot asked for two hours of extra fuel.” He cannot show me any evidence for this, and admits that it’s not unusual for a pilot to request extra fuel. He thinks two hours’ additional fuel makes a lot of difference to some of the theories: the plane could have made it to the Maldives or Diego Garcia, the US naval base in a remote part of the Indian Ocean. Ethan says the private investigation firm is still working for the committee, for free. He had just met with the detectives in Singapore. But they’ll eventually want to start getting paid again. “How are you going to raise the money?” I ask. “We’re thinking about maybe another crowdfunding campaign,” he says. M eanwhile the anniversary of MH370’s disappearance is on everybody’s minds. “This case will never be a ‘lifetime’ mystery,” Maarten tells me on the phone from Brazil. “It simply won’t happen. It can’t.” He pauses. “Next year we’ll be less emotional, and more rational, and this will help.” On the phone, Sarah tells me she’s exhausted by the process. Three years ago, she says, she had found in Philip “a magical gift. I didn’t even know it was possible to have a relationship with someone like that. He changed my life.” And now everything is all over the place. She says her Beijing apartment was broken into two weeks after the plane went missing. Someone tried to get into her safe. People moved things around. And now, living in Kuala Lumpur, her Malaysian work permit has taken several months longer than usual to be renewed. Sarah is getting impatient with me. She says she’s just not interested in telling sweet human stories any more, about her life with Philip. “All those stories have done absolutely nothing to move us along to the truth. I’m running out of patience with giving up my personal time.” She’s interested in just one thing: finding MH370. And if I can’t help with that, I can’t help her at all. I agree with Maarten. I don’t think this will be a “lifetime” mystery. If the plane is in the ocean, it will eventually be found. If it is on land, it would be too huge and bizarre a plot to remain secret for ever. And I do think it’s possible Ethan and Sarah’s investigation may eventually move a rock an inch, and that things will emerge from underneath it. But for now I am a distraction to Sarah. “Bring something unique to the table,” she says. “Then I’d absolutely love to talk to you.”

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2012/apr/13/fabiano-caruana-winning-run

Sport

2012-04-13T22:02:01.000Z

Leonard Barden

Leonard Barden on Chess

Fabiano Caruana's eye-catching bout of tournaments with hardly a break has resumed this week. Italy's world No8, aged 19, had already played more games in March and April than the rest of the top 10 grandmasters combined. Caruana joined the elite in February when he tied second with the world No1 Magnus Carlsen at Wijk. After that most GMs would have consolidated with a rest, but Caruana went on to two more tournaments. Now, a few days further on, he is playing for Moscow 64 in the Russian team championship at Sochi. He probably felt he owed it to them after Moscow controversially won the 2011 title with a squad built round western Europe's two star teenagers, Caruana and the 17-year-old Dutch champion Anish Giri. It could never have happened in Soviet times. Spring 2012 has a dearth of invitation elite events after Linares was cancelled because of the recession in Spain while Monaco ceased after 20 years. So for a top talent like Caruana it is open and team tournaments or nothing. Whether intentionally or not, his approach follows a famous old precedent from 1936-37 when Paul Keres and Reuben Fine, then the rising stars of Europe and the US, also played with little rest and ended up tied first at Avro 1938 ahead of four world champions. There is a moral here for other young talents and ambitious amateurs. When on a winning run, keep playing a bunch of events while your energy and motivation are strong. This gives the maximum chance of the hot streak feeding through into your national and world ranking. Alex Morozevich's reputation as one of the most imaginative tacticians among the top 10 GMs was boosted again by his Sochi win against the reigning European champion. White's bold concept was to gambit his d4 pawn so that his Ba3 would stop Black castling. It was unwise for Dmitry Jakovenko to take the bait when 15…g6 16 Qd1 Qb4 or a move later 16…Nc2 would hinder White's plan. In the game Moro broke through and Black resigned because the forced 27…Rxb4 leaves him down on material and position. A Morozevich v D Jakovenko 1 d4 d5 2 c4 c6 3 Nf3 Nf6 4 Nc3 dxc4 5 a4 e6 6 e4 Bb4 7 e5 Nd5 8 Bd2 b5 9 axb5 Bxc3 10 bxc3 cxb5 11 Ng5 Nc6 12 Qh5 Qe7 13 h4 b4 14 Bxc4 bxc3 15 Bc1!? Nxd4?! 16 O-O h6?! 17 Bxd5 exd5 18 Ba3 Qc7 19 e6! Bxe6 20 Nxe6 Nxe6 21 Qxd5 Rd8 22 Qb3 h5 23 Rfe1 Rh6 24 Qb4 Kd7 25 Rac1 Rb8 26 Qa4+ Kc8 27 Bb4 1-0 Sometimes one opening error is enough. Black would remain level by 13…a6! 14 Nd6 Bxc3 15 Qxc3 but as played the Russian champion Peter Svidler got a bind on the position then launched the mating attack 22 Qg6! P Svidler v A Timofeev 1 e4 c5 2 Nf3 e6 3 d4 cxd4 4 Nxd4 Nc6 5 Nc3 Qc7 6 Be3 Nf6 7 f4 Bb4 8 Ndb5 Qa5 9 e5 Ne4 10 Qd3 f5 11 exf6 Nxf6 12 O-O-O O-O 13 a3 Be7? 14 Nd6 a6 15 g3 b5 16 Bg2 Qc7 17 Nce4 Nd5 18 Bc5 Nd8 19 h4 Rb8 20 Ng5 Nf6 21 b4 h6 22 Qg6! a5 23 Nf5! exf5 24 Bxe7 1-0 3249 (by S Brehmer, 1950) 1 Rc3!! (threat 2 Rcb3 and Rb8 or Rb7-a7) Bxc3 2 Re4 Be5 3 Rxe5 and 4 Re8 mate. If c5 2 Rxc5 with 3 Rc8 mates.

Full

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/sep/04/all-in-by-billie-jean-king-review-game-set-and-match

Books

2021-09-04T06:30:15.000Z

Fiona Sturges

All In by Billie Jean King review – game, set and match

Billie Jean King learned early that, as a girl who excelled at sport, she wouldn’t always be treated fairly. There was the elementary school teacher who marked her down for using her “superior ability” during playground games, and the tennis official who pulled her, aged 10, from a players’ photo during a California tournament because she was wearing shorts instead of a skirt. King went on to observe top-ranking teenage boys getting free meals at the canteen of the Los Angeles Tennis Club where she trained, while she and her mother were made to eat the food they had brought from home outside. Later, as a player competing on the international stage, she would see male competitors winning up to eight times the prize money of their female counterparts. “Even if you’re not a born activist,” she writes, “life can damn well make you one.” King’s memoir ­– written with the sports journalist Johnette Howard and writer Maryanne Vollers – is a vivid and detailed account of her rise to sporting greatness and her struggles to attain equal treatment for women in a shockingly discriminatory sport. She reveals how, in the early 1970s, she forged a path for female players by leading the breakaway movement for the first all-women’s tennis pro tour, despite threats that it would finish her career. Many male players, among them Stan Smith , denounced King’s efforts; the Australian player, Fred Stolle, told her: “No one wants to pay to watch you birds play.” But King was undeterred, persuading eight others, among them Rosemary Casals and Nancy Richey, to sign up to what would become the Virginia Slims Circuit for a token dollar bill. They were called the “Original 9” and their set-up became the basis for the formation of the Women’s Tennis Association three years later. King with the Wimbledon trophy following her victory over PF Jones in July 1967. Photograph: Bettmann Archive In 1971, King, who had spent much of the 60s living hand-to-mouth on the measly per diems dispensed during amateur tournaments, earned an unprecedented $100,000; in 1976, Chris Evert’s earnings topped $1m. There were those who felt King’s focus on money was vulgar, but she remained steadfast. As Althea Gibson, the first African American tennis player to win a Grand Slam title and one of King’s biggest inspirations, said: “You can’t eat trophies.” Elsewhere, it’s with remarkable clarity that King recalls life-changing matches, in some cases walking us through each set. This isn’t as laborious as it sounds. King revels in drama and tension, both in her tennis and in her storytelling; given her status as a record-breaking sportswoman, her occasional lapses into bombast seem forgivable. The build-up to the famous “Battle of the Sexes” match, in which she played against Bobby Riggs, and the circus that surrounded it, is terrifically told. Riggs, a fiftysomething attention-seeker and self-proclaimed “male chauvinist pig”, had challenged King to a prize fight in order to prove that women’s tennis was inferior to men’s, and not worthy of investment. Where King spent the weeks before the match training hard and studying Riggs’s game, he spent much of them taunting her in media interviews and setting up endorsement deals. She thrashed him in straight sets. King’s campaigning went beyond tennis, of course. She marched for women’s liberation alongside Gloria Steinem and, in the face of ferocious criticism, went public about having had an abortion. King also endured intense and unfair scrutiny about her marriage to the lawyer Larry King and her sexuality. For years, she kept quiet about her relationships with women, for fear of blowing up her career (she is now a staunch advocate of the LGBTQ community). While All In contains plenty of sporting highs and lows, it is her reflections on this denial and secrecy that gives it its emotional heft. King repeatedly lied to her family, colleagues and the media, even after a former girlfriend, Marilyn Barnett, outed her in 1981 by filing a palimony lawsuit. King writes movingly of her denials of homosexuality, which she says were a result of fear, shame and her own internalised homophobia. “It’s a legacy of so many things, including not knowing if you could trust anyone with the information,” she observes. “People in the closet often take consolation in the idea that at least they’re controlling who knows the truth, when the real truth is that the closet is controlling them.” Later she adds: “I didn’t come out completely and wasn’t comfortable in my own skin until I was 51. I wish I could have done it sooner.” Nonetheless, the courage and stamina it took King to take on a defensive, intractable and often bigoted tennis establishment, and to win, is no small feat, even if it turned out that her biggest battle would be with herself. All In describes a life comprising one epic struggle after another, both on and off court. “But I came through it,” she writes in the epilogue. “I am free.” All In: An Autobiography is published by Viking (£20). To support the Guardian and the Observer buy a copy at guardianbookshop.com. To order Delivery charges may apply.

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https://www.theguardian.com/media/2011/sep/06/emap-appoints-chief-executive

Media

2011-09-06T12:36:00.000Z

Mark Sweney

Emap appoints Duncan Painter as chief executive

Emap, owner of magazines including Drapers and trade shows such as the Cannes advertising festival, has appointed the senior BSkyB executive, Duncan Painter, as its new chief executive. Emap, the trade magazine, data and exhibitions business, has been hunting for a new chief since David Gilbertson announced his surprise departure in early May. Painter is managing director of BSkyB's customer intelligence unit, Sky IQ, which provides data and information to BSkyB as well as other companies such as Centrica and financial services company Zurich. The 41-year-old, who has worked at Sky for the last two years, has held senior roles at companies including Experian and Hitachi. He led the management buyout of ClarityBlue, a consumer intelligence company, in 2003 prior to the sale of the business to Experian in 2006. Guardian Media Group, which also publishes MediaGuardian.co.uk, and Apax bought Emap in December 2007 for about £1bn, with both companies subsequently forced to write down the value of the investment. Apax also acquired a 49.9% stake in Trader Media Group from GMG in 2007. "Duncan has extensive experience of leading successful business-to-business and data companies and was the stand-out candidate for the role," said Irina Hemmers, chairman of Emap and a partner at Apax. Gilbertson left Emap after three years citing the need for new management due to the impact of the recession – adding that the company is on track to post its first year-on-year profit growth since the acquisition. Painter's start date has not yet been confirmed. To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediatheguardian.com or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication". To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook.

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