Innholdsfortegnelse for V. 1072 i The Week

What happened Labour was in disarray in the run-up to Thursday’s local elections as it struggled to contain an ongoing row over anti-Semitism in the party. The issue flared up last week following the suspension of Naz Shah, the Labour MP for Bradford West, over a 2014 Facebook post in which she endorsed the suggestion that Israeli Jews should be transported to America. Ken Livingstone defended her comments in a round of provocative interviews, in which he claimed, among other things, that Hitler had supported Zionism “before he went mad and ended up killing six million Jews”. This led to a televised spat with Labour MP John Mann, who accused the former mayor of London of being a “Nazi apologist”. Livingstone was suspended from Labour, but he remained unrepentant, insisting…

Tipping proposals Restaurants should hand all tips – and money accrued from service charges – to staff, the Business Secretary said this week. Sajid Javid wants to prevent firms from taking any share of tips; and for restaurants to make it clearer to customers that service charges are optional. The proposals would initially be voluntary, but Javid said the Government would consider legislation “if necessary”. The Government launched a review last year, in response to complaints that restaurants were helping themselves to some of the service charge. Separately, it was reported that Le Pain Quotidien – which has for years been creaming off staff tips – and other chains are now cutting other staff perks to cover the cost of paying the National Living Wage. Parents’ strike It is estimated…

Callow on “blacking up” In 1984, Simon Callow became the first well-known British actor to come out as gay. “I used to say that I was John the Baptist to Ian McKellen’s Jesus. Because I got the ball rolling,” he told Harry Wallop in The Daily Telegraph. It didn’t do his career any harm: on the contrary, in the years since, Callow has become something of a national treasure, playing everyone from Charles Dickens to Galileo. A decent actor, he believes, should be able to play any part – a view directly opposed to the current orthodoxy, which holds that, say, transgender roles should be played only by transgender actors. “The whole idea of acting has gone out of the window if you follow the logic of that,” he says.…

Schools are for learning, not for loveliness Barbara Ellen The Observer “Let our kids be kids.” That was the cry of the campaigners who urged parents to protest the upcoming Sats tests by keeping their Year 2 children out of primary school this Tuesday, and instead make their own “educational fun”. To some degree, I sympathise, says Barbara Ellen: nobody wants children to get worn down by exams, or primary schools to become fixated on Sats results. Yet there’s an element of self-indulgence and naivety about all this. To listen to some, you’d think schools were there only to be a “haven of potato-printing, tambourine-banging loveliness”, rather than a place where children actually learn stuff. The bottom line is that taking tests has always been a key part of education.…

Sound waves used to zap cancer A treatment for early-stage prostate cancer that uses sound waves to “cook” tumours could be used as an alternative to invasive treatments, sparing thousands of patients the erectile problems and incontinence that are often side effects of surgery, reports the Daily Mail. Known as High Intensity Focused Ultrasound or “HiFu”, it works by using a narrow beam of energy – transmitted via an ultrasound projector – to heat cancer cells to 90°C, killing the tumour while leaving the surrounding tissue intact. The technology is not in fact new, but it has never been widely used because ultrasound projectors have until now contained steel, which meant they could not be used in conjunction with MRI scanners. (The steel interferes with magnets in the machines.) Doctors…

Terence Trent D’Arby had a profound connection with the late pop star Prince. Writing in the New Statesman, Trent D’Arby (below, who now goes by the name Sananda Maitreya) revealed that Prince was his “great master” and “mentor”, in matters of spirituality as well as music. “He could both read minds and place thoughts, like the ancient eastern yogis,” Maitreya claimed. “And if you were full of s***, you would be very uncomfortable around him. In fact, he once berated me for not responding to a telepathic message he sent: I did receive it but I told him that I was busy sending a message to Michael Jackson.” Gerry Adams has defended himself against accusations of racism, saying: “I’ve never seen myself as white.” The Sinn Féin leader provoked fury…

It was Syria’s commercial capital, home to two million people, and famed for the sprawling medieval souk in its walled Old Town. Now, after four years of civil war, much of Aleppo – ancient and modern – lies in ruins. Thousands of people have been killed, and around three-quarters of Aleppo’s civilian population has fled in the face of the Assad regime’s ferocious barrel bombing, and bombardments from rebel-held areas. For those that remain, conditions grow ever more desperate. Aid agencies estimate that in rebel-held parts of Aleppo, there are only about 80 medical staff left to care for a population of 250,000; and with government forces deliberately targeting medical clinics, their numbers are dwindling fast. Last week, the only paediatrician left in rebel-held Aleppo, Dr Mohammad Maaz, was among…

To The Guardian I was living in Sheffield in 1989, and bought a copy of the Sheffield Star’s special edition on the tragedy, published the following day, on Sunday 16 April, which I still have. Reading it again, in the context of the inquest verdicts, it is striking to note that the paper’s account of the disaster, written by local reporters in the hours following it, and based on eyewitness accounts, is virtually identical in its conclusions to that of the jury’s verdicts 27 years later. The front page explicitly states that “Liverpool fans were not to blame, but the victims”. It also describes the decision of David Duckenfield (not named at that stage) to open the gate as “a moment of madness”, which “backfired in a catastrophe which brought…

Eligible by Curtis Sittenfeld The Borough Press 528pp £14.99 The Week bookshop £12.99 (incl. p&p) In this “hilarious” updating of Pride and Prejudice (one of a series of reworked Austens), Curtis Sittenfeld “transposes” the Bennets to modern-day Cincinnati, said Janice Turner in The Times. Jane and Lizzie, aged 22 and 20 in the original, are now career women of 40 and 38, worried about their “declining fertility”. Then the “rich and imperious” Darcy – a neurosurgeon – turns up; where the original Elizabeth and Darcy sparred in the drawing room, Sittenfeld’s go off for afternoon “hate sex”. Exuberant and full of “in-jokes”, Eligible is a “sure-footed” effort by a writer with a “better claim than most” to “Austen’s mantle”. “This is Pride and Prejudice in the age of smartphones, transgender…

The success of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel has ushered in a spate of movies aimed at an older audience. And one such is Golden Years, a crime caper set in Bristol, featuring a likeable cast of TV and theatre stalwarts of a certain age. It sounds as if it might be quite entertaining, said Wendy Ide in The Observer, but don’t be fooled. It’s actually about as much fun as “a botched hip operation”. The film casts Bernard Hill and Virginia McKenna as two poverty-stricken retirees who decide to become bank robbers, with the help of similarly hard-up contemporaries. These include Simon Callow as “a Welsh am-dram aficionado who gets his bum out” and Una Stubbs as “his sex-starved missus”, said Catherine Shoard in The Guardian. But eventually the…

Keith Coventry at Pace Of all the artists associated with the Young British Artists movement, Keith Coventry always stood out as the most cerebral. Though his work often deals with sordid subjects – drugs, racism and prostitution have all featured – the results have a quiet beauty informed by both art historical tradition and present-day social concerns. This new exhibition showcases two bodies of work inspired by the discarded McDonald’s fast-food packaging that Coventry found littering the streets around his studio. The first consists of a number of huge white reliefs based on the curving “M” of the chain’s logo, recalling both minimalist painting and – with their mottled, ivory-like surfaces – primitive carving. The second group renders the McDonald’s motif in precious metals, a literal spin on the chain’s…

As the days get longer and brighter, so the search begins for wines which are long on taste and light on the palate, says David Williams in The Observer. Here are three reds: Boutinot Percheron Old Vine Cinsault, Western Cape, South Africa 2014 (£5.75, The Wine Society). The current vintage of one of the UK’s best-value springinto-summer reds, with its whiff of pretty red berries and cherries, is now available from numerous independent sellers. Carlos Costoya Alodio Joven Ribeira Sacra, Spain 2015 (£11.50; Chester Beer and Wine). Mencía is the main red variety here, mixed with the more obscure merenzao and brancellao for a distinctively wild, earthy, cherry scented, fluent and spring fresh original. Domaine de la Noblaie Chinon, France 2013 (£12.95; Halifax Wine Company). Loire wines ooze “freshness and…

The Mackintosh trail In the 1920s, the pioneering architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh and his wife, Margaret, took up painting in France’s Languedoc-Roussillon region, in the foothills of the Pyrénées. They travelled widely with their easels, and now the routes they took are waymarked, says Gavin Bell in The Independent. The village of Collioure (pictured), squeezed between the hills and the sea, close to the Spanish border, was an artists’ colony then: now its narrow cobbled lanes are lined with galleries. No less lovely are medieval Céret (which has a fine Museum of Modern Art), the spa town of Amélie-les-Bains, and the walled town of Villefranche-de-Conflent. From there, the Petit Train Jaune (Little Yellow Train) still “bravely climbs” through ravines and over chasms to a place that Mackintosh called “fairyland” –…

Apple: shares puréed on “peak” fears “This too shall pass,” said Apple chief Tim Cook in a call with analysts after reporting the company’s first ever drop in iPhone sales. But not perhaps as quickly as he’d like, said the Financial Times. Having lost more than $40bn in value last week, Apple’s losing streak continued: on Monday, shares fell for the eighth consecutive day – “their worst losing streak since July 1998”. They are now more than a third off their all-time high of $133, seen in May 2015. The most optimistic assessment of analysts is that Cook and co have a couple of quarters “to sweat out” before the arrival of the iPhone 7 later this year, said Supantha Mukherjee on Reuters. The hope is that will “turn the…

Things are looking up in Europe Richard Barley The Wall Street Journal “The eurozone has provided investors with plenty of surprises of late, most of them unpleasant,” says Richard Barley. So the latest economic data is “a refreshing change”. According to Eurostat, first-quarter growth in the zone came in at a “decent” 0.6%, or 2.2% annualised – trumping the US and the UK. Meanwhile, unemployment has continued to fall. There are caveats: inflation has dipped back into negative territory, and this early estimate excludes data from Germany and Italy, which account for 45% of the eurozone economy. Besides, “growth may not be sustainable at the first quarter’s pace, as it appears to be well above trend”. The European Commission puts potential annual growth in 2016-17 at just 1%. Yet the…

What happened They said it was as likely as a cat winning the Grand National, or a Boris Bike the Tour de France. Yet Leicester City achieved the seemingly impossible this week, by winning the Premier League. The East Midlands club had never before been crowned champions of England; it narrowly avoided relegation last season; and many pundits had predicted it would go down this year. Last August, the bookies offered odds of up to 5,000-1 on the club winning the title – the same as on Elvis Presley being found alive. Yet the team clinched the title on Monday, prompting a wave of delight across the country. The side is managed by Claudio Ranieri, an avuncular 64-year-old Italian best known in Britain for an undistinguished period at Chelsea. He…

Dublin Political deal: More than two months on from its inconclusive general election, Ireland finally has a new government, thanks to an unprecedented accord between the Republic’s two biggest parties, Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil. There will be no grand coalition between the two – that proved a step too far for parties whose historic enmity was forged during the Irish civil war almost a century ago. However, in a deal thrashed out last week, Fianna Fáil agreed to facilitate a Fine Gael minority government until September 2018, bringing some stability to Irish politics. Under its terms, Fine Gael’s Enda Kenny will remain as PM, subject to the support of a handful of independent MPs. However, commentators have warned that as the diminished leader of a diminished party, he will…

To the usual list of public swimming pool rules (no running, no heavy petting), Icelanders have added another. Users of a pool in Reykjavík were surprised to find new posters in the men’s changing room, warning them not to use the communal hairdryers to dry their scrotums. The laminated posters feature a naked gentleman with one leg raised, brazenly blowdrying his private parts, with a large X drawn across him. The discovery of a 19th century photograph of a semi-naked, large-bottomed figure has raised speculation that Boris Johnson could be a time-travelling prostitute. The London mayor is said to bear a startling resemblance to the person, posing in underwear in the photo, taken circa 1896 – although it is not clear if the subject is a cross-dressing man, or a…

UNITED STATES Who’s the real “shirker” in Nato? The Washington Post “When it comes to foreign policy, Donald Trump and Barack Obama do not have that much in common,” says Daniel W. Drezner. But they agree on one thing: Nato’s European members aren’t pulling their weight. Trump has repeatedly complained about countries “free-riding” off the US, and Obama echoed that sentiment in an interview the other day, saying “free-riders aggravate me”. It seems a legitimate grievance when you consider that the US spends more than 3.5% of GDP on defence, whereas only four non-US members of Nato made good on the pledge to spend 2% of GDP on defence last year. But before this complaint “calcifies into an accepted story told around the foreign policy campfire”, it’s worth pointing out…

Britain’s ash trees may be more resistant to ash dieback than those elsewhere in Europe, according to new research – raising hopes that the disease may not be as devastating to British forests as originally feared. Ash dieback has killed 90% of ash trees in Denmark, and there have been predictions that British forests will be all but wiped out too. But when a team of international researchers compared the genes of a sample of British ashes with trees from Denmark, they found that the British trees were much more likely than their Danish counterparts to display the “genetic markers” of immunity. On the basis of this discovery, Professor Allan Downie, of the John Innes Centre in Norwich, said it may be that the death rate in Britain will be…

Are you shocked by what Naz Shah posted on Facebook in 2014, a year before she became Labour MP for Bradford? Are you amazed that an aspiring politician would call for Israeli Jews to be “relocated” to America, or warn supporters to vote in an online poll because “the Jews are rallying”? “Don’t be,” said Ben Judah in The Independent. “Because Naz Shah, and everything she said, is normal politics in Bradford.” It has been ever since 2012, when the former Labour MP George Galloway descended on the depressed industrial town and started spreading his anti-Semitic poison. He managed to persuade the Muslim voters of Bradford that a vote for him was a vote to “liberate Jerusalem”. He won the election and duly declared Bradford an “Israel-free zone”. Soon, every…

Fields drenched in blood. Characters ambushed by murderous rivals and strangled in snares. Watership Down – the 1972 story about a colony of rabbits – is “not exactly a fluffy bunny tale”, said Brian Viner in the Daily Mail. I still remember “soft-hearted friends” going to see the 1978 animated film version of the book because “they were entranced by Art Garfunkel sweetly singing the theme tune, Bright Eyes”, then “reeling away from the cinema in horror”. When Channel 5 screened the film on Easter Sunday this year, it led to a barrage of complaints from parents. Little wonder, then, that the BBC is planning to tone down the violence in its new adaptation of the work. The four-part animation, voiced by Olivia Colman and James McAvoy, apparently “won’t shy…

Snooker Leicester had cause for “double cheer” on Monday night, said Hector Nunns in The Times. Local boy Mark Selby beat Ding Junhui 18-14 to win his second World Championship. That made him only the sixth player to have won more than one world title at Sheffield’s Crucible – and earned him £330,000, the biggest prize in the sport’s history. Rugby union The Leicester Tigers have also done the city proud, said Paul Rees in The Observer. They beat Worcester 31-17 last Saturday to secure a spot in the Premiership play-offs for the 12th consecutive season. Yet the side will approach the play-offs with trepidation: they are likely to face Saracens, the overwhelming favourites for the title.…

Theatre The Comedy About a Bank Robbery Playwrights: Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer and Henry Shields Director: Mark Bell The Criterion Theatre, London W1 (0844-815 6131) Until April 2017 Running time: 2hrs 20mins (including interval) “When was the last time you spent your evening laughing like a drunken cheetah?” Mine was last Wednesday, said Dominic Maxwell in the Times, when I watched Mischief Theatre, the “terrifically talented and fearsomely focused twentysomethings behind The Play That Goes Wrong, raise their game and slay their audience” with the “funniest flat-out comedy since One Man, Two Guvnors”. Unlike their breakthrough hit, still running in the West End after two years, The Comedy About a Bank Robbery doesn’t rely on the “conceit of theatrical catastrophe”. Instead, this spoof 1950s jewel-heist caper is an “outrageously well-executed”…

This is a “funny, smoothly executed” comedy drama, said Allan Hunter in the Daily Express, in which Jake Gyllenhaal plays Davis, a banker who loses his wife in a car crash, only to discover that he feels no emotion. Did he ever really love her? He promptly plunges into a midlife crisis that sees him growing a beard, warming to a “kooky” customer-services operator (Naomi Watts), and dismantling his computer to find out how it works. It’s a compelling performance. Davis engages in this frantic activity, we’re meant to realise, in an attempt to understand himself better. In case we don’t, his voice-over intones: “For some reason, everything has become a metaphor.” And that, said Danny Leigh in the FT, was when I wanted to kick the screenwriter in the…

The luxury goods billionaire François Pinault is one of this planet’s “most aggressive collectors of modern masters”, says Guy Martin in Forbes. And he has finally found a home in the heart of Paris for his $1.2bn art collection – after years of trying, and being rebuffed by local planners. At present, the works are displayed in three private museums in Venice. But last week Pinault (pictured) announced his vast collection of works by modern and contemporary artists – from Mark Rothko to Damien Hirst – is to be housed at Paris’s Bourse de Commerce in the 1st Arrondissement; he’ll sign a 50-year lease on the building. Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo described the new museum as “an immense gift” to the city, and praised Pinault and his business rival Bernard…

Rob arrives home from hospital and is irritated by Ursula’s fussing. Ursula collects Henry from Bridge Farm for a visit. He’s excited to see Rob, but wants to know when his mummy will be home. Henry isn’t taken back to Bridge Farm at the agreed time. Pat calls Ursula, who says Henry will be staying put: “Now that his father’s back home, there’s no need for him to be staying at Bridge Farm any more is there?” Pat’s distraught. Rob speaks to Pat and reminds her of his parental rights and explains that Helen’s no longer responsible for Henry after what she’s done. Dominic advises Pat that they need to file an application to the family court. Anna interviews Helen. Helen can recall only hazy details of the stabbing. Anna…

Gravetye Manor Vowels Lane, West Hoathly, Sussex (01342-810567) Chef George Blogg’s menu, at this Michelin-starred restaurant, is “not just a pleasure to read but also to listen to”, says Nicholas Lander in the FT. “As we were finishing our first course, a couple was shown to the next table, handed menus and aperitifs, and proceeded to read out every single dish to each other.” Some might have found this annoying; I found it rather charming to hear the woman’s voice resound with surprise and indecision. Should she choose the guinea fowl with pak choi, caramelised cauliflower and mead sauce? Or the haunch of local venison with baked pumpkin and a chartreuse jus? The truth is that anyone fortunate enough to be lunching or dining at this calming country hotel, with…

New cars: what the critics say Car Magazine Car buyers’ hunger for crossovers “shows little sign of abating”. By the end of the decade, these compact, more comfortable SUVs are expected to account for a fifth of all cars sold in Europe. It’s no surprise, then, that the Tiguan has already been a big hit – it’s Volkswagen’s third bestselling model in the UK. And this new, overhauled version of the five-seater builds on the car’s strengths. The Daily Telegraph The new Tiguan won’t “put off” old fans: VW has taken a “conservative approach” to the design, merely making it more angular. Inside, however, there are big changes. The dashboard is “much classier”, with a touchscreen entertainment system. And the car has become more spacious – six-footers can fit easily…

Fforest, Pembrokeshire A “creative commune” founded by two graduates of the Shoreditch art scene, Fforest is set on a “tumbledown” farm just outside Cardigan. There are bell tents, a “hybrid campshack”, domes like “giant puffballs”, a wooden sauna in a glade, and lots of activities, including wildlife art sessions, evening films in a big tepee, and survival lessons. Nearby are Teifi Marshes (for otterspotting in canoes), and Poppit Sands (for kite-flying). Three nights for four people from £484 (www.coldatnight.co.uk). Swinton Bivouac, Yorkshire Set in the grounds of a country house hotel, this camp has yurts as well as more luxurious wooden shacks with stone-tiled bathrooms, flushing loos and wood-fired showers. Children can handle falcons and even a snowy owl in the aviary; the café serves “marvellous” game pie; and there’s…

Alarm bells continued to sound about London property. Knight Frank warned of “hesitant” buyers in the capital, reporting that some sellers are dropping asking prices by more than 10%. Prices in Chelsea are now down 3% year-onyear; south Kensington has seen falls approaching 5%. The pound dropped after a shock contraction in UK manufacturing, which fell for the first time in three years in April. Sterling was also hit by Markit data revealing that employment had fallen at its fastest pace since February 2013, and that new export orders have dropped for a fourth straight month. Moody’s warned that the break-up of the EU could be a case of “when not if”. The credit-rating agency said the union was vulnerable to a cocktail of looming crises that threatened to reverse…

● A turning point for commodities? “The only way is up for oil and metal prices.” This is a call increasingly heard in the City of late, with oil leading the way. After months of touching decade-low levels, the price has enjoyed a substantial bounceback, said Harry Wilson in The Times. Oil put in its biggest monthly gain in seven years in April, with Brent crude gaining more than 22% in the month, reaching $48.50/barrel – up more than 70% from its January lows. The hope in the industry is that a floor has finally been reached. ● Phantom rally? Investor sentiment has also “started to turn cautiously positive” in the metals sector, said Jessica Morris in City AM. Copper and iron prices have improved materially in the last couple…

Dominic Chappell BHS employees are still reeling from a memo sent by their boy-racer boss casually informing them of the company’s lurch into administration, says the Daily Mail. Chappell’s “insensitive note” advised them “to keep their heads held high” and ended with an upbeat refrain: “Bonne chance, mon ami.” Fortunately, the “BHS buffoon” was away from the group’s Marylebone offices when his billet-doux landed. “Otherwise, workers say there’s ‘a bonne chance’ he wouldn’t have made it out of the building.” Chappell, a double bankrupt, hasn’t given up on BHS. In fact, he’s preparing a second bid to buy the retailer out of administration, and claims that talks with US investors are at a “mature” stage. He reckons he has a “sporting” 50/50 chance of success. Nice odds. Lord (Stuart) Rose…

Cops and robbers. Goodies and baddies. When we were growing up, the cops were always the good guys, said Bryony Gordon in The Daily Telegraph. We don’t think that any more – not after the jury at the Hillsborough inquest delivered its verdict last week. It wasn’t just an indictment of how the South Yorkshire Police (SYP) behaved in 1989: how they twisted the truth and leant on witnesses to preserve the fiction that it was the drunken behaviour of Liverpool fans, not their own gross negligence, that led to 96 people being crushed to death in the stadium. We now learn that during this inquest, the SYP chief constable David Crompton spent millions of taxpayers’ money to get lawyers to maintain that fiction. Crompton has now been suspended, but…

The special relationship is often seen as a choice between Britain facing Europe or the Atlantic. “Every time I must choose between you and Roosevelt, I shall choose Roosevelt!” shouted Churchill in a row with General de Gaulle on the eve of D-Day. “In my lifetime,” declared Thatcher, “all our problems have come from mainland Europe and all the solutions have come from the English-speaking nations across the world.” But, of course, Churchill was an early proponent of a United States of Europe; and in recent years it has become increasingly clear that the US views British membership as a priority. Long before Obama’s most recent intervention, a string of US officials have been unusually frank that their preference, as Secretary of State John Kerry put it, is for “a…

NETHERLANDS Anne Frank’s diary should be free to all 7 May 2016 THE WEEK Anne Frank’s diary should be free to all Few published works have done more to expose the chaotic and incoherent nature of copyright law in Europe than Anne Frank’s The Diary of a Young Girl, says Alek Tarkowski. Under EU copyright law, a work ceases to be protected when the writer has been dead 70 years, so theoretically it should now be possible to download the book for free. Alas, the original copyright holder has other ideas. Ownership of the best-known version, the one edited by Anne’s father, Otto, passed on his death in 1980 to his Swiss-based foundation, which insists that Otto should be considered a co-author of the edited version – meaning it could…

E-cigarettes are “much safer” than conventional cigarettes, and doctors should do more to encourage smokers to switch to them, a report by the Royal College of Physicians has concluded. Moreover, fears that e-cigarettes act as a “gateway” to smoking for non-users are unfounded, it says: nearly everyone who uses e-cigarettes is a current or ex-smoker looking to cut down or quit. If anything, the report continues, e-cigarettes act as a gateway “from smoking” – since they lead some smokers to quit who wouldn’t otherwise have done so. The findings follow a recent report by Public Health England that estimated vaping is around 95% safer than normal smoking. E-cigarettes, which first appeared in the UK in 2007, are used by an estimated 2.1 million Britons; anti-smoking group Ash estimates that there…

In 1939, my grandfather, then aged eight, and his brother, 12, left Berlin on a Kindertransport train bound for London, said Joshua Zitser in The Independent. They arrived at Liverpool Street station on their own; they would never see their parents or their little brother again. However, like 10,000 other Jewish children, they were received by the British Government, and given homes by British people. These penniless orphans grew up to have happy, successful lives, and their own families. This is why I found the rejection of the so-called “Dubs Amendment” by the Commons last week so “devastating”. Lord Dubs, himself a beneficiary of the Kindertransport, put forward a motion to take in 3,000 unaccompanied child refugees now in Calais or elsewhere in mainland Europe. Such children, some separated from…

“The student leaders of today are the student leaders of tomorrow.” John F. Kennedy, quoted in The Times “I can hardly imagine anyone setting out deliberately for Brussels.” Lady Georgia in Ronald Firbank’s Vainglory, quoted in The Times “To be a grown-up is to be a plausible liar, to other plausible liars.” Lemmy from Motörhead, quoted in The Guardian “There’s no Labour problem Ken [Livingstone] can’t make worse.” Alan Johnson, quoted in The Observer “The best qualification for a prophet is to have a good memory.” Lord Halifax, quoted on The Browser “When choosing between two evils, I always like to try the one I’ve never tried before.” Mae West, quoted in The Daily Telegraph “The most formidable weapon against errors of every kind is reason. I have never used…

Changing times To The Times Unlike Gideon Osen, my Jewish family has only been here since the late 19th century. When I was a child in the kindergarten of a renowned boys’ public school during the War, the class teacher would say, when I had an altercation with another boy: “You Jews are always making trouble.” For my first job, I was interviewed with a view to my becoming articled to a London accountant. “Sorry, but some of our clients don’t like dealing with Jewish clerks,” he said. When my nephews applied to be pupils at a well-known London boys’ school, it was: “Sorry, the Jewish quota is full.” Although some “saloon bar” anti-Semitism persists, and although, since 1948, “anti-Zionism” has arrived, thankfully none of the above behaviour would be…

by Lynsey Hanley Allen Lane 256pp £16.99 The Week bookshop £14.99 (incl. p&p) In her new book, Lynsey Hanley tells the “ageold” story of the “lonely journey” from lower class to middle class, said Craig Brown in The Mail on Sunday – a journey she describes as “like emigrating from one side of the world to the other”. Although she grew up on a Birmingham council estate (an experience she wrote about in an earlier work, Estates), Hanley wasn’t “classically working class”. Her father, a clerk, wore a tie to work; the family ate “HP Sauce, not Daddies”. From an early age, Hanley felt herself a “misfit” on the tough Chelmsley Wood estate, with its “casual racism and casual violence”, and she had a strong “urge towards self-improvement”. Aged 17,…

“Underwear rarely makes it into the history books,” said Helen Lewis in the New Statesman. But believe it or not, “you can tell a huge amount about a society by its pants”. Although it is “essentially functional”, it cannot help but betray the “intimate secrets of its owner’s body and life”. From the “heavy stays” of the Regency period to the “shapewear” of today, our underwear has always been representative of class, status and taste. This new exhibition at the V&A is an attempt to “tease out” the “complicated contextual history” of our undies, taking in everything from tightly laced corsets to the present-day creations of Agent Provocateur. It shows us not only the “technical advances” of underwear design, but also how fashion dictates our most basic physical movements. The…

John Aubrey’s Brief Lives (Vintage £9.99). Aubrey’s brilliant biographical sketches, written in the late 17th century, are often cited as the beginning of modern biography. They also inspired the playful obituaries pioneered by Hugh Massingberd on The Daily Telegraph obituaries desk, where I worked in the 1990s. Aubrey has now himself become the subject of a wonderfully original biography, John Aubrey: My Own Life, by Ruth Scurr. The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes by Janet Malcolm, 1993 (Granta £9.99). This is so good: inventive, piercing and witty, it’s both a fantastic essay on biography and a riveting revisiting of the Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath story. The Trip to Echo Spring by Olivia Laing, 2013 (Canongate £10.99). Biography blends with memoir, essay, travel diary and literary criticism in…

Programmes Hillsborough An in-depth account of the disaster that claimed the lives of 96 football fans, and its aftermath. Sun 8 May, BBC2 9pm (120mins). Upstart Crow Six-part comedy starring David Mitchell as a fictional William Shakespeare trying to make his name. Mon 9 May, BBC2 10pm (30mins). Crash: Anatomy of an Accident Dramadocumentary following the stories of the people involved in one of Britain’s biggest ever pile-ups, when 130 vehicles on the Sheppey Crossing in Kent collided in thick fog. Tue 10 May, ITV1 9pm (60mins). Children on the Frontline: The Escape Documentary following the fortunes of a Syrian family over three years, from escaping Aleppo to beginning new lives in Germany. Tue 10 May, C4 10pm (60mins). Iran’s Dating Revolution Unreported World visits Iran, where nearly half of…

Banoffee chia pots Serves 4-6 For the base: 12 large dates (look for the Deglet Nour variety) 75g desiccated coconut a pinch of salt For the pudding: 100g chia seeds 1 x 400g tin coconut milk 1 tsp vanilla bean paste juice of 1 lemon 1 tbsp maple syrup 5 ripe bananas 1 tsp coconut oil desiccated coconut and black sesame seeds, to sprinkle • First make the base. Blitz the dates, coconut and a generous pinch of salt in a food processor until a sticky mixture forms. Divide between tumblers and press down firmly, then leave in the fridge to set while you make the pudding. • Put the chia seeds, coconut milk, vanilla bean paste, lemon juice, maple syrup and 4 of the bananas in a food processor…

Acclaimed photographer who started life as a shepherd Malick Sidibé 1935-2016 Malick Sidibé, who has died aged 80, was known as the “Eye of Bamako” for the way he captured – in his images of young Malians dancing – the new-found exuberance of the country as it emerged from colonial rule in the 1960s, said The Times. “Amusez-vous!” he would cry, as he photographed smartly dressed couples jiving to the twist, or getting down to James Brown. Until then, photographs of West Africa had tended to depict its topography, or conflict and hardship, said The Daily Telegraph. Sidibé showed a different side. “For me, photography is all about youth,” he said in 2008. “It’s about a happy world full of joy, not some kid crying on a street corner.” Malick…

“This AGM season is shaping up to be one of the most raucous on record,” observed the Institute of Directors boss, Simon Walker, last week. “Shareholders are finding their voice.” It was indeed another bruising week for some of Britain’s largest companies, as millions of shareholders turned on “fat cat” bosses, said Hugo Duncan in the Daily Mail. There were rebellions at pharma firms AstraZeneca and Shire. But the biggest upset was at Weir Group, the engineering outfit recently demoted from the FTSE 100, where 72% of shareholders voted down a plan granting executives millions in share options without performance targets – forcing it to be ditched. It was the most emphatic rejection of a pay policy since binding votes on bonuses were introduced in 2013. Boardroom bosses will be…

“Active” fund managers have taken a lot of flak for charging high fees for mediocre performance – hence the growing popularity of “passive” tracking funds, said The Times. Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) are a fast-expanding category and deliver exposure to a broad range of markets. Here Hargreaves Lansdown selects its version of the perfect ETF portfolio. FTSE 100: iShares FTSE 100. This is the UK’s oldest ETF and still one of the best. It’s a simple FTSE 100 tracker with a low fee of 0.07%. US Equities: iShares Core S&P 500. Europe’s largest ETF, tracking the S&P 500 index of the largest US companies. Emerging markets: iShares Core MSCI Emerging Markets. The emerging markets ETF covering almost 2,000 companies, with fees of only 0.25%. Bonds: Lyxor ETF iBoxx £ Gilts. With…

Who’s tipping what The week’s best buys AB Dynamics Investors Chronicle The testing and measurement specialist has delivered robust growth and a 48% profit rise, thanks to carmakers’ obsession with cutting-edge technology such as AB’s advanced driver assistance systems. Pricey but worth it. Buy. 473p. AstraZeneca The Times CEO Pascal Soriot has ambitious oncology-focused plans for the pharma, which is suffering a patent cliff. There’s no guarantee that plans will come to fruition, but the 4.8% yield is safe and worth having anyway. Buy. £39.41. Croda International The Times The speciality chemicals firm is developing patent-protected products for industrial customers who are not too price-sensitive. Croda plans to triple capital spending: there should be more innovation to come. Buy. £30.53. Pendragon The Times Pendragon is a well-run car dealership that…

This week’s crossword winner will receive an Ettinger (www.ettinger.co.uk) Brogue Collection nut coin purse, which retails at £150, and two Connell Guides (www.connellguides.com). ACROSS 8 Type that is offensive (6) 9 Old harpsichord never having been touched? (8) 10 Switch positions sometimes (3-3-2) 11 Computing expert breaking the ice (6) 12 Pitcher, for example showing courage (6) 13 No Royal Marines go into partnership as a rule (8) 14 Office announcement about leave (5,10) 18 Brie repeatedly off leading to serious complaint (8) 21 Reason to change places around half-time (6) 23 The old chaps next to one person from the Middle East (6) 24 Seat covers had nothing changed for sleeping policeman (4,4) 25 Dangerous material uncovered from an emergency call around A1 (8) 26 Saharan in bombing outrages…