News Round-Up

• “Man handed 20-month jail sentence for stirring up hate on Facebook” – Twenty-eight year-old Jordan Parlour has been sentenced to 20 months in jail for a Facebook post, reports the Spectator.
• “Woman arrested for ‘spreading false information’ about Southport attacker” – Cheshire Police says a 55 year-old woman has been arrested for spreading ‘misinformation’ about the Southport murders, according to the Telegraph.
• “In latest Bond film, 007 tasked with taking down 83 year-old British grandma who shared inaccurate meme” – The Babylon Bee’s take on Britain’s new passion for censorship under the premiership of Sir Keir Starmer.
• “Tech giants will be forced to ban fake news under Labour plans” – Sir Keir Jong Un vows to amend the Online Safety Act to give the Government the power to draw up a list of ‘legal but harmful’ content and force social media companies to remove it, reports the Telegraph.
• “Labour-run council to fine people £100 for swearing in street” – The Free Speech Union says Labour-run Thanet District Council is “restricting fundamental rights and liberties” by threatening to fine residents £100 for swearing, reports the Telegraph.
• “Ditching this free speech act is a green light to campus bullies” – Passed by the Tories, the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act has been shelved by the Labour Government. But it would have protected Jewish students and sceptics of gender ideology, while standing up to China, writes Helen Joyce in the Times.
• “The Left has an authoritarian problem (but doesn’t know it)” – In Presser, Luke Conway explains how it’s not just right-wing extremists who long for an authority figure to crush their enemies, silence opponents, and restore order; it’s also those who tell people to “be kind” and celebrate “inclusivity”.
• “Let’s Shoot the Messenger!” – On his Substack, Konstantin Kisin argues that social media platforms aren’t to blame for the recent civil unrest in Britain.
• “Twitsteria, horrible herds and governments in glasshouses” – On her Substack, Laura Dodsworth reacts to the Government’s crack down on free speech in the wake of the riots.
• “These are dark times for free speech” – The riots are being exploited to justify state censorship, says Andrew Doyle on his Substack.
• “‘Think before you post’: Britain’s slide into censorship” – The Labour Government’s sudden authoritarian turn has been decades in the making, reports Tom Slater in Spiked.
• “Censorship won’t address the riots” – In the face of extreme violence, we must stand strong in defence of freedom of speech, says Claire Fox on the Academy of Ideas Substack.
• “The unfashionable truth about the riots” – As the days slip by, the likelihood that anything will be learned from the recent rioting looks ever more remote, says Douglas Murray in the Spectator, judging from the response to the 2011 riots.
• “The truth about two-tier policing in Britain” – Does Britain have a two-tier policing system? Yes, says Alex Klaushofer in the Spectator, who looks back at the different ways in which the anti-lockdown and BLM protests were policed in the summer of 2020.
• “Down and out in Birmingham and Rotherham” – Why did riots happen in Birmingham and Rotherham? The Spectator’s Gus Carter meets people in the towns to hear their side of the story.
• “Starmer and Angela Rayner taking the knee was a disaster’” – Lord Sewell, former Chair of the Commission on Racial and Ethnic Disparities, tells the Mail it was a terrible mistake for Sir Keir and his deputy to take the knee in response to the BLM protests.
• “King Charles sends ‘heartfelt thanks’ to police for restoring order after riots” – The monarch has held calls with Sir Keir Starmer and senior police officers and paid tribute to the emergency services, says the Guardian.
• “Counter-protesters jailed after attacking white men wearing Union flag” – Leeds Crown Court has been shown footage of Asian men kicking and punching a smaller group of white men, reports the Telegraph.
• “Judge savages ‘cowardly’ thugs in mob that attacked lone black man” – The Mail has a run-down of all the people mixed up in the riots who appeared before a judge in Manchester today.
• “Brave Yazidi ISIS captive describes horror ordeal of sexual slavery” – In the Mail, a Yazidi woman enslaved by ISIS describes the terrible things she witnessed during her captivity.
• “Russell Brand is ‘axed from Despicable Me films after rape claims’” – Russell Brand has lost his role as a voice actor in the Despicable Me franchise following allegations of sexual assault, according to the Mail.
• “BBC asks Huw Edwards to return more than £200,000 from salary” – The BBC has asked Huw Edwards to return some of the salary he earned in the past year, having continued to pay it in spite of knowing of the allegations against him, reports the Telegraph.
• “Is the ‘motherhood penalty’ really behind the U.K.’s falling birth rate?” – Over the last half century, more and more women have delayed marriage and children, says Annabel Denham in the Spectator. We’re now paying the price.
• “How Jack Karlson became immortal” – Imagine a stubbled Brian Blessed in a half-buttoned polyester shirt, caught in the middle of a police scrum. That was the scene Karlson caused, says Terry Barnes in the Spectator, paying tribute to the late, great Covid protestor.
• “From Covidiot to Covictor – the Olympics goes full circle in three years” – On Substack, the Naked Emperor contrasts the paranoid, germ-phobic approach to athletes either with Covid or at risk of catching Covid at the Tokyo Olympics with the laissez-faire attitude at Paris 2024.
• “COVID-19 may protect against the common cold” – An article in Medical News discusses new research on immune system cross-reactivity to different coronaviruses. (Note to IPSO: you upheld a complaint against me for saying something very like this in the Telegraph in 2020.)
• “On the mediocrity and mendacity of Tim Walz” – No wonder Kamala Harris was so happy with Tim Walz, says Alex Berenson on Substack. He’s a less ambitious version of Joe Biden.
• “Iran’s new president battles revolutionary guard to stop all-out war with Israel” – Iran’s top generals are demanding a missile strike on Tel Aviv, but Masoud Pezeshkian, the new Iranian President, suggests targeting secret Israeli bases instead, reports the Telegraph.
• “Migration figures are falling – but the crisis is far from over” – A large section of the British electorate now demands an altogether more radical change when it comes to immigration policy, says Patrick O’Flynn in the Spectator.
• “Parents scramble to find state school places to avoid VAT on fees” – With tax on private school fees set to increase costs by 20% from January, parents are scrambling to find places at good state schools, according to the Times.
• “Civil servants on over £100,000 rises by 40% in a year” – The public will look at the growth in Civil Servant salaries with disbelief, say the Tories, as nearly 3,000 mandarins take home six-figure pay, says the Telegraph.
• “How much Labour could save by scrapping gold-plated public sector pensions” – Taxpayers could claw back £28 billion a year if public sector pensions were brought into line with private sector ones, according to the Telegraph.
• “Kemi Badenoch: Tories were wrong to extend windfall tax” – The former Business Secretary has admitted that a windfall tax on oil and gas companies was a terrible idea, reports the Telegraph.
• “Telegraph bid backed by U.S. billionaire Ken Griffin makes shortlist” – A U.S. billionaire bidding for the Telegraph, alongside U.K. billionaire Paul Marshall, has made the shortlist, according to the Telegraph.
• “I didn’t think Starmer would go this far!” – On X, Alex Armstrong has produced an amusing video portraying Sir Keir as a Chinese-style Communist leader.

If you have any tips for inclusion in the round-up, email us here.