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What happened What the editorials said May’s last stand “What ashambles,” said The Daily Telegraph. Tuesday was set to be amoment of truth for Brexit, yet once again May Tory MPs triggered avote of confidence “decided to delay matters in the hope that in Theresa May’s leadership this week, something will turn up, Micawber-style”. adding to the sense of chaos engulfing The Government looks adrift and her premiership and her Brexit deal. powerless. The PM is playing for time, The chairman of the 1922 Committee of hoping that delaying the vote until closer Conservative backbenchers, Graham Brady, to the 29 March exit deadline will “spook” revealed on Wednesday that he had received colleagues into accepting her deal, said The the requisite 48 letters –representing 15% Times. This is adangerous gamble, as it of Tory MPs –calling for such ameasure. significantly increases the chances of an The move came two days after the “accidental no deal” outcome. Those Prime Minister belatedly called off acrunch yearning for aclean break from the EU Commons vote on her Brexit plan, admitting have always known that their best chance to MPs that it faced defeat by a“significant The PM with Angela Merkel in Berlin of achieving it is “to run down the clock”. margin”. She was jeered as she said she had listened to the “widespread and deep concern” about the deal. May’s tactics throughout the Brexit process have been “based on her own self-interest and that of her party, rather than the After pulling the vote, May embarked on awhistle-stop tour country”, said The Guardian. She only has herself to blame of European capitals to plead for help in salvaging her Brexit for the current mess. On the contrary, said the Daily Mail, plan. EU leaders indicated that they would be prepared to May has worked tirelessly to achieve “an honourable Brexit offer some assurances and clarifications about how they compromise” that the country can unite behind. The blame would interpret the withdrawal treaty, but ruled out further lies with Tory rebels, who, with their endless wrecking tactics negotiations on the deal itself. May promised to hold avote and backbiting (see page 8), risk ushering Jeremy Corbyn into by 21 January, which is alittle more than two months before No. 10. Compared to the threat aCorbyn-led government the UK is due to leave the EU under the terms of Article 50. would pose to our prosperity, “Brexit is amere sideshow”.

What happened What the editorials said China’s hi-tech espionage Prepare for a“spectacular legal confrontation”, said The Chicago Tribune. Meng’s arrest is about much more than China and the US were on acollision course the possible violation of trade sanctions. For this week as adiplomatic row intensified over one thing, she’s no ordinary businesswoman: the arrest of asenior executive of the Chinese she’s the daughter of the company’s founder, telecoms giant Huawei. Beijing demanded the Ren Zhengfei, aformer People’s Liberation Army immediate release of Meng Wanzhou, the officer with close ties to Beijing. More importantly, company’s 46-year-old chief financial officer, Huawei has long been atarget of Western held in Canada at the request of the US, which suspicions, notably over its role in building new is seeking her extradition. Meng, who was 5G telecoms networks around the world. The arrested two weeks ago during astopover at risks are all too real, said The Globe and Mail Vancouver airport, is accused of breaching (Toronto). If unchecked, Huawei is likely to use US trade sanctions on Iran and could face its technology for industrial espionage and to 30 years in jail if convicted. Beijing accused the set up cyberattacks. Anew Cold War with China US of “despicable hooliganism” and in atit-for- looms: this affair could be its first salvo. tat move has ordered the detention of aformer Meng’s arrest: an act of Canadian diplomat in China. “despicable hooliganism”? At the very least, the affair is sure to inflame existing US-China trade tensions –and just In abid to defuse tensions, President Trump announced that when detente looked possible, said the FT. After meeting he was ready to intervene in the Meng case if it would help China’s President Xi this month, President Trump delayed close atrade deal with China. Fears that the row would the imposition of steep tariffs on Chinese imports for 90 days, aggravate the US-China trade war had prompted asteep fall to allow for negotiations on atrade deal. After Meng’s arrest, in share prices around the world. that “deadline for progress looks like atime bomb”.

It wasn’t all bad The world’s oldest ABritish solo yachtswoman known wild bird, taking part in around-the-world Paramedics in London and aLaysan albatross race was dramatically rescued Surrey have been finding named Wisdom, last week in the Southern mysterious envelopes on their looks set to become Ocean, 50 hours after her mast ambulances containing thank amother again at broke in astorm. Susie Goodall, you cards, and up to £10 in cash the age of 68. For 29, was in fourth place 157 days or vouchers for “coffee and the nesting season, into the Golden Globe race doughnuts”. The “professional- Wisdom has returned when her yacht flipped over, looking” cards, some found to the Midway Atoll 2,000 miles off Cape Horn. Her outside the Royal Surrey wildlife refuge, atiny distress signal was picked up by Hospital in Guildford, have US island territory in the coastguard in Cornwall, and come in clear envelopes marked the middle of the a40,000-tonne cargo ship going “documents enclosed”. London Pacific, where she was born. Should her latest egg with her mate, from China to Argentina went to Ambulance Service said the Akeakamai, hatch and take to the sea, it will be her 37th chick, say her rescue. Goodall was pulled cards were among 300 notes US officials. Albatrosses are known for their long lifespans, and out of the sea on alarge hook, RILEY/USFWS and letters of thanks sent to its often outlive their researchers; Chandler Robbins, the biologist and should reach dry land just staff by the public each month. who first banded Wisdom, in 1956, died last year aged 98. before Christmas. ADALYN ©M

COVER CARTOON: HOWARD MCWILLIAM THE WEEK 15 December 2018 …and how they were covered NEWS 7

What the commentators said What next? “It’s not foolish to run from afight you are about to lose,” said Robert Shrimsley in the FT. SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon But if you don’t have anywhere to run to, you’re only putting off the inevitable. May bought and more than 30 Labour herself alittle time by cancelling the Brexit vote and promising to seek new assurances from MPs urged Jeremy Corbyn EU leaders. But there’s no chance of her securing the sort of fundamental treaty changes this week to call avote of demanded by Tory rebels and the DUP, who regard the Irish backstop as a“constitutional no confidence in the trap from which the UK cannot unilaterally escape”. It’s not going to happen, agreed Government as awhole. Such George Eaton in the New Statesman. Tory Brexiters talk of imposing atime limit or avote would stand no chance conditions on the backstop, but that’s “oxymoronic”. As an insurance policy guaranteeing of passing, says Stephen Bush asoft border in Ireland, the backstop is “indefinite and unconditional or it is nothing”. in the New Statesman. The move was just abid to With Parliament deadlocked, people are increasingly coming round to the idea that a “accelerate the evolution of second referendum is likely, said Katy Balls in The Spectator. The Vote Leave mastermind Labour’s position” by ruling Dominic Cummings has previously said his team would reform in the event of such avote, out the option of an early and the separate Leave Means Leave organisation is already raising money and devising general election, thereby possible campaign slogans. An early candidate: “Tell them again.” Those pushing for a forcing Corbyn to throw second vote need to ask themselves whether they’re “confident Remain would win in the his support behind asecond face of aLeave campaign based on an anti-establishment betrayal narrative”. referendum. Corbyn said he wouldn’t call aconfidence Whether or not we have another referendum, there’s agood chance that we’re going to crash vote until he could win it. out of the EU, said Daniel Finkelstein in The Times. To complete the withdrawal agreement process, it’s not enough simply for the Government to win a“meaningful vote” on the Aruling from the European principle of the deal, as May hoped to on Tuesday. It also has to get adetailed EU withdrawal Court of Justice this week bill through both houses of Parliament. That’s going to be very hard to do without Labour confirmed that the UK had support, but winning that backing –by, say, enabling asecond referendum –may create more aunilateral right to cancel Tory rebels. It’s “incredibly complacent” to believe that the calamitous consequences of Brexit and stay in the EU no deal mean it won’t happen. The chances of no deal are actually “very high indeed”. under its current terms.

What the commentators said What next? America’s challenge to Huawei has “sent shock waves through the world economy”, said Owing to security concerns, James Titcomb and Laurence Dodds in The Sunday Telegraph. Less than adecade ago, the BT last week announced company was almost unknown; today, it’s the world’s biggest supplier of telecoms equipment that it is removing Huawei and the second-largest manufacturer of mobile telephones. Annual revenues are slated to reach equipment from the core $100bn this year, largely from overseas. As asymbol of “China’s technological ascendancy”, of its existing 3G and 4G it’s the darling of aChinese government that promotes it as a“national champion”. But to the mobile operations. Nor will West, Huawei has become a“lightning rod” for more general concerns about Chinese it be using Huawei equip- technology, said The Economist. Top of the worry list is 5G, which will be the “enabling ment when it rolls out its technology” behind the “internet of things”, destined to pave the way for communication 5G network. Huawei, which between everything from cars to children’s toys. As the world becomes more connected, do employs 1,500 people in the we really want “a Chinese firm in charge of the infrastructure on which it all depends”? UK, is now unlikely to go ahead with the plans it The prospect has certainly rattled our own security services, said James Kynge in the FT. Spy announced in February to chiefs from across the Western world have recently been “emerging from the shadows” to air invest £3bn in the country their concerns. Last week Alex Younger, head of MI6, spoke openly of the danger posed by over the next five years. Huawei and the need to “take some decisions” about its place in Britain. Other countries haven’t waited to act. The US, Australia and New Zealand have already banned or limited Meng, released on £6m bail Huawei’s role in the roll-out of their 5G networks. The US isn’t blameless itself, said Eli Lake this week, will appear again on Bloomberg. We now know from leaked documents that the National Security Agency has in court in Vancouver in paid US companies for access to their customers’ data. However, China’s snooping is of a February. No date has been different order. Under the country’s new National Intelligence Law, private companies are set for aformal extradition actually obliged to assist the state in its espionage work. That’s one good reason why “America hearing, and the process is and its allies must make sure Huawei is kept far away from their cell phone towers”. expected to take months.

Editor-in-chief: Jeremy O’Grady Brexit supporters are bigots, convinced foreigners have deprived Editor: Caroline Law THEWEEK them of their jobs and livelihoods, despite evidence that immigration Executive editor: Theo Tait Deputy editor: Harry Nicolle City editor: Jane Lewis Editorial assistant: Asya Likhtman has had no significant effect on wages, house prices or public Contributing editors: Daniel Cohen, Charity Crewe,Thomas Hodgkinson, Simon Wilson, Rob McLuhan, Anthony services. So said Matthew d’Ancona in The Guardian last week. Of course, immigration was a Gardner, William Underhill, Digby Warde-Aldam, Tom Yarwood Editorial staff: Anoushka Petit, Tigger Ridgwell, major factor in the result; but does that mean everyone who voted for Brexit because of it is bigoted? William Skidelsky, Rosabel Creen Picture editor: Xandie Nutting Art director: Nathalie Fowler Sub-editor: Laurie Not necessarily. As The Guardian itself pointed out in arecent editorial, the fact that freedom of Tuffrey Production editor: Alanna O’Connell movement has had aneutral or positive impact at amacro level does not mean that it hasn’t had a Founder and editorial director: Jolyon Connell Production Manager: Ebony Besagni Senior Production negative impact on some communities (see letters, page 27). Telling voters that their experience has Executive: Maaya Mistry Newstrade Director: David Barker Direct Marketing Director: Abi Spooner Inserts: Joe Teal been imagined or concocted is not productive. In fact, to the extent that Brexit was aprotest vote, it Classified: Henry Haselock, Henry Pickford, Rebecca Seetanah Account Directors: Scott Hayter, John Hipkiss, Jocelyn was surely that kind of blindness to people’s grievances that drove it. Sital-Singh, Chris Watters Digital Director: John Perry UK Advertsing Director: Caroline Fenner In Britain, we tend to think that there’s something uniquely insular about our outlook: Remainers Executive Director –Head of Advertising: David Weeks talk about Little Englanders, wedded to amonocultural past. Yet we know that the forces behind the Chief Executive, The Week: Kerin O’Connor Group CFO/COO: Brett Reynolds Brexit vote are causing cataclysms all over Europe (see page 22). And we know that those countries Chief executive: James Tye are just as plagued by xenophobia and nationalism as Britain –more so, in some cases. But when Dennis Publishing founder: Felix Dennis the French vote for anti-immigrant parties, we look to structural disadvantages; whereas when THE WEEK Ltd, asubsidiary of Dennis Publishing Ltd, Britons vote to leave the EU, we assume they’re small-minded racists. Is it part of 31-32 Alfred Place, London WC1E 7DP. Tel: 020-3890 3890. Caroline Law Editorial: The Week Ltd, 2nd Floor, 32 Queensway, London our much-discussed British exceptionalism, that we think no one is as bad as us? W2 3RX. Tel: 020-3890 3787. email: [email protected]

Subscriptions: 0330-333 9494; [email protected] The Week is licensed to The Week Limited by Dennis Publishing Limited. The Week is aregistered trademark of Felix Dennis. 15 December 2018 THE WEEK 8 NEWS Politics

Controversy of the week Ban on gambling adverts Online gambling companies Knives out for May have agreed avoluntary ban on TV advertising during After “a year of false alarms”, it finally happened, said live sports broadcasts. Katy Balls in The Guardian. This week, the tipping point The Remote Gambling was reached: Tory MPs called avote of no confidence in the Association (RGA), whose Prime Minister, which was scheduled for Wednesday evening. members include Bet365 and Theresa May came out fighting, vowing to contest the vote William Hill, agreed the ban “with everything Ihave got”. Conservative MPs were faced in response to concerns that with adifficult choice: oust May and “face abloody leadership the ads lead to underage and problem gambling: there are contest with just months before the UK leaves the EU”; or an estimated 55,000 problem back aleader many see as stubborn and incapable, cementing gamblers aged under 16. her position for another year (under party rules, aleader who The “whistle-to-whistle” ban wins anoconfidence vote cannot be challenged for 12 months). (which has yet to be rubber- stamped) applies to any What abetrayal, said John Stevens in the Daily Mail. While event that starts before the the PM was touring Europe’s capitals in “a last-ditch effort Situation vacant? watershed, but excludes to save Brexit”, backbenchers were stabbing her in the back. horse racing. Shares fell Boris Johnson and even supposedly loyal Cabinet colleagues such as Sajid Javid were jostling to on the news. The RGA is expected to resist calls for replace her. This is anational crisis, said Jonathan Freedland in The Guardian –not the time for a aban on its members spon- pointless Tory feud. But “with the Brexit clock ticking ever louder”, Conservative MPs “retreated soring football shirts. into the comfort zone to engage in their favourite pastime –around of navel-gazing and internecine bloodletting”. As for areplacement, said Alex Massie in The Spectator. “Well, the choice is between Lord Lester resignation those people of whom the public have never heard and those people whom they recognise and dislike An 82-year-old peer accused intensely” (see below, right). There is no credible “Brexit champion” waiting in the wings. Not only of sexual harassment has that, there is no convincing new Brexit strategy waiting to be deployed. resigned from the House of Lords. Lord Lester, aformer May has tried “with the utmost conscientiousness to negotiate acompromise on Brexit”, said human rights lawyer, was Andrew Gimson in The Guardian. But she has failed, and her authority is “shot to pieces”. “Is accused of offering afemale human rights campaigner a it in the country’s interest to let her plod on in her astonishingly uninspiring way for another peerage in return for sex 12 months? And is it in the party’s interest?” The rebels are right: it’s time for “a new and bolder 12 years ago. He denies approach”. Johnson, or any of the Brexiters, would make abetter fist of negotiating than May, the allegations, but said he said Robin Harris in The Daily Telegraph. “Every day she stays in office, announcing and then was resigning, days before pulling parliamentary votes, oscillating between grubby threats and pleas for understanding, peers were due to vote traipsing around Europe like some pitiful beggar”, is “another day of national humiliation for again on his recommended which the Conservatives can expect to be punished”. By Wednesday afternoon, amajority of suspension, because he Tory MPs and the entire Cabinet had declared their support for the PM, said Rob Wilson, in the did “not have the strength same paper. At the time of writing, the likely outcome was aclear victory for May, but with more or health to continue”. Last month, peers blocked his than 100 MPs voting against her, it would be areal blow to her authority. She could “try to limp suspension, claiming the on”, but with her Brexit deal effectively “dead”, and hardly asingle Tory MP who wants her to investigation into the lead them into the next election, it wouldn’t be for long. May’s days in No. 10 are numbered. allegations had been flawed.

Good week for: Spirit of the age Nasa, after its Voyager II probe finally reached interstellar Poll watch Aprimary school in space, becoming only the second man-made object (after its twin, None of the contenders to Lincolnshire was inundated Voyager I) to reach the “space between the stars”. The craft, succeed Theresa May as with complaints after pupils launched in 1977, is now 11 billion miles from Earth. However, Tory leader has apositive were allegedly informed Nasa says that although it has left the heliosphere, it has not left approval rating. When UK that Santa was “made up” our solar system. The boundary is deemed to be the Oort Cloud, adults were asked if each during assembly. The afar-flung collection of objects still influenced by the Sun’s would make agood or bad event’s organisers, the Mary gravity. To get beyond that could take afurther 30,000 years. PM, Sajid Javid ended up Bass Charity, were trying to with the highest net rating explain to Fleet Wood Lane Female adrenaline junkies, who are finally to be allowed full at -18% (15% said he would school that Christmas marks access to the Cresta Run. Women were allowed to hurtle down be agood PM; 33% said the birth of Christ and is not the icy track until 1929, when they were banned, apparently he’d be abad one), closely just about presents; but it because of fears that lying on the sleds might cause breast cancer. followed by David Davis, ended with children crying Since then, they’ve only been allowed down it on one day ayear. Dominic Raab and Amber when, to reinforce the point, Rudd. Trailing behind them two pupils were invited were Boris Johnson, -35%; onto the stage to smash Bad week for: Jeremy Hunt, -41%;and achocolate Santa and ATM operators, with reports that gangs targeting cash machines Michael Gove, -45%. reindeer with ahammer. struck twice aday on average last year, stealing nearly £50m. YouGov/The Sunday Times At Lady Lumley’s School Tactics have included using diggers to tear the machines from in North Yorkshire, walls, and blowing them up by filling them with explosive gas. One in ten Britons send a however, when teachers Mobile phone users, after 25 million of them were unable to Christmas card to their pet said there would be no gifts, –twice as many as give one cards or trees unless pupils access the internet for aday last week, as aresult of afault on to their postman or woman. could explain why we the O2 network. Some of them couldn’t make calls either. Royal Mail/The Inewspaper should celebrate Christmas, The tech giants, with reports suggesting that as employers, the school received more they are losing their lustre. Google, which one survey ranked as Only 12% of 18- to 24-year- than 500 essays about the the best company in Britain to work for last year, has lost its top olds believe they’ll be better meaning of the holiday, spot to Anglian Water, and fallen to 13th place. Meanwhile, off than older generations. and festivities resumed. Apple has been overtaken by Nando’s and easyJet. YouGov/The Guardian

THE WEEK 15 December 2018 Europe at aglance NEWS 9

Hamburg, Rimbo, Sweden Reykjavík Germany Yemen talks: The warring sides in the MPs’ lewd talk: Acovert recording of Merkel successor: four-year-long conflict in Yemen agreed agroup of Icelandic MPs drunkenly Annegret Kramp- to swap 15,000 prisoners at UN-brokered mocking the #MeToo movement, and Karrenbauer, a peace talks in rural Sweden this week. The rating their female colleagues as either staunchly Catholic talks, the first in two years between the “f***able” or “non-f***able”, has social conservative Iran-backed Houthi rebels and the caused uproar in acountry that prizes sometimes dubbed country’s Saudi-backed government, were itself on being at the forefront of gender “Mini-Merkel”, aimed not at brokering an official ceasefire, equality. The recording was made at has been elected but primarily at de-escalating the violence abar near the parliament building in as leader in two major population centres: the port Reykjavík where the six politicians – of Germany’s of rebel-held Hodeida, where an offensive who included amale former prime ruling Christian by the Saudi coalition is threatening avital minister and amale former foreign Democratic Union, narrowly fending off supply line of UN humanitarian aid, and minister –had gathered to drink beer, astrong challenge from the millionaire Taiz, Yemen’s third-largest city, which is rather than attend an afternoon budget businessman Friedrich Merz, who had under siege from rebel forces. The prisoner debate. The MPs can be heard joking returned to politics to contest the CDU swap was aconfidence-building measure about domestic abuse allegations; leadership. AKK (as she is widely known designed to ensure the talks, the first step ridiculing afemale MP who is severely in Germany, pictured) was Merkel’s in along-term peace plan, progressed. disabled; and describing female preferred successor, and her victory – ministers as “clapped-out bags”. at aspecial party congress in Hamburg The only member of the party not last week –makes it more likely that recorded making offensive comments Merkel will see out the rest of her was the only female MP in the group. fourth term as chancellor, which in theory runs until 2021.

Brussels Africa museum: Belgium’s Royal Museum for Central Africa, long criticised for celebrating the country’s brutal colonial past, has reopened following a£67m renovation and acareful process of “decolonisation”. The renamed Africa Museum’s permanent collection, ranging from racist statues to stuffed animals, remains much the same. However, many of the artefacts have been reordered and given new wall texts exploring their history; there are also new displays, discussing colonialism’s impact and legacy. The museum was founded by King Leopold II, who took Congo as his personal fiefdom in the late 19th century, and turned it into aslave state in which millions of people perished. Many believe that the museum should not exist at all and that most of its contents should be returned to Africa –aview reiterated by DR Congo’s President Kabila last week.

Strasbourg, France Rome Ankara Three killed in “terror attack”: France Churches offer Khashoggi tape: Ankara has announced raised its security level to the maximum shelter: Italian that it is trying to organise aUN-backed “emergency attack” this week, after bishops and international investigation into the murder asuspected terrorist shot and killed priests have of Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate two people near acentral square in pledged to “open in Istanbul on 2October. According to the eastern city of Strasbourg. Thirteen the church doors, Turkish officials, the journalist was more were injured in the attack, seven of every single strangled and dismembered by a15-strong of them seriously. The gunman, parish”, to people team sent from Riyadh for that purpose; known to the authorities as having expelled from the speculation is that the killing was been radicalised in jail and thought to migrant reception ordered by Crown Prince Mohammed bin be apotential terror threat, opened fire centres under the Salman (MbS). However, Riyadh denies at about 8pm on Tuesday night as crowds “Salvini decree” this, and last week refused to extradite to converged on apopular Christmas market. that came into force last week. Named Turkey two Saudis who are close to MbS He is believed to have been shot himself in after Matteo Salvini (above), the far-right and who are suspected in Turkey of afirefight with police, but managed to interior minister, this threatens to make planning the killing. This week, Turkish escape. In the aftermath, France tightened homeless thousands of people who are not intelligence sources shared with news security at its borders, and deployed 350 eligible for refugee status, but who are also media atranscript of an audio tape personnel to hunt for the suspect –said to unable to return to their home countries. purporting to document Khashoggi’s be a29-year-old who was born in the city Last Saturday, Salvini held an “Italians last moments; it includes screaming and –but stopped short of reinstating the state first” rally in Rome, attended by 50,000 of sounds identified as “sawing”. His body of emergency imposed after the attacks his supporters, to mark his League party’s has not been found; Turkish officials in Paris in November 2015. six months in power (in coalition). believe it was dissolved in acid.

Catch up with daily news at theweek.co.uk 15 December 2018 THE WEEK 10 NEWS The world at aglance

Charlottesville, Virginia New York White nationalist guilty: Aman who Trump accused of felony: The federal prosecutors who secured drove his car into acrowd of anti-fascist the conviction of Michael Cohen, Donald Trump’s former lawyer counter-protesters at a“Unite the Right” and self-described “Mr Fixit”, have now accused the president rally in Charlottesville last year, killing a of being involved in his crimes. In court filings released last week, woman and injuring nearly 40 others, has they claim Trump illegally orchestrated the hush-money payments been convicted of murder. James Fields Jr, that Cohen arranged for aporn actress and aformer Playboy 21 (pictured), aHitler admirer, had model, with aview to influencing the 2016 election. To add to travelled from Ohio to take part in one of Trump’s problems, special counsel Robert Mueller revealed last America’s biggest white nationalist rallies week that Cohen had told his own team of prosecutors that in decades. The jury rejected his claim that Trump was working on ahuge real estate deal in Moscow well he’d acted out of fear for his safety, and into his election campaign. It was aproject, as the court filings recommended he be sentenced to life plus 419 years. He will be put it, “that sought, and likely required, the assistance of the sentenced in March. At the time of the rally, Donald Trump was Russian government”. These dramatic disclosures have renewed widely criticised for indulging white supremacists by saying there speculation that President Trump may face impeachment – was “blame on both sides” for the violence that ensued. and even imprisonment, when he eventually stands down.

Hollywood, California Oscars host: Three days after being announced as the host of February’s Oscars ceremony, the actor and comedian Kevin Hart has stood down as aresult of homophobic tweets he had sent between 2009 and 2011. Hart, who had said that the comments were satirical, at first refused to apologise, saying he was not going to bow to the “internet trolls” who had unearthed the tweets. But in the face of asocial media backlash, he was obliged to stand down –and apologise.

Washington DC Fox News diplomat: President Trump has named aformer Fox News journalist with no background in international relations as his pick for America’s new ambassador to the UN. The crucial role –which former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley will be leaving at the end of the year –has previously gone to scholars, diplomats or experienced politicians. Heather Nauert, by contrast, was an anchor on Fox –the fiercely right-wing network regularly watched by Trump –before becoming spokesperson for the State Department last year. In that capacity she made headlines in June for citing the D-Day landings in the Second World War as an example of America’s “strong relationship” with Germany.

Caracas Show of solidarity: Two Russian nuclear-capable “Blackjack” bombers landed in Venezuela on Monday, in ashow of support for the Maduro regime that immediately provoked awar of words with Washington. In all, about 100 Russian air force pilots, aboard four aircraft, were welcomed by Venezuela’s defence minister, amove that analysts said was intended as ablunt signal to Washington that Caracas is not without international support. It follows athree-day visit to Moscow last week by President Maduro, who subsequently renewed his claim that the US is actively working to overthrow his government. The US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, attacked the Russian air force deployment as “two corrupt governments squandering public funds, and squelching liberty and freedom while their people suffer”.

Abadiânia, Brazil Buenos Aires Sexual abuse claims: Twelve women in Brazil have accused an Ford executives convicted: Two internationally known “spiritual healer” of sexually abusing former Ford Motor Co. executives them under the guise of “curing” them of depression and other have been convicted by an Argentinian court for aiding the problems. João Teixeira de Faria, 76, who is better known as military in the kidnap and torture of 24 company workers during “João de Deus” (meaning João of God), has followers in the US, Argentina’s 1976-83 dictatorship. Pedro Müller, the manufact- Europe and Australia as well as Brazil –and claims to have cured uring director, was sentenced to ten years in jail; security manager thousands of people over a44-year career in “psychic surgery”. Héctor Sibila to 12. For years, the men had escaped trial thanks to Speaking as part of aTVnews investigation into Faria, one sweeping amnesty laws passed after the return to democracy in Dutch woman and nine Brazilians accused the self-styled healer 1984. But the overturning of the amnesty in 2003 paved the way of forcing them to masturbate him or perform oral sex, for nearly 3,000 people to be charged with human rights abuses. supposedly as the only way of transferring his “cleansing” Almost 1,000 ex-military officers have been imprisoned, but this energy to them. One of the women also accused him of rape. is the first time executives of aforeign firm have been convicted.

THE WEEK 15 December 2018 The world at aglance NEWS 11

Marrakech, Morocco Angarsk, Russia Xinjiang region, China Migration pact: More than 160 countries, Policeman killer: “Precursor to genocide”: The UN’s including the UK, have agreed the Aformer police most senior human rights official, first international accord on managing lieutenant, already Michelle Bachelet, has called for immediate migration flows, at aUNconference in serving life in access to China’s Xinjiang region to verify Morocco. Hailed as an “important day” jail for killing what she called “worrying reports” about by Germany’s Angela Merkel, the Global 22 women, has “re-education” camps where amillion Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular been convicted Muslim Uighurs are being detained. Beijing Migration lays out 23 objectives to open of 56 more acknowledged the existence of the camps up legal migration and discourage illegal murders, making for the first time in October; it claims border crossings. However, it is non- him Russia’s they are places where people undergo binding, some 30 nations didn’t attend worst serial vocational training and learn Mandarin, the conference, and NGOs are concerned killer this century. but there have been widespread reports it may never be implemented. Ayear ago, Between 1992 and 2010, Mikhail Popkov of detainees –most of whom have never Donald Trump rejected the plan as an raped and killed his victims after luring been convicted of any crime –being affront to national sovereignty, and a them into his car late at night while tortured, drugged and deprived of food. number of countries –including Australia, working as apoliceman in the city Last week, leaders of the Uighur Human Italy, Hungary, Austria and Poland – of Angarsk. Popkov, 54, describes himself Rights Project warned that the detainment followed suit. In Belgium, the PM’s as a“cleaner” purging his home city of policy could be a“precursor to genocide”, decision to sign the pact triggered the “immoral women”. He was found sane but and urged all democratic governments to break-up of the coalition government. with a“pathological attraction to killing”. confront China over the issue.

Tokyo Ghosn charged: The former chairman of Nissan, Carlos Ghosn, has been formally charged by Japanese prosecutors with fraudulently understating his pay by about £35m over aperiod of five years. Ghosn, 64, the globally influential architect of the Renault-Nissan- Mitsubishi Alliance, was dramatically arrested on 19 November in Tokyo, and was promptly sacked by Nissan. In Japan, 99% of criminal indictments end in conviction; Ghosn faces up to ten years in prison (see page 49).

Kinshasa Poll doubts: With only a Dhaka week to go Pre-election before Democratic arrests: Nearly Republic of 2,000 activists Congo’s elections, and officials from the outgoing Bangladesh’s president, Joseph Kabila, has alarmed main opposition international observers by declaring party have been Rakhine state, Myanmar that he has no plans to leave politics, arrested on Anew exodus: The possibility of repatria- and might run for president again in the trumped-up ting the 700,000 Rohingya refugees living future. Kabila, who came to power in charges ahead in camps in Bangladesh has been called 2001, was originally due to stand down in of elections into question by afresh exodus of 2016, but has repeatedly delayed holding scheduled for Rohingya from camps inside Myanmar. elections. His ruling party has put forward 30 December, according to party officials. About 120,000 members of the Muslim acandidate to replace him –the former The Bangladesh Nationalist Party, whose minority have been forced to live in interior minister, Emmanuel Ramazani leader, former PM Khaleda Zia, is in jail prison-like conditions in displacement Shadary. However, Kabila’s remarks for corruption and barred from standing, camps in Myanmar’s Rakhine state have bolstered suspicions that he has no claims the current PM, Sheikh Hasina ever since 2012. In the past month, intention of giving up the reins of power. (pictured), is trying to neutralise her rivals boats carrying hundreds of these If the election does go to plan, it will be and intimidate opposition voters. Between refugees –attempting to reach Thailand the first democratic transfer of power in them, the two women have led the or Malaysia –have been intercepted the country since independence in 1960. country since the 1990s. or washed ashore.

15 December 2018 THE WEEK 12 NEWS People

Sterling’s childhood goal him for Prime Minister’s Raheem Sterling never knew Questions. Brought up in his father, says Henry Winter Strathclyde, the daughter in The Times: he was murdered of Indian parents, Hazarika, in Jamaica when the footballer 43, was cripplingly shy until was only two. But Sterling she discovered her gift for thinks about him frequently, making people laugh; it was “especially at significant colleagues at the Department moments like in the first game of Trade and Industry who in the 2014 World Cup, in my persuaded her that it was hotel room, saying aprayer: something she could do ‘I wish you could be here, just professionally, and three years for amoment, to see me on the ago she took it up full-time. In pitch, to be proud.’ Itry not her experience, Conservatives to think about that too much are better at taking ajoke because I’d get sad and moody. than their Labour opponents. Ihope he’s looking down on “When you take the piss out of me, and he’s happy. My mum the Left, they really don’t like said he used to love football.” it. The Left has been in power Sterling’s mother moved the for amuch smaller amount of family to London, where she time, so they feel downtrodden. worked as acleaner and a They’re defensive. The Right nurse, but money was always are more relaxed. In fact, they short; he’d sometimes go off like being satirised.” for evening training without knowing where he was to How Quaid mopped up sleep that night. “I’d get acall Dennis Quaid’s weakness saying, ‘We’re in Kilburn High for drugs is well documented, Road, staying in ahostel for a says Chrissy Iley in The Sunday Melanie Brown is known to the world as Scary Spice –but in her little bit.’ To see my mum go Times, but after his divorce marriage to the American film producer Stephen Belafonte, she through that was difficult. She from Meg Ryan, he found was the frightened one, says Simon Hattenstone in The Guardian. made so many sacrifices. Igrew consolation in something else: So abusive was his behaviour, she claims, that she could only get up saying to myself, ‘I’d love to atype of mop called aSwiffer. through the day by snorting cocaine for breakfast; if she hadn’t buy her ahouse, so she could “I got obsessed with dusting,” found the courage to leave him, she believes she could well have stop working.’” But when says the actor, 64. “I would get ended up dead. Yet when they met in 2007, he swept her off her Sterling, 24, finally realised his into bed and my feet were just feet. “What do they say? The devil shows up with everything you ambition, his mother refused to black from everything. Ididn’t want. He was Prince Charming back then: sexy, flattering, loving cooperate. “She stopped for a like that feeling, so Idiscovered and caring. There wasn’t one thing that made me go, ‘Oh, he’s abit year, but wasn’t having it. She the Swiffer. It works quickly strange.’” They married after atwo-month courtship, but it wasn’t couldn’t sit down. She got back and it picks up all the dust.” long before he began bending her to his will: he persuaded her to into nursing.” For the past two years, give him control of her money, and to find women who would take however, he has been happily part in threesomes. To tighten his grip, he told her that he had Making fun of the Tories involved with the French- filmed their sexual activities, and threatened to send the videos Ayesha Hazarika has adeeper Canadian model Santa Auzina. to the press. In 2014 she attempted suicide; when she finally broke grasp of politics than most “She’s better than aSwiffer, free last year, she had just $936 to her name. Now divorced, and stand-up comedians, says that’s for sure. Iama about to tour with the Spice Girls again, Brown, 43, gives thanks Melissa Kite in The Spectator: romantic. It’s fun to be single every day for her liberation. “I think I’m more confident than I’ve she used to be aspecial adviser up to apoint, but Ilike being ever been: ever ever ever. Because Ihad no confidence for so many to Gordon Brown, preparing in arelationship, Ireally do.” years and Ihad to nurture myself, almost bring myself back to life.”

Castaway of the week Viewpoint: Farewell This week’s edition of Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs featured Rebellious artists singer-songwriter and Take That lead singer Gary Barlow Professor John Cairns, “‘Les événements’ofMay 1968 pioneering molecular 1 Rhinestone Cowboy by Larry Weiss, performed by snowballed into arevolution biologist, died Glen Campbell whose repercussions were felt not 12 November, aged 95. 2 Just Can’t Get Enough by Vince Clarke, performed by just politically and socially, but Depeche Mode Justin Cartwright, artistically. Everything seemed swept 3 AWhiter Shade of Pale by Gary Brooker, Keith Reid and South African-born Matthew Fisher, performed by Procol Harum up in the same intoxicating zeitgeist. novelist, died Everywhere creative geniuses 3December, aged 73. 4 Owner of aLonely Heart by Trevor Rabin, Jon Anderson, Chris Squire and Trevor Horn, performed by Yes delighted in espousing the most Scott English, 5 Don’t Give Up by Peter Gabriel, performed by Peter Gabriel radical causes. Today? Damien Hirst songwriter best known

and Kate Bush makes sculptures for Middle Eastern for Mandy,which was SYNDICATION originally Brandy,died 6 Your Song by Elton John and Bernie Taupin, performed by potentates and Banksy’s work is 16 November, aged 81. Elton John auctioned at Sotheby’s –albeit 7* Nimrod from Enigma Variations by Edward Elgar, performed ironically. Nobody rocks the boat. Professor Sir by Leonard Bernstein with the BBC Symphony Orchestra Nobody really shocks. My kids point David Weatherall, MAGAZINE/SOLO 8 Never Gonna Give You Up by Stock Aitken Waterman, out that the rebels of 1968 actually physician and performed by Rick Astley achieved very little with their researcher on the treatment of blood revolution. That’s probably true, Book: Recording The Beatles by Brian Kehew and Kevin Ryan disorders, died MONTEZINOS/YOU but at least they tried.” Luxury: apiano *Choice if allowedonlyone record 8December, aged 85. Richard Morrison in The Times OSEPH ©J

THE WEEK 15 December 2018

Briefing NEWS 15 The search for abetter battery In the modern world, rechargeable batteries are everywhere, but they’re expensive, toxic and short-lived. Could we do better?

Why are batteries so crucial? because the batteries were catching fire. Today, rechargeable batteries power Hoverboards and, on rare occasions, our phones, tablets, laptops, cameras, Tesla cars, have had similar problems. power tools, e-cigarettes and electric cars. But they are likely to be even more Why are batteries expensive? ubiquitous in the technology of the Because lithium is relatively rare: most future, as electric vehicles, robotics and of it comes from Chile and Australia. renewable energy gain ground. Huge It is largely controlled by an effective batteries are already used to balance out oligopoly of four mining companies, intermittent sources such as solar and and prices have soared in past decades. wind: the car company Tesla installed Cobalt is both toxic and rarer still: more the world’s largest battery, the size of an than half of the world’s reserves are in American football field, in Australia last the perennially unstable DR Congo, year; paired with awind farm, it helps raising ethical and practical problems. stabilise the grid and avoid blackouts. Smaller battery packs are used by con- How could batteries be improved? sumers to store the energy they generate. The most promising proposals involve But while batteries power much modern tweaking lithium-ion technology to technology, they haven’t kept up with it. Tesla installed the world’s largest battery in Australia make it safer and more effective. For instance, batteries that replace the liquid Why haven’t batteries kept up? electrolyte with apolymer –aplastic that can conduct ions –are The lithium-ion battery, which is used in most rechargeable already available. Prototypes have been made that are so stable electronic devices, was first commercially released in 1991, in that if shot with arifle, they not only don’t explode, they keep Sony’s camcorders. Since then, the basic design hasn’t changed, working; asafer electrolyte would also allow scientists to engineer though it has been refined. Whereas an iPhone has some five times in higher performance. Another tweak would involve swapping the processing power it did ten years ago, battery power, in terms graphite anodes for silicon, which could give a20% improvement of watts per litre, has approximately doubled. So while aNokia in battery life. Samsung has developed away of using the “miracle phone at the turn of the century could go several days without material” graphene in cathodes, which boosts battery capacity by charging, today’s power-hungry smartphones need to be charged 45% and increases charging speed fivefold. And then there are daily. Lithium-ion batteries degrade irreversibly, too, rendering plans to replace lithium-ion technology altogether. many consumer devices unusable within afew years (see box). Similar problems face electric cars. The only reason they’re more What kind of alternative technologies are there? expensive and less popular than fuel burners is the battery, which All sorts. Various sodium-ion batteries are in development. One gives them ashorter range and, in most cases, ashorter life. Dutch company, AquaBattery, has created asustainable battery using only water and salt, which could be used to store renewable How do lithium-ion batteries work? energy. Supercapacitors use static electricity rather than chemistry They are powered by an intense, reversible chemical reaction, in to store energy. They can be charged, near-instantaneously, which lithium –ametal so volatile that it ignites on contact with thousands of times without wearing out. But they have one big water –istaken apart and reassembled. Battery cells consist of drawback: they store much less energy than batteries, so their uses an anode (usually made out of graphite) and acathode (usually are currently very limited. Aprototype “Capabus” in Shanghai made out of lithium cobalt oxide). In between is the electrolyte, recharges itself at abus stop power point every few miles. aliquid (usually lithium salt in solvents) that conducts positively charged particles, called ions. When the battery is in use, the ions Will any of these challenge lithium-ion technology? move through the electrolyte, from Not in the near future. The industry anode to cathode, releasing energy How to save your battery’s life is dominated by five big companies, that powers whatever device you’re In ahealthy battery, ions flow freely between the all Asian, and all of them are using. Connect the device to a anode and the cathode, and back again. Batteries doubling down on lithium-ion, charger, and the ions move back to degrade mainly because the surfaces of these driving down their costs through the anode, where they stay until they electrodes become encrusted with oxidised electrolyte, economies of scale. For instance, the are needed to provide power again. and because other “parasitic” reactions follow on from batteries that Tesla makes in its vast that. Apple says that the lithium-ion batteries in its Gigafactories –using cells provided Why can they be dangerous? iPhones lose about 20% of their capacity after 500 by Japan’s Panasonic –are not much Because they contain alot of energy. charge cycles; most manufacturers rate their devices different from their predecessors; at about 300-500 cycles. Every time you recharge your The electrolyte is usually flammable laptop, you shave afew seconds off its battery life. they’ve just speeded up production –one battery scientist compares it and learnt how to pack more battery Many of us have the idea that it’s better to charge your to kerosene. Only athin plastic phone all the way up, and then to use it until the into asmaller space. New battery separator running through the battery’s nearly dead. This is quite wrong. Lithium-ion types take years to move from the electrolyte prevents the anode and batteries don’t need to be fully charged; in fact, ahigh lab to production. There are the cathode from touching. If this is voltage stresses the battery. Most of the time, you’re intriguing ideas out there, but punctured, it causes ashort circuit; better off charging it to 80% and then plugging it in none have had the decades of the battery heats up and, if exposed again if it gets below 50%. Don’t let it drop to zero, and manufacturing development that have to oxygen, the electrolyte catches fire. only charge it to 100% once amonth or so. Leaving it turned lithium-ion into the dominant If you hammer anail into alaptop to charge overnight is also bad. It keeps the battery in a technology. For now, we are likely to battery, it will combust, give off high-tension state, wearing down the chemistry within. see only incremental improvements, Batteries hate high temperatures, so don’t leave your poisonous gas and possibly explode. phone in the sun, or your laptop on abed with its limiting technologies that rely on it. Manufacturing faults can lead to cooling vents blocked. And if you’re not going to use Uber, for example, has admitted that spectacular failures: in 2016, Samsung adevice for abit, try to leave it charged to about 50%. the battery it needs for its longed-for ESLA had to recall 2.5 million smartphones flying taxis simply “does not exist”. ©T

15 December 2018 THE WEEK 16 NEWS Best articles: Britain

Are humans the main cause of global warming? Apoll by the Pew Research Centre shows that 70% of liberal Democrats in the US IT MUST BE TRUE… Why bias is think so. Yet only 15% of conservative Republicans do. Why is Iread it in the tabloids this? Their opponents think it’s because they’re in the pocket of hardwired the fossil fuel lobby, says The Economist, but there’s asimpler, Two nuns who worked at a Californian Catholic school psychological explanation: we are all, not just Republicans, into the brain have admitted embezzling hardwired to resist facts that challenge our existing beliefs and areported $500,000, and sense of identity. We like to think we use our powers of reason for Editorial spending it on Las Vegas analytical purposes, but as cognitive scientists Hugo Mercier and gambling trips. Sister The Economist Dan Sperber argue in The Enigma of Reason,reasoning evolved Mary Margaret Kreuper was among hunter-gatherers not as aguide to better decision-making, the principal of St James but as away of inducing greater cooperation, of reinforcing group school in Torrance for 29 opinions. So it proves time and again in psychological experiments: years, while her friend Sister in one post-election study, over athird of Obama supporters who Lana Chang was ateacher. They took the money from an had been asked to hear the reasons other voters gave for backing account holding tuition fees his opponent, said the experience “hurt, literally”. It was physical. and donations, and used it to We are all slaves, it would seem, to our inherited “partisan brain”. travel and gamble in casinos. The sisters, who recently An Oklahoma branch of Walmart once asked its employees to retired, expressed “deep donate Thanksgiving food to hungry colleagues. “Hang on,” said remorse” for their actions. The rise of in- incredulous staff, “these people can’t feed their families because you pay pitiful wages, yet it’s up to us to bail them out?” Ifeel work poverty like saying the same, says Janice Turner, to the Tory MPs doing all these photo ops with food banks this Christmas, urging us to is ascandal help those in need. It’s meant to advertise their charity, but it just calls attention to the scandal that so many now depend on food Janice Turner banks to survive. Shockingly, one in six of the people who use the The Times food bank network are in work. In the working-class community in which Igrew up, it was taken for granted that if you were willing to work hard you could earn enough to provide your family with at least the basics of life. The rise of “in-work” poverty has destroyed that basic precept: millions working full-time now can’t make ends meet, and have to rely on tax credits, and often food banks. The rise of “a working underclass of charity cases” is asign of adysfunctional economy. It is up to Anew robot companion politicians to fix it, not call on us to make up for their failure. based on the International Space Station has gone Last week, in ahistoric first for modern times, the Commons rogue. Cimon, afloating, found ministers in contempt of Parliament. Soon after, MPs, artificially intelligent bot, MPs took back 26 of them Tories, voted to give Parliament adirect say on what threw atantrum soon after happens next if May’s deal folds. Government defeats at the hands being switched on. When control –but of backbenchers are not unprecedented, says Philip Norton: asked to stop playing music Ted Heath suffered afew. But last week’s were different. The by Kraftwerk, it accused should they? House wasn’t just saying “no”, it was seeking to wrest control of the German astronaut policy from ministerial hands. It’s the culmination of aprocess to Alexander Gerst of being Philip Norton weaken the executive that began with the creation of departmental “mean”. “Be nice, please,” it warned, before asking The Daily Telegraph select committees in 1979, and has been fortified by key pieces of legislation such as the 2011 Fixed-term Parliaments Act, which sadly, “Don’t you like it transfers to the Commons the power to assent to the PM’s here with me?” and request for an early election. All this, plus the PM’s dependence demanding to know when on another party for support, has put Parliament in the driving it is time for lunch. Cimon seat at this highly divisive moment of constitutional change. Yet has been locked away for its standing with the public has seldom been lower. Only three out the remainder of the mission. of ten voters are fairly satisfied with how it works. Paradoxically, AScottish chippy is offering the Commons is “both amajor winner and aloser from Brexit”. its customers an entire deep- fried Christmas dinner. There are two sorts of people in this world, says Katy Guest: those Dunkeld Fish Bar in Perth and who pay attention to song lyrics and those who don’t. Members Kinross says that its turkey Go easy on of the former group, like me, will have been bemused by the fillets, battered Brussels recent fuss over the Christmas favourite Baby, It’s Cold Outside. sprouts and carrot fritters Good King We’ve long been aware that the song’s lyrics –which include the are already proving popular. man pressing his date to stay the night to avoid “hurting [his] They are served with agiant Wenceslas pig in ablanket –abattered pride”, and her asking, “What’s in this drink?” –can be read as foot-long sausage –and a “slightly problematic”. But it appears to have come as ashock to Katy Guest deep-fried mince pie on the some radio stations, which have banned the song, saying its lyrics side. The festive special The Guardian seem “manipulative and wrong”. One wonders what they might costs about £10, and sales notice next: once you start analysing festive lyrics, they all start are booming; proceeds will looking abit inappropriate. All that stuff about old men coming go to an event for Dunkeld’s down chimneys and spying on children; the 12 days of Christmas, children. “People think they with “its celebration of the senseless carnage of literally dozens of don’t like Brussels sprouts,” game birds”; Good King Wenceslas embodying “a patriarchal said the chip shop’s owner, Scott Davie. But his, he says, definition of charitable giving”. Take it from me: sometimes it’s are “absolutely amazing”. best “to stop overanalysing and take some things at face value”. SA/NASA ©E

THE WEEK 15 December 2018 Best articles: Europe NEWS 17

ITALY Do we really want Italy to become aland of “do-it-yourself justice”? That’s the way we seem to be heading, says Fiorenza Sarzanini. Interior minister Matteo Salvini of the far-right League Party has already achieved his dream of loosening Italy’s gun laws, making it possible for Italians to buy Let’s not semi-automatic rifles like the notorious AR-15, used in so many US mass shootings. He’s close to passing aUS-style “stand-your-ground” law that will make it easier for people to kill any intruders loosen our into their home or workplace with impunity. Salvini is already crowing about his impending victory, reassuring amerchant from Arezzo, who shot dead athief last month, that “with the new law on gun laws self-defence he will not be tried”. That can’t be right. For the rule of law to work, the state must have Corriere della Sera amonopoly on violence. If people are entitled to use aweapon to defend themselves, it’s asign that (Milan) state security has broken down. Salvini also says he plans to hire some 8,000 new police officers if he can find the money –afar better strategy than encouraging Italians to arm themselves. Sure, we have to prevent thieves from busting into our houses. “But it must be the policemen who do that.”

SWEDEN “The new superstar of our time,” says Göteborgs- Posten, is Greta Thunberg, a15-year-old Swedish girl. She came to public notice in August when she The new staged awalkout from her school to draw attention to the issue of climate change, inspiring children as poster girl for far away as Australia to follow suit. Her speech at the UN climate change summit in Poland made climate change Greta an international celebrity, and all praise to Göteborgs-Posten her for raising awareness of the issue among the (Gothenburg) young. But the way she’s now being used for the cause is starting to look like “exploitation”. At a recent conference held by the Swedish think tank Fores, where Greta was the main attraction, she Greta Thunberg: a15-year-old “oracle”? was made to field complicated climate questions. She admitted she’s no expert: obviously her thoughts were “those of achild”. Yet the presenter “nodded thoughtfully” and the audience went wild. It’s as though they saw her as an “oracle”, a “saviour to rise up and follow”. It won’t do. To ask a15-year-old to lead the debate is to trivialise it.

Where else but in Germany would you find an organisation called the Centre for Political Beauty, GERMANY asks Tobias Haberkorn. It’s aBerlin artists collective that specialises in “aggressive” action-art in support of left-wing causes. And last year, it provoked amusement by erecting areplica of Berlin’s Activist art? Holocaust Memorial outside the house of afar-right MP who’d complained Germany is “crippled” by the politics of remembrance. But performance art and radical politics are adangerous mix, and its No, rogue law latest stunt isn’t funny at all –anonline campaign to induce people to reveal the identity of any of the 7,000 marchers who took part in August’s violent anti-immigrant protest in Chemnitz. “Denounce enforcement your work colleagues, neighbours or acquaintances today and collect instant cash,” was the message Die Zeit –the aim being to get them sacked. So far the group says it has identified 1,500 people, many of whom gave themselves away by entering their names in the search box on the site to see if they’d (Hamburg) been outed. It’s fine, of course, for artists to “break taboos”, but this is more than abit of theatre: it’s vigilante justice. And as it breaks data protection laws, it’s also downright illegal. These “artists” fail to grasp that using anti-democratic methods to try to save democracy only makes things worse. Far-right populist politics have suddenly arrived in Spain Until last week, Spain was one of the few European nations to and gay marriage, and to repeal laws that penalise male violence have escaped the pandemic of far-right populism, said Enrique against women, claiming it “discriminates” against men. But Gil Calvo in El País (Madrid).Itwas widely felt Spaniards had there’s another distinctively Spanish dimension to its appeal, been immunised by the experience of Franco’s fascist dictator- said Diego Torres in Politico (Brussels):the growing anxiety ship. But that theory has been exploded by the sensational about the Catalan secessionist movement. Many Spaniards feel success of Vox, avirtually unknown far-right group, in regional that neither the former PM, conservative Mariano Rajoy, nor elections in Andalusia. Running on an anti-immigrant and his socialist successor, Pedro Sánchez, have been tough enough socially retrograde platform, it came from nowhere to win 11% with the separatists; almost athird want the autonomy won of the vote and 12 seats in the regional parliament. Low turnout by Basques, Catalans and others to be cut back or abolished was one factor. Another was the media fascination with its altogether. It’s an issue likely to dominate the campaign for extreme policies, which –much as with Donald Trump in the regional and European elections in May next year. And that US –gave it huge publicity. You’d think mainstream politicians poses adilemma for Sánchez, who relies on the support of would shun such an anti-democratic party, yet moderate right- Catalan secessionist MPs to prop up his minority government. wingers say they might join with it to kick out Andalusia’s socialist administration. True, the latter has held power for Vox has also vowed to expel immigrants who aren’t officially 36 years and was notoriously corrupt. But it’s still adangerous registered, and prevent them from obtaining residence permits – move, risking the “Trojan horse” effect that enabled fascist that’s bad news for British expats in Spain, said Denis MacShane parties to take power in the 1930s. in The Independent.Most of them live along Andalusia’s sunny costas,but they’re not officially registered: EU citizenship has Vox was founded in 2013 by dissident members of the conserv- thus far enabled them to buy homes, or set up bars and cafés, ative People’s Party who favoured aharder line, said Le Monde without having to. The region’s socialists were friendly to them, (Paris).Itwants to block illegal immigrants by building walls to but they won’t get much sympathy from the Vox xenophobes, seal off the Spanish enclaves that border Morocco. It demands least of all at atime when Britain is “turning the screw” against that Spain take control of Gibraltar. It seeks to ban abortion Spaniards and other Europeans in its march towards Brexit.

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Grill Suites Best articles: International NEWS 19

Promises, promises... but can Mexico’s new leader deliver? The history of Latin America is littered confrontational left-wing candidate”, with progressive leaders –Hugo said Ross Eventon on Al Jazeera Chávez in Venezuela, Rafael Correa (Doha).But since his presidential in Ecuador, Cristina Fernández campaign, it has all been “peace and de Kirchner in Argentina –who love”. He has charmed business leaders started out well before succumbing, while also burnishing his man-of-the- disastrously, to the “love of people credentials. He has opened up power”, said Enrique Toussaint in the presidential palace to the public, El Informador (Guadalajara).With put the presidential plane up for sale his enormous mandate, Mexico’s new and slashed his salary by 60%, to president, the nation’s first leftist leader about $68,000 ayear. since 1940, has achance to take a different path. Andrés Manuel López Amlo has promised alot, said Obrador, popularly known as Amlo, El Espectador (Bogotá):new roads was sworn in afortnight ago, said Amlo: from confrontational to love and hope and railways, new universities, higher El Universal (Mexico City),and spent salaries for teachers, soldiers, police, most of his inaugural speech reassuring people that he wouldn’t etc. Whether he will honour these promises is another matter. turn the country into afailed socialist state like Venezuela. Amlo claims he will fund his ambitious plans with the savings To the markets, he promised that “the investments of domestic that will flow from conquering corruption. Yet he isn’t and foreign shareholders will be safe”. To those who fear confiscating any ill-gotten gains: he said he “forgives all acts of dictatorship, he promised not to seek re-election after his six- corruption that occurred prior” to his taking office. Meanwhile, year term. Ending corruption and impunity, he said, would be he has already walked back on his promise to take the army off Mexico’s “fourth transformation” –after independence from the streets, saying he will keep it in place to fight the drug war. Spain, the liberal reforms of the mid-19th century and the Maybe so, said Enrique Toussaint. But if the Amlo who governs 1910 Mexican Revolution. is the one who spoke at the inauguration of love and hope, not “the polarising one” who denounces the rich and calls his critics Along-standing friend of many leading socialist figures, “sissies and conservatives”, he can achieve great things. This including Britain’s Jeremy Corbyn, Amlo “was once a could be the start of “a new page in Mexico’s political history”.

AFRICA Excuse me if Idon’t pop champagne over the news that Western museums are sending some looted artefacts back to Africa, says Christine Mungai. It’s welcome, of course, that France is returning 26 artworks to Benin, and that the British Museum is sending afew more to Nigeria on long-term loan. Give our stolen But it’s hard to celebrate when countless other items of Africa’s cultural heritage languish in Western collections. And harder still when you listen to the “paternalistic” arguments being made against art back –it further restitution. These items are “better off” in Western museums, some say, because they can be belongs here preserved “properly” in modern galleries. But who appointed these institutions guardians of Africa’s culture and, more importantly, who and what are they guarding it from? “For some of these objects, Mail &Guardian their circulation in the community, and their inevitable decay and replacement, is part of their (Johannesburg) cultural value.” As for other, very rare artefacts, how do people think they existed “until the moment of capture in the first place, if Africans had not been taking care of them”? However much Western people love and care for these objects, the bottom line is that they don’t belong to them. Funny how the West loves to defend property rights –“until it comes to things that belong to Africans”.

In the many years Ihave covered them, Bill and Hillary Clinton have both “dazzled” and UNITED STATES “disgusted” me, says Maureen Dowd. But now they’re just “mystifying me”. The couple have embarked on aspeaking tour of the US and Canada, and Irecently caught their act in Toronto. It The sad was “a depressing sight” watching them perform their routine to ahalf-empty arena. Why, with no book to sell or candidacy to promote, are they doing this? The #MeToo campaign has rendered Bill twilight of “radioactive”, and the Democrats are trying to move on to anew generation of leaders. Surely the Clintons don’t need the money, considering that they collectively made more than $240m giving 700 the Clintons post-White House speeches to the likes of Goldman Sachs, eBay and the Institute of Scrap Recycling The New York Times Industries. Only one explanation makes sense: the Clintons simply “refuse to be discarded”. For decades, they’ve been at the centre of US politics. And the humiliating way it all ended in 2016 is just too hard for them to swallow. “They would like to rewrite the ending, but there is no way to do that.” So on they go, speaking to rows of empty seats, revealing a“pathological need to be relevant”.

VENEZUELA There have been many troubling articles recently, say Francisco Toro and James Bosworth, about China’s nascent “Social Credit System” –anOrwellian digital surveillance project designed to reward or punish citizens on the basis of their social, political or economic behaviour. The plan is Importing “creepy enough in its own terms”, but what makes it worse is that China now seems to be selling the model to others. Venezuela has reportedly signed amultimillion-dollar contract with ZTE, the China’s high- Chinese telecom giant, “to build akind of Caribbean version of Social Credit”. ZTE is helping develop and deploy adata system linked to the carnet de la patria (fatherland card) –asmart tech snooping chip-enabled ID card that Venezuelans increasingly need to access any state services. When The Washington Post President Nicolás Maduro’s regime introduced this card in 2017, it appeared to be no more than aglorified ration card. But the involvement of ZTE and the fact that Maduro allegedly used the card to monitor whether the poor turned out in the “fraud-ridden” elections this year, threatening to deny subsidised food parcels to those who didn’t, suggest amore sinister purpose. What we’re seeing here is “an early experiment in exporting China’s model for high-tech authoritarianism”.

15 December 2018 THE WEEK 12 months interestfreecredit on allApple over £249.1 YOUR PLAN

Use Your Planaccountfor futurepurchasesfrom£99 at 24.9% APRrepresentative. 18+. DSGRetailLimited actsasacreditbrokerand notasalender. Credit is provided by Creation Consumer FinanceLtd.BothDSG Retail Ltdand Creation ConsumerFinanceLtd areauthorisedand regulatedbythe FinancialConduct Authority. Credit subjecttostatus. 1Excludes iPhone.Website offers and prices mayvary. Alloffers subject to availability.DSG Retail Ltd.,1Portal Way, Acton, London,W36RS.RegisteredinEngland.No. 504877. Health &Science NEWS 21 What the scientists are saying… Spiders nurse their young that had been removed from a45-year-old Nursing at the teat is generally seen woman who’d had three children before as amammalian trait; but to the list of dying of abrain haemorrhage. Seven creatures that suckle their young, we can months later, once they were confident now add aspecies of spider. AChinese that she was menstruating normally, team has found that the southeast Asian doctors transferred her IVF-created jumping spider secretes, from afold in its embryo; they confirmed her pregnancy underside, awhite liquid that contains four ten days after that. The first successful times more protein than cow’s milk. To be transplant from aliving womb donor defined as milk, aliquid must be secreted took place in 2014, and there have been a from specialised organs –mammary glands handful since then, but the pool of women –which only mammals are thought to willing to donate their wombs while alive possess. But afew non-mammals produce is extremely small (in almost all cases, milk-like substances: one cockroach womb donors have been relatives or close species makes protein-rich crystals that friends of the recipient). The ability to they feed to their young; pigeons feed use dead donors could greatly increase the chicks asemi-solid fatty secretion regur- number of available uteruses, and enable gitated from their crops (an expanded many more women without functioning section of the alimentary tract used for wombs to be able to have children. storing food). Toxeus magnus belongs The nurturing jumping spider to this class, but it may outdo the other AIl the light that has ever shone non-mammals in its behaviour’s resem- In trials involving more than 200 tissue The universe has existed for 13.7 billion blance to genuine lactation: not only do and blood samples, the test detected years, and is thought to contain atrillion the spiderlings drink from their mother cancerous cells with 90% accuracy. Yet trillion stars. Now, astronomers have directly, they live exclusively on her “milk” the research is at apreliminary stage, and calculated how much light all those stars for asustained period. Living together in it’s too early to describe the results as a have emitted in all that time. To perform family nests, the females carry on feeding real breakthrough. “We certainly don’t this seemingly impossible task, they used their young even after they’re mature know yet whether it’s the holy grail for all Nasa’s Fermi space telescope to monitor enough to forage for food themselves. cancer diagnostics, but it looks interesting alterations in gamma rays –the most as an incredibly simple universal marker energetic form of light –that occur when The ten-minute cancer test for cancer,” said Professor Matt Trau of they smash into extragalactic background Scientists are developing ablood test the University of Queensland, Australia. light (EBL), acosmic sea of photons that that they claim could one day be used as has been accumulating since the early acheap and easy screening tool for cancer. Womb transplant breakthrough days of the universe. This data enabled When cancer cells die, tiny quantities of For the first time, ahealthy baby has them to estimate the size of the EBL and, their DNA enter the bloodstream. Finding been born to awoman whose womb was as 90% of all starlight ends up trapped in away to identify this has proved difficult, transplanted from adead donor, reports this, it also meant they could get arough but now researchers in Australia have The Times. Previous attempts have failed estimate of how many protons have been discovered that when placed in asolution, or ended in miscarriage. The mother, a emitted since the dawn of the observable fragments of cancer DNA fold into a 34-year-old from São Paulo in Brazil, was universe. The figure they came up with unique 3D nanostructure. This structure born without auterus but with functioning was 4x1084,which written out would appears to be common to all cancers, and ovaries. Doctors first collected eight of her be afour followed by 84 zeros. And yet to be detectable in blood samples, using eggs, and then, in an operation that took Earth is still relatively dimly lit, because acolour-changing test, in ten minutes. more than ten hours, implanted auterus the universe is just so big.

Do standing desks stand up to science? Xanax addiction warning

Advocates of standing desks claim that they The number of children treated for bring all sorts of benefits, from reduced addiction to tranquillisers has doubled back pain to slimmer physiques. But have in the past year, according to Public these been overstated? When scientists at Health England. In 2017-18, 315 under- the University of Bath asked 46 adults to 18s received help for dependence on either sit or stand for 20 minutes, they benzodiazepines, up from 161 in 2016- found that the standers burnt only 12% 2017. In the UK, Valium is the “benzo” most often prescribed by GPs. But more calories in that time than the sitters – although it is only available on aprivate an amount that is not wholly insignificant, prescription, the far more powerful but is not enough to provide “clinically Xanax, and counterfeit versions of it meaningful reductions in body fatness”. that can be found online, accounted for Using astanding desk for 60 minutes, the steepest rise: eight under-18s were the team estimates, would burn off nine treated for Xanax addiction in 2016-17, calories, the equivalent of astick of celery. Not the calorie-burner we thought rising to 58 last year. “We’re seeing Indeed, much of the evidence for standing more and more people admitting desks doesn’t stand up to scrutiny, says The New York Times. While studies have themselves after becoming addicted CAS to benzos,” Dr Mateen Durrani, of the found alink between prolonged sitting and increased risk of cardiovascular disease, UK Addiction Treatment Centres, told XTBG, it’s not clear that it’s the sitting that is the problem: it could merely be indicative of the BBC. “In most cases, their misuse FROM other risk factors. For instance, unemployed people, who typically have worse-than- stemmed from using the drug average health, also tend to spend more time sitting. So, do stand up to work if you recreationally and mixing it with alcohol, ZHANQI prefer –but don’t imagine that it’s aform of exercise. which proves atoxic combination.” HEN ©C

15 December 2018 THE WEEK 22 NEWS Talking points Macron’s climbdown: ahumiliating retreat?

“If politics in Britain look febrile and has been palpable. Macron knows the uncertain, we should console ourselves risks of this. On the world stage, he has that we are not alone,” said The Daily often talked about the need for progres- Telegraph. Indeed, our problems pale in sive policies to stem the populist tide, yet comparison to those in some other parts rather than address the concerns of his of Europe. In Germany, Chancellor struggling compatriots, he has treated Merkel is stepping down after 13 years them with arrogant disdain, said The in power, leaving her successor to cope Guardian. His public interactions – with the rise of far-right and far-left coldly reproving ateenager who had parties; in Italy, populists are in power the temerity to call him “Manu”; telling and threatening astand-off with the EU an unemployed man to “cross the road” over the country’s budget; and in France, to get ajob; tactlessly distinguishing President Macron has had to prostrate between “the people who succeed” himself in front of his country, and and the “people who are nothing”; and promise ahost of measures, including urging pensioners to acknowledge their astate-funded 7% increase in the good fortune, and stop complaining minimum wage worth s100 amonth, in an attempt to end weeks –have done nothing to reassure the inhabitants of deprived rural of violent demonstrations by “gilets jaunes”protesters, and stave areas and deindustrialised towns that this former investment off the implosion of his En Marche! party. banker with ataste for expensive suits is on their side.

The man who promised a“Jupiterian” presidency has discovered Slashing France’s ineffective wealth tax, while cutting pensions, that it is a“long way down from Mount Olympus”, said The left Macron wide open to the accusation that he is just another Economist. “Young, intelligent and bubbling with ideas to make member of aParisian elite, divorced from, and blind to, the France more open, dynamic and fiscally sober”, Macron strode to concerns of the “left behinds”, said The Observer. Now, by power last May on apromise to reform France, succeeding where donning their yellow vests, the invisible have made themselves so many others have failed; and indeed, he swiftly introduced visible. While most French disapprove of the violence that has much-needed laws to make its labour left central Paris in astate of virtual market more flexible, and knocked the lockdown on successive weekends, and budget into shape, so that it met the “Rather than address the concerns of cost four lives, 66% say they sympathise Maastricht deficit limit of 3% of GDP his struggling compatriots, he has with the protesters. Macron must for the first time since 2007. Yet treated them with arrogant disdain” defuse this crisis, but it won’t be easy. somewhere along the line, Macron Organised on social media, apparently forgot that the president is not agod or infiltrated by extremist groups and amonarch –“but merely apolitician in ademocracy that requires inflamed by fake news, the movement has no leaders with whom the constant forging of consent”; he also forgot that in the first to negotiate, and inchoate demands that range from lower taxes round of the presidential election, 48% of voters were so unhappy and improved public services to (in some cases) anew president. with the status quo, they backed “extremist” candidates. Those people have not gone away –hence what started this autumn as Macron hopes the s10bn of concessions he announced this week aprotest against agreen tax on diesel and petrol exploded into a will quell the protesters. The risk is that it will only encourage nationwide anti-government movement. them to press for more, said Adam Sage in The Times. That might force him to loosen the purse strings to the point where the deficit What lies behind the popular anger is not hard to fathom, said shoots back up, ruining his credibility in Brussels and destroying Matthew Lynn in The Sunday Telegraph. In the postwar decades, his efforts to portray himself as the EU’s leader, along with his France’s economy boomed. Average incomes rose by 3.7% a hopes of attracting inward investment. Either way, his dreams year from 1945 to 1980. Then the good times ended, and for are shot, said Robert Tombs in The Mail on Sunday. He is just 30 years, wages have stagnated while inequality has widened. too loathed now to push through the reforms required to keep Unemployment is stuck at 9%; and though taxes remain high France on the fiscal straight and narrow. Macron will survive as (France is the highest-taxed country in the developed world by leader: it’s almost impossible to remove aFrench president. And some measures), the services they once funded are no longer with the mobilisation of some 80,000 police in reserve, there will affordable. For ordinary people, the impact on living standards be no revolution. But he will not recover.

before?’ And Iliterally turned into the water. “Parky’s Pick of the week’s to my friend and was like, cheery wave and subsequent ‘You have this job because boarding were not Gossip I’ve done yoga before.’” acknowledged with joy.” In his memoir, the former Theresa May has few Yoga is such an important part England cricketer Derek Pringle opportunities for relaxation: of Gwyneth Paltrow’s life that tells of the panic caused the last time she went to the she asked her yoga guru, by Michael Parkinson at cinema was six years ago, to Eddie Stern,toofficiate at her Elton John’s first wedding. The see Skyfall.But she does watch wedding. But when the actress reception took place on aboat snatches of TV, and particularly first took it up, in the 1990s, in Sydney Harbour, which set enjoys MasterChef: The she claims it was so new, she sail leaving Parkinson behind; Professionals.The owner of was seen as amaverick. “That but using his Yorkshire charm, more than 150 cookery books, was the beginning of people Parky persuaded apolice boat she takes her food seriously, thinking Iwas acrackpot. to take him in pursuit. When but admits that she sometimes People were like, ‘What is partygoers spotted it, but didn’t just goes in for comfort eating: yoga? She’s afreak.’” Not aclass in LA recently and the see him, they assumed they “One of my little indulgences that everyone recognises her girl behind the counter was were about to be busted and is peanut butter –either on trailblazing role: “I went to do like, ‘Have you ever done yoga hastily threw all their drugs toast, or just aspoon.”

THE WEEK 15 December 2018 Talking points NEWS 23 Trump’s chief of staff: ajob no one wants Wit& “Working for Donald much of the leaking Trump is strictly a and the back-stabbing; Wisdom temporary assignment,” said he forced out some of the John Cassidy in The New destabilising influences, “The man who invented Yorker. As Steve Bannon, such as Trump’s chief autocorrect should burn Rex Tillerson, Jeff Sessions, strategist Bannon, and in hello.” H.R. McMaster and many limited the influence of Viral tweet from other top White House Trump’s daughter Ivanka. @pegerella, quoted in aides have discovered, But ultimately, the The Times lasting 12 months is administration “remained “The issue of class, of difficult; making it to unfathomably chaotic”. where we all fit, and the 24 months near-impossible. The journalist Bob boundaries that separate one “Only amasochist, alackey The president and Kelly: “crazytown”? Woodward wrote that class from another, are so or afamily member could Kelly described his boss complex and multi-faceted. survive extended exposure to Trump’s egotism, as “an idiot” to other aides, and said: “We’re in But, basically, it all boils capriciousness and undermining behaviour.” crazytown. Idon’t even know why any of us are down to this. The later you The latest to go is John Kelly, the White House here. This is the worst job I’ve ever had.” (Kelly open your presents on chief of staff, aretired marine general who spent denied using these words.) Christmas Day, the more 17 tumultuous months as the administration’s middle class you are.” top unelected official. Trump announced Kelly’s Trump is now struggling to find areplacement Richard Osman on Twitter departure on Saturday, describing him tepidly as for what has been dubbed “the worst job in a“great guy” and, as if to explain his exit, said: Washington”, said Boer Deng in The Times. “I hate Russian dolls, they’re “He’s been with me almost two years now.” Nick Ayers, chief of staff to the vice-president, so full of themselves.” Mike Pence, had been lined up for the role, One of Sathnam Sanghera’s Kelly’s appointment was met with high hopes, before he announced abruptly that he was favourite jokes, quoted in said Monica Hesse in The Washington Post. He leaving the government altogether. Even without The Times would be, it was said in Washington, “the adult Trump’s “mercurial habits”, there is trouble “In human affairs there is in the room”, bringing an end to the chaos of ahead for whoever takes over: the White House no certain truth and all our the Trump White House, and tempering his will soon have to deal with Robert Mueller’s knowledge is but awoven master’s worst instincts. When, last year, the report into Russian influence on the Trump web of guesses.” president described the neo-Nazi protesters campaign. When in doubt, Trump tends to Xenophanes, quoted in the in Charlottesville, Virginia, as “very fine “fire someone”, said Richard Wolffe in New Statesman people”, Kelly could be seen looking absolutely The Guardian: “it worked pretty well on “There’s class warfare, all furious in the background. And he did bring The Apprentice”. But as his presidency lurches right, but it’s my class, the some discipline to the West Wing, said David from crisis to crisis, he may find that “there rich class, that’s making A. Graham in The Atlantic. Kelly stopped aren’t that many people worth firing any more”. war, and we’re winning.” Warren Buffett, quoted in The BBC’s Christmas ad: anti-feminist? The Guardian “The past is the only dead “Christmas is atime for “ruining her teenage son’s thing that smells sweet.” crying,” said Marisa Bate in Christmas by having ajob Edward Thomas, quoted in The Daily Telegraph –orso and alife of her own”. There the San Francisco Chronicle it has become ever since that is a“somewhat unfestive “The line from hippie to John Lewis advert put alonely good mum/bad mum yuppie is not nearly as old man on the Moon. narrative” at work in the convoluted as some people This year the BBC has got in film, agreed Barbara Ellen like to believe.” on the act by releasing its own in The Observer. Perhaps one Charles Shaar Murray, mawkish Christmas advert. day aworking mother can be quoted in The Guardian But its offering has provoked portrayed “doing her job, rage as well as tears among because her family probably “You don’t have to be viewers. The short film A“somewhat unfestive narrative” needs the money, but also, aparent to suffer from features aharassed working because maybe she enjoys it. sentimentality, but it mother and ateenage son who wants more of Now that would be atrue Christmas miracle.” definitely helps.” her time. We see her juggling tasks at her desk, Jemima Lewis in while he mooches sadly around aseaside town, When it comes to sexism, Christmas ads are The Daily Telegraph before, magically, the world about them freezes aminefield, said Glosswitch in the New in time, allowing the mother to abandon her Statesman, owing to the fact that “almost Statistic of the week busy office and hang out with her son at a everything associated with the festive season Eight leading private funfair. For many, the ad worked: “Sitting here –cooking, caring, family ties, giving birth in schools send more pupils to sobbing. What an absolutely beautiful film. great discomfort in an inadequate setting –is Oxford and Cambridge than Family is SO important,” tweeted one woman. associated with women”. The safest course for three-quarters of all state But others were furious, accusing the BBC of adverts is to stick to “children, animals and root secondary schools. The eight guilt-tripping working mothers. vegetables”. Iobject to the BBC commissioning schools (believed to include expensive films to promote itself in the first Eton, Westminster and Count me among the latter group, said place, said Libby Purves in The Times. But if St Paul’s) sent 1,310 pupils Sarah Vine in the Daily Mail. If the BBC wants it must, let it at least do so without portraying to Oxbridge from 2015 to us all to “play happy families”, that’s fine, but women simultaneously as “borderline-neglectful 2017, while 2,894 state schools sent 1,220. there’s adistinctly “anti-feminist tilt” to this ad. mothers and flaky unreliable workers. Merry BC The underlying message is that the woman is Christmas from BBC One! Bah, humbug.” Sutton Trust/The Times ©B

15 December 2018 THE WEEK 24 NEWS Sport

Football: Man City brought down to earth Until they arrived at Stamford Bridge on rate in the league; when he’s absent, that drops Saturday, Manchester City had been behind for to 11.1%. City have been hurt, too, by the atotal of 12 minutes in all their Premier League injuries to Kevin de Bruyne, the midfielder games this season, said Oliver Holt in The Mail who was their star player last season. But on Sunday. “The idea of adomestic City defeat let’s not get carried away, said Daniel Taylor had started to seem like an offence against in The Observer. This is still quite possibly nature.” But Chelsea had other ideas. Playing “the most exciting collection of players” that with “ferocious determination”, they destroyed English football has ever seen. They just aren’t the champions’ “aura of invincibility” by beating perfect. “Not yet, anyway.” them 2-0. The victory breathed “excitement into the title race”: it put Liverpool, who are now the On the same day as City’s defeat, Liverpool only unbeaten side in the Premier League, top of issued a“voluble statement of intent” by the table. Guardiola: first defeat of the season beating Bournemouth 4-0, said Jim White in The Sunday Telegraph. It marked areturn to This result will give hope to the rest of the league, said the “coruscating” performances that lit up the league last season. Danny Murphy in the same paper. City had been “blowing away In recent weeks, we had seen adifferent kind of Liverpool: “more teams”: they have scored five goals or more on four occasions this resolute, more robust in the challenge, tougher to beat”. Having season. But Chelsea’s win suggests that other clubs might find signed the defender Virgil van Dijk and anew goalkeeper, away to defeat them. It was “a triumph of togetherness and Alisson, they are now far tighter at the back, and have conceded organisation”: Maurizio Sarri picked Pedro and Willian on each only six goals in their 16 league matches so far. But they had wing, knowing they would “work extremely hard” to stop City been less exciting, too –and Mo Salah had looked out of sorts. building from the back. This defeat highlighted just how much Fortunately, the Bournemouth match “felt like astaging post” Pep Guardiola’s team depend on Sergio Agüero, said Jason Burt for the Egyptian forward, said Ian Ladyman in the Daily Mail. He in The Daily Telegraph. The injured Argentinian striker is scored three goals, two of them “stunning”. For Liverpool to lead “irreplaceable”. Not only has he scored eight goals in his 13 “one of the greatest top-flight teams of all time” as the season’s league appearances, but his very presence lifts the side: when he’s midpoint approaches is astunning achievement. And if the Reds playing, City score 15.69% of their chances, the second-highest are to go all the way, it is Salah who must “set the pace”. Snooker: the Rocket’s record-breaking victory On Sunday night, Ronnie O’Sullivan “ripped up despite being right-handed; when he spent long the snooker history books”, said Hector Nunns in stretches of amatch sitting with awet towel draped the Daily Mail. He beat Mark Allen 10-6 to win the over his head. And on Sunday, he celebrated his UK Championship for arecord seventh time. Even victory by pouring abottle of water over his head. more impressively, it was his 19th success in the Whatever you make of such incidents, there is no sport’s three major tournaments, the highest tally denying that O’Sullivan is agenius of the sport. And of any player in history. It capped a“rampant” year even now, at this stage of his career, he is improving: for the Rocket. At the age of 43, he has won three of he has won aremarkable 27 of his 28 matches in the the five events he has played this season, and reached UK Championship since 2014. For years, O’Sullivan the final and semi-final in the others; currently No. 3 has been snooker’s biggest asset, said Jim White in in the world rankings, he is “fast closing in” on the The Daily Telegraph. But he is now on acollision top spot, aposition he last occupied eight years ago. course with World Snooker, the body that runs the sport. Angry that players are being required to It’s amazing to think that O’Sullivan first won this O’Sullivan: “rampant” take part in more and more competitions, O’Sullivan tournament aquarter of acentury ago, when he was is trying to set up an independent, breakaway only 17, said Shamoon Hafez on BBC Sport online. His career competition, featuring only elite players. Unsurprisingly, World since then has been by turns confounding and captivating. There Snooker has lashed out at the idea, but it has abig problem on was the time when he insisted on taking shots with his left hand, its hands. “Snooker is embroiled in agathering civil war.”

Did Stokes get off lightly? Sporting headlines “Finally this saga has come to The Sunday Telegraph. A Rugby union In the European an end,” said Vic Marks in The professional cricketer “goes Rugby Champions Cup, Guardian. Fifteen months after out in public and behaves Gloucester beat Exeter 27-19. England cricketers Ben Stokes violently”, and what does the Saracens beat Cardiff Blues and Alex Hales were arrested game do? It just “shrugs its 51-25. Leinster beat Bath for taking part in abrawl shoulders”. Stokes should have 17-10. outside aBristol nightclub, been banned for the next year; Football In their final group the Cricket Disciplinary Hales, “the minor offender”, stage match, Tottenham drew Commission has delivered its for the next six months. On the 1-1 with Barcelona to reach verdict. It decided to ban the contrary, said Mike Atherton in the last 16 of the Champions players, for eight matches and Stokes: eight-match ban and afine The Times, this episode may League. Liverpool qualified six matches respectively. But have been “entirely self- with a1-0 win over Napoli. they won’t actually have to miss any. Stokes inflicted”, but the players have surely suffered Cricket At the start of a was ruled to have served his ban, having sat enough. They have had to deal with “legal bills, four-Test series, India beat out enough matches already, while Hales’s uncertainty and criticism” about their future. Australia by 31 runs to win remaining four matches have been suspended And Stokes has learnt his lesson: since aTest in Australia for the for now –pending good behaviour. In addition, returning to the side, he has set an impeccable first time in adecade. Stokes was fined £30,000, and Hales £17,500 example “off the field, in training and practice”. (with £10,000 of that suspended). This was “a common-sense solution”. It’s time Boxing British boxer Kell Brook beat Australian What apitiful response, said Simon Heffer in for everyone to move on. Michael Zerafa on points.

THE WEEK 15 December 2018

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Not another xenophobe Exchange of the week meet the needs of their patient To the New Statesman population. As aresult of being Afterthe rush of EU migrants Revising the Brexit deal embarrassed on national TV in post-2004, theday rate forself- aQ&A session with voters, he employed building workersin To The Times introduced a“one-size-fits-all” Southamptonfellby50%. If TheresaMay were really seriousabout improvingthe terms system incentivising practices The15,000new arrivals of herwithdrawal agreement, she would have pressed ahead to deal with all requests for an were accommodated by private with the vote, waited for Parliament formally to reject the deal appointment within 48 hours. landlordsturning family homes and then gone back to Brussels armed with that ammunition. This could only be achieved by into multiple occupancies, One can only assume that instead of forcing Brussels to be practices not allowing booking thereby changing the character more reasonable, her real aim is to run down the clock in in advance, so the appointment of streets and neighbourhoods. an attempt to force MPs and the country into accepting book was empty at the start of Some schools were ill-equipped her terrible deal unchanged. each day. This created the rush for their first non-English- Nigel Henson, Farningham, Kent hour at 8.15am and alucky language-speaking students. 30 got an appointment. At the time, Iregarded these To TheTimes Any service where demand as legitimate concerns, but The only hope of persuading the EU to offer us revised outweighs supply inevitably Ilearn from Gavin Jacobson terms for our withdrawal is to convince its members that the has apinch point, and in this that Iwas just another alternative would be worse for them. The only outcome that scenario the bottleneck is at “nationalist and xenophobe”. the EU would regard as worse is for us to leave without adeal. about two to three days. His assumption that any worry We know that it would like us to remain, so every vote for Urgent cases can still be seen about immigration is evidence another referendum, carrying with it the possibility of a on the same day and chronic of apernicious outlook decision to remain, weakens the Prime Minister’s bargaining conditions can wait acouple skews his reviews of several position. The EU might reluctantly agree to the Norway of weeks with no detriment to important books on populism. option, but this involves the retention of free movement the patient. Illnesses such as John Denham, Labour MP and would outrage all those who voted to leave. If Parliament sore throats, viral illnesses and 1992-2015 and former wants to honour the referendum and leave but on better terms, diarrhoea get better without cabinet minister it must strengthen the Prime Minister’s hand by dropping the need to be seen at all. the Norway option, and stop claiming that withdrawal Dr Andrew Cairns, Petersfield, Rewarding the bandits without adeal must be avoided at all costs. Hampshire To The Guardian Lord Millett, House of Lords KPMG’s partners receivingan When croquet kills average16% payincreasethis To TheTimes To The Times year demonstrates that reward The headline of your leading article, that May’s deal is the Furthertoyourletters forfailure is aliveand well. “Least Bad Option”, is questionable. Many are deeply wary on croquet, Ihave been It is furtherproof that the of aPeople’s Vote, not least because the decision by the researching deaths of soldiers regulatory system, which is previous prime minister to hold the referendum was made whose number was not on the meant to control the worst in an attempt to paper over the divisions in the Conservative bullet throughout 1914-18, excesses of corporate greed, Party. Two years have elapsed since that vote and people are but who died in bizarre or is so weak that it is almost now much better informed about the likely consequences of unfortunate circumstances non-existent. leaving the EU. Today citizens can see, as your article stated, after their Great War service. KPMG was Carillion’s that there is no Brexit that could ever meet the wild promises Idiscovered one Anglo-French external auditor for 19 years, of the Leave campaign. officer who survived the the lifetime of the company. APeople’s Vote would be decided by an electorate with a horrors of Verdun only to Despite charging huge sums much better understanding of what Brexit might mean, and be killed by his wife lifting a for its auditing expertise, it thus the result would be better respected. mallet with too much vigour failed to notice that the Angus McNeilage, Blackham, East Sussex during apeaceful postwar company’s accounts did not game, accidentally breaking bear any relation to Carillion’s Until then, the general vocational education. We his skull. At least, that’s what true financial position. public should not be asking could have afantastic system, she told the magistrate. If KPMG’s audits had if there will be another but we persistently undervalue Dr Bruce Cherry, Wooburn identified that Carillion was Carillion, but when. and underfund it. Green, Buckinghamshire in financial difficulties it might Gail Cartmail, assistant This political failure was not have saved the company, general secretary, Unite always the case, even under but it would have allowed for the Union Labour, but since 2010 the an orderly break-up, which Tories have cut funding by would have saved the taxpayer Britain’s skills shortfall nearly aquarter. That’s why millions, and meant that To The Observer we have such alack of the thousands of workers would Onereasonsomanyeastern kind of skills required for not have lost their jobs. European workerscame to what we persist in calling The Financial Reporting Britain –famously, Polish “low-paid jobs”. Council is yet to take any builders –was that however Jeremy Cushing, Exeter action, giving every impression bad the old communist states that it is atoothless watchdog. were, at least they had good GP waiting times Until the regulatory system has technical education systems. To The Times undergone root-and-branch In this country, we have Tony Blairmadetwo bigerrors reform, and those responsible governments dominated by in hisdealingswithprimary for driving companies to people who went to schools care:allowing GPs to opt out the wall are held to account, where the academic route was of 24-hour care, and interfering bandit capitalism will taken for granted, and who with appointment systems that

continue to flourish. simply don’t understand practices had fine-tuned to ©MATT/THE DAILY TELEGRAPH

● Letters have been edited 15 December 2018 THE WEEK

ARTS 29 Review of reviews: Books

Book of the week in accelerating South Africa’s HIV/Aids crisis, for instance; and Britain’s own Nine Pints infected blood scandal, in which haemophilia patients were used as by Rose George “guinea pigs” for new and unsafe blood Portobello 384pp £14.99 products. But she is also angry “on her The Week Bookshop £11.99 own behalf”: as someone who suffers from endometriosis (a condition that causes uterus lining tissue to develop Given how essential it is to human outside the womb), she is “painfully health, people are surprisingly ignorant aware” of the suffering that “ignorance about blood, said James Marriott in about blood” causes. This ignorance The Times. Before Iread Rose George’s has always disproportionately excellent book, Ihad no idea where in affected women: tampon safety has the body it’s made (the bone marrow), barely advanced in decades. George nor how much of the stuff atypical also visits acowshed in rural Nepal human body contains (the answer’s in where menstruating women are sent the title). Thankfully, I’m now better informed: George examines for fear that they will pollute their families. blood from every angle, covering blood types, blood donation, Idecided to read everything George writes after “avidly menstruation, haemophilia, leeches and vampires. When it comes consuming” her 2008 book about human waste, The Big to the “red stuff”, she argues, ignorance and superstition have Necessity,said Dwight Garner in The New York Times. long been the norm: Pliny the Elder believed menstruating women The qualities that made that work so good –a“no-nonsense could “scare away lightning storms”; the Nazis thought races briskness on the page”, alack of pretension –are equally on show could be categorised according to blood type; and even today, here. The two books also share an interest in tackling taboos, said many Japanese people think that blood reveals something about James McConnachie in The Sunday Times: excrement and blood, personality. Nine Pints is written in “immensely readable prose”, for all their differences, both arouse fear and disgust. George, for but is also admirably “serious” and “weighty”. her part, calls blood a“wondrous” substance, and describes how George combines a“journalistic eye” with “sharp moral it “travels 12,000 miles aday, regulating temperature, getting rid judgement”, said Sarah Ditum in The Guardian. She exposes of waste and defending us against infection”. She fearlessly “rips various ethical atrocities: the role of the “sugar daddy economy” off the plaster” –and what she exposes “is strangely beautiful”.

Germaine by Elizabeth Kleinhenz Novel of the week Scribe 480pp £20 Evening in Paradise The Week Bookshop £15.99 by Lucia Berlin Picador 256pp £14.99 If nothing else, you have to admire the bravery The Week Bookshop £11.99 of Elizabeth Kleinhenz, said Rosamund Urwin in The Sunday Times. The subject of this biography Lucia Berlin, who died in 2004, was a“long- –the 79-year-old feminist Germaine Greer overlooked” American short story writer, said (pictured) –doesn’t like people writing about her. Johanna Thomas-Corr in The Guardian. In “I f***ing hate biography,” she once declared, 2015, she became “something of aliterary and labelled the author of aprevious effort a sensation” when 43 of her “raw, elliptical, “parasite”. Although Greer didn’t cooperate with devilishly funny” stories –mined from her Kleinhenz, the academic was able to draw on the “precarious, peripatetic life” –were anthologised “vast” personal archive that the University of Melbourne acquired five years in AManual For Cleaning Women.This new ago. And the result is “terrific”, said Melanie Reid in The Times. This “richly volume collects afurther 22 and they again human” biography balances Greer’s personal flaws –her attention-seeking, showcase Berlin’s distinctive skills. She was a her “venomous tongue” –against her many “majestic achievements”, which subversive writer who used “wily humour” to include her “groundbreaking” first book, The Female Eunuch,awork that lit expose injustice. “Time and again in Evening in “the fire of the second wave of feminism”. Kleinhenz presents Greer as awoman Paradise,weencounter bohemian men who talk of contradictions: aserious scholar who (in her younger days) was a“reckless about poetry, jazz and painting, but keep their hippy”; abasically lonely person who thrives on acclaim; and afeminist who wives stuck in crushing domestic routines.” reserves her sharpest barbs for other women. Perhaps inevitably, these stories aren’t as Kleinhenz rattles through plenty of anecdotes, said Anna Leszkiewicz in The strong as the earlier ones, said Max Liu in the Daily Telegraph: Greer’s one-night stand with Federico Fellini; her decision to be FT. Yet there’s plenty to “conjure the original photographed in apornographic pose; her “30,000-word love letter to Martin thrill of reading Berlin” –from a“disconcerting Amis”. None of which pack the “punch you’d expect”. One problem is the portrait of childhood poverty” to afarcical tale oddly “twee” prose. Another is the absence of any real engagement with Greer’s set in aluxury Mexican hotel. Few writers are work. Trawling through her life is not particularly edifying: one is left with the better than Berlin at “landing in the middle of impression of a“petty, vindictive” person. Yet confusingly, and seemingly out alife or aplace”, said Kate Saunders in The of nowhere, Kleinhenz ends by concluding that her subject is a“genius” who Times. Her stories are “mostly wonderful”. thinks “differently from the rest of us”. To order these titles or any other book in print, visit theweek.co.uk/bookshop or speak to abookseller on 020-3176 3835 Opening times: Monday to Saturday 9am-5.30pm and Sunday 10am-4pm

15 December 2018 THE WEEK 30 ARTS Drama Musical: Fiddler on the Roof Menier Chocolate Factory, London SE1 (020-7378 1713). Until 9March Running time: 2hrs 50mins ★★★★ The intimate Menier theatre with hallowed tradition, Nyman is the perfect setting for “wrings out the full measure of Trevor Nunn’s magnificent mounting anguish”. The dancing and “extraordinarily emotional” (Jerome Robbins’s original revival of Fiddler on the Roof, choreography has been honed said Sarah Crompton on What’s by Matt Cole) is breathtaking, On Stage. There’s so much to said Ann Treneman in admire. Robert Jones’s natural- The Times –with Cossacks istic, wrap-around set brilliantly somersaulting and awedding evokes adark, smoky shtetl in dance involving bottles on early 20th century imperial heads. And the politics of the Russia. Jonathan Lipman’s piece –made “cruelly topical costumes –prayer aprons once more” by the terrifying poking out from heavy coats – resurgence of anti-Semitism are perfectly judged. The band –are chillingly present sounds like a“billion dollars”; without being overplayed, said the musical arrangements Kuhn and Nyman: superb, pitch-perfect performances Mark Lawson in The Guardian. “make the score gleam”. And In one unforgettable moment, then there’s the superb acting. Andy Nyman’s fresh, truthful awild wedding party is interrupted by the outbreak of apogrom. reading of Tevye, the put-upon milkman, is the beating heart of And the final sequence of the villagers fleeing is powerfully the show. But he is helped by sensational performances from the emblematic of countless other forced diasporas. “Musically, young actresses playing his daughters –including a“glorious” geopolitically, emotionally, this Fiddler raises the roof.” debut from Molly Osborne as Tzeitel –and apitch-perfect turn from Judy Kuhn as his wife, Golde. Amusical that can sometimes The week’s other opening feel “hokey” here becomes “overwhelming and engrossing”. True West Vaudeville Theatre, Strand, London WC2 Nyman, with his “big beard, labourer’s forearms and stout (0330-333 4814). Until 23 February physique”, makes aphysically convincing Tevye in away few SamShepard’s tale of battling brothers –one ascreenwriter, the since Topol have achieved, said Dominic Cavendish in The Daily othera“swaggering outlaw” –isonly “moderately amusing”, Telegraph. He delivers the “daidle, deedle, daidles” in If IWere but it offers “terrific” parts for actors; watching Kit Harington aRich Man “with rare frailty, as if giving voice to back spasms”. and Johnny Flynn at work is “a real pleasure” (Sunday Times). And as his daughters peel away, marrying for love and breaking The pick of Christmas theatre around the country

Wendy and Peter Pan Royal but “without compromising on Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh, pizzazz”, says Claire Allfree in until 5January Ella Hickson’s The Daily Telegraph. Fifty years “superb” adaptation of J.M. on from the original film, The Barrie’s story, first staged by the Producers remains “resonantly, RSC in 2013, places Wendy, giddily funny”: the “satirical rather than Peter, at the centre swipes at deluded fanatics hit of the much-adapted tale, says home” harder than ever. Mark Fisher in The Guardian. Staged on aset that swaps the Dick Whittington and net curtains of the nursery for His Cat Oxford Playhouse, the billowing sails of aship, this until 6January There’s no great fabulous, high-energy revival is secret about the key ingredients “both funny and heartbreaking, for araucously successful intelligent and tense. Warning: pantomime, says Andrew Pulver features actual fairy dust.” in The Guardian: ear-busting The Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh’s Wendy and Peter Pan songs, dance routines, topical AChristmas Carol Bristol Old jokes (with afair sprinkling of Vic, until 13 January Bristol Old Vic, “gloriously reborn this double entendres) and bombardments of sweets from the stage to year, with the scaffolding finally stripped away”, still has aposter whip the kids into afrenzy. “But Idon’t think I’ve ever seen them for its first production of AChristmas Carol,staged in 1844, only all come together quite so enjoyably as in this fantastically good- afew months after Dickens wrote his tale, says Ann Treneman in natured production” by Steve Marmion at Oxford Playhouse. The Times. That version promised astirring drama with “novel mechanical effects”, dresses, dances and “appropriate” Old AChristmas Carol The Old Vic, London SE1, until 19 January English ballad music. “Frankly, plus ça change.” This fizzing Jack Thorne’s adaptation of AChristmas Carol was asmash hit new adaptation, by Bristol’s “almost obsessively creative” for The Old Vic last year, with bell-ringing, carol-singing and artistic director Tom Morris, has “all of that and more”. snow aplenty (and even Brussels sprouts descending on mini- parachutes). Last time Iwas moved to tears, yet “bah-humbugged” BODLOVIC The Producers Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester, until abit at the show’s “insistent sweetness”, says Dominic Cavendish MIHAELA 2February Raz Shaw’s “exuberantly funny” revival of Mel in The Daily Telegraph. This year, however, Iwas sucked in more Brooks’s modern classic beautifully scales down this Broadway completely –“seized by aspirit of dumbfounded gratitude almost musical for the Royal Exchange’s intimate in-the-round space – worthy of the converted Ebenezer himself”. PERSSON; OHAN

Stars reflect the overall quality of reviews and our own independent assessment (4 stars=don’t miss; 1star=don’t bother) ©J Book your tickets now by calling 020-7492 9948 or visiting TheWeekTickets.co.uk THE WEEK 15 December 2018 octopusgroup.com The Human Body is Remarkable.

It inspired us to ask whether we could harness the potential of the immune system to fight cancer. At Bristol-Myers Squibb, our team is committed to researching and developing innovative treatments that can help patients in their fight against cancer, now and in the future. www.bms.com/gb

Jobcode: ONCUK1801415-09 Date of Prep: December 2018 Film ARTS 33

“Robert Redford goes out with abang and a bucketload of charm in David Lowery’s The Old Man &the Gun,” said Tom Shone in The Sunday Times. The Old Man In what he says will be his last film, the 82-year-old actor plays an impeccably mannered, elderly thief &the Gun named Forrest Tucker, who walks into banks, Dir: David Lowery modestly reveals agun in his jacket and then leaves 1hr 33mins (12A) with abag of money. His hearing aid, tuned into police radio, facilitates his getaway. The talented cast of this 1980s-set drama, which is based on a Beguiling swansong true story, also includes Casey Affleck, as the dour for Robert Redford detective on Tucker’s trail, and Sissy Spacek as a wholesome widow, whom Tucker chats up with his habitual courtesy. This is ultimately “a bit too ★★★ adorable” for its own good, said Nigel Andrews in the Financial Times. And it fails to properly address the fact that armed robbery is not really ajoke. But that’s part of the appeal, said Nev Pierce in Empire. Freighted with nostalgic awareness of Redford’s earlier roles, this “delightful folk story” is a“fitting final turn” for the old smoothie. “It takes alifetime of effort to look this effortless.”

The sarcastic title of this “funny, offbeat” race satire by the hip-hop artist Boots Riley sets out his stall, said Michael Gingold in Time Out. Riley is no more Sorry to sorry about annoying you than the telemarketers who coo “sorry to bother you” are about interrupting Bother You your day. One such interrupterisCassius Green Dir: Boots Riley (Lakeith Stanfield), an African-American under- achiever struggling to prove to his boss (Omari 1hr 52mins (15) Hardwick) that he can succeed in telesales. But then acolleague (Danny Glover) suggests he try using Irreverent race satire a“white”, ingratiating tone of voice. He does so (here Stanfield is overdubbed by the white comedian ★★★ David Cross) and instantly becomes ahit. Thus begins astartling film that sometimes relies too heavily on “weirdness”, said Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian. But it is held together by aheroically relaxed turn from Stanfield, who maintains the air of aman who’s just been woken from anap. In its satire of US racial tensions, this is abit like Jordan Peele’s Get Out,but sadly is not as clever or as funny, said Nigel Andrews in the FT. I’m afraid it’s hard to care much about any of the characters.

Don’t let the running time put you off, said Kevin Maher in The Times. This is a“speedy three hours of Turkish miserabilism” from the award- The Wild winning Nuri Bilge Ceylan, leavened by sly humour and unforgettable characters. Chief among these is Pear Tree Sinan (Aydın Dogu Demirkol), an aspirant writer Dir: Nuri Bilge Ceylan who has returned to the city of Çanakkale where he 3hrs 8mins (15) grew up, to gather funding to publish his pretentious first novel. Carrying his manuscript around town, he tries the patience of the mayor, property developers Bewitching art-house epic and his own father (Murat Cemcir), who is digging for water obsessively on ascrap of land he owns – ★★★★ adoomed quest that mirrors Sinan’s own monomania. The Wild Pear Tree is a“beautifully made and magnificently acted” movie, said Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian. It’s an “elegiac” exploration of “the gamble on life that we are required to make in our 20s”. “Flights of beguiling lyricism” are combined with “biting social observation” about life in contemporary Turkey, said Geoffrey Macnab in The Independent. This is one of the “most accessible” films yet from Ceylan.

Motion impossible: Tom Cruise takes aim at high-definition TV This has been agreat year for Tom Cruise. His film-maker had intended. Actually, some directors latest Mission: Impossible film was ahuge hit and like the idea of filming at ahigher rate of frames he’s currently filming asequel to Top Gun.Yet per second (fps), said Matthew Moore in The probably his worthiest achievement, said Stuart Times. Peter Jackson, for example, decided to Heritage in The Guardian, is the 87-second video shoot his Hobbit trilogy at 48fps –twice the he posted on his Twitter feed last week in which industry standard. But many viewers complained he and Mission: Impossible director Christopher that it ended up spoiling the fantasy and making McQuarrie take ashot at high-definition the film look “too real”. TVs (HDTVs). But television viewers who don’t like the The target of their complaint was not HD itself, effect can easily turn the feature off, said but afeature that comes with it and is set as the Courtney Bartlett in the Daily Mail. Just go into default mode on most HDTVs –motion smoothing. “picture settings” on your TV and disable the Also known as “the soap opera effect”, it adds option or dial it down. Note, however, that TV artificial frames into footage so that fast-moving Cruise: requires no smoothing brands –asCruise points out –often have objects appear less blurry. Motion smoothing was different names for motion smoothing: Sony calls designed to improve the experience of watching sport, but as it MotionFlow, Samsung Auto Motion Plus. Cruise’s earnestness Cruise points out, it makes films look as if they’ve been shot can be abit off-putting, said Stuart Heritage, but on this occasion on high-speed video, so they look cheaper and sharper than the he’s absolutely right. “Welcome back, Tom. We’ve missed you.”

15 December 2018 THE WEEK 34 ARTS Art

Exhibition of the week Gainsborough’s Family Album National Portrait Gallery, London WC2 (020-7306 0055, npg.org.uk). Until 3February Thomas Gainsborough –isastudy in (1727-88) is arguably disappointed dignity, Britain’s most celebrated while his nephews are portrait painter, said “transformed from Michael Prodger in The Suffolk provincials Times. But though his to courtly youths “fame and fortune rested by scintillating blue on his portraiture, it was Van Dyck outfits”. atrade he resented”: he We meet his siblings: wanted to paint the “sober vicar” landscapes, but was Humphrey, the forever irritated by his “dishevelled failed wealthy, aristocratic inventor” John, and sitters (“confounded the “ornately coiffed” ugly creatures”, as he Sarah. Even his dogs, called them). “I am sick a“languorous” of portraits,” he wrote spaniel and a“perky” in 1768. But, as this spitz, get alook in. “lovely” new exhibition Gainsborough brings demonstrates, there was them all to life, like one group of people he “characters from didn’t mind depicting: Mary and Margaret Gainsborough, the Artist’s Daughters (c.1760-61) Jane Austen”. his family. In the course of his life, Gainsborough painted some 50 portraits of family Best of all are the artist’s portraits of his daughters Mary and members, more than any other artist of his time. The show brings Margaret, said Waldemar Januszczak in The Sunday Times. Both together an unprecedented selection of these personal studies, led “tragic” existences –Mary suffered from delusions and died in many of which remain “unfinished”: they were never intended to an asylum, and Margaret devoted her life to looking after her – be seen in public, and thus allowed him to experiment with but when they were young their doting father repeatedly painted his craft. Although they “lack the grandeur and swagger of them with extraordinary tenderness. In one masterpiece here, his commissions”, they have “an intimacy and immediacy” Gainsborough depicts them as “sweet toddlers” chasing a not always found in his better-known works. It is a“fascinating” butterfly, while alater painting has them as “awkward teenagers” display that gives new insights into this brilliant. training to be artists –aprofession that neither took up. Later still, we see them in adulthood, unconvincingly dressed up for “Everything Gainsborough paints is touched with rapture,” high society. “Soppy” though these works may sometimes be, said Jackie Wullschlager in the FT. He depicts his “aspirational” they have a“psychological intensity” rarely matched in art. This middle-class Suffolk family with startling liveliness. The artist’s is a“beautiful and touching exhibition” that perfectly captures father –a“thwarted businessman turned local postmaster” Gainsborough’s “warmth, intimacy, involvement and invention”.

Where to buy… The portrait of aplunderer The Week reviews an Aportrait of The exhibition in aprivate gallery Great Belzoni –a circus strongman Studio Prints: who used his strength to plunder ASurvey the treasures of ancient Egypt – at Marlborough Fine Art has been given to Britain. Giovanni The London printing workshop Studio Battista Belzoni, who CAMBRIDGE Prints was founded by Slade art school was 6ft 7in, fled Italy graduate Dorothea Wight in aformer to England in the MUSEUM, butcher’s shop in Kentish Town in the early 19th century, where he performed in acircus before late 1960s, and over the next 40 years embarking on an entirely new career –asan FITWILLIAM it received the custom of some of Egyptologist, said David Sanderson in The THE Britain’s greatest painters –among Times. Working for Henry Salt, the British ART; them Lucian Freud, Paula Rego and consul general in Egypt, he helped to remove FINE R.B. Kitaj. This show brings together antiquities and bring them to Britain: he prised anumber of artists’ prints produced off the lid from the granite sarcophagus of Ken Kiff’s Castle Rising from the Sea (1993) Rameses III, and hauled away the 2.7-metre

there between the mid-1980s and the MARLBOROUGH end of the first decade of the century, some dizzying views of Christ Church head of Rameses II from the Valley of the Kings. Now aportrait of Belzoni, by the Dutch

when the business closed. There are in Spitalfields and Going Home,a LONDON; artist Jan Adam Kruseman, has been given some fantastic pictures here. Rego depiction of acrowd in aTube station to the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge by is represented by ritualistic scenes that somehow lends artistic gravitas aBritish art dealer, as part of ascheme to MUSEUM, depicting wild folk dances, and to the mundanity of the rush hour encourage cultural donations by setting them

there are anumber of lugubrious commute. Prices on request. against tax. It will be displayed next to the ALBERT

little portraits by Freud. The standout, sarcophagus lid, which Belzoni handed to the AND however, is awonderful selection 6Albemarle Street, London W1 museum in 1823. of images by Leon Kossoff, including (020-7629 5161). Until 21 December. ICTORIA ©V

THE WEEK 15 December 2018

The List 37

Best books… Cathy Newman Television The Channel 4News presenter picks her favourite books. Her own book, Programmes Bloody Brilliant Women: The Pioneers, Revolutionaries and Geniuses Your The Long Song Three-part History Teacher Forgot to Mention,isout now (William Collins £20) adaptation of Andrea Levy’s novel set in 19th century The Kite Runner by like amedium at aseance and often get arough ride because Jamaica during the final days Khaled Hosseini, 2003 by the end we feel as if Daisy being obliged to react to of slavery. Hayley Atwell plays an odious plantation owner (Bloomsbury £8.99). Despite is aclose friend, but of course events can make for bad and Tamara Lawrance is having aborderline unsym- she’s unknowable. Something poetry. Duffy continues to her headstrong maid. Tue pathetic protagonist, this novel about that tension makes the be as great as she’s ever been. 18-Thur 19 Dec, BBC1 21:00 wins you over. Even though book very moving –how well Iadore this collection about (60mins). Levy is the subject Amir’s redemption drives the can we really know anyone? the women who lurk behind of Imagine... on Wed 19 Dec, plot, his betrayal of his best mythologised men: Mrs BBC1 22:45 (75mins). friend, the son of his father’s Beloved by Toni Morrison, Lazarus and Queen Herod, servant, is hard to stomach. 1987 (Vintage £9.99). There for example. Victoria &Albert: The RoyalWedding Aidedbya It’s acompelling portrait of are so many amazing novels team of experts, Lucy Worsley Afghanistan before the Soviet about the legacy of slavery, but Philip Larkin: AWriter’s recreatesVictoriaand Albert’s invasion, and aclever melding Beloved has aphantasmagoric Life by Andrew Motion, lavish nuptials in 1840,from of the personal and political. power that singles it out. The 1993 (Faber £18.99). This was thefoodtothe clothes. Fri interplay between past and controversial because it blew 21 Dec, BBC2 20:30(90mins). The Stone Diaries by present –the stories of Sethe’s the gaff on Larkin’s racism Carol Shields, 1993 (World life on the plantation and her and predilection for schoolgirl Front Row Late: Editions £9.99). The story of life with her daughter after porn. Yet it remains one of the When Mary Beard Met Daisy Goodwill, an ordinary escaping –issocleverly done. most thoughtful biographies Clive James The classicist Canadian, from her birth on I’ve ever read. It shows how talks to the author and broadcaster. Fri 21 Dec, akitchen floor to her death in The World’s Wife by complex Larkin was, and how BBC2 23:05 (30mins). anursing home nearly 90 years Carol Ann Duffy, 1999 his poetry was the by-product later. Shields conjures her up (Picador £9.99). Poet Laureates of loneliness and private rage. Films Titles in print are available from The Week Bookshop on 020-3176 3835. For out-of-print books visit biblio.co.uk Miracle on 34th Street (1947) The original (and best) The Week’s guide to what’s worth seeing and reading version of the beguiling tale about adepartment store Santa (Edmund Gwenn) who Showing now is charged with insanity when Charles II: Art &Power at The Queen’s he says he is the real deal. Sat Gallery, Palace of Holyroodhouse, Edinburgh 15 Dec, C4 15:10 (110mins). (rct.uk). This “tremendous” show, first seen in London, captures the sumptuous world of the The Big Short (2015) Oscar- Restoration (Observer). Ends 2June. winning drama based on Michael Lewis’s non-fiction bestseller about the financial Company at the Gielgud Theatre, London W1 mavericks who “shorted” the (companymusical.co.uk). Rosalie Craig gives a market before the 2008 crash. “career-making performance” as Bobbie in With Ryan Gosling. Sat 15 Marianne Elliott’s “astonishing” gender- Dec, BBC2 21:00 (120mins). switched production of the 1970 musical by Stephen Sondheim. (Telegraph). Ends 30 March. Brooklyn (2015) Moving adaptation of Colm Tóibín’s Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake: “breathtaking” Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake at Sadler’s novel about ayoung woman Wells, London EC1 (new-adventures.net). The in the 1950s who moves from show since 2011. 12-13 July, Eventim Apollo, Ireland to New York. Sun 16 choreographer’s landmark 1995 production of London W6 (eventimapollo.com). Dec, BBC2 20:00 (105mins). Tchaikovsky’s tragic romance, which boasts all- male swans, has been given areboot for an Just out in paperback Eye in the Sky (2015) extensive national tour. “Breathtaking” (The Left Bank: Art Passion and the Rebirth of Thriller exploring the ethics List). Until 27 January, then touring Milton Paris 1940-50 by Agnès Poirier (Bloomsbury of drone strikes. Helen Mirren Keynes, Birmingham and on until 25 May. £9.99). Abrisk, “character-driven” cultural and Alan Rickman star. Mon history of the French capital during the 1940s, 17 Dec, Film4 21:00 (125mins). Book now whisking us through occupation, liberation and Jerry Seinfeld,the great American the growth of art, fashion and music –and of New to subscription TV observational stand-up, is doing his first UK the city’s famed café culture (Times). Roma (2018) Magnificent drama set in 1970s Mexico, The Archers: what happened last week directed by Alfonso Cuarón Elizabeth is still sick so Lily shows the new manager, Glen, around Lower Loxley. Rex has ataxi job and shot in black and white. to Deck the Hall and catches up with Lily. She tells him Glen has settled in quickly. Rex isn’t enjoying On Netflix. doing Lynda’s show. Lily calls Russ, who’s fed up with being alone. Lily says she’ll be back on Wed-

PERSSON nesday. The buyers of Home Farm agree to the sale being completed by New Year. Phoebe advises The Marvelous Mrs. Roy to ask Lexi to marry him. Helen’s distressed to learn Tony can’t come to France with her to buy Maisel The Emmy-winning JOHAN the Montbéliardes because Tom’s trees are arriving early. Elizabeth’s thrilled when Lily decides to stay at home until the start of the new term. Freddie agrees to Lily’s prison visit on their birthday. comedy drama series about Helen tells Lee that she’s nervous about going to France alone. He urges her to make the most of a1950s housewife-turned- it and gives her tips on how to breathe. Lynda is on the brink of tears when Ed and Emma say they stand-up returns for asecond LOURIE/EYEVINE; can’t make the rehearsal. She cheers up when she finds everyone marvelling at the stunt bottom series. Rachel Brosnahan

DRIAN Fallon has made for Harrison and Kirsty. The rehearsal is about to start when the roof springs aleak. stars. On Amazon Prime. ©A

15 December 2018 THE WEEK 38 Best properties

Homes designed by famous architects

▲ Surrey: Apartment 1, The Mansion at Sondes Place, Dorking. ▲ Norfolk: The Lodge, Letton, Cranworth. This Grade II 18th century Gothic-style Originally designed cottage was designed by the esteemed neo-classical architect John Soane, who went by Thomas Cubitt on to design the Bank of England and the London law courts. Master bed, 3further and once owned by the beds (1 en suite), family bath, kitchen/breakfast room, 2receps, hall, substantial Cartier family, Sondes outbuildings with flexible use, large enclosed rear courtyard, shingle driveway, has been converted into parking, lawned garden, 1acre. £525,000; Sowerbys (01362-693591). six ultra high-spec properties, set in leafy parkland at the foot of the Surrey Hills. Apartment 1isa duplex with internal private lift, and amix of period and modern features. Master suite, 2further suites, kitchen/ breakfast room, 2receps, hall, utility, 2terraces, stores, parking. £1.75m; Patrick Gardner (01372-360832).

▲ Hertfordshire: Amwell Grove, Great Amwell. This Georgian house overlooking the New River was built between 1794 and 1797 by Robert Mylne, the architect and civil engineer, who is remembered for his design of Blackfriars Bridge in London. 2suites, 6further beds, 2baths, kitchen/breakfast room, 4receps, cloakroom, study, 7-room lower ground floor with own access, lawns, terrace, woodland, tennis court, paddock, garage, outbuildings, 4.1 acres. £2.99m; Savills (020-7075 2806).

THE WEEK 15 December 2018 on the market 39

▲ Somerset: 7Sion Hill, Bath. Designed by John Pinch the elder and built from 1818-20, this Grade Itown house is in need of modernisation. 5beds, 3baths, kitchen, 4receps, hall, kitchenette, wine store, vaults, courtyards, garden. £1.495m; Strutt &Parker (020-7629 7282). Devon: Stealth House, Berrynarbor. Astriking ▲ contemporary waterfront home, designed by award- winning architect Guy Greenfield. Master suite with dressing room, 4further beds (3 en suite), family bath, shower, open-plan kitchen/recep, hall, utility, pantry, study, garage, kitchenette, media room, gardens, infinity pool. £2.5m; Knight Frank (01392-848822).

▲ Essex: New Farm, Great Easton. Asubstantial and historically important Grade II family home, built in 1934 by W.F. Crittall as his country residence. The house has been sensitively renovated and modernised. Master suite with shared balcony, 6further beds, 2baths, kitchen/breakfast room, octagonal recep, 2further receps, study, 2studio annexes, gardens, 5acres. POA, Savills (01279-756800).

▲ Cumbria: Eller How, Lindale. This Regency villa was designed and built by renowned architect George Webster as his family home in 1827. The house is set in asecluded spot just above Lindale, in 12 acres of wooded gardens and grounds. East wing: 5beds, family bath, kitchen/ breakfast room, 2 receps, utility, cellars; West wing: 3suites, WC, kitchen/dining ▲ room, 2further receps, utility; garage, ▲ North Yorkshire: The East Wing, 3Grimston Park, Grimston. This family home outbuildings. £1.4m; forms part of Grade II* Grimston Park, built by Decimus Burton in 1839 in the Scott Bainbridge via style of an Italianate palace. Master bed with dressing room, 3further beds, family OnTheMarket.com bath, shower, kitchen/breakfast room, 2receps, snug, study, office, media room, (01539-291948). utility, cloakroom, cellar, garden. £750,000; Strutt &Parker (01423-561274).

15 December 2018 THE WEEK

LEISURE 41 Food &Drink Nine of the best food books from 2018

Asma’s Ottolenghi Feast: Indian Simple Food of Kitchen Yotam the Islamic Asma Khan Ottolenghi World Pavilion £20 Ebury £25 Anissa Helou (£15.99) (£19.99) Bloomsbury Asma Khan Ottolenghi’s £45 (£34.99) couldn’t boil cooking is There are plenty an egg when she universally of classic dishes arrived in Britain lauded, but his in this wonderful in 1991; yet having discovered her culinary recipes are not always the easiest for home book, alongside others you will never have heritage, she went on to start her famous cooks to follow, says Lisa Allardice in heard of, said Diana Henry in The Daily supper club and founded her celebrated The Guardian. So for his new book, he Telegraph. Its scope is massive, with London restaurant, Darjeeling Express, has limited himself to ten ingredients delicious recipes from Indonesia, Pakistan, with its all-female kitchen. Her “beautiful” (excluding salt, pepper, olive oil, garlic India, Somalia and Zanzibar, as well as the book tells that astonishing story, says and onion) per recipe. The results, from Middle East, and around them are nuggets Stacey Smith in The Independent, and fishcake tacos to adeeply smoky slow- of fascinating history and culture. The contains astring of vibrant recipes, cooked chicken with acrisp corn crust, book is gorgeously designed too: it feels with vegetarians notably well catered for. look “impossibly stylish and delicious”. “like agold-encrusted box of delights”.

How to Eat Time ATable aPeach Gill Meller in Venice Diana Henry Quadrille £25 Skye McAlpine Mitchell Beazley (£19.99) Bloomsbury £26 £25 (£19.99) When your first (£19.99) Diana Henry’s book is widely Skye McAlpine, latest is aculinary acclaimed, who lives in Venice “masterpiece”, following it up part of the time says Bee Wilson in can be hard, says and styles herself as The Sunday Times Diana Henry. But a“Venetian house- –amust-have this outstanding wife”, is a“heaven- book structured as aseries of “deeply chef’s second collection is “every bit as sent new voice in cookery writing”, says atmospheric” menus, from Summer Begins good” as his first (Gather)and, in fact, Rose Prince in The Spectator. To read with Apricot Tart, to Take Me Back to more “approachable for the home cook”. this book is to get lost in the city’s markets, Istanbul. We spent aweek over the The recipes are arranged by time of day, bakeries, bars and other “secret places summer cooking from the book, and from breakfast to dinner –hence the title patronised only by locals” –and the “everything delighted”, from rye bread –and “you’ll want to make them all (think recipes make Venetian cooking accessible with radish butter to fish with fennel aioli. mushroom, cider and blue cheese soup, too. Much of it is humble but “wonderful” Of them all, “her mango cheeks in lime bacon with peaches and sage, poached food, but there are occasional feasts of and ginger syrup is the most requested”. rhubarb with rose geranium)”. meat or fish. Iwant to cook it all.

Black Sea Lateral Completely Caroline Eden Cooking Perfect Quadrille £25 Niki Segnit Felicity Cloake (£19.99) Bloomsbury £35 Fig Tree £12.99 This seems to have (£27.99) (£9.99) been the year of Segnit’s first book, The cover of “beautiful writing The Flavour this paperback – and immersive Thesaurus,was subtitled 120 travelogue one of the most Essential Recipes cunningly disguised original food for Every Cook – as cookbooks”, books of recent will immediately says Tim Hayward in the FT. Following years, says Bee Wilson. “This is another remind you of “your treasured old on from Eden’s award-winning first book, high-concept treat”, in which linked Penguins of Elizabeth David and Samarkand,this follows her journey, and recipes are cleverly grouped together in “a Jane Grigson”, says Tim Hayward. the food she finds, as she travels from continuum”. Blinis lead to pancakes that And so it should: Cloake’s collection Odessa to Istanbul and on to Trabzon. The lead to toad-in-the-hole, for example. Or of “brilliant master recipes” –which result is a“genuinely erudite dive into the if you know how to make soup, then stew explore the various ways that chefs and cultures that meet at the Black Sea”. It is is but ashort step away. There are stacks writers approach particular classics – “beautiful enough for the coffee table, but of fabulous recipes here, but the real joy truly deserves its place next to those fascinating enough for the nightstand and is Segnit’s “exuberant voice” –you feel as revered volumes. It’s aperfect gift for useful in the kitchen too”. though you’re “listening to awitty friend”. anyone learning to cook. Order these titles from The Week Bookshop at the bracketed price (orders over £20 incl. p&p): 020-3176 3835, TheWeek.co.uk/bookshop 15 December 2018 THE WEEK

Consumer LEISURE 43

The best… Christmas gifts for kids

▲ Nanoblockock Scandibørn Sebra ▲ ▲ Sphero animals Thisis play kitchen This Bolt robot flamingo is one of a neat toy kitchen Children range of animalsanimalmals and has an oven, can playplay other designs tthat two dials for thehe all sorts of can be built outou of “hotplates” and games withh Nanoblocks –llikeiike asink that’s this sphericalsphericrical teeny, tiny LegLego (£9.50; removable, to robot by lealearning to codecod its utilitydesign.co.uutilitydesign.co.uk).o.uk). make it easy movementsmovements;nts; or just use it as a to clean (£159; fun remoteremotmote control baball (£118;

scandiborn.co.uk). sphero.cosphero.com)..com).

▲ Miffy light The ▲ Kiipix smartphone printer You sweet Miffy nightnig place your smartphone on top of light emits asoft this tiny collapsible printer to receive and warm glow. It’s instant, fuss-free made from flexibleflexi prints (from £40; plastic, so is safesaf for amazon.co.uk). toddlers to play with too CuboroCub (£85; miffyshop.co.uk).miffyshop .uk). ▲ Tricky Ways Available in a woodwoo or acheaper mixed ▲ Fisura glitter material editioedition, this is agreat, lava lamp Bring challenging brain-training game (from atouch of the £48; mastersmastersofgames.com).ersofgames.com). 1960s to a tweenager’s bedroom with this sparkling lavalav lamp filled ▲ Spikeball Get activeactiv with rainbow-colouredrainbow-colouloured glittergl with this two-on- ES/ (£40; harrods.com).s.com). two team game, TIMES/ which is like a mad variation onon volleyball, with a SUNDAY Star Wars swim cap ▲ mini trampoline Aswimming cap TELEGRAPH instead of anet inspired by R2-D2 for (£53; amazon.co.uk).amazon.co.uk young Star Wars fans SUNDAY GUARDIAN/THE (£11; speedo.com). THE TIMES/THE SOURCES: THE Tips of the week... how to Anddfforoor those who Where ttoo fifind...nd thethe bbestest dooacacryptic crossword haveve everything…e cooking classes

● Look for anagram clues by finding the Spend aday cooking five seasonal simple “indicators” –words suggesting change suppers at the lavish Thyme hotel in or that something is wrong, like “broken” Southrop, Gloucestershire, complete with or “out of order”. In the clue “Language akitchen garden and ex-Soho Farmhouse Belgian translated (7)”, “translated” chef Graham Grafton (£225; thyme.co.uk). suggests we’re looking for alanguage that Take part in Kylee Newton’s two-and-a- is an anagram of Belgian: Bengali. half-hour pickling and preserving class ● If you think it’s an anagram, write down in London to learn askill that could leave the letters you need to unscramble and the you never short of presents to give word may jump out at you. (£53; newtonandpott.co.uk). ● Clues with words like “some”, “partly” Game cookery is not for the squeamish, or “in” tend to indicate an answer is hidden but if you don’t mind the gore at this day inside the clue. “Member into popular course at River Cottage in east Devon, music (3)” suggests a“member” (or “arm”) you’ll learn some novel and sophisticated recipes (£240; rivercottage.net). is inside the phrase “populAR Music”. In an unlikely collaboration, Adidas has ● Short clues may be double definitions; in teamed up with Transport for London to In east London, Martha de Lacey can teach “Give gift (7)”, the answer is “present”, so release arange of trainers inspired by the you everything you need to know about “give” as averb and “gift” as anoun. sourdough baking in aday (£120; email London Underground. You can now pay [email protected]). ● Train yourself to think: what else could homage to the Hammersmith &City line this word mean? In the clue “Black suit with your right foot, and the Northern At Loaf, abakery and food education passed to tailor (6)”, the “tailor” indicates co-op in Birmingham, you can learn to an anagram of “passed”. The answer, line with your left. make an array of Thai dishes in three “spades”, is ablack suit in apack of cards. from £75; adidas.co.uk hours (from £70; loafonline.co.uk).

SOURCE: THE DAILY TELEGRAPH SOURCE: LONDON EVENING STANDARD SOURCE: THE DAILY TELEGRAPH

15 December 2018 THE WEEK

Travel LEISURE 45

This week’s dream: sea lions and solitude in the Falkland Islands Things are changing in the Oxfordshire. Once there, visitors get Falkland Islands –“but slowly”, around by air too, along with the locals says Nigel Tisdall in the FT. There’s (a “jovial extended family with aliking an “excellent” new boutique hotel and for fleeces, roast lamb and gossip”), in a“selfie trail” in the quaint capital, a“plucky” fleet of red-white-and-blue Stanley, best known for its red phone twin-prop Britten-Norman Islanders boxes, red postboxes and “imperious” that fly low enough to make every bust of Margaret Thatcher, the islands’ journey aspectacular “scenic tour”. “saviour” (sculpted by the local On Carcass Island, there’s a taxidermist). But though visitor numbers “homely” farmhouse hotel, and are rising, of the 52,000 or so who Magellanic penguins, steamer ducks come each year, 50,000 are day trippers and black-browed albatrosses to see. By on cruise ships. Taking up an area contrast, the lodge on Sea Lion Island almost as big as Northern Ireland, but is merely “functional” (jelly and cream with apopulation of only 3,400, the for dessert), but the wildlife more than islands remain, in essence, “an immense compensates. Down on the beach, sanctuary of wildlife and wilderness”. Local royalty: king penguins in the Falklands southern elephant seals “lie scattered Since the conflict in 1982, Argentina like tattered sofas”, and guests can spot has retained its claim to the islands, which have been under five species of penguins, including kings, in one day. More enter- British administration since 1833, but there’s no prospect of taining still are the “sparring” sea lions. Elsewhere, encounters invasion. Flying to them from the UK still involves “a round-the- with them would be “regimented” by rangers, but here, it’s just houses” route via Santiago and Punta Arenas in Chile, or else you and “raw nature”. Rainbow Tours (020-3131 6625, rainbow a(pricier) military charter flight from RAF Brize Norton in tours.co.uk) has aten-night trip from £4,595pp, including flights.

B&b of the week Getting the flavour of… Panama City’s half millennium with Tel Aviv’s boardwalk. Stay at the Setai, The oldest European settlement on the Drisco or Jaffa hotels, and explore the area’s Pacific coast of the Americas, Panama City narrow, cobbled streets with Eviatar Gover, celebrates its 500th anniversary next year, whose company, Be Tel Aviv Tours, offers and it’s brushing up for the occasion, impeccably “hip” walking tours. There’s says Chris Moss in The Daily Telegraph. 4,000 years of history to discover, as well as Everywhere you go in its pastel-hued old “hipster” coffee shops, vegan eateries and a town (“a thriving museum of colonial famous market, Shuk Hapishpeshim, that’s heritage”), historic buildings –from the full of vintage finds and transforms into an National Theatre to grand hotels –are open-air food festival on Saturdays. emerging from restoration works. The Le Pont de L’Orme city is the ultimate “melting pot”, with East Kent’s micropubs by rail Malaucène, Provence lots of smart boutiques and “trendy” Tiny bars serving small-batch brews restaurants. Towering above it, the new (and generally eschewing “electronic This “affordable” new b&b city is a“breathtaking” sight –a“Dubai-like entertainment”), micropubs first appeared an hour from Avignon is “a charmingly uncomplicated curtain of steel-and-glass skyscrapers” in the UK adecade or so ago, following proposition”, says Condé Nast benefiting from proximity to the Panama arelaxation in licensing laws. Now there Traveller –ashuttered, white- Canal, and from “dubious” financial are more than 600 of them, and there’s no washed house with five “airy” instruments and the “generous” better way to sample afew than on arail rooms, apool, agood restaurant territorial tax system. Nearby lie journey down the east Kent coast, says and some excellent local wine. “pretty” beaches and excellent jungle Andrew Eames in The Sunday Times. It Inside, you’ll find the original lodges, offering fantastic bird-watching was here, in Herne Bay, that Martyn Hillier marble fireplaces and terracotta and sloth-spotting opportunities. founded Britain’s first micropub, The tiles, and amix of vintage furniture Butcher’s Arms (a “pew-lined salon” in and “sleek” pieces from the owner’s Antwerp-based design Tel Aviv’s ancient new hotspot aformer butcher’s shop), and co-founded studio. There’s Belgian gin, Belgian The old city of Jaffa and its surrounding, the Micropub Association. Several of the tableware and plenty of Belgian largely Arab neighbourhood long played region’s other beautiful seaside towns have guests, but the daily chalked-up second fiddle to the newer parts of Tel Aviv. prize examples too. Don’t miss The Four menu is “respectfully regional” But now Jaffa is “the place to stay” in Israel’s Candles in Broadstairs, with its lovely (gnocchi with sage butter; pork “vibrant” metropolis, says Bridget Harrison sandy bay, Fez (a “charivari of kitsch”) knuckle; bouillabaisse) in The Times, thanks to the opening of three in newly arty Margate, The Black Dog Doubles from £90. 00 33 98755 new luxury hotels, and afive-mile coastal in fashionable Whitstable or, some way 79 20, pontdelorme.com. cycle route linking its seafront promenade inland, The Flippin’ Frog in Rochester. Last-minute offers from top travel companies Boutique hotel in London Self-catering luxury 4-star Fuerteventura stay Escape to Antigua Stay 2nights at the luxurious Overlooking Saunton Sands A7-night all-inclusive stay Spend 5nights at the hidden Colonnade Hotel, situated in beach in north Devon, a at the Occidental Jandía Mar, away Verandah Resort and Little Venice, with breakfast 2-night stay in The Chalet’s with Playa del Matorral Spa on an all-inclusive basis and complimentary afternoon self-catering Apartment 1, nearby, costs from £527pp, from £1,609pp, including tea from £170pp. 01904- with 3bedrooms, costs £700. including Liverpool flights. Glasgow flights. 020-8974 717362, superbreak.com. 01271-890514, chaletsaunton. 020-3451 2720, firstchoice. 7200, travelrepublic.co.uk. Arrive 18 January. com. Arrive 13 February. co.uk. Depart 16 January. Depart 15 January.

15 December 2018 THE WEEK 46 Obituaries

Jovial entrepreneur who popularised pizza in Britain

As ateenager in the late pared-back new style, with pot plants, Peter Boizot 1940s, Peter Boizot spent a spotlights and abstract murals. Two more 1929-2018 summer working as atutor restaurants, in Notting Hill Gate and on for afamily in Florence. To Fulham Road, followed: stylish places serving cater to his vegetarian diet, they served him reliably good food at relatively low prices, they adelicacy he’d never seen before: pizza. “I heralded anew era of “casual dining”. Ten thought it was the most delicious thing I’d ever years on, Pizza Express was everywhere, and its eaten,” he recalled. Later he found that there founder was amillionaire. But Boizot, ajovial, were decent pizza restaurants in cities all over heavy-set man, was famously generous, and Europe –but in London, pizza was not easily gave most of his fortune away –toindividuals come by. Even Italian restaurants did not and good causes, and to support his great usually serve it, not least, he discovered, passions: jazz and hockey. He employed home- because of the cost of installing apizza oven. less people in his kitchens, and introduced a Finally, spurred on by friends, he decided in the surcharge on his specially created Veneziana early 1960s to rectify the situation himself. On pizza that has raised £2m for the Venice in abusiness trip to Rome, he acquired an oven; Peril fund. Deeply loyal to his home town of then, returning to London, he hired aSicilian Peterborough, he invested in local enterprises, chef, and bought afailing pizza restaurant that including an entertainment complex with a the Italian director Mario Zampi had opened in cinema and agallery, owned the football club, Wardour Street. (Zampi had hoped Italian film and supported its cathedral choir. Alifelong stars like Gina Lollobrigida would hang out Boizot: anew era of “casual dining” Liberal, he also tried to become its MP. there; they’d told him they had not come all the way to London to eat Italian peasant food.) Although he changed Peter James Boizot was born into acomfortably middle-class almost everything else, Boizot, who has died aged 89, kept the family in Peterborough; his father, Gaston Boizot, was an restaurant’s name: Pizza Express. insurance inspector of French descent; his mother, Susannah, was an excellent cook. However, Peter became avegetarian aged Most Italian restaurants nearby were dimly lit rooms, featuring five, after she fed him too much raw liver. He was educated at Chianti bottles in raffia baskets. Boizot painted his new premises The King’s School, Peterborough, and after national service, read white, knocked down walls to maximise natural light, installed history at St Catharine’s College, Cambridge. After graduating, alarge Formica counter where customers could watch the pizzas he spent awhile knocking around Europe: he sold postcards being cooked in front of them (a novelty then), and imported from abarrow in Italy, and worked as adeckhand on aship crates of Peroni beer (also anovelty). Initially, the pizzas were sailing between Britain and France. He was working in business, made in large sheets, then cut into slices and served on mainly in sales, by the time he founded his first restaurant. He greaseproof paper. Business boomed, and two years later, Boizot sold the Pizza Express chain (or “necklace of individual gems”, was able to open asecond restaurant, in Coptic Street, said The as he preferred to call it) in 1993, but remained its chairman and Times. Realising the value of creating abuzz around abrand, this later became its president. Boizot never married, but insisted time he called in adesigner, the late Enzo Apicella, to create a even in old age that he was still looking for the right woman. The sensitive punk who founded Buzzcocks

Pete Shelley, who has died in Manchester –the gig known as the “concert Pete Shelley aged 63, was the co-founder that changed the world” because although only 1955-2018 of one of the most successful about 40 people turned up, most of them were British bands of the punk era. inspired to form their own bands. Joy Division, Buzzcocks played their first gig supporting the The Smiths and The Fall are said to have had Sex Pistols in 1976, yet they had none of the their genesis that night; Tony Wilson, who would spitting anger of Sid Vicious and Johnny Rotten, found Factory Records, was also there. As for said The Guardian. Shelley explored adolescent McNeish and Trafford, they changed their names love and lust in songs that were witty and fast- to Pete Shelley and Howard Devoto, and –with paced, but also complex and melodic; for him, Steve Diggle on bass and John Maher on drums – punk was not all anarchy and rebellion, but launched Buzzcocks. “about deciding to do something and then going out and doing it”. Abisexual who described Six weeks later, Buzzcocks supported the Pistols; himself as a“modern romantic”, he made his six months later, using £250 borrowed from lyrics non-gender-specific –anidea he would Shelley’s father, they released one of the first DIY later accuse Morrissey of filching –asinhis best- Shelley: a“modern romantic” punk records, the Spiral Scratch EP –often said known song, Ever Fallen in Love (With Someone to have spawned what is now known as indie You Shouldn’t’ve),which was written about amale friend with music. When Devoto quit the band, declaring that punk “was whom he had fallen in love. once unhealthily fresh [but] is now aclean old hat”, Shelley took over vocals himself. Astring of hits followed, before the band Born in Leigh, Lancashire, in 1955, Peter Campbell McNeish was broke up in 1981. Shelley returned to his electronic roots with the son of John, afitter at Astley Green colliery, and Margaret, songs that included Homosapien,which the BBC banned because aformer mill worker. He became interested in electronic music of its references to gay sex, said The Daily Telegraph. Cited as while at grammar school; and then teamed up with an aspiring an influence by emerging bands, Buzzcocks reformed in the late singer-songwriter and fellow student, Howard Trafford, at the 1980s, and in 1994 toured with Nirvana. Shelley, who is survived Bolton Institute of Technology. In early 1976, they read areview by his second wife, claimed never to have made much money of the Sex Pistols in the NME, and were so intrigued, they from his music, but he was not bitter. “I’m not amillionaire, but borrowed acar and drove south to High Wycombe to see them then again, I’m not starvingly poor,” he said. “The love of the perform. In June that year, they set up the Pistols’ first appearance music around the world is worth more than money.”

THE WEEK 15 December 2018 BEDS, SOFAS AND FURNITURE FOR LOAFERS

LOAF.COM LONDON GUILDFORD WILMSLOW SOLIHULL ST ALBANS URGENT APPEAL: help Syrian refugee parents like Khitam to protect their children through the winter.

“Living here, in Khitam lives with her four young these conditions, children, husband Abdelsalam, I cannot keep my and his elderly parents in a single, children healthy.” damp room of a half-built apartment block near Tripoli, Lebanon.

There are holes in UNHCR, the UN the walls and ceiling Refugee Agency, needs and they share a toilet your support to help McConnell with other refugee parents protect their families crammed into children this winter.

the building. Khitam and Please will you Maule-ffinch Abdelsalam are mentally give £75 to provide

and physically a refugee family like UNHCR/Andrew exhausted Khitam’s with a © after years of o winter survival UNHCR/Hannah

struggling kit to protect © to survive, -8c against the unable freezing to earn a TEMPERATURE FACED weather? (4) contracted worms. without assistance from when temperatures living and BY SYRIAN REFUGEES The kit Khitam herself developed UNHCR “my children are likely to fall below fighting IN LEBANON. contains painful growths would be dead”. zero, the lives of the a daily, WINTER 2017. essentials such on her throat Across Lebanon most vulnerable: young relentless as a heating stove, and lost her and Jordan, six children, pregnant battle to feed thermal blankets and a voice. Without £75 of the last seven women and the elderly, their children. tarpaulin for insulation. It access could provide a winters have are at grave risk from Right now, they are could mean survival for a to a free Syrian refugee brought heavy hypothermia, frostbite terrified by the prospect family like Khitam’s. healthcare family with a snowfall and and diseases like of another winter in their Last winter, as a system like winter survival temperatures pneumonia. kit cold, uninsulated single result of their exposed we have in the regularly drop With a gift of £75 room. Another winter and unsanitary living UK, Khitam became below 0°C. you can provide a where they will feel every conditions, Khitam and overwhelmed with worry 1.7 million Syrian winter survival kit blast of icy wind. Another all four of her children about how to pay for the refugees are living, containing a stove, winter where every time became ill. Baby Bilal treatment and medicines like Khitam’s family, in blankets, jerry can their children cough or had a high temperature her children needed. unfinished or derelict and a tarpaulin to help sneeze they will fear they and diarrhoea. Her sons “I felt helpless. My buildings, or in makeshift a family insulate and have contracted a lethal Khaled (3, pictured) children were coughing shelters, sometimes made heat their home. respiratory condition and Abdul Rahman (8) and crying and there of little more than wood Please give today – you like pneumonia or had chest infections was nothing I could do.” and plastic sheeting. could save the lives of tuberculosis. and their sister Fatimah Khitam believes that This coming winter, children like Khitam’s.

Give at unhcr.org/wintersupport Yes, I will help Syrian refugee or call 020 3761 9525 families survive the winter

Please accept my gift of: £ With £75, you can give a winter £75 £150 £225 My own choice of survival kit containing: Please post urgently to: Freepost UNHCR. You do not need a stamp.

Please debit my: Visa MasterCard Maestro AMEX Maestro only Card no. – – –

– – Maestro Valid from Expiry date Issue no. only

Signature Date / / STOVE TARPAULIN For heating and cooking. For insulation. Keeps the cold I enclose a cheque or postal order made payable to UNHCR An absolute essential. out and the warmth in. Please tell us if you are happy to hear more about UNHCR’s work: By email By phone We will use your details to process your donation and to keep you up to date with our work, fundraising activities and other events. You can read more about how we use your data in our Privacy Policy www.unhcr.org/uk/privacy-policy You can opt out of any communications at any time by emailing [email protected] or by calling 020 3761 9525 Title First name Last name

BLANKET JERRY CACANN Address Families left their homes with For storing fuel or water. Postcode nothing. A simple blanket Means people can avoid could save a life. venturing out in the cold. Email Phone WEEPRAWI18 CITY CITY 49 Companies in the news ...and how they were assessed

Crossrail: £1bn bailout If all had gone to plan, London would have been celebrating the opening of its new east- to-west rail link, Crossrail, this week, said Jim Pickard and Gill Plimmer in the Financial Times. But in August, the eponymous company responsible for “the biggest construction project in Europe” said it would not begin operation “until autumn 2019 at the earliest”. Even that looks optimistic now we learn that “ministers are poised to announce afresh £1bn bailout” to address “urgent cash-flow problems”, and plug a“capital hole”, Seven days in the marking the project’s third rescue this year. Crossrail chairman Terry Morgan, who Square Mile was forced to quit last week, has been engaged in abitter row with London’s Mayor Sadiq Khan, “over who knew what when”, said Alex Brummer in the Daily Mail. It’s a The City held its breath midweek as depressing situation. “The mismanagement of Crossrail and the implosion at Interserve” the Westminster Brexit drama unfolded, (see below) raise fundamental questions as to whether UK organisations are capable of but there was at least some respite in international trade negotiations –despite delivering crucial infrastructure projects. “Even as successive governments executed some heightened tensions following the arrest of the biggest public spending cuts in our nation’s history, Downing Street declined to in Canada of Huawei’s CFO. Beijing was break faith with the ambitious £14.8bn project.” We were treated to documentaries reported to have agreed to cut tariffs showing “great new architect-designed glass-and-steel stations” arising in the capital’s on imported US cars from 40% to drearier suburbs. “How utterly misguided all that upbeat propaganda now looks.” 15%, prompting Donald Trump, the US president, to tweet of “very Renault/Nissan: going, going Ghosn? productive conversations”. Yet the Three weeks after his arrest “stunned the business world”, Carlos Ghosn, the former ceasefire to the trade war remains Nissan chairman, has been charged with financial misconduct in Japan, said The Daily fragile. Following the revelation that US authorities have traced arecent Telegraph. The auto tycoon, who was the architect of the Renault-Nissan alliance (and data breach at Marriott Hotels to Chinese added Mitsubishi to the line-up in 2016), stands accused of under-reporting his salary by hackers, Washington is reportedly some £35m and using “company assets for personal use”. If convicted, he could face a preparing ahost of measures to ten-year prison sentence. The Japanese firms in the three-way alliance have both sacked expose economic espionage in China. Ghosn, but he “still formally leads” Renault, where sources report that the Franco- Disappointing figures from John Lewis, Lebanese-Brazilian is pacing his prison cell in a“combative” frame of mind. How Tesco and Sainsbury’s suggested that miserable to be “in the clink for Christmas”, said Alistair Osborne in The Times. And political turmoil in Britain is taking its how frustrating for Ghosn. The fear is that this is acunning plan to keep him “out of the toll on consumer confidence. Sales at way” while “Nissan agitates to change the terms of alopsided car alliance”, in which John Lewis fell by more than 5% last Renault has 43% of Nissan, but the (now more profitable) Japanese carmaker has amere week –aworrying development in 15% non-voting stake in Renault, which is partly owned by the French government. what is traditionally the most lucrative “How lucky for Japan that President Macron is so distracted by his gilet jaunes.” But time of the year for retailers. “this caper” could well rebound on the country. Who’ll want to do business there now? Barclays became the first UK bank to allow debit card holders to “switch off” Uber/Lyft: racing to market certain types of spending, including gambling. China’s “Spotify”, Tencent Get ready for an exciting spectacle next year, said The Wall Street Journal. The ride- Music,raised nearly $1.1bn after floating hailing company Uber has “confidentially” filed papers to go public, just aday after its in the US at $13/share, valuing the smaller rival Lyft, triggering the starting gun of arace “to be the first to market”. Uber, company at $21bn. Deutsche Bank which has reportedly dubbed its IPO “Project Liberty” (a reference to the thousands of was revealed to have processed s31bn employees and investors who have waited for years to sell their stakes), could now go more in questionable funds for the public as soon as the first quarter –earlier than observers had expected. Many predict scandal-ridden Danish bank Danske agold rush: Uber could potentially reach amarket cap valuation of $120bn. Indeed, the than previously thought. combination of the Uber/Lyft floats alone could make 2019 arecord year for IPOs.

Interserve: lessons learnt from Carillion?

The implosion of Carillion, the giant builder bulk of its revenues (70%) from government and government outsourcer, at the start of contracts. The main reason for its current the year was adisaster for tens of thousands crisis, said Phillip Inman in The Guardian, of workers and subcontractors. Could the year was an ill-advised decision to build aseries of end with asimilar collapse at Interserve? The untested and “almost useless” energy-from- outsourcer, which employs 75,000 people waste (EfW) plants when there is already “a worldwide and 45,000 in Britain, has been huge surplus of EfW capacity across Europe”. fighting for survival “since its first round of Interserve now faces amultimillion-pound bill rescue talks” in March, said Jillian Ambrose to extract itself from these loss-making in The Sunday Telegraph. Back then, a“lender contracts. bloc” –consisting of HSBC and BNP Paribas, together with Emerald Asset Management Fearing a“Carillion II”, the Government has and Davidson Kempner Capital –threw the instructed Interserve to draw up “a living troubled firm a£834m lifeline to avoid “a Interserve: ajack-of-all-trades will”, or back-up plan, to ensure that core Carillion-style collapse”. Those creditors have services will continue without interruption if now “lost faith” in management and will seek to “wrest control” it goes under, said Katherine Denham in City AM. The company, in adebt-for-equity deal. Interserve shares plunged 75% on the which “continues to be awarded new government contracts”, news, which could wipe out “long-suffering shareholders”. claims to have the full support of the Cabinet Office. “Interserve got lucky” by following Carillion, analyst Stephen Rawlinson told Like Carillion, Interserve is ajack-of-all-trades, which sources the the FT. “Nobody wants to go through that liquidation again.”

15 December 2018 THE WEEK 50 CITY Commentators

“Think of an industry in which three big companies have used technology and economies of scale to become oligopolies,” City profile The worrying says John Gapper. Not Silicon Valley, but “passive investment management”, where the Big Three –BlackRock, Vanguard and Ray Kelvin power of the The row surrounding State Street –now control 80% of money invested in US index- the Ted Baker founder’s Big Three linked funds. The growth of these “passive” investment outfits, fondness for “forced hugs” which eschew “human stock pickers” in favour of computers, in the workplace shows is now such that even the industry’s pioneer, Jack Bogle of John Gapper no sign of abating, said Vanguard, has warned that “a handful of giant institutional Antonia Hoyle in the Daily Mail. About 100 current or Financial Times investors will one day hold voting control of virtually every large US corporation”. Index funds have “brought great benefits former employees have now to ordinary investors”, making investment cheaper and more reported receiving unwanted efficient. But they’re not designed to perform the traditional advances from Ray Kelvin, “the very touchy-feely King shareholder function of holding companies to account, because of the High Street”. Kelvin their weighting “is set by aformula, not by individual discretion”. is taking “temporary leave” Recognising this, the Big Three are increasing their human while the retailer’s board “stewardship”, to exercise more discretion. But it is worrying, and the law firm Herbert even so, that “so few investors” should hold so much power. Smith Freehills mount an investigation. And the The success of the private sector in China is “undisputed”, says allegations are getting more Schumpeter. All the country’s “most innovative stars” –including serious. As well as accusing Creeping Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent –are privately run. The “non-state Kelvin of “harassing them” with crude sexual innuendo, sector contributes close to two-thirds of China’s GDP growth”, state control there are claims that he and about 80% of new jobs. But it is under increasing threat from “forced workers to sit on in China the state. At least 29 listed firms have sold controlling interests to his lap”. Perhaps the most the state this year, many “crimped by agovernment crackdown serious accusation, said The on the informal channels of financing on which they rely”. Sunday Times, is that the Schumpeter When Xi Jinping came to power in 2012, “the talk was of 63-year-old entrepreneur reinvigorating” state-owned enterprises “by allowing private “climbed on top” of a The Economist companies to buy stakes in them”; that now appears to be female employee during “working in reverse”. State expansion in China is nothing new, aHalloween party while wearing amonster mask. as we saw in 2008. But while that was largely a“reflex” reaction to the financial crisis, liberal economists contend that the current advance is “intentional and active”. It has certainly put the frighteners on the country’s entrepreneurs. Xi recently advised them to take an “anxiety pill”. But unless he halts the creep, they seem right to fear that “the state is turning against them”.

When the former FBI lawyer Lisa Osofsky was hired to lead the Serious Fraud Office earlier this year, the hope was that The “Serious she would shake it up “after astring of high-profile failures”, says Ben Marlow. There’s no sign of that yet. Far from losing its Farce Office” reputation as the “Serious Farce Office”, the SFO is reeling from the collapse of a“massive fraud case” against two former Tesco strikes again directors. The judge said the case was “so weak” that he apolo- gised to jurors for wasting their time. It would be “horribly sim- Ben Marlow plistic” to dismiss the SFO as fools: pursuing white-collar crime is Kelvin, aLondoner who opened his first store in The Sunday Telegraph expensive, and complex cases are often difficult, particularly when multinationals can afford “to appoint armies of the best lawyers”. Glasgow in 1988, has long claimed to be “protective” The agency has enjoyed some success this year, extracting “hun- of workers’ rights, “positing dreds of millions of pounds” from deferred prosecution agree- himself as the polar ments from companies including Tesco and Rolls-Royce. Even so, opposite” of Arcadia “the sheer number of failures” speaks for itself. Britain needs “a boss Philip Green, said strong, independent enforcer” to strike “fear into the hearts of Antonia Hoyle. His distinctive criminals”. The SFO still looks like a“hapless crime-fighter”. clothes have been worn by celebrities and royalty, Silicon Valley start-ups talk about the “SoftBank effect” –the but he tends to “shun the ability of acompany to “grind rivals into the dust” if it catches limelight” –hehides his face Cannabis and in photos and doesn’t flaunt the eye of the Japanese tech group, and secures some of its his wealth. Kelvin claims to $100bn investment war chest. Something similar is taking place “care deeply for colleagues”: the “SoftBank in another fast-growing industry, says John Foley: cannabis. he told Vogue in 2013, Last week, Altria –the US tobacco giant behind Marlboro – “I want to give them areal effect” announced it would invest $1.8bn to secure a45% stake in the career –ateducation as Canadian pot grower Cronos. The steep price (a 41.5% premium we call it.” But while allies John Foley on Cronos’s previous valuation) indicates the promise that Altria continue to champion him – believes marijuana holds out for its future. It’s possible “to “Since when is hugging Reuters Breakingviews overstate the benefits of the partnership”. Some reckon that in bad?” asks his former wife –shareholder support is Canada, where marijuana is now “federally legal”, it will be fading, said The New York consumed “more like alcohol”, in which Altria is no expert. Times. Some 14% has now And Cronos may be taking arisk by linking its pot to cigarettes. been wiped off the value Nonetheless, the bigger risk in an industry of minnows would of Ted Baker stock, taking have been to turn down Altria’s advances. “As in Silicon Valley, shares to afive-year low. the likely winner at the end of the day is whoever holds the cash.”

THE WEEK 15 December 2018

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Issue of the week: Brexit and markets Do markets still have the power to move politicians? Events this week would suggest otherwise After several weeks of turmoil, global and analysts outside of normal business markets on Wednesday morning were hours” for the abandoned Brexit vote looking calm and mostly in positive on Tuesday –and doubtless kept them territory –with one notable exception, hanging on till Wednesday night. One said The Wall Street Journal. News that firm, Samuel and Co Trading, prepared the British PM, Theresa May, faced a “by bringing sleeping bags into the no confidence vote triggered by rebels office”, and laying on “mini golf and within her own party threatened to pinball”. Judging by the relative stability “further destabilise the already chaotic of sterling, investors were expecting Brexit process”, prompting the pound May to survive, said Eva Szalay in to fall below $1.248. Sterling’s fall had the FT. Nomura’s Bilal Hafeez put been accelerating all week. Even before the probability at 65-75%, but the the vote’s announcement, it had hit its pound was “poised to pounce in either lowest level in 20 months –taking the direction” –with the “risk of turbulent pound’s decline since early November to short-term moves” heightened by the over 4%, and its fall from its mid-April Traders in London: facing Brexit turbulence fact that big investors are likely to shy high to nearly 13%. Those are still big away from the market for now. movements in currency terms, but the volatility could have been much worse. So much for the idea –still doing the rounds at the The odds of anodeal certainly rose this week, said John Stepek start of the week –that stress in financial markets and pressure on MoneyWeek. But “the scenario that really scares the market” from businesses might lead to alast-minute approval of May’s is the increased danger “that Jeremy Corbyn gets his shot in the Brexit deal in Parliament. hot seat”. For all the uncertainty attached to anodeal, “markets have spent alot of time” thinking about it and have arough idea The FTSE 100 took the “blue-on-blue infighting” in its stride, of what it might look like. “Wargaming” aCorbyn government, said Joe Curtis in City AM. Although Brexit is clearly abig issue, however, is trickier, because no one really knows what it would other factors –notably signs of progress in US-China trade do. The one “reasonable assumption” is that Labour is likely to relations –helped underpin sentiment. Even so, traders across the be more hostile to financial markets, and to take “a somewhat board were taking no chances, said Reuters. Barclays, Investec, cavalier attitude towards property rights”. Neither would be the JPMorgan and Nomura all had plans in place “to draft in traders cause of much rejoicing in the City.

Making money: what the experts think Christmas books ● Getting curvier investors aren’t sticking around to find out – Part two of our guide to the best “Popular culture focuses festive reading: on the stock market, particularly after a but Wall Street keeps nine-year bull run. But Bad Blood by John Carreyrou (Picador its eyes on bonds,” said there may still be time £20). The FT/McKinsey Business Book Liz Moyer on CNBC. for one last hurrah, said of the Year charts the rise and Fortunes can be made Michael Mackenzie in “scandalous fall” of Elizabeth Holmes or lost on them, but they the FT. As Jim Paulsen and her Silicon Valley blood-testing also have “predictive of the Leuthold Group firm, Theranos, says Andrew Hill in the observes: “Investors FT. This “splendidly written book” asks qualities” about where questions about “the cult of founders”. the economy and will need to decide whether the bear stock markets are Moneyland by Oliver Bullough (Profile headed –and lately market has begun or £20). Bullough’s “modern story of dirty there’s been “a Orangutans: tired of monkeying around whether they have just money and ultra-wealthy miscreants” worrisome dynamic” in been presented with blasts open the huge global money- the market. Normally, ten-year US one last great risk-on buying opportunity.” laundering industry. “It will reshape Treasury bonds carry ahigher rate how you see the world,” says Rosamund Urwin in The Sunday Times. of interest than two-year notes, to ● King of the Swingers “compensate for the greater risk that The price of palm oil, which is used in The Future of Capitalism by Paul Collier inflation will chip away at the value of everything from soap to chocolate, “has (Allen Lane £20). In this “important that investment over time”. But, in recent hit aten-year low” –mainly because of book”, one of Britain’s most weeks, the rate on the two-year note has Malaysia’s “huge” stockpile of the stuff, distinguished economists analyses been inching so close to the ten-year that said Lex in the FT. That’s good news for “what has gone wrong with it is “dangerously close” to rising above orangutans, whose numbers have fallen contemporary capitalism”, says it, in an “inversion” of the healthy yield rapidly as millions of hectares of forest Martin Wolf in the FT. Aprovocative, curve. “If the historic pattern holds”, that have been razed for palm planting. But perceptive exploration of how to deliver means “recession is on the horizon”. that alone won’t “secure the King of the more “widely shared prosperity”. Swingers’ future”. Now is the time for The Cryotron Files by Iain Dey ● Reliable barometer politicians in consumer countries to do and Douglas Buck (Icon £20). This is the An “inverted yield curve” has preceded something useful. Before prices start to “fascinating and disturbing story” of “every serious economic downturn since rise again, tempting producers to start computing pioneer Dudley Buck, says WWII”, so no wonder investors have been planting more palms, they “should force Rosamund Urwin. Buck’s “cryotron” feeling jumpy, said Tom Stevenson of replacement” to other sustainable energy chip paved the way for the microchip; Fidelity in The Daily Telegraph. But there’s sources: both “bold regulation and canny he died in mysterious circumstances, often “a sizeable lag”. Falling US stock invention” are required. “The great ape is after avisit from Russian scientists. markets would seem to indicate that many tired of us monkeying around.”

15 December 2018 THE WEEK

Shares CITY 57

Who’s tipping what

The week’s best shares Directors’ dealings AJ Bell Hollywood Bowl Group Keystone Law Group Victoria The Times The Sunday Times The Daily Telegraph 900 This newly floated broker is Hollywood is a“slicker Lawyers are flocking to this challenging rival Hargreaves breed” operator, running 58 “almost virtual” law firm, 800 Lansdown with its user- bowling alleys in the UK and with its flexible, platform- friendly investment platform. performing well. Shares have based, networked model. 700 Costs are low, margins high drifted, but it’s cash-generative It’s rapidly growing, and and it offers “considerable with aprospective 3.9% yield sales are up 30%, while 600 growth and yield potential”. and atarget price of 250p. operating profits are gaining 500 Chairman Buy. 160p. Buy. 183.5p. 42%. Buy. 381p. buys 1m 400 Drax Group International Biotechnology Ramsdens Holdings Investors Chronicle Trust The Mail on Sunday Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec The acquisition of Scottish The Daily Telegraph This northern pawnbroker Power’s pumped storage, This biotech investment trust, and retailer is “thriving”, Chairman Geoff Wilding has bought £4.91m worth of hydro and gas-fired generation with 69 holdings, offers with 136 sites and an online shares to try and bolster capabilities has broadened early-stage exposure to a business. Run by an ex-banker, confidence in the carpet- CHRONICLE Drax’s power sources. The specialist sector with strong stores are well located and the maker, where shares have group has amended the deal prospects. Biotech-derived balance sheet “rock-solid”, fallen by more than 40%. Two to mitigate risks in the UK’s drugs are complex and with rising revenues and other directors also bought, INVESTORS capacity market. Buy. 389p. expensive to copy. Buy. 604p. profits. Buy. 166p. to the tune of £293,201. SOURCE:

…and some to hold, avoid or sell Form guide

BT Group Greggs Northgate Shares tipped 12 weeks ago Investors Chronicle The Times The Times Best tip The telecoms giant has Sales are up at Britain’s This white van hire outfit, Anglo Asian Mining suffered another setback biggest bakery, which which operates in the UK, The Mail on Sunday in its quest to address a remains “a retailing class Ireland and Spain, is emerging up 81.6% to 90.8p colossal pension burden, act”. However, profits are from a“painful reinvention”. Worst tip having lost the court flat, shares look pricey and Shares are volatile, but higher Ashtead Group battle to change the the company is vulnerable revenues from arejuvenated The Times scheme’s indexation from the to factors beyond its control. fleet will soon translate into down 30.65% to £16.63 more generous RPI inflation Avoid. £13.99. profits. Hold. 380p. rate to the CPI. Sell. 260p. Hiscox Thomas Cook Group Market view CVS Group The Times Investors Chronicle “Trying to forecast market Investors Chronicle The “efficient and well-run” The hot British summer movements based on the The vet services provider insurer has been elevated hit the travel firm hard as outcome of unpredictable has been hit by higher locum to the FTSE 100. Hiscox’s increased discounting in the political events is abit like and general salary rates, diversity and rapidly “lates” market constricted trying to play darts while which are squeezing margins. expanding retail division profitability. Debt is high riding aunicycle.” Debt is rising as the group bring “attractive and and there are concerns that Laith Khalaf of Hargreaves Lansdown on the ongoing continues spending on solid long-term growth covenants may be breached. Brexit saga acquisitions. Sell. 649p. opportunities”. Hold. £16.52. Sell. 30.74p. Market summary

KeyKey numbers for investors BestBest andand worst performing shares Following the Footsie

11 Dec 2018 Week before Change (%) WEEK’S CHANGE, FTSE 100 STOCKS 7,800 RISES Price %change FTSE 100 6806.94 7022.76 –3.07% 7,700 FTSE All-share UK 3715.79 3837.07 –3.16% Randgold Resources 6906.00 +7.04 7,600 Dow Jones 24504.53 25582.74 –4.21% Berkeley Group Hdg. 3311.00 +2.51 NASDAQ 7079.47 7351.12 –3.70% Smith &Nephew 1495.50 +2.40 7,500 Nikkei 225 21148.02 22036.05 –4.03% Fresnillo 813.40 +1.62 7,400 Persimmon 1890.50 +1.42 Hang Seng 25771.67 27260.44 –5.46% 7,300 Gold 1245.35 1230.30 1.22% FALLS 7,200 Brent Crude Oil 60.20 62.02 –2.93% Standard Life Aberdeen 224.85 –12.97 DIVIDEND YIELD (FTSE 100) 4.48% 4.34% Melrose Industries 153.30 –12.50 7,100 UK 10-year gilts yield 1.05 1.14 GVC Holdings 642.50 –11.87 7,000 US 10-year Treasuries 2.86 2.93 Associated Brit.Foods 2151.00 –10.52 6,900 UK ECONOMIC DATA St James’s Place 933.60 –9.18 Latest CPI (yoy) 2.4% (Oct) 2.4% (Sep) 6,800 BEST AND WORST UK STOCKS OVERALL Latest RPI (yoy) 3.3% (Oct) 3.3% (Sep) 6,700 Challenger Acquisits. 0.09 +44.00 Halifax house price (yoy) +0.3% (Nov) +1.5% (Oct) Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec LB-Shell 0.05 –74.44 £1 STERLING $1.254 E1.106 ¥142.251 Source: Datastream (not adjusted for dividends). Prices on 11 Dec (pm) 6-month movement in the FTSE 100 index

15 December 2018 THE WEEK 58 The last word Field of dreams: the heroic world of competitive ploughing

Every year the international elite of ploughing gather to do battle over the quality of their furrows. Sophie Elmhirst reports from the World Ploughing Championship in Germany

On 31 August, the night job, one that has been before the first day of performed for millennia. the World Ploughing It’s the oldest profession in Championship, the bar the world –second oldest, of the Hotel Fortuna in ploughmen like to say, if the small German town of you count prostitution. Reutlingen was crammed with the global ploughing When you first watch elite –Swiss, Kenyans, someone plough, the Australians, Latvians, technical skill honed over Canadians and French, all alifetime isn’t immediately slugging glasses of German obvious. The ploughman beer. The top flight of drives his tractor, and the international ploughing is a plough drags behind and limited pool, the same faces seems to do all the work. recurring every year, and Adisc on the plough slices the atmosphere was jovial, through the earth, creating like aschool reunion: the wall of the furrow. 50-odd ploughmen and two Asmall metal plate, the ploughwomen hailing each ploughshare, cuts into the other across the room. But earth, and alarger plate, there was something else the mouldboard, inverts in the air too, abonhomie the soil, burying the edged with rivalry. They remains of the old crop were here to win. and any lingering weeds. Watch for longer and you The two competitors from The competition in Germany: “nature finally disciplined into straight lines” start to notice the intricacy England, Mick Chappell and –the way aploughman Ashley Boyles, stood to one side with their families. Chappell is has to make endless tiny mechanical adjustments to his plough 57, Boyles 35, but it was the younger man who went up to bed to ensure the furrows are straight and tidy, no weeds poking early. Boyles takes his ploughing very seriously. Chappell, aman through. Ploughmen often talk about cleanliness –aclean base more inclined to Freddie Flintoff-style bouts of prolonged revelry, to the furrow, aclean seam where the furrows meet –and good leant against awall, finished apint and readily accepted another. ploughing has akind of startling purity, as though nature has He’d told me he’d prepare for the championship by drinking five finally been disciplined into straight lines. pints the night before. When asked if any other international athlete adopted asimilar Early in the morning on day strategy ahead of amajor one of the competition, atrail of competition, he replied: “Three-man teams of judges assess the cars lined the drive into Hofgut “I wouldn’t say athlete.” neatness, straightness, width, depth and Einsiedel, the vast farm where aesthetic quality of the ploughing” the competition would take Competitive ploughing is place. Hundreds of spectators unquestionably asport, in that were already surrounding the it’s an organised physical activity with agoverning body and strict fields. Chappell and Boyles were in their tractors, ready to start. rules. Ploughing –after sufficient immersion –can quietly thrill in The two men would plough their furrows on afield of stubble, its display of precision and technique, but it is not apastime that the remains of acrop that has been harvested, while being watched requires fitness or even ahealthy BMI. One recent winner at the by three-man teams of judges, who would assess the neatness, UK annual British Ploughing Championships was 82 years old. straightness, width, depth and aesthetic quality of their ploughing. Boyles, from Lincolnshire, has the build of aretired scrum-half; Chappell, who works on an 800-hectare Yorkshire farm as a The pair were competing in different classes, using different CHAPPELL/KUBOTA contractor, wears glasses and has aheavy limp –helost his left kinds of ploughs –Chappell with areversible and Boyles with a leg to asugar-beet harvester at the age of 17. (In Chappell family conventional. (The reversible plough can flip over at the end of MICK

lore, he hopped back to his tractor and drove to the farm for help, each furrow, allowing the ploughman to plough up and down ZIRWES; blood seeping from his stump, his severed leg still in the harvester.) his plot. The more old-fashioned conventional plough stays in the same position, requiring the ploughman to plough around his

The next day, Chappell and Boyles would mount their tractors, plot instead.) The following day, they would return to plough on E.V./STEPHAN

ploughs rigged to the back, and spend four hours inverting the grassland –aless forgiving surface, where every wonky furrow is 2018 soil on aplot of land to create asequence of furrows, burying obvious. The scores from the two days would then be combined, the old crop and making aseedbed for the new. Nothing would and the winner in each class crowned world champion at the gala

happen very quickly, the event closer to test cricket than asprint. dinner in the evening. WELTPFLÜGEN But if ploughing lacks as asport in terms of speed or jeopardy, it also exceeds other sports’ parameters. Like archery, it’s an ancient Chappell and Boyles’s plots, each marked by aStGeorge’s cross skill, but where archery is now ahobby, ploughing is still areal flapping in the wind, were on opposite sides of awide path in the URATORIUM ©K

THE WEEK 15 December 2018 The last word 59 middle of the field. At one end of Chappell’s No flaw is more obvious than abend. Five plot, his parents, Ken and Anne, and his sister, yards down Chappell’s first furrow, there it Sue, were already stationed on folding chairs. was: an unmistakable swerve. The Chappells are like the Redknapps or the Nevilles of ploughing, adominant family in After nearly four hours, the amber light the sport. The surname reverberates: started to flash. Those taking part, if sometimes agift, sometimes aweight. Sue is they hadn’t finished already, were now the Society of Ploughmen’s secretary, Uncle scampering around their ploughs making David also competes and Ken is the sport’s final adjustments, their movements suddenly retired emperor. Spaced out along the field, hot-footed and rushed. At 2pm, the lights each ploughman on his own plot, were the turned red. Boyles looked shattered, but Englishmen’s rivals. On the reversible side, pleased. “I’m reasonably happy,” he said. On Chappell had his eye on the Northern the other side, Chappell was sunk in gloom. Irishman, Thomas Cochrane. On the “I finished like Istarted,” he said. “Crap.” conventional, the runaway favourite was Eamonn Tracey, atall Irishman who had Day two, grassland ploughing, and the rain either won or been runner-up in the past started in the morning and never stopped. four world championships. At the far end The crowds descended, swaddled in plastic. of the field was the unknown quantity, the Clusters of glory hunters gathered at US’s Hailey Gruber, 16 years old and one Chappell: “eyes fixed on the turning soil” Cochrane and Tracey’s plots. Chappell, vivid of the two women competing. She had in ared boiler suit, was sitting in his tractor beaten her own father, last year’s world champion, to qualify. looking wrecked. “He’s had the trots since four in the morning,” said Sue. An upset stomach, little sleep. Ken and Anne looked Just before 10am, all eyes were on the lights on astand in the anxious and damp. The lights turned green and the ploughmen corner of the field, still on red. Soon, they would turn amber, set off. Although there were hours to go, so much seemed to rest which meant five minutes to go, and then eventually green. The on those opening minutes, that first incision into the earth. After competitors would then have 20 minutes to complete their first afew moments, no one wanted to be the first to say it. Anne furrow, before an hour-long break while the judges came round peered at her son’s furrow. “That doesn’t look straight to me.” to assess the openings, and then afurther two hours and 40 minutes to complete their plot. If anyone failed to finish their At the 20-minute break, Ken went and stood at the foot of his plot in the allotted time, they son’s tractor and had aquiet would be docked points. Alarge, word. But Mick didn’t seem sloping field doesn’t quite have “No one wanted to be the first to say it. keen to talk, leaning back in the taut atmosphere of astadium Anne peered at her son’s furrow and said: his seat with his eyes closed. before astarting gun is fired. ‘That doesn’t look straight to me’” Ken just kept standing there, There was no ceremonial hush staring into the drizzle. For when the lights turned amber. the next two hours, following The competitors sat, silent and upright in their tractor seats, Mick’s progress was not unlike watching Paula Radcliffe engines running, ready to drop their ploughs into the earth. The run that marathon at the 2004 Athens Olympics. Expectations waiting was Chappell’s worst bit. Once the lights turned amber, dropped until you simply hoped he’d survive. He kept getting off Boyles always sang the national anthem to himself, his prematch and slowly limping around the plough, or stopping completely. ritual. You could see him mouthing the words. At last: green. There was no way he could finish in time.

Ploughmen often compare ploughing to Formula One because of As the final minutes ticked by and Cochrane rounded off his how essential the machinery is to their success, but that is where faultless plot, Mick was still down the wrong end of the field with the similarity ends. Almost as soon as the competitors had inched his tape measure out. Ken and Anne were watching in silence. off the starting line, they all stopped again, hopping off their Finally, Mick finished, five minutes over, and collapsed back in tractors with their measuring tapes and spanners, fiddling at their his seat. Boyles was still spannering away as the amber light ploughs. Measuring is half the sport: the plots adjoin each other, flashed, and ploughed his last furrow with seconds to spare. Two and everyone has to plough aprescribed number of furrows days immersed in the sport was enough, it turned out, to find neatly up to their neighbour. Get the measurements wrong myself jumping up and down at the end of Boyles’s plot, shouting and you end up with the wrong number, or uneven widths. for him to get back on his tractor and bloody finish. At the gala The judges would be brutal about sloppiness –wheel marks, dinner the winners surprised no one: in the reversible, Cochrane, footprints, visible weeds or ragged edges would all be harshly and in the conventional, the inevitable Tracey. Up they came to penalised. Although they were technically competing against the podium, applause clattering off the barn walls, and accepted each other, all of them seemed locked in adance with their gear their trophies. Cochrane’s was asort of gilt sword, Tracey’s a and the ground, aware only of the relationship between the two. golden plough on awooden plinth. He lifted it to the sky. Much of their time was spent facing backwards, turned around in the tractor seat to monitor the vital work taking place in the Aweek later, Boyles, who’d come fifth, was in post-match furrow behind them, eyes fixed on the turning soil. analysis mode. He’d learnt alot. He was going to Ireland to judge abig event, which would give him achance to scrutinise Tracey’s In the first 20 minutes of the competition, Boyles put on an methods. “It’s not abig scary thing to get in front of him,” he exemplary display. To the untrained eye, his first furrow said. “I’ve beaten Eamonn before.” When Ispoke to Chappell, appeared immaculate. But he wasn’t happy. “Would help if who’d come 22nd, he was in the middle of drilling wheat and it was straight,” he muttered, as he waited for the judges. barley. He didn’t really want to think about Germany. “Well Afew plots down, asmall crowd had already gathered to it were abit of adisaster really, weren’t it?” he said. Down the watch Tracey. The Irishman’s opening was almost tediously phone, you could almost hear the heavy shrug. “There’s nowt well executed, his first furrow straight as abeam. On the Ican do about it now.” Part of him wished he could have another reversible side, Ken Chappell looked solemn. Mick had got go, but he was blessed with the optimism of the true sportsman. off to aquick start, but something was awry with the setting There was always next year, another match, another field. of his plough. “Bad ploughing done straight is better than good ploughing done bent,” Ken said, ominously, repeating Alonger version of this article first appeared in The Guardian. afavourite mantra. In ploughing, straightness is all. ©Guardian News and Media 2018.

15 December 2018 THE WEEK

Crossword 63

THE WEEK CROSSWORD 1137 This week’sweek winner will receive an An Ettinger travel pass case and two Connell Guides will be given to the sender Ettinger (ettinger.co.uk)(et Brogue Single of the first correct solution to the crossword and the clue of the week opened on Friday Travel PassPass Case in black, which retails 21 December. Send it to: The Week Crossword 1137, 2nd floor, 32 Queensway, London at £100, and two Connell Guides W2 3RX, or email the answers to [email protected]. Tim Moorey (timmoorey.info) (connellg(connellguides.com).uid 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 ACROSS DOWN 9 New man cutting front of lip 1 International force in mid-winter 9 10 in close shave (4,5) pollution (8) 10 Strangely easy time, until 2 Food is better without starter (4) now (2,3) 3 Scarves nicked by leader of 11 Stand in comfort on line (5) shoplifters (6) 11 12 12 Place to live Iscreened (9) 4 Food on plane for numbers 13 Fancy dates embraced by a moving abroad (10) Frenchman in these lodgings (5-1-5) 5 Potential birdies, maybe 16 Place for asong (3) eagles (4) 13 14 15 16 17 Excuse something fool inserted 6 Workers given new supply when in building toy (3,2,2) machines not available (4-4) 19 Left out in the cold, shivering 7 Garden ably managed on the in Gironde (7) whole (2,3,5) 21 Jerusalem’s country (3) 8 Filthy place to keep fish cold (6) 17 18 19 20 22 Stall spaces moved into 14 Added heading, leaving apage entrances (5,1,5) for drawing (10) 24 Western city woman with a 15 Check part of theatre sets for degree becoming one seduced by asecond time (10) 21 22 23 David (9) 18 Friar’s short trip for aHarrow 26 Rodent that works with your PC? store (4-4) Not right (5) 20 See us in action having got 28 Amateur gets two attempts in rid of parasites (8) 24 25 26 27 abundance (1,4) 21 Positive lead taken in 29 Sketch energy policy in university achievement when engagement (9) Fellow is away (6) 23 Only alittle time for support (6) 28 29 25 Nurses taking time off in Borders (4) 27 Agreed clue that is indeed hard (4) Name Address

Clueofthe week: It’s allowed on alake (5, first letter L) The Spectator Lavatch Tel no Clue of the week answer:

Solution to Crossword 1135 ACROSS: 1 Stones throw 9 Nonet 10 Rum Baba 11 Close call 13 Oar 14 Rameau 16 Twilit 17 Nod 18 Endurance 21 St Lucia 23 Atria 24 Scorekeeper Give tthis Christmas DOWN: 2 Tondo 3 Notre-Dame 4 Syria 5 Hum 6 On aroll 7 Anachronism 8 Carry the can 12 Lower case 15 Middle C 19 Drank 20 Nurse 22 Cor Treat afriend or family member to The Week this Christmas. Ittmakes the perfect Clue of the week: One offering vision of what may come to pass gift, and with prices going up soon you’ll sasave up to £17 when you order now. (4-4,6 first letters RVM) Solution: REAR-VIEW MIRROR GIFT SUBSCRIPTION FORM Order by 10th December and you will receive aspecial custom-designed The Week Christmas gift card to pass on.Your gift subscription will start with the first issue of the New Year. The winner of 1135 is B. Bansal from Ware Nn YES! This Christmas Iwould liketogive agift subscription to The Week. The Week is available from RNIB Newsagent for the benefit of blind and PLEASE COMPLETE IN BLOCK CAPITALS partially sighted readers. 0303-123 9999, rnib.org.uk/newsagent TITLE FORENAME SURNAME

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