Top story: No 10’s new PR ‘lobbied for Huawei’
Hello, I’m Warren Murray, and I hope this will help you feel more on top of things.
MPs from all sides have accused Boris Johnson of whipping up political poison after the Labour leader, Keir Starmer, was set upon by protesters who accused him of protecting the paedophile Jimmy Savile. Starmer and the shadow foreign secretary, David Lammy, had to be bundled into a police car after anti-vax protesters surrounded him near parliament with shouts of “traitor” and “Jimmy Savile”. The former chief whip Julian Smith described the events as appalling and said the prime minister’s false Savile slurs must be “withdrawn in full”. Johnson said the behaviour directed at Starmer was “absolutely disgraceful” and “completely unacceptable” but once again stopped short of apologising.
Johnson is expected to reshuffle his team today including possibly sacking the chief whip, Mark Spencer. The prime minister will also continue a No 10 overhaul after recruiting Steve Barclay, the Cabinet Office minister, as his chief of staff, and Guto Harri, his former spokesperson, as his new director of communications. Harri has drawn criticism from Labour over his previous job for a lobbying firm that worked for Huawei, the company linked to the Chinese Communist party that has been banned from the UK’s 5G mobile network.
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Diplomacy but no detente – Emmanuel Macron and Vladimir Putin had nothing in the way of a breakthrough to show for five hours of talks at the Kremlin on the Russia-Ukraine crisis. Macron, the French president, is due today in Kyiv to hold talks with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy. Germany’s chancellor, Olaf Scholz, has met with Joe Biden at the White House. Biden insisted the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline from Russia to Germany would be shut down if Russia attacked, but Scholz would not be so specific. Biden said of Putin: “I know that he’s in a position now to be able to invade, almost assuming that the ground is frozen above Kyiv. He has the capacity to do that. What he’s going to do I don’t know.” The president advised US civilians to leave Ukraine, saying: “I don’t want them to get caught in the crossfire.” As the Russian build-up continues, Britain has agreed to send a further 350 troops to Poland.
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Over-18 checks on porn sites – British users of pornography websites would have to provide credit card or passport details to prove they are over 18 under revived plans. Ministers have said the forthcoming online safety bill will cover commercial porn sites, updating draft legislation that now applies to providers of user-generated pornography such as OnlyFans. More than a third of the British population are estimated to watch online pornography, according to estimates by the age verification industry, meaning age checking could be both an enormous technical challenge and potentially big business.
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High street faces hit – Britain’s biggest retailers have warned the cost of living crisis will mean consumers tightening their purse strings over the coming months. Households already grappling with rising energy bills, petrol prices, tax, mortgage payments and rent can also expect to pay more for groceries this year. Supermarkets are responding by cutting back on staff costs; squeezing farmers and other suppliers not to increase their prices; “shrinkflation” tactics such as reducing the amount in a pack of peanuts while keeping the price the same; and cutting out unnecessary product lines. And while it won’t solve the energy price crunch, thousands of homes could soon be paid to halve their electricity usage during high-demand times. Octopus Energy and the National Grid are to trial the scheme.
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Toxins in tap water – Drinking water containing dangerously high levels of toxic chemicals known as PFOS was piped into the homes of more than 1,000 people in south Cambridgeshire, the Guardian can reveal. The aquifer supplying the affected houses, close to Duxford airfield, was found to have PFOS levels at almost 400 nanograms per litre (ng/l) of water – four times the Drinking Water Inspectorate’s limit. Cambridge Water has admitted it removed the supply in June last year and said the exposure was under investigation. It admitted it had not told the community but said it had blended the water with another source. It would not say how long the villages had been drinking the contaminated supply, only that modelling and sampling undertaken in 2020 suggested the levels were previously below 100ng/l. PFOS has been associated with increased cholesterol, low birthweight and suppressed immune response. In the past it was used in firefighting foams, including at airfields. Defra, the Drinking Water Inspectorate and the Environment Agency declined to comment.
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Runs like it’s on rails – The Elizabeth line must be “flawless” before it can officially launch this year, London’s transport chief has said, amid speculation that the £18.9bn Crossrail project’s opening could be moved to the spring – before the Queen’s jubilee celebrations. As trials continue, Gwyn Topham, the Guardian’s transport correspondent, has taken a trip on the line, riding on spacious trains along the tunnels winding from Paddington to Liverpool Street.
The official deadline for opening is the end of June. Andy Byford, the transport commissioner, said he would not give the go-ahead until entirely satisfied: “Better to take an extra couple of weeks, after how long Londoners have had to wait, than have people loving the surroundings but disappointed by the reliability. Some days it is 98% on time, but some days have been 80%, and that’s not good enough.”
Today in Focus podcast: Hooked on crypto
With endorsements from celebrities and ads on TikTok, cryptocurrency has gone mainstream. But not everyone gets rich. Rob Davies reports on how crypto apps encourage addictive, high-risk trading habits.
Lunchtime read: Confessions of an alcoholic doctor
“I’m 29 years old, writing notes in a sloppy felt-tip pen (no ballpoints are allowed), trying to understand how I went from being a newly minted doctor in a psychiatry residency programme at Columbia University in New York to a psychiatric patient at Bellevue, the city’s notorious public hospital.”
Drinking and drug use pushed Carl Erik Fisher over the edge into a complete breakdown. Then a stint in rehab made him question how much we really understand about addiction.
Sport
At the Winter Olympics so far this morning, Kirsty Muir of Team GB has finished fifth in the women’s big air. US-born Eileen Gu won the gold for China. The curling mixed doubles bronze-medal game between Sweden and Team GB will be starting soon. Follow the action at our live blog.
England slumped to an eight-wicket defeat in the third one-day international as Australia brought down the curtain on the Women’s Ashes series with another thumping win. Max Verstappen, the Formula One world champion, has spoken to the Guardian about the final-lap drama in Abu Dhabi that secured him a first world title – that he “really deserved” – at the expense of his fierce rival Lewis Hamilton. After confirming the appointment of Paul Collingwood as interim head coach on Monday England’s extensive post-Ashes overhaul turns next to the playing staff. Nike has terminated its endorsement agreement with the Manchester United and England striker Mason Greenwood, the sportswear firm has announced. Chelsea have settled a high court case brought by four former youth-team players over alleged historical racist abuse.
Business
The Indian coal tycoon Gautam Adani has become Asia’s richest man after his big bet on solar energy propelled his fortune to $88.5bn. Adani, whose company is pursuing one of the world’s largest coal projects in Australia, passed fellow Indian mogul Mukesh Ambani and also entered the top 10 of the world’s richest people. The FTSE100 is set to nudge up 0.1% this morning while the pound is on $1.353 and €1.184.
The papers
The Guardian leads with “Angry MPs blame Johnson ‘poison’ after anti-vaxxers set upon Starmer”. A Mirror front-page photo of the scene is overlaid with: “This is why words matter … this is why truth matters”. Its splash though, is “Waiting shame”, about the backlog of six million NHS patients on waiting lists. The number one story in the Times is “Britain will not flinch over Ukraine, says PM” – the mobbing of Keir Starmer runs across the top of the page. The Metro has the latter as “Keir flees hate mob” and the i has something similar, appended with “… as PM faces crunch 48 hours”.
The Telegraph reports “North Sea oil fired up amid net zero row” – it says new drilling is set to be approved. “A licence to clean up the web” – that’s the Mail on over-18 ID requirements for porn sites. The Express has “Boris: Rishi is loyal and we’re united on problems”. In a puff box below the masthead it has “Disgraceful: Starmer is mobbed by anti-vaxxers”. The Sun leads with a footballer being filmed kicking a cat. And the top story in the Financial Times is “ECB rate expectations force up Greek and Italian borrowing costs” – as investors adjust to signs that the European Central Bank could raise interest rates as soon as this year.
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