News Round-Up

• “Healey faces £35 billion hole in Budget, IFS warns” – The Institute for Fiscal Studies says the Chancellor faces a £35 billion shortfall to maintain existing spending policies and boost defence funding, reports the Telegraph.
• “Putin’s attempt to influence Brexit vote failed, says minister” – The Middle East minister Stephen Doughty has insisted that the Kremlin failed in its attempt to manipulate the 2016 Brexit vote, says the Telegraph.
• “Boris suggests Burnham is lying about Russian interference in EU vote” – Boris Johnson has accused Andy Burnham of lying about Russian interference in the EU referendum, reports the Mail.
• “I fear Burnham has the edge in the battle to reverse Brexit” – There is plenty of evidence to defend our decision to leave the EU. So why doesn’t the Right make use of it? asks Robert Tombs in the Telegraph.
• “Andy Burnham must think voters are stupid” – The Prime Minister is retoxifying the Brexit debate – and the Right needs to be prepared, writes David Frost in the Telegraph.
• “I saw lynch mobs as a child… cancel culture is similar” – Kemi Badenoch, who grew up in Nigeria, has compared the mob mentality of cancel culture to the street violence she witnessed as a child, according to the Telegraph.
• “Polanski hints at Green Party reforms after Zionism row” – The under-pressure Green leader has signalled he wants “more responsibility” to better shape the party’s “strategic direction” following the damaging Zionism controversy, says the Telegraph.
• “Pro-Palestine Greens plot to banish ‘toxic’ Caroline Lucas” – Green Party activists are plotting to oust Caroline Lucas after accusing her of being an Israeli “shill”, reveals the Telegraph.
• “Unions fear Poundland will go into administration ‘within days’” – One of Britain’s largest trade unions is warning that Poundland could collapse into administration imminently, putting 12,000 jobs at risk, according to the Grocer.
• “The great private school sell-off: from mansions to Send schools” – More than 70 independents closed their doors last year, unable to weather the storm of VAT on fees and rising costs. In the Times, David Byers investigates what happens to the buildings.
• “French 14 year-old ‘shoots two teachers with hunting rifle’” – A teenage suspect has been arrested after a headteacher was struck at a school in France in a shocking attack carried out with a hunting rifle, reports Sky News.
• “Europe’s test case to ‘unite the Right’” – A once-fringe party of Franco-apologists could finally take seats in the Spanish national government in next month’s snap elections, writes James Crisp in the Telegraph.
• “Danish teachers granted permission to use ‘physical force’ in classrooms” – Denmark is to allow teachers to physically restrain pupils in classrooms amid mounting complaints about rising violence in schools, says the Telegraph.
• “True-blue Jewish voters turn red in Michigan” – Old political certainties are crumbling in Michigan as true blue voters face a choice between an anti-Israel Democrat and an ally of Trump, notes Benedict Smith in the Telegraph.
• “A Nobel prize for hating Israel” – The Nobel Peace Prize nomination of Navi Pillay – a figure who has consistently aligned herself with Hamas apologists – reveals the extent to which the award has been corrupted by anti-Israel politics, says the Wall Street Journal in a leading article.
• “Disability claims ‘rose faster post-Covid than after First World War’” – The number of working-age people classed as disabled has jumped by 1.8 million in just five years – a rise even greater than in the aftermath of the First World War, according to the Mail.
• “Migration since Covid pushed up house prices by £15,000” – New analysis reveals that post-2020 migration has added around £15,270 to average house prices, reports the Telegraph.
• “The fraud that launched the mRNA era” – On his Substack, a Midwestern Doctor presents a forensic audit of Pfizer’s trial data alongside newly released Argentine regulatory documents, arguing they expose the fraudulent foundations of the “safe and effective” claim underpinning the entire mRNA platform.
• “Hackers cause French supermarket fridges to catch fire” – Temperatures in fridges across hundreds of stores in France were forced up to 50°C on Sunday night, sparking fires and causing widespread food losses, reports the BBC.
• “Houthis used Claude AI to make self-correcting missiles” – Anthropic has revealed that Yemen-based Houthi fighters launched three weapons programmes using its Claude AI products to develop self-correcting rockets and ballistic missiles, says the Mail.
• “EV drivers face police raids for dodging pay-per-mile tax” – Labour plans to allow officers to enter homes to inspect and seize cars belonging to EV drivers who dodge the new pay-per-mile tax, reports the Telegraph.
• “Just the numbers, ma’am: Chris Martz on Isaias and Gulf sea surface temperatures” – An anomalously warm Gulf of Mexico has no meaningful correlation to hurricane intensity, writes Charles Rotter in Watts Up With That?
• “Feds defy Supreme Court ban on labelling every puddle a ‘protected wetland’” – The US Supreme Court has put limits on the government’s power to regulate wetlands, but the Army Corps of Engineers seems to be carrying on regardless, says Bonner Cohen at CFACT.
• “Seattle Times story on Skagit flooding and global warming is clearly wrong” – The Seattle Times has fundamentally misrepresented the link between Skagit river flooding and global warming, according to Cliff Mass on his weather blog.
• “The great Arctic ice meltdown that wasn’t: comical calamity of climate prophecy” – In Principia Scientific, John O’Sullivan notes that the confident scientific predictions of a catastrophic long-term Arctic ice meltdown have been torpedoed by massive ice growth.
• “Wrong, media: penguins thriving or dying, climate change gets blamed either way” – The media blame climate change for both penguin population booms and busts, which tells you all you need to know about the rigour of climate reporting, says Anthony Watts in ClimateRealism.
• “Digger on course to be biggest box office flop of all time” – Tom Cruise’s polarising film Digger looks set to lose a staggering $245 million after its second-weekend ticket sales collapsed by 60%, reports the Mail.
• “Trans activists criticise BBC over Strictly ‘censorship’” – Trans activists have accused the BBC of “censorship” after Strictly Come Dancing edited out a dancer’s pro-trans T-shirt from training footage, reports the Telegraph.
• “Mein Kampf: a very, very long review” – On his Substack, Eugyppius delivers the second part of his in-depth review of Hitler’s Mein Kampf.
• “Free Speech Union backs councillor punished for protecting children from sex toys in a public library” – Toby explains why the Free Speech Union is crowdfunding to defend Councillor Michael Fife Cook after Devon County Council sanctioned him for raising safeguarding concerns about a library event that forced a mother to explain giant sex toys to her young children.

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