“Britain scrambled jets after the Iranian regime sent a swarm of drones towards Israel in an unprecedented attack. Israel was on “high alert” overnight into Sunday after Iran fired more than 300 drones, ballistic and cruise missiles. The Israeli army intercepted nearly all of them, according to President Biden of the US. A seven-year-old girl was injured in the attack and an army base suffered light damage. Many Israelis spent the night in shelters, listening to the sound of sirens and distant explosions as the Iron Dome missile defence system operated. “The Iranian attack was foiled,” said Israeli military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, who calculated that 99 per cent of the drones and missiles were shot down.” – Sunday Times
“The battle over gender ideology is only just beginning, Kemi Badenoch has warned as she calls for “more bravery and less cancel culture” in the wake of a landmark review of child gender services. In her first public intervention since the publication of Dr Hilary Cass’s report, the business secretary calls for a review into public bodies and their policies on transgender issues. She also launches an extraordinary broadside against politicians of every stripe, the police, the media, the NHS and universities. She says the “cowardice of those in positions of influence” was “worse than the ravings of the militants”. – Sunday Times
“Angela Rayner was last night facing mounting pressure over her ‘two homes’ row after one of her former aides told police that she had not told the truth about her real ‘home’. Matt Finnegan, Ms Rayner’s former chief adviser, has given a statement to Greater Manchester Police in which he states that her actual home was with her then husband – not at the former council house where she was registered on the electoral roll. The testimony is the latest evidence to shatter the insistence by Labour’s deputy leader that she has not broken any rules.” – Mail on Sunday
“Rishi Sunak has hit out at the “complete overreach” of an “illegitimate” ruling by the European Court of Human Rights that imposes a duty on governments to achieve net zero. The intervention from Downing Street comes ahead of a final round of votes on the Rwanda Bill, which could pass by the end of this week, allowing the Government to press ahead with plans for deportation flights. However, there are fears among Tory MPs that the long-awaited flights could yet be thwarted by judges in Strasbourg.” – Sunday Telegraph
>Today: ToryDiary: Our survey. By more than two to one, the panel leans against Conservative prospects being improved by a move against Sunak.
“Senior Tories fear super-rich donors have a stranglehold over Downing Street as they claim the Prime Minister is “in hock” to a small group of wealthy individuals. The Conservative party is now more reliant on a small group of donors than it has been since records began more than two decades ago, according to an analysis of records held by the Electoral Commission. The Sunday Telegraph examined the top 10 donors in each given year as a proportion of the total amount of donations received by the two major parties. Last year, three-quarters of donations to the Tories came from just 10 people, an increase from 40 per cent in 2022 and the highest since 2001.” – Sunday Telegraph
“I knew the economic establishment would resent being challenged, but I had not appreciated just how ruthless they would be in pushing back by all means at their disposal. As uniquely influential figures, their signals to the market took on immense significance. It was once said that all the governor of the Bank of England had to do was raise an eyebrow to bring errant financial institutions back into line. While that form of informal regulation is widely believed to have been consigned to history, the ‘governor’s eyebrow’ retains the power to shape opinion and move markets. In our case, it was not just the raising of an eyebrow but a sustained whispering campaign by the economic establishment, encouraged and fuelled by my political opponents in the Conservative Party who refused to accept my mandate to lead. The signal was given that my agenda was a dangerous heresy that could not be allowed to succeed.” – Liz Truss, Mail on Sunday
“James Bagge looks like a Tory. The retired army officer, barrister and former high sheriff of Norfolk sounds like a Tory. He cheerfully confirms that he is a Tory and he drives a deeply Tory car, a beaten-up silver Volvo A70 with 160,000 miles on the clock and a quietly farting golden retriever recumbent on the back seat. His great-great-grandfather was a Tory MP. But at the next general election Bagge, 71, wants to destroy the Conservative Party. He is standing as an independent candidate in rural South West Norfolk, the seat where blink-and-you-missed-her ex-prime ministerial disaster zone Liz Truss commanded a majority of 26,195 votes in 2019.” – Sunday Times
“Mortal fear of climate change has grown and intensified among children and young adults, to the extent of damaging their mental health. It has also been reflected in the increasing number of young people declaring that they won’t have any children themselves, because of a (delusional) terror that any offspring would be born onto a planet that would entirely combust during their lifetimes. Paradoxically, this Armageddon-based reluctance to procreate is widespread in countries like this one, but not at all in sub-Saharan Africa, where rising temperatures would be much more of a threat to human survival. As the data scientist Hannah Ritchie, author of Not the End of the World, observes: “For the poorest countries, being richer and more resilient is key.” For example, by the UN climate chief’s country, Grenada, developing its own hydrocarbon resources — and leaving sermons about the apocalypse at the church door, where they belong.” – Dominic Lawson, Sunday Times