News Round-Up

• “Japan may rethink reporting of Covid cases as subvariant hits hard” – The Japanese Government is considering changing the protocol for reporting new cases, the Guardian says, in order to relieve pressure on hospitals
• “True reason for border chaos with France Exposed – and Covid not Brexit plays a key role” – According to the Express, French border officials were carrying out Covid checks during the massive backlogs over the past fortnight.
• “Corporate insolvencies jump in England and Wales after withdrawal of Covid support” – Corporate insolvencies rose sharply in England and Wales in the second quarter, the Financial Times reports, due in part to the withdrawal of the the Government’s Covid support programmes
• “The murky road to lockdown – Part One: Dr Richard Hatchett” – TCW Defending Freedom publishes the first of two articles by Paula Jardine investigating the background to the imposition of lockdown
• “Court Documents Reveal Canada’s Travel Ban Had No Scientific Basis” – Officials were frantically looking for a rationale for the vaccine mandate on public transport and “they came up short” writes Rupa Subramanya on Common Sense
• “The end of medicine?” – “Freedom of speech for the medical profession is under threat in Australia,” says the newly formed Australian Medical Professionals Society in Spectator Australia
• “‘One would not want to tarnish another journal’: Why a republished COVID-19 masks study doesn’t say it was retracted” – Retraction Watch tells of how a paper on the effect of increased carbon dioxide in children wearing masks which was retracted last year has come to be republished
• “California, Illinois Join New York to Declare Monkeypox States of Emergency” – The governors of California, Illinois and New York have issued proclamations declaring a state of emergency over Monkeypox, the Epoch Times reports
• “Countries disagree over severity of monkeypox” – Reactions to Monkeypox have “varied widely across the world”, observes Finn McRedmond in UnHerd
• “Onshore wind turbines could be 60ft taller to avoid planning rules” – Octopus Energy plans to make its turbines 25% taller and install bigger blades, according to MailOnline, so they can avoid planning restrictions
• “No change in weather extremes, just a moving of the goalposts” – Paul Homewood looks at a new Global Warming Policy Foundation paper for TCW Defending Freedom. It says that a shift in the IPCC’s methodology “has led to misleading claims about increases in weather extremes”
• “We must all wear hairshirts now to save Germany, and ourselves” – The Telegraph’s Ambrose Evans-Pritchard calls for Britain to help Germany and central Europe avert an energy disaster this winter as a matter of economic and strategic self-defence
• “‘Madrid will not switch off’ vows mayor amid EU’s gas crisis” – Madrid’s regional leader Isabel Diaz Ayuso, who refused to implement Covid restrictions, has squared up to the Spanish Government over its energy-saving measures, MailOnline reports
• “Welsh council scraps 20mph speed limit after community backlash” – The Telegraph reports that Monmouthshire Council has ditched a blanket 20mph speed limit after it slowed down traffic and caused more carbon emissions
• “Sadiq Khan is backing obesity claims based on shameless junk science” – Writing for CapX, Christopher Snowdon scrutinises a study claiming that TFL’s ban on junk food advertisements resulted in 94,867 fewer individuals with obesity.  It’s a “classic case of garbage in, garbage out”, he says
• “Nick Cohen Observer column on hold pending investigation by publisher” – Nick Cohen’s column in the Observer has been paused, Press Gazette reports, pending an investigation into ‘Me Too’ complaints about his conduct
• “The woke cult can’t see that religion should be triggering” – “Blood, guts and miracles are as much a part of Christianity as loving your neighbour,” says Catherine Pepinster in the Telegraph, after Manchester Metropolitan University issued trigger warnings on descriptions of divine healings
• “Don’t let them spoil the Lionesses’ victory” – “Our woke elites cannot help but turn this brilliant moment into a pompous lecture,” says Fraser Myers in Spiked
• “Gary Lineker: I will not be bullied into self-censorship after ‘ludicrous’ furore over Chloe Kelly tweet” – The Match of the Day presenter has vowed to continue posting “funny” comments on Twitter, the Telegraph says, following the backlash over his pun about Chloe Kelly’s celebration of her winning goal
• “Does Stonewall have no shame?” – Writing for the Spectator, Gareth Roberts admires the audacity of Stonewall’s response to Allison Bailey’s successful Employment Tribunal case against Garden Court Chambers after it became a member of Stonewall’s Diversity Champions scheme
• “Liberalism is in Liz Truss’s blood” – It’s unusual, writes Ed West, for Left-wing families like the one Liz Truss grew up in to produce Tory children
• “My three biggest issues are net zero, lockdowns and woke gobbledegook of all kinds” – Toby appears on GB News to tell Mark Steyn why he’ll be voting for Liz Truss in the forthcoming Conservative leadership election

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