News Round-Up

• “Badenoch: Burnham ‘fiddling while Putin threatens to burn Europe’” – Kemi Badenoch has accused Andy Burnham of ignoring the growing Russian threat to Europe as Moscow intensifies its hybrid war against the West, reports the Telegraph.
• “Can Andy Burnham’s sunshine act survive budget reality?” – With a Healey in No. 11 and a mounting pile of debt, Burnham faces an uphill battle to escape the shadow of the 1970s as he prepares his first conference speech as Prime Minister, says the Times.
• “Kemi Badenoch: Of course the captains of industry are quitting Britain” – In the Mail, Kemi writes that under Andy Burnham, Britain has become a hostile environment for the wealth creators and entrepreneurs the country desperately needs.
• “Sir Jim Ratcliffe has lost confidence in the UK” – The Manchester United co-owner and billionaire industrialist blames Labour’s failure to tackle welfare and immigration, along with punishingly high taxes, for driving Britain’s wealthy abroad, reports the Mail.
• “Ed Davey calls for 10p fuel duty cut after damning poll” – Ahead of the Liberal Democrats’ annual conference, Ed Davey warns that taxes have reached a “historic high” and demands a 10p cut to fuel duty, notes the Mail.
• “Healey’s mansion tax raid to hit 270,000 families” – John Healey’s planned changes to the mansion tax threshold will drag more than a quarter of a million families into the levy, reports the Telegraph.
• “PIP benefits bill set to double by 2030” – The disability payments budget is on course to hit £45 billion a year by 2030, making it larger than all but three Government departments, says the Times.
• “Rory Stewart’s grooming-gangs howler” – Rory Stewart’s dismissal of the grooming gangs scandal as no longer a serious problem reveals a staggering disconnect from the horror and rage it still provokes, writes Simon Evans in Spiked.
• “I’m a grooming gang survivor. This is why Rory Stewart is wrong” – In UnHerd, Fiona Goddard hits back at Rory Stewart’s claim that the grooming gangs scandal is “manageable” and a thing of the past, arguing that his comments betray a profound failure to understand the survivors’ continuing trauma.
• “Tories intervene after NHS Trust digs in over trans stance” – Shadow Health Secretary Damian Hinds and Shadow Minister for Women and Equalities Joy Morrissey have written to the Chief Executive of Greater Manchester Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust demanding it reverse its policy of admitting biological males to female psychiatric wards, notes Christian Concern.
• “Sandie Peggie: ‘My nursing union is blinded by trans activists’” – The nurse campaigning for single-sex NHS changing rooms is suing the Royal College of Nursing, claiming she was turned away when she sought its support, reports the Times.
• “Trans activists bullying us out of Lib Dems and Greens, say women” – Women in the Liberal Democrats and Green Party claim they have “been bullied out of their political home” by trans activists, says the Telegraph.
• “Calne town councillor cleared over gender debate comments” – A town councillor has been cleared of wrongdoing after making comments about a proposal on gender identity, reports BBC News.
• “Protester arrested after ‘attack on Restore campaigner’” – A Restore Britain canvasser was punched while handing out leaflets in Camden and a woman has been arrested on suspicion of assault, writes the Telegraph.
• “Greens teach councils how to stop Home Office migrant raids” – Green Party councillors are set to lead a 45-minute session instructing local authorities on how to obstruct Home Office immigration enforcement operations, notes the Telegraph.
• “Slipping the net” – The proscription of Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation was meant to shut the campaign down, but the group is finding ways to continue operating, writes Anna Stanley in the Critic.
• “There was never a plan to integrate this wave of migrants into Britain” – People of all classes sense they are being lied to by politicians who presided over mass migration with no strategy for integration, says Janet Daley in the Telegraph.
• “Moment seven migrants are found hiding in back of a lorry” – Police surrounded a yellow lorry parked on Britannia Road in Waltham Cross, Hertfordshire, after seven migrants were discovered concealed in its rear, says the Mail.
• “Reform to dodge ban on foreign donors by ‘setting up crypto union’” – Arron Banks claims Reform UK will respond to Labour’s crackdown on foreign donations by establishing a new trade union representing workers in the IT, AI and cryptocurrency industries, according to the Mail. Cunning.
• “Liberal Democrats ‘want British troops to join EU army’” – The Conservatives claim the Liberal Democrats want Britain’s Armed Forces to form part of an EU army as part of a drive to forge closer ties with Brussels, reveals the Telegraph.
• “Why the Civil Service are revolting – again” – In the Spectator, Patrick West writes that parts of the public sector in Whitehall have long been citadels of progressive dogma – and that the Civil Service’s instinct for obstruction is alive and well.
• “Disabled toddler’s euthanasia was ‘reasonable’, Netherlands claims” – A two year-old child with disabilities has been euthanised in the Netherlands in a case that an official committee determined was “handled well”, reports the Christian Institute.
• “B.C. doctor fined $28,000 for refusing to inject trans-identifying teen with puberty blocker” – A British Columbia family doctor has been ordered to pay $28,000 after refusing to administer puberty blockers to a trans-identifying teenager, says the National Post.
• “Eric Zemmour announces comeback with migrant crackdown pledge” – The Right-wing former TV presenter is entering a crowded French presidential race with a pledge to crack down on migration, potentially splitting the vote with Marine Le Pen, notes the Telegraph.
• “Anxious schoolchildren represented in the classroom by £3,500 robots” – The AV1 robot – equipped with a camera, microphone and speaker – is being used to allow anxiety-stricken pupils to ‘attend’ lessons from home via an app, reveals the Mail.
• “Moss Landing battery plant fire reignites, stoking fresh safety concerns statewide” – A fresh fire at California’s Moss Landing battery storage facility has renewed alarm over the health impacts of large-scale battery installations and the state’s accelerating reliance on them, reports the Hemet and San Jacinto Chronicle.
• “Taxpayers foot £420,000 bill for eco-boiler to keep sex offenders warm” – A Dorset prison is spending £420,000 on a Net Zero-compliant boiler to heat workshops used by sex offenders, says the Telegraph.
• “Don’t waste water on full-body baptisms, judge tells church” – A judge has blocked an Anglican church in Nottingham from installing a full-immersion baptism font, ruling that the water use cannot be justified, writes the Telegraph.
• “Aberdeen hydrogen bus fleet sold for just 6% of original public investment” – Aberdeen’s much-trumpeted hydrogen bus fleet has been sold for a mere 6% of the taxpayer money originally spent on it, revealing the true cost of the city’s green transport experiment, notes Paul Homewood in Not a Lot of People Know That.
• “Why green zealots want to drop ‘Net Zero’” – In the Spectator, Ross Clark argues that the Commons Energy Security Committee’s call to drop the term ‘Net Zero’ is a cynical rebranding exercise designed to rescue the discredited policy by ditching only its toxic label, not its substance.
• “Britain teaching kids they have to save the world from climate change” – As Britain teeters on the brink of a self-inflicted green economic catastrophe, children are being indoctrinated to demand ever more aggressive climate action, writes Eric Worrall in Watts Up With That?
• “Fantasy climate models effectively denied energy to the poor: the White House just set the stage for change” – A debunked climate agenda built on fantasy models has kept millions in the developing world locked in energy poverty, but a new White House intervention could finally rewrite the rules, says Vijay Jayaraj in Watts Up With That?
• “A frenzy of cancellation” – Andrew Doyle reports on an escalating cancellation campaign that, following the firing of rap artist Macklemore over his on-stage pro-Palestine antics, is threatening to engulf Ed Sheeran.
• “Damon Albarn is the latest musician to turn his back on Ed Sheeran” – Damon Albarn has draped a Palestinian flag over his shoulder and urged fans: “Don’t ever be neutral,” making him the latest musician to publicly distance himself from Ed Sheeran amid the Macklemore row, reports the Mail.
• “Ed Sheeran protégées cut ties with star after Macklemore Palestine row” – Five members of Sheeran’s protégée group Katseye have quietly removed him from their followers list, signalling a fresh rupture in the fallout from the Macklemore Palestine controversy, notes the Mail.
• “Ireland’s insane witch-hunting of Ed Sheeran” – In Spiked, Brendan O’Neill says Ireland’s elites have turned on Sheeran for refusing to condemn Israel with the same feral intensity they demand of everyone else.
• “Archbishop accused of condoning repression of Muslim women” – Archbishop of Canterbury Sarah Mullally faces accusations of sending a “deeply troubling message” by posing beside the fully-covered wife of Islamic cleric Hafiz Tahir Ashrafi, reports the Mail.
• “Muslim cleric’s award withdrawal shows limits of liberal Christianity” – In UnHerd, Niall Gooch writes that the scandal of Sarah Mullally honouring a controversial Muslim cleric on the 25th anniversary of 9/11 – only to hastily withdraw the award – lays bare the fatal contradictions of liberal Christianity.
• “The Church of England is destroying itself” – Andrew Gilligan in the Spectator says the Church of England’s decision to mark the 25th anniversary of 9/11 by awarding a prize for ‘reconciliation’ to a supporter of Osama bin Laden is a devastating illustration of an institution being destroyed from within.
• “Ruling classes won’t admit they are wrong about Letby” – Lady Justice Thirlwall’s report on the Lucy Letby case exposes a ruling class almost pathologically incapable of confronting what it does not wish to know, according to Peter Hitchens in the Mail.
• “Lucy Letby: 900 pages later, who’s winning the PR battle?” – The Thirlwall report’s implications for the families, Letby’s defenders and public opinion are examined in depth, reports the Times.
• “The Effective Altruists are already in control” – Effective Altruism’s drive to maximise global happiness leads to deeply unsettling conclusions that are already shaping the levers of power, writes Travis Aaroe in the Spectator.
• “Sir Jim Ratcliffe has said that Britain is on the slide” – Watch on X the INEOS boss says politicians are in it for themselves and aren’t tough enough to deal with the benefits and immigration problems.

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