Innholdsfortegnelse for V. 1253 i The Week

What happened Farage retreats Boris Johnson’s election campaign received a boost this week when Nigel Farage announced that his Brexit Party would not contest any of the 317 seats won by the Tories at the last election. He had previously threatened to field candidates in almost all of Britain’s 650 constituencies, a stance some of his former allies warned could fatally split the Leave vote. Farage said he had changed his mind in response to the PM apparently ruling out the post-Brexit transition period being extended beyond the end of 2020. Johnson welcomed Farage’s move, calling it “arecognition that there’s only one way to get Brexit done, and that’s to vote for the Conservatives”. Rival parties, on the other hand, claimed that Farage’s retreat meant that the Tories were now…

Vegans, with news that Mars is launching a plant-based version of its bestselling Galaxy bar. However, the 100g bar – which comes in three flavours –will cost £3, twice the price of a regular milk-chocolate Galaxy. Laurent Simons, a nine-year-old from Belgium, who was recognised by Guinness World Records as the world’s youngest university graduate. Simons finished his secondary education aged eight, and then earned his degree in electrical engineering from Eindhoven University of Technology in one year. His professor says he is the smartest student he has ever taught. Jilly Cooper, after her 1980s bonkbuster Riders was named one of the 100 Novels That Shaped Our World. “I can’t believe it, it’s hysterical,” said the novelist, 82, of her appearance on the list, compiled by a panel of literary…

Paris Nato “brain death” warning: President Macron has issued a frank warning that the EU is“on the edge of aprecipice” that could see itdisappear if its leaders don’t “wake up” and confront the various challenges facing it. These, he said in an interview with The Economist, include the spread of populism – and Washington’s new-found indifference to its European allies. He said Nato was experiencing “brain death”, referencing Donald Trump’s abrupt and “uncoordinated” decision to withdraw US troops from northern Syria last month, which led to another uncoordinated intervention by a second Nato member, Turkey. Asked whether he still had faith in the effectiveness of Nato’s Article 5, the principle that if one member is attacked, all will come to its defence, he replied: “I don’t know.” Macron’s blunt warning…

“Before watching the recent World Cup final, I last saw a whole rugby match on television in the early 1970s. My memory may be false, but I recall a game of movement. Except for a very few moments of astonishing speed, notably the South African try, the final seemed a contest about how best to exploit quite obscure rules in one’s favour. It was the sporting equivalent of arcane disputes by brilliant lawyers about how their clients can legally get round taxes. It was all about what constitutes a penalty. If you did not share the intense emotion invested in the result, you would conclude that it was quite poor sport.” Charles Moore in The Spectator Desert Island Discs returns on 15 November…

An American habit that’s bad for the world John Gapper Financial Times Europe has acquired a noxious American habit, says John Gapper: the Sports Utility Vehicle. A third of new cars sold in Europe are now SUVs. The parents of school kids in my street in east London all seem to have a Nissan Qashqai or BMW X5 parked outside their house. Once, when small cars filled our roads, we Europeans enjoyed a sense of ethical superiority over Americans, with their heavy postwar gas guzzlers. Indeed, in the mid-1970s they decided to copy us and downsize. But with the dawn of the SUV, US cars piled on the pounds again, and in two decades CO2 emissions from US vehicles rose by 11%. Now the same is occurring here: thanks to…

An end to smear tests? A home test for signs of cervical cancer that could ultimately replace the smear test has been developed by scientists in Britain. The smear test requires cells to be extracted from the cervix: it’s usually conducted by a nurse at a GPs surgery, and many women find it unpleasant and embarrassing. InBritain, the take-up rate is currently 75% – itslowest level for two decades. With the new test, known as an S5 test, women provide urine samples and vaginal swabs themselves, which they send to the lab to be analysed for cell changes that could be a sign of pre-cancerous activity. In a trial involving 600 women, the test was found to be almost asaccurate as a smear test –and the participants said they found…

Once upon a time we were brought up on the fairy tale that true love is the only path to happiness. But these days, “single-positive” people are rejecting such old-fashioned notions, said Lizzie Cernik in The Guardian. Among them isthe actress Emma Watson, who told British Vogue last week that asshe contemplated going into her 30s without either a husband or a baby, a “bloody influx of subliminal messaging” had left her “stressed and anxious”. The good news, she said, is that she has since learnt to embrace her unattached status. Now she doesn’t even consider herself to be single. “I call it being self-partnered,” she explained. We may snigger at Watson’s rebranding of singledom, but she’s right to kick back against the widespread assumption that unmarried women are unhappy,…

When England made itto the final ofthe Rugby World Cup earlier this month, it was Saracens who “got them there”, said Owen Slot inThe Times. Six of the men who started that day – among them Maro Itoje, Billy Vunipola, Mako Vunipola and the captain, Owen Farrell – play for the north London side. But now the club, who are currently champions of both England and Europe, are facing a relegation battle. Last week, they were deducted 35 points (pending an appeal) and ordered to pay a £5.3m fine for breaching the Premiership’s salary cap over the last three seasons. The salary cap was introduced 20 years ago to prevent wages becoming unaffordable, said David Conn in The Guardian. It was also meant to “keep the league competitive between the…

To The Spectator Rod Liddle’s joke that the election might be held on a date when Muslims cannot vote, thereby reducing support for Labour, has apparently led to outrage. There has been no similar outrage over your front cover, which satirises the Christian nativity by portraying Boris Johnson, Jeremy Corbyn and Jo Swinson visiting the stable in Bethlehem. It should be a principle of free speech in any free society that all religions are equally subject to satire, criticism and even gentle mockery; there should be no special protection for one set of beliefs over another. In allowing satire about two mainstream religions in the same issue, you have shown admirable balance. Peter Richardson, Amersham, Buckinghamshire To The Spectator I like to think I read broadly across the political spectrum;…

Michael Kiwanuka: Kiwanuka Polydor £11.99 Five years ago, the British-Ugandan singer-songwriter Michael Kiwanuka was on the verge of giving up music, said Elizabeth Aubrey in NME. He was crippled by self-doubt and a feeling of being “lost”, despite the success of his Mercury-nominated debut, Home Again. But now, with this triumphant, self-titled third album – and a sound that recalls Curtis Mayfield, Bill Withers and Gil Scott-Heron – there’s a sense of an artist discovering his true self. If Kiwanuka’s previous albums established him as a “folksy symphonic soul man” and set the bar high, this one “knocks it skyward”, said Dave Simpson in The Observer. It’s a “bold, expansive, heartfelt, sublime album” – surely among the decade’s best. The sound is “timeless and contemporary”, with a “dreamlike, revelatory quality”…

The reign of Tutankhamun (c.1336-1327 BC) was a short one, said Jonathan Jones in The Guardian. He ascended the throne aged just nine, succeeding his father, the modernising Pharaoh Akhenaten, and died at about 19. He was “no tyrant, no warlord, no politician”; he was a boy who liked to play with board games and boomerangs. Nevertheless, he left what may well be the most spectacular wonders to have survived from the ancient world. After his death, Egypt’s finest craftsmen were summoned to fill his tomb, which contained everything the young Pharaoh would need in the afterlife. Their creations, many of which have been gathered for this “sumptuous” exhibition, are among “the most graceful and intimate masterpieces of all time”. The show brings together around 150 artefacts from Tutankhamun’s burial…

The Way of the World by Nicolas Bouvier, 1963 (Eland £12.99). Bouvier inspired a generation of young Europeans onto the road, taking me with them. The Jack Kerouac of Switzerland, he revelled in how a journey –and a traveller’s tale – can change our lives: “You think you are making a trip, but soon it is making you – or unmaking you.” The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov, 1966 (Vintage £7.99). The devil turns up in Moscow and only the Master, a man devoted to truth, and Margarita, the woman he loves, can resist him. This beguiling, long-banned, Stalinist-era masterpiece fuelled my obsession with complicity, compromise and artistic courage – on making choices when there seem to be none, on what men will do to survive. The Alexandria Quartet…

Programmes Reggie in China Three-part series in which Reggie Yates explores four cities – and their constant technological advances – that define a rapidly evolving nation. Sun 17 Nov, BBC2 21:00 (60mins). Vienna Blood A detective struggling with a puzzling murder in 1900s Vienna enlists the help of a young English doctor, in this three-part drama adapted for TV by Sherlock writer Steve Thompson. Mon 18 Nov, BBC2 21:00 (90mins). Johnson v Corbyn: The ITV Debate Julie Etchingham will be overseeing this pre-election sparring match. Tue 19 Nov, ITV1 20:00 (60mins). Boom, Bust & Bankers Starting with the deregulation of the banks, this documentary explains how great sums of money have been made and squandered in the City of London. Tue 19 Nov, C4 21:00 (60mins). Country Music by Ken…

This recipe is my version of the classic slow-cooked French beef stew, the daube – only made with venison, says Anna Hedworth, of Cook House in Newcastle. When it is done, the carrots have picked up the flavour of orange, the rich red wine gravy is infused with delicate herbs, and the venison is soft and falling apart. I serve it with creamy mashed potato or buttery polenta. Serves 2-3 50g mixed dried wild mushrooms 100ml boiling water 50g plain flour salt and pepper 500g of venison stewing meat, in bite-size pieces 1 tbsp olive oil 100g smoked bacon lardons 1 medium onion, peeled and sliced into thin rounds ½ abottle of ared wine you like 1 carrot, peeled and sliced 1 sprig of thyme 1 bay leaf 4 juniper…

Soho House outpost Babington House in Somerset has lovely grounds with a lake that are perfect for walks (b&b doubles from £530; babingtonhouse.co.uk). Cringletie House, acastle hotel on a 28-acre country estate in the Scottish Borders, has a 400-year-old walled garden and a vet and groomers on-call (b&b doubles from £155; cringletie.com). The St George Hotel in Harrogate welcomes dogs in rooms and some public areas (b&b doubles from £85, plus £15 per day for dogs; countrylivinghotels.com). The Egerton House Hotel in London has a dedicated “pet concierge service”, offering treats based on a questionnaire about your pet’s preferences (b&b doubles from £468; egertonhousehotel.com). The Fish in Worcestershire, a collection of quirky rooms, houses and huts, has a dog agility course and a canine afternoon tea (b&b doubles from £150,…

Andalucia on horseback Dividing the rich farmland of Andalucia from the “harsh” landscape of Extremadura, the wild hills of the Sierra Morena are horse-riding country to dream of – and few guides know them better than George Scott, says Sophy Roberts in the FT. The son of a British couple who moved to Spain in the 1970s, he attended a local school, and has recently launched “riding safaris” along old cattle trails he has identified using maps held in local archives. Guests set out from his family house, Trasierra (now only open for these and other events, but formerly a hotel beloved of Kate Moss and other celebrities), and spend other nights at remote and atmospheric farmhouses. With wonderful food (including formal dinners served under the stars) and sublimely varied…

Saudi Aramco: sheikh it up Investors will shortly start bidding for a slice of the world’s biggest and most profitable oil company, said Lucy Burton in The Sunday Telegraph. According to the 658-page prospectus published last weekend, Saudi Aramco will offer 0.5% of its shares to ordinary investors when it floats on the Tadawul exchange inRiyadh –amounting to “roughly $10bn worth if it hits its ambitious $2trn valuation”. Many think that unrealistic. The document released by the “once secretive oil behemoth”, which pumps about a tenth of the world’s oil, was short on key details (such as a previously touted $75bn dividend) – prompting the head of Japan’s largest refiner, JXTG, to claim Japanese investors were unlikely to buy “because of transparency concerns”. But it did outline risks “that…

The private buyout industry is on a roll, and records may soon be broken, said James Dean in The Times. KKR has crashed in with a reported $70bn offer for Walgreens Boots Alliance – the international drugstore conglomerate built by the Italian pharma maestro Stefano Pessina. “A deal to take it private would represent the largest leveraged buyout of all time.” The private equity giant’s proposed deal eclipses the previous record set in 2007, when a KKR-led consortium paid $45bn for the Texas energy giant TXU, which later filed for bankruptcy under the weight of its debts. Some analysts are equally “sceptical” this time round, “given the huge amount of debt it would require”. When Pessina, 78, “is leading the charge, anything is possible”, said Ben Marlow in The Daily…

Nichola Pease News that Nichola Pease is to take over as chair of Jupiter Fund Management has ruffled a few feathers in the City, said Patrick Hosking in The Times. Pease, 58, is “a leading figure in asset management”, as Jupiter is keen to note, with a long list of roles in blue-blooded finance houses. What it does not mention is that she was also a non-executive director at Northern Rock from 1999 right up to the bank’s collapse in 2007, and “presumably privy to every fateful step”. The otherwise “well-regarded” financier may well be competent to chair Jupiter, which has £46bn under management. But a few public words of regret and explanation would help. “It’s not the fact that Pease has this skeleton in her closet that riles, it’s…

London Stock Exchange Shares in the 218-year-old institution have returned 267% over the past five years, against 38% for the leading FTSE 100 index of shares. “Uncertainty about Brexit has cast a shadow”, but London has a unique “concentration of expertise”. Meanwhile, the LSE’s stake in the Delhi Stock Exchange and its acquisition of financial data company Refinitiv open “access to new growth areas”. Intercontinental Exchange The owner of numerous exchanges, including the New York Stock Exchange, has returned 127% – almost double the 68% return of the S&P 500 index over the same five-year period. The caveat is that fintech companies are finding ways to cut out the middleman – a potential blow to the money made by the ICE on trading fees. Euronext The exchange owns about 30…

Controversy of the week Labour loses its deputy Farewell, then, to “the leader of the opposition to the leader of the opposition”, said John Rentoul in The Independent. Since 2015, Labour’s deputy leader Tom Watson has been “key to the internal resistance to Jeremy Corbyn”. The Corbynites have the party leadership, the membership and the national executive; many MPs have made their peace with the new order. But “they never had Tom Watson”. The deputy leader did what he could to fight anti-Semitism in the party, to campaign for Remain and to marshal the forces of social democracy. “Capitalism, comrades, is not the enemy,” he told the Labour conference in 2016. But last week, Watson stepped down. His departure was diplomatically managed: he said his reasons for leaving were “personal,…

The HS2 rail project should go full steam ahead, even though it is likely to run over its revised £88bn budget, a review has concluded. Douglas Oakervee’s report is not due to be published until after the election, but according to a leaked draft, it warns that without HS2, demand on existing lines will so exceed capacity that “large ticket prices” will be needed to discourage peak-time travel. He also found that HS2 would bring more benefits to northern cities than to London. However, his report has been disowned by the review’s deputy chair, Lord Berkeley. Among other things, he has complained about its “unquestioning acceptance of information” provided by HS2 Ltd.…

Washington DC Taming Trump: Nikki Haley, the former US ambassador to the UN, has claimed that two former senior Trump administration officials – former secretary of state Rex Tillerson and ex-White House chief of staff John Kelly – tried to persuade her to join in their attempts to subvert parts of the president’s agenda, for the sake of the country. “Kelly and Tillerson confided in me that when they resisted the president, they weren’t being insubordinate”, she writes in a new memoir, “they were trying to save the country”. She goes on to condemn their “arrogant” assumption that “it was their decisions, not the president’s, that were in the best interests of America”, and says that if they disagreed with Trump, they should have quit. Tillerson has denied the claim.…

Gin aficionados can now enjoy their favourite tipple infused with the flavours of elephant dung. Les and Paula Ansley, a South African couple, started to make the gin after learning that two-thirds of the fruit and flowers that elephants eat is not digested. As a result, “you get the most amazing variety of these botanicals”, says Les. The couple, who collect the dung by hand, describe Indlovu Gin as “wooded, almost spicy, earthy”. A South Korean mortuary is offering people the chance to experience their own “living funerals”. The Hyowon Healing Centre invites members of the public to dress in shrouds, write their last testaments and lie in closed coffins for around ten minutes. More than 25,000 people have made use of the free service. According to the centre’s head,…

INDIA Stop playing politics and curb the smog Outlook (New Delhi) The Delhi smog has become an annual ritual, says Dinesh C. Sharma. Every year about this time, a public health emergency is declared as the nation’s capital is wreathed in toxic fumes. Schools are shut, sporting events cancelled, and doctors’ surgeries fill with patients with coughs and burning eyes. The politicians, meanwhile, “bicker”. The central government in Delhi blames the states of Punjab and Haryana for not curbing the stubble burning that causes the spike in pollution. State leaders in turn blame Delhi for not curbing vehicle emissions. This goes on for a few weeks, then everyone returns to business as usual. We can’t keep doing this. The problem is getting deadlier every season: studies suggest it causes tens…

A new species of ape that lived 12 million years ago has been discovered by scientists in Germany – and intriguingly, though it was a tree-dweller, it appears to have been capable of walking on two legs. Danuvius guggenmosi lived in what is now Bavaria and stood just over a metre tall. With elongated arms and opposable big toes, it shares some features with chimps and gorillas, but it also had straight legs and an S-shaped spine – human-like traits that suggest it combined tree-swinging with upright walking. “It was astonishing for us to realise during the process of research how similar certain bones were to humans, as opposed to great apes,” said Prof Madelaine Böhme of the University of Tübingen. Writing in Nature, Böhme and her colleagues controversially propose…

Flora Gill relished some aspects of her mother Amber Rudd’s life in politics. This week, she tweeted two screengrabs of Rudd looking at her phone during a Commons debate, and then putting it away. “The thing I’m going to miss most about Mum being an MP,” Gill commented, “is being able to spy on her live in Parliament, and then watch in real time as she reads and ignores my messages.” Olivia Colman (pictured) has admitted to being a “left-wing monarchist” – and a “staunch admirer” of the Queen. “She’s the breadwinner,” says the actress, who stars in the new series of The Crown. “She’s the one on our coins and banknotes. Prince Philip has to walk behind her. She fixed cars in the Second World War. She insisted on…

“Habit is habit, and not to be flung out of the window by any man, but coaxed downstairs a step at atime.” Mark Twain, quoted in Forbes “Diplomacy is to do and say the nastiest things in the nicest way.” Author Isaac Goldberg, quoted in The Times “The further a society drifts from the truth, the more it will hate those that speak it.” George Orwell, quoted on CapX “Every joke calls for a public of its own, and laughing at the same jokes is evidence of far-reaching psychical conformity.” Sigmund Freud, quoted in the London Review of Books “At first we want life to be romantic; later, to be bearable; finally, to be understandable.” Poet Louise Bogan, quoted in The New Yorker “Curiosity is the one thing invincible in…

The good news was 77,768 people turned up to watch England play Germany at Wembley, said Rebecca Myers in The Sunday Times – “the biggest home crowd for an England women’s game in history”. The bad news is that the Lionesses lost 2-1, making it their fifth defeat in seven matches. This team have certainly “taken a step backwards” since their World Cup semi-final in July, said Molly McElwee in The Daily Telegraph. They have developed some bad habits, which were in evidence last Saturday: yet again, there was a missed penalty by Nikita Parris, a “slow, nervy start”, a goal conceded from a cross. The defence is particularly troubling: they have kept just one clean sheet in their last eight games, a problem not helped by persistent “tinkering” by…

Naomi Frears at Beaux Arts London Bold lines, ambiguous subjects and hints of surrealism combine in the paintings of Cornwall-based artist Naomi Frears (b.1963). One picture in this exhibition presents you with a tuxedo-clad lothario leaning over a bar towards you, his facial features blurred to the point of total obscurity, the interior behind him reminiscent of David Lynch at his darkest. Another gives us a spooky aerial view of two figures ensconced in some kind of ritual, their movements tracing an arc through what looks like a toxic mist. Elsewhere, things are quieter: an elegant female figure sketched against an orange background gazes down at acrease in her shirt to examine an imperfection invisible to us; another finds herself isolated in a grey-yellow wilderness, her arms placed uncomfortably on…

Glamping in St Davids Stay seven nights in the petite Cysgod Y Nos pod, on the stunning Pembrokeshire coast, from £138pp self-catering, based on two sharing. 01237-459801, holidaycottages.co.uk. Arrive 1 February. Five-star Turkey escape Situated close to the seafront, the Martı Hemithea Hotel near Marmaris offers a 6-night stay from £876pp b&b, including London flights. 020-8705 0071, southalltravel.co.uk. Depart 27 December. Portuguese beach break Four nights in a 1-bed apartment at the Oura Senses costs from £290pp b&b, including Liverpool flights. 020-8492 6868, olympicholidays.com. Depart 19 December. Five-star South Goa hotel Stay 7 nights at the Novotel Goa Dona Sylvia Resort, with Cavelossim Beach on its doorstep, from £800pp all-inclusive, including Manchester flights. 020-3636 1931, tui.co. uk. Depart 9 December.…

This year, families hoping to visit Father Christmas in his grotto at Harrods will first have to have spent at least £2,000 at the department store. Of the 4,400 ten-minute appointments available with Santa (to be played by three actors at a time in different parts of the grotto), all but 160 will only be open to those who qualify for a “Green Tier 2” Harrods reward card. “Climate strike” has been named Collins Dictionary’s word of the year for 2019. The term, which was used about 100 times more frequently this year than in 2018, is defined as a climate protest in which people skip work or school. Collins also published a “Brexicon”: a list of words brought into use by Brexit, including “flextension”, “cakeism” and “Brexiety”.…

56% of UK adults, and 47% of Tory voters, say they think that the UK should reduce its net carbon emissions to zero by 2030, as proposed by the Labour and Green parties. Current government policy is to decarbonise by 2050. YouGov/The Guardian Only 29% of Britons think that the forthcoming general election will break the Brexit deadlock. 56% believe a new parliament is unlikely to make more progress. BMG/The Independent Support for the Labour Party in the northwest of England has fallen 25 points since the last election to 30%, with the Tories on 33%. Labour is also down 20 points in the Yorkshire and Humber regions, leaving it five points behind the Tories. YouGov/The Independent…

From Hollywood to jail As a wild Hollywood teenager, Cameron Douglas was often at odds with his father, Michael, says Laura Pullman in The Sunday Times. He discovered drink and drugs at 13, and by 17 was taking crystal meth; he later became addicted to liquid cocaine. “I had a pretty good DJ career, and an acting career that was all but handed to me. But in the span of six months my life was in tatters.” He took to robbing motels and liquor stores, and in 2009 began a seven-year jail term. At first he got a kick from it. “It’s something you hear glamorised in music. You get there and you’re enamoured by some of these characters, the big mob bosses.” But when he overheard a rape, and…

As it was in the early days, the internet is still a network of networks – though on a vastly bigger scale. In Britain, individual networked computers connect with their Internet Service Providers (ISPs) via a modem and the national telecoms network. The ISPs have massive numbers of specialised computers called routers. Each router’s job is to know how to move the packets of data along from their source to their destination. ISPs then connect with each other at internet exchange points (IXPs). The London Internet Exchange, for instance, provides “peering” services to large numbers of ISPs at 16 data centres in the capital; it also has local exchanges in Glasgow, Manchester and Cardiff. Internationally, the continents are linked by many hundreds of fibre-optic cables on the seabed. Yet far…

CYPRUS Golden passports for a corrupt elite Philenews (Nicosia) For years, people have been complaining about Cyprus’s “golden passport” scheme, says Michalis Hadjistylianou. Launched in 2013, it offers citizenship to anyone investing s2m in Cypriot property, giving them full EU working and living rights – and so far, 4,000 members of the global mega-rich have taken advantage of this back door into Europe. Earlier this year, President Nicos Anastasiades reacted angrily to claims Cyprus was abusing the practice by handing out passports to corrupt individuals. Far from being a money-laundering paradise, he thundered, Cyprus has the “most stringent” vetting criteria in the EU. How hollow that claim sounds now. After Reuters revealed the identities of dubious recipients, the government has had to take back passports from 26 individuals, including Cambodians…

British workers took just over 140 million days off for sickness last year, says The Daily Telegraph – ten million more than in 2017. The spike has been attributed to a range of factors, including a hot summer combined with the World Cup, and a bad winter owing to February’s “Beast from the East” blizzards. It may also have been linked to a fall in unemployment – making workers more cavalier about taking time off. However, looking at the big picture, last year’s rise was only a blip: the average number of sick days per employee increased marginally from 4.1 days in 2017 to 4.4 in 2018. The long-term trend is sharply in the other direction: it has dropped from 7.2 days off per worker in the mid-1990s. Workers have…

The residents of Bentley, in South Yorkshire, are experiencing a horrible sense of déjà vu, said Nazia Parveen in The Guardian. Twelve years ago, many of them lost everything when their houses in the Doncaster suburb were submerged in floodwater. Last Friday it happened again, as “almost biblical” downpours on saturated ground led the River Don to break its banks. But they were only some of thevictims of flooding that left “a trail of devastation across swathes of the Midlands and northern England”. Derbyshire and other areas registered more rainfall in 24hours than they normally get in the whole of November. As more than 100 flood warnings were issued across the region, some 1,200 properties were evacuated, and awoman was swept to her death as she tried to escape rising…

“Sometimes, a team get into such a good place that it is almost as if they forget how to lose,” said Martin Samuel in the Daily Mail. “That iswhere Liverpool are.” They didn’t actually outplay Manchester City in Sunday’s 3-1 victory. But whenever they got a chance, they took it. “When they got a sniff, they took it too.” The win sent them eight points clear at the top of the table, nine ahead of City. Only one team in Premier League history – Manchester United in 1993 – has ever had a bigger advantage at this stage of a Premier League campaign. Titles may not be won in November, “but this is Liverpool’s tolose now”. This Liverpool side is “jam-packed with quality”, said James Pearce on The Athletic. But…

To your good health To The Daily Telegraph I read with interest that average consumption is now 9.7 litres of pure alcohol a year, equivalent to1.5 glasses of wine per day, which is the same as it was in 1980, and just over the recently revised limit of 14 units per week. This is also approximately the intake associated with improved mortality when compared to non-drinkers. Why is it now considered a problem? The issue lies with the small numbers who consume far in excess of safe levels, not the increasingly vilified boomer generation. Dr John Giles, Robertsbridge, East Sussex Let managers manage? To The Times In his letter, Dr Tim Howard asserts that it is time to remove the NHS from politicians’ control and allow it to be run…

There’s something quite unusual about the Vietnam War pic due for release next year, says Rebecca Alter in New York Magazine. It’s going to star James Dean. Yes, you read that right. In Finding Jack, the broodingly handsome 1950s Hollywood icon, who died in a car crash in 1955 – a month before the Vietnam War began – has been “posthumously cast” as a Vietnam vet who befriends a Labrador. It isn’t a gimmick, insists the film’s co-director, Anton Ernst: “We searched high and low for the perfect [actor], and after months of research, we decided Dean” was perfect for the role. His performance will be built from “full body” CGI using actual footage, though another actor will voice his words. “This has been coming for a long time,” said…

The margins of Édouard Manet’s letters were often decorated with watercolour doodles – of curled-up cats, watering cans, women’s ankles. These designs have been long admired for their “effortless spontaneity”, says Dalya Alberge in The Observer: Manet himself said that artists should capture what they see “at the first go”. However, an art historian has discovered that Manet actually created the sketches by tracing them from designs he had prepared earlier. Dr Emily Beeny of the J. Paul Getty Museum compared Manet’s illustrated letters with his sketchbook drawings, and found that most of the former had been traced. “He would take semi-transparent letter paper, lay it down over a sketchbook page, trace that design with a wash of grey watercolour and then basically colour it in with watercolour,” said Beeny.…

In the build-up to Joe’s wake Eddie’s scheming continues, as he develops his hangover cure. Gamely, Johnny agrees to try it and, lo and behold, it appears to work. Clarrie is overcome with gratitude for all the help being offered in the preparations for the wake. That there is standing room only in the church pays testament to the great affection felt towards Joe. After the service, the myriad mourners repair to The Bull where the cider club reminisce, Jim plays a song and a final toast is made after a “telegram” arrives from the Queen pub in Hollerton. Russ’s protracted divorce begins to take its toll on Lily. She eventually decides to trail Lara, only to discover her surprising youth. Lily pressures Russ to start divorce proceedings. Elsewhere, Helen’s…

Marmo 31 Baldwin Street, Bristol (0117-316 4987) “I’m beginning to wonder whether they breed them in tanks, these small, perfectly formed Bristolian restaurants,” says Jay Rayner in The Observer. Although far from “Identikit operations”, they nonetheless share certain qualities – typically being “basically furnished” single rooms with short menus and “eminently reasonable” prices. At Marmo (Italian for marble), there are just three choices per course: “one meaty, one pescatarian and one vegetarian”. A starter of gnocco fritto – pork fat-enriched pillows of bread, puffed up in afryer – comes layered with “folds of mortadella, the pink of a giggling baby’s cheek”. My main is a “tangled heap of hand-cut tagliolini” spun through with globe artichokes and sweet brown shrimps: simple but “very effective”. Throw in a pudding, and your…

● Brush your teeth for two full minutes using a fluoride toothpaste. ● After eating, wait an hour before brushing your teeth. Sugars in food and drink lower the pH level in the mouth, making it acidic. Brushing straight after eating can loosen enamel already threatened by acid. Brush your teeth as soon as you get out of bed – and then wait 30 minutes for breakfast; or brush them an hour after breakfast. ● Mouthwash is not a substitute for brushing your teeth – it mainly freshens your breath. And mouthwash straight after brushing is counterproductive, because it removes the necessary fluoride. ● It can be helpful to use mouthwash after a midday meal, though, as it neutralises the acid produced when you eat or drink. ● If you’re…

The Storehouse Kirkwall, Orkney Set in the centre of Kirkwall, Orkney’s capital, this recently-opened restaurant with rooms is “a huge new asset to the islands”, says Stephen McClarence in The Times. Owners Judith Glue (a knitwear designer) and David Spence (an architect) have revamped the 19th century building it occupies in “vibrant” contemporary style. Four of the eight rooms have baths as well as showers, two have balconies, and all have “a calm Scandi feel”, with individually themed colours and “soft, tweedy fabrics”. In the restaurant, diners enjoy dishes made from Orkney-sourced ingredients, including fish. Doubles from £130 b&b. thestore houserestaurantwithrooms.co.uk .…

Newspaper editor caught up in the Hitler Diaries scandal Frank Giles 1919-2019 Frank Giles, who has died aged 100, was approaching retirement after a long career in journalism when he was offered the editorship of The Sunday Times. He accepted thejob, but the year was 1981, and The Times group had just been acquired by Rupert Murdoch. The Australian tycoon had little respect for his urbane, slightly left-leaning editor. “There goes Frank Giles, ruining a great newspaper,” he’d say. And Giles had no taste for his boss’s union battles, nor for the management style that swept across the group. But his greatest misfortune was perhaps that his tenure coincided with the scandal of the Hitler Diaries. It was not entirely his fault that the Times was duped into buying what…

Annual growth in the UK economy fell to its slowest pace in nine years at one point in the third quarter, although the country has avoided slipping into recession. A boost to exports helped GDP rise by 0.3% in the three months to September, after contracting by 0.2% in the previous quarter. Strong consumer spending and a robust performance from the services sector also lifted growth. The credit rating agency Moody’s changed the outlook on the UK’s current Aa2 rating from “stable” to “negative”, claiming that Brexit had caused “paralysis in policy-making”. Stocks in Hong Kong suffered a sharp drop as protests intensified; business activity in the territory fell at its sharpest pace in more than two decades. New figures showed that President Trump’s trade war is not having the…

Big battles ahead for Big Tech Irwin Stelzer The Sunday Times US politicians are calling for the break-up of Big Tech, says Irwin Stelzer. And if they get their way, the “radical restructuring” they envisage of a sector of the economy that has changed the way we communicate, shop and live our lives will affect Britain every bit as much as America. That’s because the challenge facing Google, Facebook, Amazon and Co. is far more serious than anything thrown at them by European competition regulators, who have imposed fines and forced an end to certain practices, but left the companies’ actual structures intact. Yet in the US, momentum is building for “a basic rethinking of competition law” to cut them down to size: the old nostrum that “no consumer harm”…

The week’s best shares Bloomsbury Publishing Investors Chronicle Academic and professional sales are up, thanks to a 73% spike in Bloomsbury Digital Resources. A new illustrated edition of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire should boost Christmas sales. Yields 3.2%. Buy. 250p. FDM Group The Sunday Times FDM trains up IT experts and contracts them out to blue-chip companies. The “Brexit fog” has sparked concerns, but sales and profits are rising, and the firm is resilient. Panmure Gordon names an £11.40 target. Buy. 756p. Oxford Instruments Shares This maker of high-tech tools and systems used for scientific research, patient monitoring and semiconductor processing, has lagged in recent years. But self-help measures should improve earnings and boost margins. Buy. £13.60. Dassault Systèmes The Daily Telegraph Dassault’s high-speed artificial intelligence software…