Wednesday briefing: Tory revolt over Cummings piles pressure on PM
Top story: Americas new centre of pandemic – WHO
Hello, Warren Murray here with you, let’s wade into Wednesday.
Boris Johnson faces a growing Tory revolt over his refusal to sack his chief adviser, Dominic Cummings, for breaching lockdown rules. A junior minister has resigned and more than 30 other Conservative MPs have called for Cummings to go, many citing anger among their constituents. A further eight Tory MPs have been publicly critical of the senior aide’s actions and three said privately that he should be forced out. Johnson will be questioned about the Cummings scandal by the Commons liaison committee today.
Cummings is facing questions about his claim in his press conference on Monday to have written last year about the “possible threat of coronaviruses” after it emerged that a blogpost published in March 2019 was rewritten last month to insert a reference to “Sars coronavirus”. Police have also opened an investigation into where he went, when and how many times around Durham and Barnard Castle.
Regional outbreaks of coronavirus in England after rules are eased will be tackled with “local lockdowns”, the health secretary, Matt Hancock, has said. The ability to tighten restrictions in individual regions, he said, would be part of the NHS test, track and trace system, which is due to expand on 1 June.
The Americas have emerged as the new centre of the coronavirus pandemic, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said, as a US study forecast deaths surging in Brazil and other Latin American countries through August. The Americas have registered more than 2.4 million cases of the new coronavirus and more than 143,000 deaths from the resulting Covid-19 respiratory disease. Latin America has passed Europe and the United States in daily infections. Global deaths from coronavirus surpassed 350,000 on Wednesday with more than 5.58 million cases.
Stay up to date at our global coronavirus live blog and here is a fresh at-a-glance summary.
There’s more in our Coronavirus Extra section further down … and here’s where you can find all our coverage of the outbreak – from breaking news to factchecks and advice.
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Trump tweet branded fake news – Twitter has for the first time taken action against falsehoods tweeted by Donald Trump, labelling them with an exclamation mark and linking through to a comprehensive, factual takedown of his claims about mail-in voting. Twitter previously refused to censor the president’s many violations of its policies and changed its rules to exempt tweets by “world leaders”. Trump has swiftly rounded on his favourite soapbox, accusing its owners of trying to influence the US elections and political bias.
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Midweek catch-up
> Labour’s ruling body has chosen David Evans as general secretary to replace Jennie Formby, a Corbyn loyalist who stepped down after Keir Starmer was elected leader. Evans, Starmer’s preferred choice, defeated a union candidate, Byron Taylor.
> A serial rapist known as the “beast of Kavos” has broken his back after Greek police chased him over a cliff. Dimitris Aspiotis, 47, was previously jailed for sexually assaulting six British women but freed because of prison overcrowding. Corfu police were pursuing him for another rape.
> A newborn boy delivered by emergency caesarean section at a Norwich hospital is the first in the world to undergo a trial of a cannabis-derived medicine that may protect babies who are at risk of seizures and brain injury.
> There have been protests in Minneapolis after a black man, George Floyd, was killed when a policeman knelt on his neck during an arrest. In New York a woman has been fired from her job after video showed her making a fraudulent call to police that a black man was harassing her. He was out birdwatching in Central Park and had asked her to leash her dog in accordance with signage.
> Improving the water supply in developing nations could help reduce the hundreds of billions of plastic water bottles produced each year, experts have said. People in many countries use bottled water because their piped supply is of dubious quality.
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Hong Kong unrest – Thousands of armed police have flooded the streets of downtown Hong Kong today in an unprecedented show of force to prevent planned protests against a controversial law being debated by the territory’s legislature that would criminalise ridicule of China’s national anthem. It comes amid growing anger at the expected imposition by Beijing of “national security” laws to prevent challenge to the Communist party’s authority in Hong Kong.
Coronavirus Extra
For our science podcast, Sarah Boseley talks to Prof Susan Lanham-New about vitamin D and whether it could play a role in protecting us against Covid-19.
In Japan, Yamaha has launched an app that lets sport fans cheer for their teams remotely, aiming to boost the atmosphere in empty stadiums.
In Australia, surgical masks have washed up on the beaches of Sydney after containers fell off a cargo ship into the sea.
Today in Focus podcast: Are we headed for no-deal Brexit?
For the past few months UK and EU negotiators have been locked in talks trying to thrash out a trade deal before 1 January. But after the chief negotiators, Michel Barnier and David Frost, exchanged testy letters last week, the talks risk reaching a stalemate. Is the UK headed for a no-deal Brexit?
Lunchtime read: The notch of US territory stuck in Canada
The Angle is a wedge of Minnesota marooned in a lake and only accessible by road from Canada. It exists because the 1783 Treaty of Paris that ended the American Revolution was negotiated around an inaccurate map.
The area wasn’t actually surveyed by white settlers until more than 100 years later, and the telephone only arrived in 1991. To get there by road you have to drive through Manitoba and Canada. Peter Fox makes the journey to one of the strangest places on earth.
Sport
The controversial £300m Saudi Arabia-funded takeover of Newcastle United appears to be in serious doubt after the World Trade Organization ruled that the country is behind a pirate satellite TV and streaming service that offers illegal access to sporting events, the Guardian can reveal. The Rugby Football Union has refused to rule out funding cuts for top-flight women’s clubs after it was announced that Tyrrells will be ending its sponsorship of the Premier 15s league in August. Joshua Kimmich’s sublime chip gave Bayern Munich a 1-0 win at second-placed Borussia Dortmund in Der Klassiker as the Bundesliga leaders put one hand on the title. Expectations continue to grow over the prospective return of the Premier League before the first of two key meetings this week. The clubs are to meet via video conference this morning having taken soundings from players and coaching staff, who were briefed on a return to contact training by the league in a pair of short meetings on Tuesday.
Business
Investment in global energy will fall by $400bn (£324bn) this year, the biggest slump in the industry’s history, as the Covid-19 pandemic fuels a collapse in energy demand. The International Energy Agency says the decline is “staggering in both its scale and swiftness” and while it will affect every major sector, from fossil fuels to wind and solar power, it could undermine the transition to renewables just when the sector needs a rapid increase in investment. Asian markets have been mixed, with Shanghai down, along with Hong Kong, which is being roiled by protests over civic freedoms. The pound is worth $1.231 and €1.124 while at this point the FTSE is forecast to open 0.4% higher.
The papers
The Sun enthuses “Friends and families reunited”, saying ministers hope to let households mingle from next month. The Mail has “Housing estates will face new local lockdowns” – our version of which is here. The front of the Express alights on the story of remdesivir trials for selected Covid-19 patients, and quotes Matt Hancock hailing it as the “biggest step forward since the crisis began”.
The Metro, though, gets at what the government is up to: “Hancock’s half hour”, it says, going on to say: “The attempt to save embattled adviser Dominic Cummings descended into farce as Matt Hancock promised a review of fines for parents breaking lockdown – only to be immediately slapped down by No 10”.
Others still have their eye on the ball too: “Rising Tory revolt over PM’s refusal to ditch Cummings”, says the Guardian. “Farce and furious” – the Mirror scoffs at Michael Gove who said he also sometimes uses the public roads to test his eyesight (bound to reassure the pedestrians of Surrey Heath). “Public backlash over support for Cummings” says the i, reporting that the PM’s approval rating has plummeted. “PM suffers poll slump as Cummings revolt grows” and “Tories revolt as voters turn on Cummings” – the Times and the Telegraph, respectively, can’t credibly turn the page on this story either. The FT has a warning from the European Central Bank: “Soaring public debt poised to heap pressure on eurozone”.
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