The Guardian

Latest news, sport, business, comment, analysis and reviews from the Guardian, the world's leading liberal voice

Reform UK plan to set up migrant detention centres in Green-voting areas condemned by other parties – UK politics live

Nigel Farage’s party proposed to place detention centres in places that vote for Green council leaders or MPs

Commenting on the Reform UK detention centres plan (see 10.48am) on Bluesky, Sunder Katwala, head of the British Future thinktank, says it is not just potentially illegal, but also illogical in its own terms.

There is rather inadvertent warped logic that a rival party said to favour “open borders” would mean ‘support detention centre’

While the party favouring mass deportations at unprecedented scale means ‘oppose detention centre’ anywhere nearby

These statements could have unwelcome legal consequences for a hypothetical Reform government - which may need to show that decisions which happen to match this pattern were chosen for other legitimate policy reasons, not as partisan political punishment/reward

A hypothetical future government with a thumping majority could have the powers to repeal any treaties, conventions or laws which may constrain this.

A hypothetical minority government could find itself impeded by these kinds of public statements about the motive for locating detention facilities

A more logical version of this school sixth form debating society policy might have the opposite design

* Mass Detention in Reform-voting areas proud to vote for deportations + detentions

Reform have launched a website with this “incentive” to voters in an effort to generate profile & controversy in election week

A Reform government will not put any migrant detention facilities in any constituency with a Reform MP.

Nor will we put them where Reform controls the council.

Reform keep making abhorrent announcements to distract voters from they fact they want to privatise the NHS. Greens are focused on building council housing, fixing our public services and bringing down the cost of living.

This grotesque policy reveals Reform’s contempt for all voters – including their own. Threatening to punish places where people don’t vote your way is a betrayal of basic democratic principles. Nigel Farage has sunk to a new low: he is clearly more interested in stoking division and anger than in serving the whole country.

We need to stop illegal immigration, but this is abhorrent from Reform.

Zia is proposing the siting of detention centres expressly as a form of political punishment for people and places that don’t vote Reform – not just Green, but presumably Conservative, Liberal and Labour too. (And what about Reform voters in those constituencies?)

Continue reading...

The pet I’ll never forget: Merlin the sassy pig, who helped me meet my husband

I always knew my Vietnamese pot-bellied pig was smart and special – and he has brought love, chaos and happiness into my life

We have lots of animals in our home in Sacramento, California – a dog, two chicks, a pigeon, a bearded dragon, three rats and two rescue cows. But our pig, Merlin, is special.

I had a pig obsession for a while. I remember going to visit some animal sanctuaries and getting emotional when I saw the pigs. There’s just something about them that I felt a connection to. I knew how smart they were. I remember telling myself that one day I’d have a pig.

Continue reading...

The Devil Wears Prada 2: bitchy one-liners, devious double-crossing and Lady Gaga – discuss with spoilers

Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway shine in frothy sequel that smartly comments on struggling media industry

After a promotional blitz that has run the full gamut from haute (Meryl Streep on the cover of Vogue with Anna Wintour) to not (a heinous line of Target sweats), The Devil Wears Prada 2 is finally here, and set for very chic box office takings of over $200m in its first week.

Praised as one of the few Hollywood sequels to measure up to its beloved original, the movie sees Streep reunite with Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt and Stanley Tucci two decades after the original movie’s release in a flurry of designer rags, withering put-downs and a slew of celebrity cameos. Surprisingly enough, it mostly works. At my screening on opening weekend, fans crowded to take pictures with promotional cardboard cut-outs and clinked cocktails as the lights went down. Read on for a spoiler-packed breakdown of the film, and let us know your thoughts in the comments.

Continue reading...

Democrats are counting on Trump’s unpopularity to save them. It won’t | Osita Nwanevu

Yes, Trump might carry them to victory in the midterms. But he can’t carry them much longer – especially not in the 2028 elections

All told, Democrats already seem as though they’re headed for a great midterm election. Voters already troubled by the state of the economy now have the impacts of Donald Trump’s teeter-tottering war in Iran to contend with, and polls tell us they aren’t happy ⁠– per poll averages from the analyst Nate Silver, nearly 55% of Americans oppose the war in Iran, 61% of Americans disapprove of Trump’s handling of the economy, and 57% of Americans disapprove of Trump overall. As it stands, Democrats have a six-point advantage in generic congressional ballot polling over Republicans.

And Republican hopes that a mid-decade redistricting rush would save their tight majority in the House have been frustrated. The partisan gerrymandering war of the last several months peaked with the victory of a ballot measure in Virginia that allows the state’s Democratic legislature to draw maps that would eliminate three Republican seats and a riposte by Florida Republicans who approved their own map that could allow Republicans to gain as many as four seats in that state – mere hours after the Supreme Court struck down provisions in the Voting Rights Act banning racial gerrymandering.

Continue reading...

I tried to eat a pineapple without using a knife. It did not go well | Emma Beddington

The promise of this task: throwaway fun and mindful, tactile joy. The reality: juice, humiliation and a deeply stubborn fruit

I’m trying to “touch grass” more these days, to embrace embodied experiences and introduce analogue “friction” – and fun! – into my life, which is how I ended up attempting Rosamund Pike’s no-knife technique for eating a pineapple.

Admittedly, I discovered it online while consuming algorithmically suggested slop (the video is from 2021, but was reposted on TikTok last week and is enjoying a new flurry of attention). But shh. It’s great – Pike is infectiously enthusiastic, explaining that the Wheel of Time showrunner Rafe Judkins told her the technique, then gamely gets to work, worrying the pineapple base off with her thumbs, then popping off and eating perfect chunks. “Have you ever seen anything more beautiful?” she concludes.

Continue reading...

Want a green card? Better make sure you haven’t criticized Israel on social media | Arwa Mahdawi

Updated guidelines issued by the Trump administration mean immigrants could potentially be denied a green card for their political opinions

Let’s play a fun game of Will This Get Me Deported? The first contestant is myself: a British-Palestinian green card holder in the US. I’ll start by quoting some recent news items concerning Israel. I don’t have the space to list every atrocity that the US ally has been accused of in the past few weeks so, unlike certain trigger-happy soldiers, I’ll restrict myself to two bullet points.

“Israeli soldiers and settlers are using gendered violence and sexual assault and harassment to force Palestinians from their homes in the occupied West Bank, human rights and legal experts say.” (The Guardian; 21 April)

“Israeli forces shot and killed a young female student on Thursday while she was attending a class held in a tent in the town of Beit Lahiya in ‌the northern Gaza Strip … third-grade student Ritaj Rihan was hit by a bullet in front of her classmates.” (Reuters; 9 April)

Continue reading...

Self Driver review – driver who signs up for sinister app offers Travis Bickle take on the gig economy

A desperate cabbie joins a service that directs him down a shadowy path in this interesting, less-is-more satirical thriller

Canadian film-maker Michael Pierro makes his feature debut with this low-to-no-budget sortie, a modern-day Travis Bickle nightmare which, though flawed and in need of some script development, adds up to a pertinent satirical comment on the gig economy and the Waymo-isation of the service industry.

Nathaniel Chadwick has the everyguy role of a Toronto driver working for an Uber-style app, slumped in his hoodie at the wheel, deeply depressed about providing for a partner and baby at home, avoiding calls from his landlord, exhausted and exploited by customers who are rude and throw up in his car. He’d prefer to be paid by the app every day rather than every week but that would mean upgrading to some higher “platinum” level of driver, and paying a non-returnable membership fee which would supposedly entitle him to be first in the queue for jobs and various other questionable perks. He can’t afford it, in an interesting insight into Uber world.

Continue reading...

Kabinet-Jetten: Tanken kan echt nog wel stukje duurderder

kostbare druppels verspillen aan de pomp

Slecht nieuws voor iedereen die gewend is aan duur tanken in Nederland: dat wordt nóg duurder. Deze keer niet door Trumps strapatsen maar door ons eigen kabinet. Als het kabinet-Jetten namelijk NIET ingrijpt, wordt diesel vanaf 1 januari 2027 maar liefst 12 cent duurder omdat de op dit moment geldende korting niet wordt verlengd door de coalitie, zo schrijft De T. op basis van kabinetsstukken. En dat is nog niet alles wat ons aan de pomp te wachten staat, want dankzij een goede oude vriend genaamd Frans komt een jaar later de Timmermans-Taks eroverheen om het tanken nóg wat duurder te maken. Diezelfde korting op benzine loopt voorts in 2028 af waardoor álle brandstof behalve een goed ontbijt tegen die tijd duurderder zal zijn. MinFin Heinen laat luguber genoeg niks los over eventueel ingrijpen en daarom mogen we in angst en beven richting 2027 en 2028. Maar goed, de grootste partij in het kabinet (D66) stemt ondertussen fijntjes in met een Brusselse Begroting van 2.200.000.000.000 euro en moet helemaal niks weten van accijnsverlagingen, dus misschien moeten we dan ook maar niet zo zeiken over een paar simpele centen en lekker vertrouwen op de fantastische energietransitie.

Wel.nl

Minder lezen, Meer weten.

Opdat wij nooit vergeten: niemand kon zo puur en krachtig dit belangrijke Nederlandse gedicht voordragen als Joost Prinsen

Met Joost Prinsen (1942–2025) zijn we afgelopen jaar een veelzijdige Nederlandse acteur, presentator, schrijver en docent verloren. Van Erik Engerd in De Stratemakeropzeeshow tot de onnavolgbare quizmaster van Met het mes op tafel, maar ook gedichten voordragen kon hij als de beste.

Kijk en huiver om zijn hartverscheurende voordracht van het gedicht Ben Ali Libi van Willem Wilmink, de goochelaar die alles verloor gedurende de Tweede Wereldoorlog. (het artikel gaat verder onder de video)

Ben Ali Libi, geboren als Michel Velleman in 1895 in Groningen, werd één van de grootste goochelaars van zijn tijd. Hij trad op voor vorsten, stond in kranten als wonderboy van de magie en veroverde volle zalen. Maar in de donkere jaren van de oorlog ging het mis. Als Joodse artiest hield hij ondanks toenemende verboden toch zijn vak hoog. Hij gaf les vanuit de Joodse Raad en trad zelfs op in kamp Molengoot.

Gedeporteerd en vermoord

Op 29 juni 1943 werd hij met zijn gezin gedeporteerd. Twee dagen later, op 2 juli, werd hij in Sobibór vermoord.

“De wijze waarop je Willem Wilmink's 'Ben Ali Libi' declameerde, is en blijft voor mij een van de puurste en krachtigste voordrachten van een Nederlands gedicht ooit. Alsof het voor je stem geschreven is. Laten we je herinneren door naar je te blijven luisteren. Rust zacht, lieve, grootse Joost”, schrijft Djeekop de Dichter op X.


Rijnmond - Nieuws

Het laatste nieuws van vandaag over Rotterdam, Feyenoord, het verkeer en het weer in de regio Rijnmond

Marjolein is centralist in de meldkamer van 112 en ontvangt een telefoontje over haar eigen zoon

Iedere eerste maandag van de maand besteedt Rijnmond aandacht aan veiligheid. Meldkamercentralist Marjolein Mout vertelt hoe zij in seconden noodsituaties inschat, hulp aanstuurt en contact maakt met mensen. Zelfs toen een melding over haar eigen kind ging.