Money. Power. Self-preservation. From today, the Evening Standard launches its serialisation of The Fall: The End of the Murdoch Empire, by Michael Wolff, author of the Donald Trump blockbuster Fire and Fury.
We begin with the inside story of the sudden firing of Right-wing Fox News host Tucker Carlson, a man who seemed to grow larger than the network itself, much like Trump before him. This isn’t Succession, the loosely fictionalised version of reality. This happened, and its impact on US politics and indeed the future of the West itself is still playing out in front of our eyes.
Later this week, the focus turns to Murdoch’s almost marriage to Ann Lesley Smith, 25 years his junior and a former dental hygienist turned conservative radio host. Something of a nightmare scenario for his children, Wolff writes, who did not need the potential disruption of a fifth marriage to mess with their hard-earned status.
But tomorrow sees attention fall on Piers Morgan, a new TV streaming service and a quiet promise about the job he really wanted. Not one to be missed.
PM’s short-termism
Rishi Sunak’s apparent decision to row back from the UK’s net-zero targets is not only bad for the future viability of our planet, but for British business.
As China, the US and EU are steaming ahead on the low-carbon technologies that will power the 21st century, the UK is once again stuck in the slow lane. Take the plan to ban the sale of new petrol and diesel cars by 2030. How are companies supposed to invest when the regulatory framework can be blown up on a whim? A question raised by Ford UK this morning.
If, as the polls suggest, Sunak is only prime minister for a relatively short time, he ought to place his energies into a legacy any prime minister would be proud of. Short-termism that will lead to more carbon, less investment and fewer jobs is the antithesis of that.
Our campaign goes on
The Evening Standard has been shortlisted for Campaign of the Year at the Society of Editors Media Freedom awards for our hard-hitting School Hunger investigation.
As the cost-of-living crisis worsened over the last year, we reported on the families being pushed to the limit. Our investigations editor David Cohen broke the story of desperate pupils stealing from school canteens and heard from a mother of three caught with a loaf under her coat.
We welcome the Mayor’s subsequent decision to fund free school meals for nearly 300,000 primary school pupils across London this academic year, and will continue to campaign to ensure that no child goes hungry.
