Innholdsfortegnelse for V. 1070 i The Week

What happened Putting a price on Brexit George Osborne sought to destroy the economic arguments for Brexit this week as the In/Out referendum campaign officially began. The Chancellor released a 200-page Treasury analysis of the impact of a Leave vote. It concluded that quitting the EU would hit trade, leaving the UK economy 6% smaller than it might otherwise have been by 2030 – a cost equivalent to £4,300 a year per household. The idea that we could go on enjoying all the benefits of EU membership without any of the attendant costs and obligations, declared Osborne, was “economically illiterate”. The Chancellor’s intervention – which came days before President Obama was expected to speak in favour of a Remain vote, during a UK visit – was dismissed by critics. Justice…

Primary school places Tens of thousands of families in England have missed out on their first choice of primary school. In London, 16% of families with children learned this week they had not been offered their first choice (up from 13% last year); in Reading, 21% missed out. A national average was not yet available. There were warnings England faces a crisis over primary school numbers, with official projections pointing to a shortfall of 10,000 places within four years. The Local Government Association estimates that 336,000 more places will be needed by 2024. Sexual offences inquiry MPs have launched an inquiry into sexual harassment and sexual violence in schools. The Commons Women and Equalities Committee will examine who is committing sexual offences and who is being targeted, based on evidence…

Farage in the City Nigel Farage is nursing a pint at Simpson’s Tavern – the London chophouse where he used to enjoy long lunches during the 1980s, when he was a stockbroker. Back then, he says, the City was like a fantastic, booze-drenched gentlemen’s club. “The thing we used to drink here [at Simpson’s] was port,” he told Henry Mance in the FT. “We’d go back to work all crimson. That’s just what we did! No one cared.” Afternoons back at the office were, he recalls fondly, “chaos. Extraordinary. I remember once there was a really big cock-up… I remember the boss saying: ‘So when did this happen?’ ‘Half-past four yesterday afternoon.’ ‘Oh well, there we are then.’ The boss accepted this!” Alas, these days everyone – even in the…

When will the West learn to stop meddling? Patrick Cockburn The Independent We’ve “done it again”, says Patrick Cockburn. Once more, we have intervened in a conflict in the Middle East only to make matters worse. This time it’s Yemen. For a year now, the US and Britain have been providing arms and technical assistance to the Saudi-led coalition seeking to reimpose the rule of the former president Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi. “Relentless bombing” of the Houthi rebels who’ve seized most of the country has heaped misery on Yemenis, yet delivered only modest military gains. The “real winner” of the war has been al-Qa’eda in the Arabian Peninsula, which exploited the chaos to create and expand its own mini-state inside Yemen: it now stretches 340 miles. Sound familiar? The same…

Drink limits confusion Drinkers who find the UK’s alcohol guidelines a bit restrictive should perhaps consider moving to Poland. Researchers at Stanford University compared guidelines in 37 countries, and found that the weekly limits ranged from 14 units (for both sexes) in the UK to the equivalent of 35 units for men in both Poland and Vietnam. The advice for daily consumption varies widely, too: while men in Chile and the US can down as many as seven units a day (though such binges are supposed to be offset by dry days), those in Sweden and India are restricted to just two (and women to only one). Even what counts as a unit of alcohol isn’t consistent: while the WHO defines it as 10g, a British unit is 8g and…

Jonathan Aitken gave a speech on prison reform last week, at which he recalled his first day behind bars after being convicted of perjury in 1999. He was seen by the prison psychiatrist, who had never heard of the disgraced cabinet minister. “Does anyone other than your family know you are in prison?” asked the psychiatrist. Aitken smiled. “About 20 million people,” he replied. The psychiatrist peered sympathetically over his glasses. “Have you ever had delusions?” he asked. Jude Law appears to have let playing a wordsmith go to his head. Explaining his role in Genius, a new film about the relationship between US writer Thomas Wolfe and his editor, the actor (above) opined: “What we’ve done, which is so interesting, is physicalised the process and physicalised the relationship of…

Aged 21, she made a promise: “that my whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service”. And the Queen has certainly been true to her word, said Matthew Dennison in The Daily Telegraph. In 2015, Britain’s longest serving monarch undertook 341 engagements. And this week, as she celebrated her 90th birthday, her diary was as packed as usual, with engagements including opening a bandstand, visiting a Royal Mail sorting office, and entertaining the Obamas for lunch. On the day itself, she was due to light the first of some 1,000 birthday beacons in advance of official celebrations kicking off in mid-May, and culminating in a massive street party in The Mall on 12 June. That the Queen is popular is now “blandly accepted”, said…

Football: why Aston Villa went down “Talk about going down without a fight,” said James Ducker in The Sunday Telegraph. Aston Villa needed at least a draw against Manchester United last Saturday to have any hope, however remote, of avoiding relegation. But as on so many previous occasions in their “season of torture”, they displayed no urgency, no hunger: they lost 1-0, dropping down to the Championship with four games still to go. Until now, Villa had been part of an exclusive group, one of just seven clubs present in the Premier League since its inception. But after a ninth consecutive loss, their 24th of the season, they have a measly 16 points. This is a club that has “lost its way quite terribly”. Villa should, by all rights, be…

To The Guardian We frequently hear that the UK economy needs rebalancing in favour of manufacturing. The news that “Brexit could cost 100,000 jobs in finance” should therefore be welcomed. A bloated finance sector means an overvalued currency, and a reduction in the sector will see sterling reduce in value, perhaps by 20%. This will make our exports cheaper, even allowing a margin to pay any EU tariffs. A bonus from a reduced finance sector is that there is also less chance of the banks going bust again. Though probably not much less. Michael Gold, London To The Daily Telegraph An aspect of Brexit which nobody seems to be discussing is the question of whether we can find a government capable of running Britain without assistance from Brussels. Current indications…

All That Man Is Jonathan Cape 448pp £14.99 The Week bookshop £12.99 (incl. p&p) All that Man Is is “a 100-megawatt novel: intelligent, intricate, so very well made, the form perfectly fitting the content”, said Claire Lowdon in The Sunday Times – although it may, in fact, not be a novel at all. It is made up of nine short stories, each following a different man at a different stage of his life, in a different part of Europe: British teenagers inter-railing in Eastern Europe; a young Frenchman holidaying in Cyprus; Hungarians escorting a prostitute in London; a Russian oligarch in a yacht off Corfu. “For female readers, it is an insight into life on the other side of the fence,” said Melissa Katsoulis in The Times. It confirms our…

Since its heyday in the 1960s and 1970s, conceptual art has proved an “irresistible target” for sceptics, said Matt Rumm in The Spectator. Because it privileges the ideas behind a work of art over the finished product, conceptual art lacks the “demonstrable application of skill” involved in painting, drawing and sculpture. Its critics deem it “pretentious, po-faced and devoid of the visual éclat that is surely the entry-level qualification for great art”. Certainly, conceptualism has inspired a lot of “fanciful rubbish”, but at its best it can be “mesmerically arresting. Beautiful, even.” Now, a new show at Tate Britain sets out to prove that conceptual art was a “liberating intellectual framework” that allowed its practitioners to explore ideas beyond the constraints of traditional art forms. The exhibition covers the period…

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery, 1908 (Puffin £9.99). I adored this as a girl, and it taught me a lot about how to combine strong characters with strong storylines. There is nothing wrong with plot! The Collected Stories by Ernest Hemingway (Everyman’s Library £14.99). He may be considered sexist and unfashionable now, but to me Hemingway writes the cleanest prose around. I have long been a fan of the “less is more” school, and he is the master I have learned from. Johannes Vermeer catalogue, National Gallery of Art, Washington (out of print). I have a big and everexpanding shelf of books on Vermeer, but this exhibition catalogue is the one I always go back to. It’s the catalogue I bought after I saw the painting Girl with…

Programmes Mystery of the Crossrail Skulls During the digging for London’s Crossrail, dozens of Roman skulls were found near Liverpool Street station. This documentary examines how they got there. Sun 24 April, C4 8pm (60mins). The Hollow Crown BBC Four is showing four adaptations of Shakespeare’s filmed History Plays: Richard II, Henry IV – Parts I and II, and Henry V. Mon 25 to Thur 28 April, BBC4 11pm (except Wed: 10.50pm). Never Again: Fear and Faith in Paris In 2014, around 8,000 Jews left France, concerned about terror attacks and anti-Semitism. Here some of the families who have fled tell their stories. Tue 26 April, BBC1 10.45pm (30mins). The Extraordinary Case of Alex Lewis In 2013, Alex Lewis caught a cold that developed into toxic shock syndrome and resulted…

The term “charcuterie” encompasses all preserved meats, most of which were originally eaten by peasants, who found ways of turning scraps and odd cuts into something delicious as well as long-lasting, says Brendan Collins. These days, of course, terrines, pâtés, cured meats and the like are highly valued, and a good charcuterie spread is a thing to behold. Curing meat is intense, technical and timeconsuming, hard even for restaurants to get right, so I don’t generally advise doing it at home. But one of the more underappreciated facets of being a good cook is becoming a discerning shopper. First, consider charcuteries as divided into six categories: • Dried salamis, such as Spanish chorizo, Italian soppressata and French saucisson sec • Whole muscles, such as prosciutto, speck, coppa, bresaola, bacon and…

Shakespeare country Mark the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death at The Modern Shakespeare cottage (sleeps 4), Stratford-upon-Avon. A week’s stay from 10 June is £735. 01237-426256, www.holidaycottages.co.uk. 4-star Sri Lanka Enjoy 7 nights for the price of 5 at the beach-front Heritance Ahungalla, on the Laccadive Sea. From £749pp b&b incl. Gatwick flights and transfers. 01293-762456, www.hayesandjarvis.co.uk. Depart 30 May. Rome city break Spend 3 nights in the Eternal City at the 4-star Ariston Hotel – just a 3-minute walk from Termini railway station. From £399pp b&b including flights. 01293-765066, www.citalia.com. Depart 4 May. Action-packed Croatia Challenge the family on the Croatia River Adventure trip along the Mrežnica river. From £879 per adult (£849 per 11+ child) half board, with flights. 01962-737560, www.familiesworldwide.co.uk. Dep 28 May.…

The FTSE 100 hit another high for the year, buoyed by the strength of the oil price, which shrugged off the failure of Opec talks in Doha to agree a supply freeze. Some traders see that as a sign that market volatility has begun to ebb. The Bank of England warned again that the EU referendum could hurt growth. Continental finance chiefs also weighed into the debate. German finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble said trade negotiations would be “tough” if Britain voted Out. The EU competition commissioner, Margrethe Vestager, widened her antitrust crusade against Google, accusing it of abusing its dominance of the Android smartphone operating system. The move prompted complaints that the EU is disproportionately targeting US tech firms. It is already investigating whether Google has abused its dominance of…

● Unhappy ending? Is that finally a wrap? The long-running tax row over a film investment scheme that embroiled hundreds of wealthy investors, including Sir Alex Ferguson and Sven-Göran Eriksson, looks to have finally ended, said Nick Huber on AccountingWeb. Four years after the Eclipse 35 scheme hit the headlines, Britain’s Supreme Court has rejected a multimillion-pound appeal brought by investors against HMRC, which had judged the partnership to be an “aggressive” tax avoidance scheme. ● Not so enchanted The 289 members of the Eclipse scheme took out loans to finance a £1bn film deal with Disney, which involved buying the rights to two films, Enchanted and Underdog, and then leasing them back to the studio, said Jane Croft and Vanessa Houlder in the FT. The plan was to claim…

Kathy Chen An outcry has followed the appointment of Kathy Chen as Twitter’s new “Greater China” managing director, says Stephen McDonnell on BBC News online. Twitter is banned in China but is very popular with Chinese dissidents abroad, and online activists are “freaking out” that Chen – a former engineer in the People’s Liberation Army – won’t be independent enough from Beijing. They argue that, in her previous roles with the US companies Computer Associates and Cisco, she helped construct the “Great Firewall of China”, thereby helping to crush “free speech in her homeland”. Is she therefore really the right candidate to lead a platform popular with Chinese activists? This seems a little unfair: there’s no evidence that Chen is in cahoots with Beijing. But she may have her work…

Gwendoline Smith, born in Neyland, Pembrokeshire I like everything about the Queen. I’ve got scrapbooks in the attic full of newspaper clippings about her, and I’ve asked my daughters if they’ll look after them when I’m gone, but they say: “What do we want with them, Mum?” My husband, Ted, wasn’t a fan either. He and I had nine children, plus one we adopted. We also fostered three teenage boys, who were in and out of trouble – one for pinching cars – and we brought up four of our grandchildren, because their mum was struggling and the social services were going to put them in a home. So my life has been full of kids. I was born in Neyland, Pembrokeshire. I left school at 14 to work in…

Culture Secretary John Whittingdale found himself at the centre of a storm over press freedom last week, when the BBC revealed that two years ago he had an affair with a prostitute. Whittingdale admitted he’d briefly dated “dominatrix” Olivia King, but insisted the issue had never affected his decisions. But the pro-privacy campaign group, Hacked Off, claimed newspapers had suppressed the story, despite it being common knowledge in Fleet Street, to avoid offending Whittingdale, who is responsible for overseeing press regulation. The minister faced fresh embarrassment when the press released details of another affair, this time with a former soft porn actress, Stephanie Hudson, who alleged that he’d let her look at Cabinet papers and that the pair had once been ejected from the Savoy for “drunken heavy petting”. Whittingdale…

Dublin Fight death: Shocking footage has emerged of a professional “cage fighter” being effectively beaten to death during a bout at Dublin’s National Stadium two weeks ago. Joao Carvalho, 28, from Portugal, was taking part in a mixed martial arts (MMA) contest, a combat sport in which, unlike in boxing, fighters are allowed to keep attacking their opponents even after they are on the canvas – the “ground and pound”. In the clip, Carvalho’s opponent, Charlie Ward, is seen knocking him down and punching him in the head nine times before the referee intervenes. Carvalho (pictured) died in hospital two days later, making him the fifth MMA fighter to be killed in a sanctioned fight since 2007. Dresden, Germany Pegida founder on trial: The founder of Germany’s right-wing “anti-Islamisation” movement…

A 6ft-tall fugitive was re-arrested in Texas last week, after being found hiding in his girlfriend’s dishwasher. “He took out the racks and made himself a nice little cubbyhole,” said the local deputy police chief. Two public benches that were installed with their backs to the sea have been “rebranded” as the world’s first selfie benches. Bridgend council was much mocked for siting the benches so they overlook a busy road on Porthcawl’s esplanade rather than the Bristol Channel; but now the local tourist board has come to the council’s rescue, by promoting the benches as perfect for social media-savvy visitors. A Toy Story fanatic has won a year-long battle to get a driving licence in his new name – Buzz Lightyear. Buzz, 26, from Bideford, changed his name from…

UNITED STATES Corrupt cash is flooding into our cities Los Angeles Times “The business of moving secret foreign money isn’t confined to steamy tax havens like Panama,” says Doyle McManus. The US is an increasingly big player in this world too. Nevada, Wyoming and South Dakota have all passed laws “making it easier to set up shell companies – and harder to identify the real owners”. This has prompted an influx of foreign assets from tax havens such as Bermuda and Zurich to US cities such as Reno and Sioux Falls. “That giant sucking sound you hear?” wrote a Swiss lawyer in a legal journal earlier this year. “It’s the sound of money rushing to the USA.” Some Americans are delighted by this. Real estate brokers from New York to…

The sight of forests carpeted with bluebells has become increasingly rare owing to woodlands being destroyed: and now the British bluebell, with its rich purplish hue and sweet scent, faces a further threat – an invading force of “brutish” Spanish interlopers. The Spanish bluebell – which is odourless, paler and more upright than its British counterpart, and has broader leaves – has long been favoured by gardeners because it will grow almost anywhere; and because owing to their protected status, British bluebells are difficult to buy. But as often happens with garden flowers, the newcomers have found their way into woods, where they have cross-bred with native wild flowers to produce a more adaptable, and tougher, hybrid. It is this hybrid in particular which threatens the British bluebell and which,…

It was only a matter of time before a civilian drone hit a passenger plane, said flight safety expert Steve Landells in The Sun. The number of near misses has been mounting steadily. According to the Civil Aviation Authority, there were 23 such incidents at UK airports in the six months between April and October last year alone. And on Sunday afternoon, the inevitable happened: a drone being flown some 1,700ft above Richmond Park in southwest London collided with an Airbus A320 approaching Heathrow with 132 passengers on board. Thankfully, the aircraft landed safely and was later cleared to fly again by engineers. But had the drone gone into an engine or “smashed through the windscreen, the story could have been very different”. Along with lasers being shone from the…

For more than 20 years, during his darkest hours in jail, Nelson Mandela kept one book by his bedside. He scribbled in the margins, and read passages aloud to his cellmates. It wasn’t a religious or political tract; it wasn’t even written in Mandela’s mother tongue. Yet its “sacred characters”, from Hamlet to Prospero, inspired him. “Shakespeare,” he observed, “always seems to have something to say to us.” This, said Robert McCrum in The Observer, “is perhaps Shakespeare’s most astonishing achievement”. Four hundred years after his death, the glove-maker’s son from Stratford still has the power to “universalise” human experience. His words fall from the lips of millions who do not even realise they are quoting him (“the game is up”, “dead as a doornail”, “more in sorrow than in…

The benchmark bows out They called him “the benchmark”, says Alan Tyers in The Daily Telegraph. In the 1980s, Steve Davis made snooker “the professional sport it is today”. And this week, at the age of 58, he called time on his 38-year career. It is Davis’s misfortune to be best known for a match he lost, the 1985 World Championship final against Dennis Taylor, which was watched by a TV audience of 18 million. But he deserves to be remembered for his six world crowns, as well as his talent, “fantastic ability to handle pressure” and “ferocious appetite for hard work”. Stephen Hendry may have won more ranking titles, and Ronnie O’Sullivan may play “more thrillingly”, but Davis is snooker’s “greatest champion”. Hard times for Hamilton It was one…

Theatre Boy Playwright: Leo Butler Director: Sacha Wares Almeida, London N1 (020-7359 4404) Until 28 May Running time: 1hr 10mins (no interval) In his “poignant” new play about one aimless day in the life of Liam, a jobless 17-year-old Londoner, Leo Butler has pulled off something rather remarkable, said Sarah Hemming in the FT. He has dramatised an experience that is “fundamentally antithetical to dramatic narrative”. As we watch Liam hanging out at the bus stop, failing to link up with an old school friend, having no luck at the jobcentre, the playwright gives us “no significant action, no progress, no meaningful dialogue or conflict. And he gives voice to a boy whose largest problem is inarticulacy.” Quiet, undemonstrative and compassionate, Boy is a “devastating portrait” of life for those…

Samuel Levi Jones at The Arts Club Where the arts are concerned, books have taken on a strange significance since the Second World War. Think of Ray Bradbury’s dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451, or the artist Rachel Whiteread’s Holocaust memorial in Vienna, in which she cast rows of library shelves in concrete to create an imposing sculpture. In both cases, the book is a symbol of intellectual freedom, and the act of destroying one is tantamount to a totalitarian gesture. For this show, curated by Wedel Art, the US artist Levi Jones has torn the covers from dozens of encyclopaedias and legal texts, and stitched them together, turning them into imposing abstract works. The subtext to his work, hinted at by his titles, is the ongoing struggle faced by African Americans…

Tips… using chemistry around the house ● If you come across old batteries, test whether they’re dead by dropping them. If they’re used up, they’ll bounce, as batteries contain a zinc and potassium hydroxide gel that turns ceramic as batteries discharge – and ceramics bounce, unlike gels. ● To clean silver jewellery, put it in a cup of hot water and add a tablespoon of bicarbonate of soda and a few strips of aluminium foil. The aluminium reacts with the black tarnish to create aluminium sulfide, turning it back to silver; while the bicarb prevents the aluminium from reacting with the silver. ● You can descale a kettle by filling it with one-part vinegar to two-parts water, boiling it, and then rinsing it once it’s cooled. Limescale is mostly calcium…

Forest Side, Cumbria Housed in a “solid” Victorian mansion close to Grasmere, Forest Side hotel has just emerged from a £4m makeover. The results are “stellar”, says Fiona Duncan in The Sunday Telegraph. Every detail has been carefully thought through, from the herbal infusions for your bath to the menus printed on recycled paper and tied with Herdwick wool. The gardens are “stunning”; the 20 “soothing” bedrooms have “divine” custommade Harrison Spinks beds; and the food, made by the “hugely talented” South Cumbrian chef Kevin Tickle, is first class – locally foraged ingredients shine in dishes that are at once earthy and “wonderfully light”. Doubles from £219 b&b. 01539-435250, www.theforestside.com.…

“Kitchen sink” playwright who became an angry old man Arnold Wesker 1932-2016 Arnold Wesker, who has died aged 83, was one of the Angry Young Men – the group of writers and playwrights who, in the 1950s, sought to put the reality of working-class life centre stage. Yet he had little else in common with, say, his Royal Court colleague John Osborne, said The Daily Telegraph. Where Osborne wrote monodramas, featuring soliloquising antiheroes, Wesker specialised in dramatised debate between multiple characters, the strongest of these often being women. As The New York Times critic Howard Taubman noted, he “does not rage in disgust… He seeks to tell the truth, to laugh at it understandingly, if harshly, and to imply a vision and a hope.” In fact, Wesker described himself as…

Two years ago, Theranos was one of the hottest properties in Silicon Valley, said Alexei Oreskovic on BusinessInsider.com. But the controversial blood-testing start-up is facing perhaps its most testing challenge yet: “a criminal investigation into whether it misled investors about its technology”. The privately held company, valued at $9bn in 2014, has become the subject of a criminal probe by the US attorney’s office and a civil probe by the Securities and Exchange Commission, because of alleged “irregularities” in its tests. The revelation is the latest setback in a stunning fall from grace for Theranos and its “wunderkind” CEO, said David Crow in the FT. Elizabeth Holmes, 32, dropped out of Stanford to found the company in 2003, recruiting a bevy of luminaries to the board, including two former US…

Brexit: “It’s not going to happen,” says Gundlach – and investors hedging themselves against it are wasting their money. Look what happened in Scotland. “People like to complain, but then when it comes down to actually pulling the lever…” No one knows what would happen under a Brexit anyway, “so often things go the opposite way from what people expect. Maybe your hedge is actually in the anti-hedge.” Trump: Donald Trump is the “unconstrained bond fund” of politics, says Gundlach – referring to a new kind of fund that doesn’t adhere to established benchmarks, and which becomes popular because traditional alternatives are so unattractive: “I have no idea what I’m going to get but it’s better than getting something I don’t like.” If Trump wins the US presidency, he’d have…

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 6 Baby’s first spot and another on his bum? It’s the potty designer! (5,8) 8 Reminder for daughter (4) 9 Runners against small craft (10) 10 Titanic standard seen in Ouse? Not normally (8) 12 Dogs without lead a lot (6) 14 Thought of assistant first at the conclusion (4) 16 Beef sandwiches not initially intended (5) 17 Broadcaster on eastern island (4) 18 Sadly no cash for some Mexican snacks (6) 19 Little monster no longer available inside, damn! (8) 22 Sweet chap able to move around the Middle East (5,5) 25 Character flaw seen in party politics (4) 26 How love’s shown during desserts?…

In less than a fortnight, Londoners will choose a new mayor, said The Sunday Times. The current front runner is the Labour candidate Sadiq Khan, an energetic politician with “a good story to tell”. Where his Tory rival Zac Goldsmith was born into great wealth, Khan is the son of a Pakistani-born bus driver, who grew up in a council flat, became a successful human rights lawyer, was an MP at 34, and a minister three years later. Khan, however, also has “important questions to answer”. Recent weeks have seen a series of “troubling” revelations about his dealings with Islamic extremists, said Isabel Oakeshott in the Daily Mail. In 2003, Khan “shared a platform” at a conference with Yasser al-Siri, an Egyptian militant, and with Sajeel Shahid, a member of…

Based in Panama City, with offices in all the world’s leading OFCs, the firm at the centre of the recent scandal is the world’s fourth-largest provider of offshore legal services. It’s primarily an incorporation agent, meaning it sets up companies and trusts, mostly in the British Virgin Islands and other havens. Clients can buy a company for as little as $1,000. Like most offshore law firms, Mossack Fonseca provides complex corporate structures which can be used to disguise assets. Say, for instance, you own a painting but don’t want anyone to know: you can set up an anonymous company in one tax haven to own it, which in turn is owned by another shell company in another jurisdiction. This, in turn, is owned by a trust in a third. More…

AUSTRIA Extinguishing a symbol of European unity Münchner Merkur (Munich) “Another piece of Europe has died,” says George Anastasiadis. We’re used to seeing border fences going up in the Balkans to stop migrants trying to get into Europe, but there’s something particularly “tragic” about the blocking of the Brenner Pass. The narrow 59-mile route between Austria and Italy is the busiest crossing of the Alps. It has been bitterly contested throughout history and was the scene of bloody strife during both World Wars. So when border controls were abolished in 1995, it quickly became a symbol of European integration. But Austria resumed border checks last year, and now it is making them permanent. Construction has started on a new control centre, and 300 troops are being stationed nearby. Austria’s government…

Minuscule, laser-powered spacecraft will be the first man-made objects to travel to another solar system, if a project spearheaded by Russian internet billionaire Yuri Milner – and backed by Stephen Hawking and Mark Zuckerberg – comes to fruition. The vastness of space has always made interstellar travel seem little more than a theoretical possibility: Alpha Centauri, the closest star system to our own, is 25 trillion miles (or 4.37 light years) away, which means that today’s rockets would take 30,000 years to get there, even if they could be loaded up with enough fuel. But the “nanocraft” envisaged by Milner – each consisting of a “wafer” chip equipped with cameras, power supply, and navigation and communication equipment, mounted on a silicon “light sail” that would be propelled by beams from…

First there were “truthers”, said Sarah Baxter in The Sunday Times: people who believe the US government brought down the Twin Towers on 9/11. Then there were “birthers”, who insist that Barack Obama was born in Kenya and has no right to be US president. Now there are “anti-vaxxers” – opponents of vaccination, especially the triple MMR jab for measles, mumps and rubella. A leading light is Andrew Wakefield, the British doctor who claimed to have uncovered a link between the MMR vaccine and autism, derailing Britain’s immunisation programme for some years. His study was later entirely discredited, and exposed as a fraud: he was, it emerged, in the pay of lawyers who were trying to prove that the vaccine was unsafe. Wakefield was struck off the medical register for…

“Each decade we shiftily declare we have buried class; each decade the coffin stays empty.” Richard Hoggart, quoted in The Observer “Someone who looks at me full of hope and expectation when I come down in the morning.” The Duchess of Beaufort’s definition of a nightmare guest, quoted in The New York Times “One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.” Plato, quoted in the Philadelphia Daily News “Most music critics love Elvis Costello, because most music critics look like Elvis Costello.” Singer David Lee Roth, quoted in The Guardian “There is nothing more depressing in the world than bearing witness to other people’s happiness.” Giles Coren, in The Times “He can’t look at a belt without wishing…

Dudley’s self-worth To The Daily Telegraph I wonder if BP’s Bob Dudley, whose £14m pay package has angered shareholders, could walk into a room of 30 Royal Navy admirals, 30 Army generals, 30 Crown Court judges and 30 NHS consultants and say: “I am so good at my job that I should be rewarded better than all of you put together.” Christopher Knight, Sowerby Bridge, West Yorkshire “Worthless” degrees To The Times It is not surprising that many degree courses do not add value to graduates’ earning power. The real (unstated) purpose of the great expansion of further education was not to increase our citizens’ wealth or utility but to remove three years’ worth of hard-to-employ youths from the unemployment statistics. In this it has succeeded, and youth unemployment has…

Bloomsbury 256pp £25 The Week bookshop £21 (incl. p&p) When Quentin Blake does a book signing, people often tell him: “You illustrated my childhood”, said Sarah Crompton in The Observer. For most readers under 70, Blake’s drawings were part of growing up. His illustrations are everywhere: in his own children’s books, in Russell Hoban’s, Joan Aitken’s and, of course, Roald Dahl’s. He gave the Enormous Crocodile his “evil grimace”, and brought the Big Friendly Giant to life. It’s possible that Ghislaine Kenyon intended this “lavish” new book to be a biography. If so, she was foiled by Blake’s reticence, and the “smooth uneventfulness” of his life: the “lack of death, trauma, life partners or his own children”. Nevertheless, it is a “fine”, richly illustrated study of man and work. “The…

The Jungle Book Dir: Jon Favreau 1hr 45mins (PG) Live-action remake of the Disney classic What, you may wonder, is the point of a live-action, computer-animated remake of Disney’s much-loved cartoon based on Rudyard Kipling’s classic tale of an orphan raised by wolves? None whatsoever, said Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian, except to create “a terrifically enjoyable piece of old-fashioned storytelling”. From the opening shot, as the child hero Mowgli (Neel Sethi) races through the jungle with the wolf pack, director Jon Favreau keeps up a dizzying pace, said Raphael Abraham in the Financial Times. We’re soon introduced to the boy’s mentor, the panther Bagheera (suavely voiced by Ben Kingsley), and new best friend Baloo the bear (Bill Murray), both so convincingly rendered by CGI that even David Attenborough would…

Judith Beheading Holofernes, now in the Palazzo Barberini in Rome, is one of Caravaggio’s masterpieces, said Artnet.com. The Milan-born artist is supposed to have painted a second version of the biblical scene – which has been missing since the early 17th century. Now a 400-year-old canvas depicting the decapitation, in Caravaggio’s style, has been found in the attic of a house near Toulouse – stumbled upon in April 2014 when the owners went to fix a leak in the ceiling. The large, well-preserved painting (pictured) has been fully restored over the past two years, and has now been publicly identified as a Caravaggio worth some £100m by a leading expert. Other experts, though, beg to differ, said Jonathan Jones in The Guardian. Attribution is difficult because “his potent style inspired…

The stabbing is splashed all over the tabloids. Tom’s upset that the picture of Helen portrays her as a crazed witch, while Rob looks like a hero. Dominic, Helen’s solicitor, calls in at Bridge Farm. He says Henry won’t be able to visit Helen, because he’s a key witness. Jill bursts in and says she’s found a way to help Helen: Carol’s daughter, Anna Tregorran, is a barrister specialising in domestic abuse and is happy to help. Tom punches Jazzer when he overhears him saying that there are much less messy ways of killing people. He then fires him on the spot. Rob’s out of danger, so Helen won’t be facing a murder charge. Neil confronts Josh about working with the Fairbrothers. He says that unless Josh puts all his…

Maray 91 Bold Street, Liverpool (0151-709 5820) Normally I shudder at restaurants that claim to have “curated” their menu, says Jay Rayner in The Observer. But in the case of Maray, a splendid “small plates, sharing portions gaff” in Liverpool, I’ll concede they have indeed “curated” some of the best stuff happening in London, and brought it north. While the flavours of the Middle East grill house predominate here, Maray is also “a bit Skandi and a bit pimped American junk food”. In the hands of a lesser kitchen, this mix of genres could be a “car crash, complete with tyre marks, collapsed lamp posts and distraught witnesses”. But Maray does everything “very well indeed, and at an exceptionally good price”. Their falafel is marvellously crisp and sweetly nutty. Smoky…

Autocar The release of the F-Pace marks a “watershed moment” for Jaguar. As the manufacturer’s first SUV, the car has the potential to transform it from “upwardly mobile minnow to truly global player”. There are already plenty of “medium-sized, middle-of-the-road, upmarket” SUVs out there – but the F-Pace, which is available with a range of diesel and petrol engines, stands out from the crowd. The Daily Telegraph That’s partly because it looks better than any other SUV on the road. Whereas its Porsche and BMW rivals try to outdo each other with “curves” and “bling”, Jaguar’s model is winningly understated, inside and out. There’s lots of space, including a 650-litre boot (with the seats up). The 8in touchscreen works well, and you can control car functions such as the heating…

A night-time bike tour of Mumbai Cycling through Mumbai’s traffic by day is very risky. But now one company is offering night-time bike tours, to enable visitors to pedal past the city’s famous sights in peace, says Kate Eshelby in The Guardian. Known for its ethically responsible slum visits, Reality Tours begins its cycling adventures at the famous Gateway of India at midnight, when the streets are empty and the “scantily lit” buildings take on “a raw, almost ethereal, beauty”. On Marine Drive, the art deco architecture may remind you of Miami; at Banganga Tank, a holy pool beside a temple, people bathe in the moonlight. And at dawn, when the tour ends at Worli Fort, women make flower garlands in the streets while priests burn incense and bang drums,…

Brexit angst: hiring and investment on hold? The Chancellor’s grim predictions of post-Brexit economic carnage sparked fury in the Leave camp. But the warning has been well received by some business leaders, who claim that uncertainty over the outcome is already having a “chilling effect” on business activity, said Sarah Gordon in the Financial Times. These fears are having “a huge impact on general confidence” according to Lord [Mervyn] Davies, who chairs several private equity companies. Hiring and investment are down across sectors from real estate to recruitment. “Look at the numbers, they are already coming down quite severely,” remarks Ian Taylor, CEO of the oil trader Vitol. Insolvency experts are also forecasting doom, said Nick Goodway in the London Evening Standard. In its latest quarterly Red Flag survey, Begbies…

The IMF should butt out on Brexit Alex Brummer Daily Mail The Brexit question dominated last week’s IMF spring conference, displacing a host of other “critical issues”, says Alex Brummer. Discarding “any attempt at neutrality”, the organisation’s boss, Christine Lagarde, warned of the threat to growth and European unity if Britain quits the EU. The IMF will explore the question further in a report on the UK economy due in May, but the tone of Lagarde’s remarks leaves little doubt that “the Fund and its economists have already made up their mind”. What’s more, the timing of the report – just a month ahead of the referendum – has the Chancellor’s fingerprints “all over it”. Although most Britons probably haven’t a clue who Lagarde is, the verdict of the world’s…

Who’s tipping what The week’s best buys Carclo The Daily Telegraph The plastics giant is performing well, with new production sites in the US, India and China – and its LED lighting division for supercars is winning new orders. Peel Hunt expects revenues to rise by 8% and profits by 20%. Buy. 143p. GKN Investors Chronicle The engineer is a market leader in plane and car technology, at the forefront of electric and hybrid developments. It’s set to benefit from defence spending and expanding transportation needs as the global population grows. Buy. 281p. Michelmersh Brick Holdings Shares Robust demand for Britishmade building products augurs well for the debt-free brickmaker, which remains focused on margin improvement. A new website should drive sales, while decent prices bolster the bottom line. Buy. 82p.…